Chapter 9
"I heard you've had a lovely few evenings with Dorothy."
Irving perked, the brightest beam on his face. Charlotte felt sour from her conversation with Jeremy three days prior, constantly of the assumption that her crewmates all held an ugly disdain for her presence. She proactively sought pleasing conversations wherever she could to hide her sensitivity.
"Aye, she's such a lady," Irving replied sweetly.
Three other crewmembers sat with him and Charlotte in Homestead's less prestigious tavern, two of which at an adjacent table. They laughed, quite familiar with the lack of sarcasm at the compliment. It was a mystery to all on the ship, how such a bitter and crass woman had ensnared Irv in this romance for the last three years. More mysterious still is that such a woman would care to entertain a romance in the first place.
No one questioned him openly, though; happiness was a rare delicacy that even a band of dishonest folk didn't care to let spoil. After all, Dorothy may not be overladen with social graces, but she was surely a fine sight to behold when one wakes. Her fiery disposition probably lent itself to her lovemaking as well. If given time enough to consider, one might simply call her a "spirited" woman, in all favorable context of the word.
Irving suddenly snapped from his daydreaming, a look nearly of dread. "Shit! I have to get to her! Need to leave!"
"Does she have you on a schedule?" a crewmate from the other table asked.
Irving didn't hear him, bumbling about himself to find the cork for the bottle of wine he ordered. He already seemed flustered that he drank so much of the bottle, repeatedly stopping to peer down its spout as he hurriedly ran his hand around and underneath the table. Eventually he grabbed the cloth napkin he borrowed from the barmaid, rolled and balled it as tightly as he could and stuffed it into the bottle's spout.
As he stood to rush out of the place, Charlotte clasped his shoulder and forced him back down, requiring a generous sum of her meager strength.
"Calm yourself and drink some more," she insisted, tugging the napkin out from the bottle. Irving's urgency subsided only partially as he leant his attention to her. "You'll have all winter to visit yet. And you won't even have to contend with her business with us this year!"
"She's expecting me," Irving said, unsettled though complying with Charlotte's demand to stay.
"I don't doubt it," another sailor laughed.
Irving shook his head and conceded that he would stay with his mates. Dorothy could stay angry with him only so long. A single slap upside his head after another month or two of travel would see her fury through well enough.
"Love hurts," he said absently, remembering how hard those slaps could be. His crewmates' laughter rolled over him.
He might not have worried, or have even made this significant arrangement to begin with, if the Weeping Wight wasn't going to depart the next day. The captain decided that a final delivery would be worth their while for the year, though the contents being loaded on the ship were questionable. Jecca had declined to say, and Petra even seemed to be kept at arm's length from the whole deal. The goods were kept in odd crates, wooden and nailed shut as most, but then trapped by two sets of iron brackets bound by thick padlocks. The devices seemed foreign, though few of the sailors and dock hands involved with the loading complained since the brackets suspended the crates enough to get a grip on their undersides.
The crew at the inn stole away from doing any manner of the labor, preferring to "heighten their morale" for the betterment of everyone. Jecca and Petra didn't partake of the relaxation, at least not with Charlotte and her companions. It's suspected they gave patronage to the Benwith farmstead, who were insightful enough to pass along the delivery's details to Jecca the day before.
The ship would clear the harbor at dawn with the cargo, headed out of the bay and making the delivery to Pearl Peak. The only risk they observed was that the buyers didn't intend to pay in gold, rather preferring a clean barter with some valuable stones and jewelry not yet heard of. The Benwiths felt that they could be dissuaded to a degree, however, talked down to a low yield of the jewelry and filling the remainder with banknotes. None of the crew could imagine a quick turnover for the baubles, and a large sum of their coin was spent on the goods being delivered.
Unsure as they were of the outcome, the five at the inn made merry all the same, with the exception of the anxious Irving. He seemed all the more tense as the accordionist wallowed in his tunes, all of which seemed miserable since Irving was prevented from fleeing to see Dorothy. Perhaps it was his own self-pity that made the songs seem somber, though there came unmistakably foreboding lyrics which drew the attention of his comrades as well.
Lass, Oh m'dearie,
how lov-a-lee you shine!
Sir, Oh good heavens,
You've run out of time.
The night held no quarter
for the gentleman so cruel,
as for the lady, yessir,
ne'er again will he fool!
Charlotte willed it to be a coincidence, but she could still see Irving's mounting discomfort.
"Come, let's pay for our rooms and retire," she said to her crewmates, Irving in particular.
His face stretched from chin to brows, a thick contortion of surprise and dread. "Not likely," he replied sharply. "We'll retire to the ship."
"But the ship is already moored away from the docks," said another crew member. "You mean to row back and sleep in a hammock instead of the mattresses here?"
Irving nodded emphatically. "Most certainly, and I'll be taking the bard along with us." He fished through his pockets for his purse and loose coin. "He'll compose a damn fine lullaby for the night, you'll see!"
His crewmates sat gawking as he made his offer to the musician, fully expecting the initial hesitation and then taken aback when they apparently struck a deal and the accordionist began packing up his instrument. Irving went back to their table and collected the bottle of wine, an empowered expression on his face. He looked upon the others and scoffed at their bewildered looks.
"What?" he exclaimed. "Be merry, will you! We're making ready for our last voyage this year, and I've just spent every last coin in my possession. Brighten up!"
Charlotte could no longer ignore the obvious. The bard came at such a high price to ensure he wouldn't communicate with Dorothy that night. Though she wasn't convinced it would buy Irving any relief in the long run, she better understood the relationship at hand. One had to be special to command both love and fear with such intensity, that desperate acts of self-preservation could cost a small fortune without so much as a blink.
Henry sat at his dining table with Jecca and Petra, the rest of his family retired to bed. He stared down the captain, a look of soft judgment on him.
"You must not hold much regard for kin," he said, gesturing toward Petra. "Shouldn't he know, if not because he's your first mate?"
Jecca denied the scowl that his instincts demanded. "I don't suspect you've been a corsair yourself, old man?" Henry shook his head, amused by the implied rationale. "The relationship between family and crewmates of any rank are customarily different."
Henry then chuckled and nodded facetiously while looking down to his cold mug of tea.
"Aluminum wire," he said plainly, ignoring Jecca's sigh of protest. "Coils of 'em, for the Empire's science funding."
Petra didn't understand. "Wire, for science? Do scientists mean to build fences with it?"
"No laddy," Henry answered. "Aluminum is a metal, often used in place of copper for electrical conduction."
"Fancy talk for an old farmer," Jecca interjected. He showed a degree of jealousy as well as anger with Henry. "Is that how you've given me so many leads? Conspiring with the government? Or did you use to be an official?"
"I'll entertain no such notion," Henry said coolly. "A man doesn't need to be important to enjoy a scholarly read or two." He grinned wryly at Jecca. "Likewise an important position on a ship's roster shan't have time for more than ignorance."
Jecca's defensiveness reached a threshold, and he was oddly silenced. There wasn't a point to fighting with one's elders, condescending as they tend to be. There was a matter of truth to the criticism anyhow, Jecca admitted to himself, though not eager to admit he was in any station of importance. Few look up to a leader of outlaws aside from little boys who dream of action and adventure. He had no reason not to pick up a book or two, or have learned to read better than an adolescent in the first place.
"Aye, but the salt in your hair seems to have dried your brain to a brick!" Petra said playfully. He hid his amusement at the scene, knowing he did poorly to feign support for his brother. Instead he seemed all the more blatant in his desire to outdo Jecca. Somehow he thought being the victim in this context gave him entitlement.
Henry laughed while the red drained from Jecca's face, which seemed to flare all the brighter at Petra's intervention. It made him feel weak. Petra's natural ambitions as a younger brother was far from his list of concerns, however. He cared only for how he was perceived, ultimately not believing that anyone cared for his job. It wasn't such a desirable one anyway, he thought.
"Figure that I'm stuck in my ways, yeah?" Henry eyed Petra, then looked to his older brother, who he felt was the instigator. "I reckon so," he conceded, curling his chapped lips to wet them. "You shouldn't blame me. I sure as hell don't.
"You know where wisdom comes from?" he asked, pausing to indicate that it wasn't a rhetorical question.
"Age?" Petra guessed.
Henry shook his head. "Age is part of it, but no." He gazed down to the dinner table and gave it two firm knocks with his knuckles. "This is windaega wood, right here. Hardest lumber in all Cairn. Ever wonder how it gets so?"
Most average citizens knew something of the stuff, yet it was such a rare and expensive material that gets overlooked for its obscurity. Rich folk didn't even buy furniture made from it, or use it as building material, for it was such an ugly, gnarled bit of lumber.
The brothers sat silently, knowing there was a point to be heard.
"It's felled from the jungles on our continent, farthest you can get to the southeast," he began, wildly motioning toward the wrong direction with his hand. "There grows a tree called the winda, and it's mostly used for its pitch. Makes a fine syrup if you caramelize and sweeten it enough. But the old tribes found out how to build with it, too.
"They'd cut the trees down and split 'em as best they could," he continued, making a chopping motion with his hand. "Right awful job it was, too. The stuff's so gnarled that half the work was balancing the timber. Not to mention all the knots they had to fuss with. Then they took all those curvy, ugly boards to the Silver Sands, just north of them. Then they stuck 'em as deep in the sand as needed to make sure they kept standing straight.
"They'd let each board age for five years, once they got it down to a science. Five years of being blasted by dry winds and fine grit sand. It lost its moisture, lost its color, barely even had weight to it anymore. But the stuff was getting mineralized in the process, too, and that fine amount of silver sand in its deep grain would stay there and help 'lock in' its integrity. Then they planed the wood down to the skinny boards you see on this table, and slathered on some mixture of sap and who-knows-what for finish."
Henry ran his fingers along the tabletop, admiring the sheen its finish still held and the patterns beneath it.
"All this color is from the finish, by the way," he added. "The dark strips aren't grain at all, but the thickness of the varnish since the dried wood has such deep crevices. Soaks the stuff right in the first couple passes.
"And I suppose I meant to arrive at a point," Henry said, aware of his rambling.
"At your leisure," Jecca said, cordially enough not to seem snide.
Henry scratched the back of his head. "Moral of the story is with the desert part," he said, voice bristled from embarrassment. "It's not so much the time that refines a person, it's the grit and wind. Humility. All the times we fail at something and take scrapes from someone, it all serves to humble and toughen us up. Once you're well-aged, whenever that might be, that's when you get your finish, and all the lessons that got beaten in gets sealed into place.
"So am I going to think like you someday?" Jecca asked.
Henry's brows furrowed. "I should hope not!" he said, laughing at himself. "Everyone learns different lessons from different opinions in a different order. I'll be damned if you come out sounding like me, lest I'll have to strangle you for stealing away with my wife for four decades!"
The brothers loosened up, sharing the laugh with their old friend. True enough that they came from different generations and careers - the combination thereof akin to differing cultures - yet they intersected with whatever small joys they could appreciate together. The business was only the beginning, and it still remained the end of every discussion, try though they might to simply enjoy an evening of company.
They finished talking about the finer details of the delivery, Petra fully included. It was a sanctioned trade and they wouldn't be apprehended for any crimes in the recent past, though the Empire never took into account that pirates would be making the delivery. The fantasy of being granted amnesty was a short-lived glint on the brothers' eyes, then paled over in humor since they would ultimately attract unwanted attention the next year.
The Weeping Wight would moor in Pearl Peak's docks and immediately meet with an officer of their guard, who would then escort them as they carted the goods south to Hatherton. A Dr. Tobias Kestrem would meet them at his manor and sign for the delivery. Supposedly he would be bargaining for the compensation as well, but Jecca suspected a man who lorded over machinery and electricity had little experience in valuing jewelry. Most likely there would be a broker, and Jecca knew he needed to appeal to Dr. Kestrem's if he wanted any advantage in getting the trade he desired. The man likely had a much higher station than whoever would be brokering the payment, and if he could get his say-so, at least a portion of the trade could be cushioned by currency.
Jecca and Petra stood to leave after a satisfactory reveal of the plan, both having a turn to shake Henry's hand. After a short hour of brisk walking they reached the Golden Reed Inn where they expected to find other members of their crew still awake and reveling in a day of rest and booze. With a cursory search and inquiry they learned that they cut away, possibly for the ship. The brothers were most confused when the bartender complained about the bard who shortsold him to pack in with the ship's crew.
"Another mouth to feed," Petra commented cynically as they left the building and made their way to the waterfront.
"Don't concern yourself, brother," Jecca said, content. "We've a full store of food and the man can suitably pull his weight."
"With a musician's fingers?" Petra scoffed. "He'll not have a callus on his whole body!"
Jecca laughed knowingly. "Aye, but there's a heavier weight than ropes and chains, brother. Sometimes a spirit in need of lifting is heavier than anything."
Petra conceded to the notion, though in truth he didn't want to agree with his brother. There's no practicality in pandering to the emotional needs of an individual. If one doesn't find relief in a job well done, he believed, then there's a philosophical difference that can only mean trouble.
But this crew had functioned well for over five years with only minor changes. Preserving the status quo would be worth cradling those that required conditioning, or so he wanted to believe. Holding true to the premise would keep his hide safe, that was the important part.