Ars Historica by Marie Brennan

Author:Marie Brennan [Brennan, Marie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Book View Cafe
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Notes on “To Rise No More”

False Colours

The skies were clear and the winds fair for Plymouth, the Hesperides flying before them like a swan, her wings unfurled from the yardarms and belling out full. On deck, the gusts were strong enough to flick sailors’ tarred tails of hair forward over their shoulders; higher in the rigging, they were strong enough to knock my shoulders forward and test the set of my feet on the rope beneath. I grinned into the afternoon sky, momentarily letting the wind carry my concerns from me, away into the distance, as if to drown them in the deep.

I loved these moments aloft. The mast swayed in great arcs with the pitch and roll of the ship below, which had alarmed me greatly in my midshipman days. Now I found it exhilarating. And it was one of the few places aboard a frigate where one could feel truly alone.

Nearly three hundred men on the Hesperides, packed in cheek by jowl, and a trifle bloodied by our work at Algeciras two weeks before. But good spirits prevailed: our squadron had sunk two Spanish vessels and captured a French seventy-four, with scarcely more than a dozen killed on our side. It was remarkable how rapidly a decent victory could improve morale.

A decent victory, and the prospect of shore leave ahead. Our harbour was approaching, visible on the horizon without need for the spyglass thrust into my breeches. Duty called, as it always did. I called down to the deck in a strong bellow, then gripped the backstay in my calloused hands, piked my body upward to wrap my legs over, and slid down the thick rope with practised ease.

Perkins was waiting for me below, hat in hand. I accepted my cover from the midshipman with a nod and, settling it upon my head, made my way aft through the routine bustle of sailors and ropes, all the bones and sinews and blood that kept the ship in flight across the waves. The Hesperides was more battered than her men; a thirty-two gun frigate had no business in a battle between ships of the line. But broken yardarms, splintered deck planks, shattered rails—those could all be repaired, and would be. Leave would give us time to rest, and everyone was eager to get to it.

Except the lieutenants of the Hesperides, who faced a different fate. I found Harry brooding on what remained of the taffrail, broad shoulders hunched inside his coat, sea-coloured eyes slitted against the force of the wind. “Plymouth in sight,” I said, as if he might not have noticed, and got only a grunt in response. “It’s only a party, Harry.”

It gained me a half-smile. “I thought you hated parties.”

I did. They were invariably attended by mothers with unmarried daughters, who saw a promising young lieutenant as a reasonably likely prospect. Dedicated rakes might enjoy that game, but as Britain’s least eligible bachelor, I found it nothing short of torture. Still—“It’s good to get off the ship once in a while.

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