The Bone Ships by R. J. Barker

Author:R. J. Barker [Barker, R. J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fantasy
ISBN: 9780356511825
Publisher: Orbit; Little, Brown Book Group
Published: 2019-09-23T16:00:00+00:00

It seemed an age between each turn of the sandglass, and every time he turned it and the sand ran anew Joron hoped to hear, “Ship rising to seaward, ship rising to landward.” But the ship to landward remained stubbornly unrisen.

He questioned his decision to fly on. Was it what she would have done? Not that it mattered now as it was a decision made. To go back would make him look weak in front of the crew, and his conversation with Cwell was a staystone in his mind, weighing him down with feelings of weakness he dared not acknowledge, so he said nothing. He concentrated on pushing down the feeling within that he had done the wrong thing and used up the restless energy of worry pacing the rump. Occasionally he circled the deck, checking with bonewrights, wingwrights, seakeep and topboys that all, apart from the lost ship, was as it should be.

And all was.

It was in the very early morning, when the hint of Skearith’s opening Eye touched the far western horizon with a wash of pink, like newly leafed gion, that Joron’s patience was finally rewarded.

“Ship rising to landward, D’keeper!”

“Can you name it, Topboy?” he shouted up to Farys.

“Not for sure, D’keeper,” she returned. “Two spines, wings rigged triangle like on the fore and square on the rump like Snarltooth.” Once again Joron made his careful way up the swaying rigging of Tide Child to the top of the mainspine, where he raised the nearglass. In the coming day Snarltooth was easy to find and he did not doubt it was the lost ship.

“Have they made any signal, Farys?”

“Maybe, but it is too far for eyes alone. I did think I saw movement, D’keeper, and colour.”

“Take up your flags, Farys, and signal to them, ‘Repeat last sent.’’’

“Ey, D’keeper.” She grabbed red and blue flags from where they were tied against the mainspine and then, without even seeming to think of the danger, climbed the final height of the spine until she stood, her feet finding impossible seeming purchase on the rope that ran twice around the bound varisk stalks. There she held out her arms and became the tallest point on the ship, flags extended, red to seaward, blue to landward, then signalled as Joron had requested. Once finished she sent again, and Joron switched his gaze from the girl and centred the nearglass on Snarltooth. Swiftly the signal came back: “Lost a topstay. All good now. Station resumed.”

“Well,” said Joron, “nothing too dramatic, ey? Keep your eyes on the water, Farys. Nothing would please me more than for one of my crew to be first to spot the wakewyrm.” The girl smiled, puckering the burned skin of her face, and he wondered when he had first started to think of her, Karring and Old Briaret as “his” crew.

“It’s real then, D’keeper?”

“So we are told, Farys.”

She nodded and it was enough for her that he said it. His words made the thing real and she did not question them.

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