Eileen Kernaghan by Songs from the Drowned Lands (epub)

Author:Songs from the Drowned Lands (epub)
Format: epub
Published: 2023-12-10T00:00:00+00:00

v. The Queen of the Silver Bow

On the third day out, a stiff wind blew up from the northeast, carrying us out of sight of land. Cu’haid, at the helm, steered us steadily before the gale, our skin-boat pitching and rolling as wave after enormous wave heaved up behind us. The sky was low and overcast, promising heavier weather to come.

In spite of this, the crew was in good spirits. With Nhikal’s death it seemed that harmony had been restored among us. We were again seventeen fellow-voyagers, sworn to a common purpose.

Seventeen, I have said. The eighteenth, the boy Ghierad, remained to us all a sad enigma. Dull-eyed and listless, seldom speaking, he was near useless at the oars or at any other task assigned to him.

Left to himself in Zarimath’s harbor, he had brightened a little: stirring himself to mend ropes and grease the hull. But with Nhikal’s death he had fallen again into deep melancholy. I had seen him watching by the ship as we buried Nhikal; his face was ashen. It did not take much imagination to guess what was in his mind.

All the same, he was one only, out of many. Sorry though I was for him, there were other matters that demanded my attention.

For some days we had been beating steadily to the southwest; now once again we came in sight of land. Jhael told us that we had crossed a great bay, or sea, and the farther shore had curved around to meet us.

We rounded a cape and sailed south again. To the west was open sea; to the east a long steep coast of dark grey and copper-colored cliffs.

These were treacherous seas, with high tides and strong sudden winds. Near the coast the water boiled like milk over mist-covered reefs. It needed all of Cu’haid’s skill, and Jhael’s, to keep us from capsizing on the rocks.

We were two weeks along that coast, much of it running downwind under full sail. Meantime we lived well, adding an abundance of fresh fish to Zarimath’s bounty.

At the end of the second week we rounded a great storm-battered headland, with wild seas raging at its base. A grim passage we had around that towering wall of rock: lashed by the full force of the sea wind, twisted and turned by crosswise currents. The crash of the breakers on the rocks was like thunder, near to deafening.

Beyond that first bleak headland there reared a second massive wall; but I could see now that the Sea-Mother smiled upon us, for between the twin promontories there opened out a wide well-sheltered bay, offering safe harbor. The waters here were warm and near-transparent, with smooth white beaches rising gently into red sandcliffs. The sky, of limitless height, was a pure luminous azure; the sun leaped back at us from white sands that dazzled the eye like snow.

As we beached the ship the men tore off their salt-stiffened garments and leaped, shouting, into the warm sea. I took Lhaera’s arm and we splashed our way to shore.

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