Yoedian Arl

Tale Bearing

The moon was out when I woke again. The storm long gone and my face both itched, burned, and ached.

Standing slowly from the bed, amazed at how incredibly sore my muscles proved to be, despite the weeks worth of hard galley work, I made it to the main room and there, by the light of the lantern, left banked but not dead, I inspected my face, where the sail had cut it and bruised it. Then my arms were looked over as well and I hissed at the blood when I cleansed it by way of a wash basin of fine mouse porcelain. But then, everything in these quarters was fine, grand.

A low moan slid from one of the bedrooms and fearing to interrupt I waited a moment, testing the air, so to speak. Finding nothing but pain, however, I ventured to open the door and look in.

This room was almost identical to mine. If it had any differences I could not see them. The same berth, the same linen and wool, the same plain chest for clothing. It only added to the confusion as to why such a lavish apartment for a babes book, yet the bedrooms were so plain.

The movement on the bed brought my attention back to it. Heero lay back, his face dark in the shadow yet I saw the sheen of sweat upon his skin. His breathing came light, shallow, and I feared for what that might mean. I was but very young when one of our slaves was kicked by my father’s steed. The lad had broken ribs, stove in his chest and we buried him a week later. His death was fantastic, gruesome - wherein he screamed against things that were not there, moaned softly, and struggled weakly for each up coming breath.

Kneeling by the bedside, I placed my hand on his shoulder, not drawing back at the heated burn of his skin. "Heero… Oh Heero.." I sighed softly as I stood and went to get the basin. I feared, strangely, for his illness. That it might mean something to the crew and that they might throw him into the water to rid themselves of disease, or perhaps that he may die of his own accord. Either way, I was left alone to the captain’s strange madness. It is wrong what I thought, and I cannot condone myself of it. To me, Heero was all of what stood between myself and the madman.

The water basin was all but empty and there was a full rain barrel up topside, so I mounted the stairs and with the lilting song of waves and the helmsman, Theo, crossed the deck and pulled the top off of the barrel.

The wooden top stumbled across the top of the barrel and dropped to the side and I could feel Theo’s eyes on me. It was a time consuming, day dreaming job at the til when nothing else was about and the water were so calm. I was surprised he hadn’t just put a rope on the wheel and let the ship sail for a good hour before switching over and going back, criss crossing the ocean. Then again, maybe he’d wanted time to think that night. Plenty had happened the day and a half before.

I suppose I was caught in my own version of deep thought, so I did not hear the footsteps. Or it could have been that he was part cat and I had never heard his footsteps but for the times he wanted me to. So I couldn’t help the squeak of pain as a hand grasped my shoulder and I was turned and shoved back against the barrel, painfully bent backwards, staring at the long chestnut rope which brushed my face.

"Walkin’ late…" he growled. And as much as I didn’t want to look up, I could not help myself and I had to look at him. His violet eyes gleamed with something terrible, a feeling I could not discern from all the others.

"Y-yes ser.." I managed. Why was it that I could never speak? Me, the son of a nobleman, well versed in speech, could do nothing but stammer around him.

"And what, may I ask, are y’doin?" he peered at me, closer, I could smell him, something like vanilla and sea and old wood. It wasn’t an unpleasant smell and I might have even enjoyed it, but for the way his glance devoured me.

"Sorry ser! Just gettin’ water, ser!" my hands shook and his fingers were like daggers into my shoulders, piercing the skin.

"Hmm.." he purred the sound, looking down at the rain barrel and then in a musing tone, added, "We need to save what water we have. What use has the prettiest one of our crew for a new basin of water?" for he had, no doubt, noticed my using the wash basin.

"Oh no ser! Sorry ser! It’s not for me!" I quickly asserted. "Heero is ill, s-s-ser.." The change that came over his face was like magic. Saying that word, that name, and the very truth of madness was all about him. I whimpered, trying to pull away, for I do not think he could see me then. Rather he stared beyond me, his mouth parting as if he were ill himself.

I think he may very well have broken me into pieces and strewn me across the deck had he had the chance. A soft clearing of the throat then and Theo, who had tied up the wheel, calmly reached up and covered the hand which had clenched like iron about my shoulder. "Ser, best be lookin’ ter th’charts.." and all three of us knew, as the captain blinked, came to himself and stared at me, lost somehow, in some labyrinth of his mind’s design, that this was something from where shame could easily be born.

The captain released me as if my skin burned him. Rubbing his palms on his thighs, he stared at Theo and then nodded, once. And without a word, turned and left us. I could not hear his steps.

Confused as to what had happened, I stared after the retreating back of the captain until Theo pressed something cool and wet into my hand. "Here now, Yoedian.." he said, his gaze concerned. "Young Heero is ill, is’e? Can’t have thet… mayhaps he’s the only way out of this cursed sea."

I almost asked him what he meant by that, sailors always full of such strange sayings, always hinting at something or another. But I knew that this voyage was as cursed as he thought it to be. And for all the casual cruelty heaped upon me by the various members on the deck, I was still treated well, fed well, and tendered somewhat for the fact that my coloring made me lucky to them. None had called me the savior of the ship, the luck of it. To say aloud that fact could change the luck into a bane. It did not take much when it came to luck, not much at all. But to say otherwise, that may cause it to happen. So then Heero was the ill luck that held the ship in its grasp?

My mind on such things, I descended again to the babe’s book and set the basin next to the bed. Then I settled into a small three legged stool and with a rag torn from one of the bed linens, began to bathe his face. He made no sound. Not even with the illness upon him.

The evening came and the sound of a soft call in the main rooms. Rising I went to the door to find that Theo had come with my dinner plate and Heero’s share as well, along with a cup of broth. "Thought yer might like sommat.." he smiled and I almost threw my arms around him in joy. Just to see a smile directed towards me. In the long weeks that had gone past, I’d earned little but scowls and curses.

Remembering myself I but gave him a bow and took the food from him as graciously as I was able. He did not see anything wrong with this, for it was assumed that I had been a slave in a greater household in New Hartlin. The extent of the rumors I’m sure went from anything as debased as a pleasure slave, to the more casual references to myself as a scribe and a house manager. It did not matter, of course. Not anymore. Not to anyone here. I was the cabin boy here, and forced to remain in the babe’s book because I could not fight off any who might have thought to take advantage. It made no difference that I was very capable of fending for myself. I knew it to be an honest attempt for my safety, though it rankled.

"He was not always like that, you know," Theo asserted as he followed me in to Heero’s room and looked the boy over. "Have you turned him over? He took a beating from the sails. Many a good man has suffered undue harm from those and he may have a joint out of place or a rib broken." And without waiting for my reply, began to undress my charge.

Heero was silent and once he even opened his eyes to look at us but he did not react, did not hide, and did not recognize. I saw in those fever bright eyes a curiosity that was open and plain, like that of a child’s, and I wanted to cry for the thought that something may have stolen that look from him somewhere in his past. It was then that I resolved if I were ever to find my way home, that I would purchase Heero and make him a freed man, burn off his tattoos and let him find his peace once more. It was rare, but I had funds and ability to do it, and for him, I would.

"What was he like then?" I was unsure if we talked of the cabin or of Heero now.

"Laughter," Theo replied grimly as he looked over the bruises and shallow cuts against the pale skin. He used the water to cleanse the deepest of them, and was careful not to dirty the water with the tip he’d used. Then rinsing out the rag and dropping the blooded water out of the porthole, he placed the cooling fabric against those most raised of places. "He’ll need a poultice. Got a few that Cook’ll give us."

I wanted to ask again. Laughter? Who? But I only nodded, remaining by Heero as Theo stumped up aboard and to the galley and back, bringing with him something that smelled terribly like arnica root and lavender as well as a dozen other herbs I would not have thought to use for these.

"No broken bones, seems," he said finally as he settled back into a chair and stared out of the small window to the deepening sky beyond. "Good thing too." He sighed and I leaned against the wall, watching him. It was not long though, before he began again. "Laughter.. aye. I s’pose that was the best word t’describe him." He smiled then and it was altogether a melancholy look upon his normally cheerful face.

"See," he continued and looked back at me, indicating that I take a seat myself, which I did, on the end of Heero’s bed, "he was given this ship by his father. M’self and ol’ Cook were gifts as well. Came with the thing. She was fine then as she is now. prettiest little craft y’ever saw." So it was Duo we spoke of. I was glad to discover this by listening to him.

"Been sailing with him for three years now." Theo rubbed his chin with his thumb. "Never saw a rough wave of it until the last time we was in the northern reaches, just hunnert miles north o’New Hartlin. Went to a bar, most of us did. Ladies, drink, good comp’ny. We spent much of our meager fortunes on them before we were to return to the ship. Captain, he went further north to see a man about a shipment. He came back with no shipment, but with another man, a good hand. Heero, actually." He waved his hand to the inert form on the bed.

"Well, all was well for that first month, goin’ south toward New Hartlin. Picked up a shipment or two and took’em to the coastal cities. Th’world’s so damn small there. Get this cow, take it twenty miles south. Pick up this load of spice, take it ten miles up. Made a killin’ us an our ideas. Most of ‘em was Heero’s ideas actually. Proved himself ta be invaluable, he did."

And then, I wanted to ask, why is he here? In this room? Dishonored by the useless name of whore?

"S’pose most o’us knew what was about, from the first. How it was that Duo was watching his new mate, his new man so close. We knew of the captain’s preferences, but never had it bothered us none. Don’t s’pose it bothered us much then neither. Most of us was glad for him. Seeing as how Heero seemed to think the same of him. When we stopped in New Hartlin and they returned, Heero didn’t try to hide the tattoo on his chest. It was a sign of honor among us, it was. Some of us had even dreamed of having it ourselves. But only some. Most of us make do well enough with a woman, mind you." Theo smiled and I turned to look at Heero. He lay still, as if he were dead.

"Well, from then on, t’was a good ship to be on. Merry soul she had those months. And one night, he sits himself down and tells me the story of how them met. See, he had a woman what had boys. Sally Po, she is. Nice woman too. And she keeps the boys and lends them out. But Duo, he’s not much for boys. Likes em more his age. And for him, she keeps one or two on as well. Not that they don’t find work enough, she picks the pretty ones, so I’ve heard.

"So he went to see Sally on his way to arrange our shipment. Stayed the night at her place. But he didn’t leave. Found himself in the eyes of a pretty little courtesan there. See, Heero was a newly acquired one. Hadn’t thought yet that he’d take to the job, but Sally was keeping him around ‘til he chose to go her way or be sold again. But one look at Duo and he fell hard. Told Sally he wanted to start, and he wanted to start with that man what just entered. So Sally sends him along to entertain. Thing is, Duo fell just as hard, he did. Took one look at his consort for the night and decides he wants that consort to be his forever. So he talks to Heero all night, and come the end of the next day, discusses price and walks away with a pretty lad and no job for us. Still, it didn’t matter one bit to him. Duo was always a man of the heart, walkin’ the road of emotion as if it were the only one.

"End of that first month, we’d all come to like the boy. He was shy at first. But then changed to a quiet study. And seemed he never was sure about Duo’s love for him, even after the tattoo. He came to me a time or two, asking if Duo was wanting others, if he was truly the one. But that was first month jitters. Nothing that would have caused much trouble, really.

"Wasn’t like Duo didn’t have his own worries, mind." Theo reached over and worked on Heero’s wrappings, reapplying the poultice as he talked. I watched him and found that I too, could have easily told him all of my secrets if I was not so wary of this ship’s curses. He was a man most open and easy to talk to. So it didn’t surprise me in the least that Duo and Heero had chosen to confide in him.

"See," Theo continued, "Duo knew he’d gotten hisself a courtesan. He worried if he was enough to hold his love. If Heero wasn’t taken up by another bloke or wasn’t bored with him easily. Didn’t never know that Heero wasn’t taken with no one, because Heero was a virgin when they met. Boy hadn’t given himself to anyone but Duo. I told them both t’talk to one another, of course. Seeing as how I can’t just go and blab such things between two lovers. That’s their road. And I s’pect that is where I went wrong. Lot coulda been avoided had I said a word or two."

"Surely you couldn’t have had anything to do with all of this," I muttered and took up the poultice bowl, slathering it upon the back and then carefully working it into Heero’s shoulders, his back, careful not to push too hard on anywhere which might have injured him.

"Nah, but fate, she’s a funny mistress." Theo grinned painfully at me and left me to it as he continued with the story. "Because, as fate would have it, we came upon a storm not a week after the mark was put on Heero. We were too far out in sea, needed to have gone back in long before. Still, it was a surprise squall and maybe we’d have not been able to outrun her. Came up on us fast and furious and we lost our mast to her force. All of us was out there, fighting to get rigging up, save the sails. Duo got caught by a winch in the head and fell into the water. Heero was able to save him, but he was down for two days, not a peep, didn’t open his eyes once. And when he did…"

Theo stopped there and I refrained just barely, from pressing him. He stared at the young man on the bed and seemed unable to speak.

But there was someone who was able to speak. And in a voice, hoarse with betrayal, he filled the room as he entered, violet eyes flashing in hatred and my heart filling with his enmity. "When he did," the captain whispered, "he found his love, his shy little dove, innocent as he was, half naked and in the arms of his treacherous first mate." He sneered and I could not help it, I moved between he and Heero.

"I don’t believe it." I was surprised to hear myself speak. "I don’t! He loves you! And you must have simply seen the wrong thing, thought the wrong thing. There is no way he could have turned from you in two days."

"No?" Duo advanced on me and it took all of my strength to not back away.

"He… he is good. He’s noble. And Chang.." Oh how I felt his anger grow! It almost overwhelmed me and perhaps it was a good thing that until then I’d seemed the frail type to quail before him, for the strength of his emotions was making me feel faint. I forged on, despite the hatred that he poured into the air. "Change, to him honor is everything! He would never have gone against you. Not in something so base. He loves you too. He would never… you.. you just did not see it right or you didn’t ask or… or.. You’re wrong! You MUST be!" How I ever managed to say those things, I will never know. And yet say them I did. I was sure of them too. For had I not felt the remorse and sadness and pain in Wufei? I knew he would not have done anything so wrong. He could not have lived with himself. And Heero! Why the times when he saw the captain, the times when they were together, the constant yearning in him. It was plain that to him, Duo was air, was breath.

"And you love him too. Even though you pretend, you still love him." I ventured the last, knowing it to be as true as everything else. "That is why the babe’s book is so beautiful. That’s why it all is perfect. I’d almost hazard a guess that the last bedroom, the one no one lives in, that it is as beautiful as the rest. You made this for him. You wanted him to know, to believe that you loved him, even though you can’t say it, even though you cannot bring yourself to forgive him. You want him to rememeber.."

"SILENCE!" his roar cut through and a moment after a stinging smack across my face sent me flying back against Heero’s legs, half on the bed, half off. Under me, Heero groaned softly and turned his face, as if seeking in some strange way, the nearness of that voice, even angry. As if it might heal him.

Duo stood over me, a tower of blazing flame, his eyes burning into my soul. He would have killed me had he the lack of will. He would have reached down and torn my mouth from my very skull. He seethed above me, his hands in fists. "You will not speak of things you do not understand."

"Then why.." I flinched, knowing I was still speaking when I should not have, "Why did you not have him put to death? Why do you speak of taking me but do not? You make excuses for yourself. Why do you not kill him and take another?"

"Take another?" his voice was like steel and I realized I had gone too far. He laughed, maniacal and strange, and he bent, plucking me from the ground and hauling me to my feet. "What an idea, pretty one. Perhaps you are right. I should have taken another, and no more threats. I will simply do as I have intended from the beginning."

His hands on my shirt front trembled and his eyes glittered as he lowered his head, taking my mouth in a savage kiss. This would not be a comfort, this experience he was about to embark on. It would be a revenge. And I - I had no ability to do anything but go with it. His assault on my senses, his hatred, his self loathing, his fear… they made me incapable of doing anything but limply holding onto him as he took my mouth and then proceeded to drag me from the room.

"You will be spending nights with me, Yoedian Arl," he snarled "And so you know, I was going to kill him. I whipped Chang myself and then I went to kill him. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t make myself kill something I had once loved. Love and hate are so much the same thing, I’m sure you know this. So instead I spit on him.. I named him Whore, and I told him that if anyone ever called for him, anyone at all, he would spread his legs for them as he would have for Chang. He and his lover.. his Chang… he’d done it with him how many times before they were caught? They had months to catch one another alone. I thought about it. I realized how often they had gone off alone, how often I’d thought it was good they were becoming friends. How nice it was that my love and my best friend would care for one another as I cared for them." He spit the last out as a viper spits it’s poison.

"And he actually tried to come back up and do his work. He tried to act as if he weren’t a whore," his laughter filled me with dread. It was so harsh, so hard. Where was Theo? How could he allow this to happen? I wanted to cry for help but even I knew that the captain is to be obeyed always. Theo would not stop him, no more than I stopped him from reaching Heero had he wished to. when we get to the island, I will sell that worthless piece of shit and I’ll kill Heero myself. I’ll spread his blood across this ship and burn the entire thing, let her sink to the depths with his body." He was hissing and I whimpered, trying in vain to get nerveless fingers to fight his grip on my shirt. "But until then, I’ll take my pleasure elsewhere.." and he began again to drag me to the door.

"Duo.." the soft sound came from behind us both and I felt the captain freeze, his gaze darting from mine to the bed in wide amazement. He gasped, painfully and I fell from him, dropped to the ground where I lay, trembling and unable to get up. I could feel the shift of weight on the boards as he stepped noiselessly over my body and went to the bed.

Turning my head, I watched. Heero had managed to sit up, holding his arm closely to his body for it had been wrenched and was swollen with many places on his chest and he looked around him, confused and feverish. "Duo?" his voice was higher pitched, afraid.

"What is wrong with him?" Duo growled, and I could sense how afraid he was.

"He’s ill.. he has a fever and he’s been bruised badly from the ship sail beating him," Theo’s soft voice came from behind me. I heard Theo crouch by my side and tender hands helped me to sit up. I leaned against Theo’s knee and watched the captain stare down at the ill man on the bed. "He’s been too feverish to know his whereabouts, ser."

Heero’s eyes somehow found Duo’s front and he reached for the captain’s jacket, gripping it in hands that seemed strong, despite the illness. But perhaps it was that the captain was so weak then. For with a soft sob, Heero pulled the captain to him and buried his face into the jacket, sobbing like a little boy. "He left me…" he repeated it over and over, in such a plaintive tone that tears rose to my eyes and I had to wipe my eyes so that I could see once more.

The captain had been drawn closer but he could not be incited to sit, so instead the sick man clung to his waist and cried in his belly, sobbing a heartbreak that no one understood. "He left me.. they all did. He died and now they’re going to be gone. Oh I want him back! I want him back… "

"Who?" I ventured, for the captain seemed to have his tongue sewn to the roof of his mouth and could only stare down with a pale face. "Who left you, Heero?"

Heero opened red eyes and stared at me. I wonder that he saw me at all. "Odin.." his voice soft. "He sold me to Sally and he left. He said I’d be better off as a slave than.. than what I was before.." he clung to the captain and I could see Duo trying to slowly extricate himself, his face showing horror.

"What you were before?" I was intrigued, the mystery, all of the things that I did not understand.

"Duo?" Heero forgot my question and he looked up at the captain and screamed, pulling away and scrabbling across the bed until he hit the wall and groaned from the pain. The captain reached out a hand intuitively to ease the pain, but pulled back and stepped away.

Theo helped me to my feet and I walked to where Heero lay, my hand gentle as I touched his brow. "He’s burning hot.." I informed both of the men. "He needs rest."

Heero only continued to moan into his knees, rocking side to side as he did so. "Oh God help me… he’s going to kill me. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t mean to and he’ll kill me. God have mercy on him. He left me and he doesn’t care. No one does, no one cares. Oh Chang!" and he threw himself at me, wrapping himself into my arms and bursting into tears.

I stared down in shock and tangled my fingers into his hair as he wept. It was not long, the murmurs of words that made no sense, the names that flowed, until he was silent again and still. Then I pulled away and lay him down, my own body fatigued by the passing moments. I pressed a cold compress to his forehead and with Theo’s help, put new poultice upon his bruises, his swollen ribs and arm. And when I looked up from this, the captain was gone.

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The New Hartlins called it Intuit. But I’d been called sensitive, witch, and many more crude names. And the truth of the matter was that to live in a sea of emotion was to live in danger of drowning in that sea. So it was that my family had it’s eastern home. It was situated at the edge of the Eastern Wastes, a deserted tract of sand and tough brown grasses. The building was small, it managed just well with three servants. And it’s main attraction was the great garden, filled with force grown flowers and the more desert hardy blooms and plants. I slept away many a day there, learning to sort my own voice from all of those which I came in contact with. And later, as I grew, I went there often, so that I did not forget what I sounded like. Or after a particularly trying day or a particularly trying person.

New Hartlin was not a land of such superstitious nonsense. The New Hartlins believed in scientific thought alone and such traits as mine would have been met with considerable disdain. Therefore I never told anyone there of my gift.. or curse it might be considered as well. Instead I became known as a recluse and a hermit, an eccentric. Though I was not too often gone to that small country cottage I’d secured for myself next to an open wood. Still, it was time away from society. My wife did not complain. I suspect that she knew, though she never said a word of it to myself or anyone as far as I knew.

To be here, on a ship like this, with the emotions running so high, I would have most assuredly gone mad in a matter of a few weeks. But the kiss and the drowning into the quiet of that ocean borne love, I was saved. And that night, after all had gone and my charge was fast asleep, Theo at his side, I begged a small nap for myself, saying I had not slept much at all the day and a half before. This much was true and Theo was kind and allowed me the liberty.

But the reason was far more important than just rest. I needed escape from the sounds in my head. I stumbled into my room, weak as a kitten. I did not light the lamp at my bedside, but stood in the middle of the room and declared in a voice hoarse from lack of sleep, "If you’re here, you’d best catch me.." and then slumped forward.

He did catch me, with but the merest rustle of cloth as the sound of his motion. His arms were hardened, complete and sure as he lifted me into them. I did not know that he had a body until that time. I thought that perhaps he was only lips and face and hands. But I felt his chest against my side when he cradled me to him and felt his thighs against the backs of mine as he settled onto the bed, pulling me into his lap and against him.

Fisting my hand into his tatters, I sighed as if I had come home and breathed in his scent, then lifted my face to his. The moonlight fell across his shoulder. The darkness was all about but I saw the definition there, knew that under all of those wavering rags was a man’s arm, and I waited.

Gently, a hand raised, pale and slender, wavering in the light as kelp forests do in the darkness, and the cool touch of his fingers closed my eyes. His lips descended then, and I parted my lips to allow his tongue to invade my mouth, hot and clean, I tasted him and the freedom he provided. And because I had such great need of it, I pressed upwards, returning the touch.

He moaned, deep in his chest and his fingers trembled on my lids, fell away. I looked up in the midst of that kiss and saw him, or saw the closed eyes, the dark lashes brushing cheekbones, the gentle arch of bone around each eye, and the tangle of silken sea weed like hair which brushed down along one side. A thought came to me then, a consideration which wanted desperately to be looked at. I began to pull away, afraid that the thought might break what silent reverie I found in this lover’s arms, but he tightened an arm around me and I was pulled into him and I knew no more, no more than that kiss and then silence in my heart that followed.. and dreams.

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Waking, I lifted a finger to trace my lower lip, the kiss still echoing in my heart. I could taste him, like something almost forgotten. I had been trying to remember something. Something important. It had been a thought as I’d looked at him, but with the morning sun, as it is with mists off of the ocean waves, it had dissipated. Even the look of him was gone from my memory and I did not know what it was I had seen, and only knew that I had seen him. It made me cry then, weep into my pillow for I had seen his face and I could not remember him. It felt as if I had failed him somehow, forgetting him like that.

My tears could not last long, a knock on the door brought me round. "Come in," I called and slowly sat up.

Theo looked tired and yet he smiled as he entered. "Yer look rested," he stated, obviously pleased. "He needs sommat t’sit with him til this even. Can you do thet?" He tilted his head and then took a step forward.

"Hmm.. yes.." I replied, watching him as he stepped to the small dresser in my room. "What is it?" I stood. Sometimes small things would sit there. A starfish once, which I dropped back into the ocean. A fish in my wash basin. A shell, a piece of satin. I kept only those things which were not alive, returning everything else to the sea.

"Where’d you get this?" Theo sounded strange and I came to his side, concerned. He turned to me, holding out the newest addition. A small white shell. It was a rather plain thing and I looked confused I’m sure because he turned it around and I saw what had struck him so strongly.

All along the other side a small scene had been carved out, set in relief against the side of the shell. The only way such a thing could have been done is by a master craftsman, with a needle. It was beautiful and as I came closer and plucked it from his fingers, I realized that the depth of detail was so complete that no craftsman I had ever known could have done such a beautiful thing. "He… he left it.." I whispered to myself, tracing the delicate edges around the picture, afraid to touch it for fear it would break.

It was beautiful. Scroll work along the edges of the picture, interspersed with eels and remoras doing a strange cavorting dance about one another that seemed almost as if it were some kind of language in and of itself. And in the center, a pair of humpback whales intertwined in a web of their own bubbles. Kept forests below them and the play of light about. It was without a doubt, the most beautiful piece I had ever seen. My breath caught and I cradled it, shocked and hardly heard what Theo said, whispered.

"Maybe… there’s hope yet.." and then the click of his jaw, afraid to take away even that small hope by naming it, he continued. "But more’n likely not.." a grumpy shout to the sea as he scowled and then jerked his head to the dresser. "Put it away. Child’s toys shouldn’t be bandied about like that. Make you less than a man, they do. You’re needed elsewhere.. go on, put it up!"

His gruff manner was fearful and I looked up, my smile covering my entire face. His very behavior told me that something magical, something wonderful, was going to happen. If we could just keep from taking its power, keep from speaking aloud what we hoped. In this small shell, the delicacy of it, we would find our saving grace.

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[Chapter Five] We learn a few things about the mysterious green eyed sailor, how he came to be on board. And Duo shows his weakness.

((Thanks for reading! ))