Setting Sail 5- Homeward Bound

You would think his awakening would have been violent. That he would’ve leapt out of the hammock and bolted for the helm. To turn the ship towards running into whatever horizon led to fields of grain like what he’d seen in his dream. Instead Wilkes simply remained still on the hammock. He burned as much of the dream into his memory as he could manage. Particularly the man that had called him son.

“Hair like clouds, constrained in golden bands. White human skin… without a single tattoo or blemish. He can play the piano. Domain of harvest? Music? Maybe… festivals?” Wilkes muttered to himself in a half dreaming state. A dry sponge rested next to his mouth, he’d apparently rung it dry in his sleep. Dortas wasn’t around though, probably off draining yet another bucket. Nothing to worry about too majorly, the lad would be back. Maybe he could rest a bit longer, let himself slip back into the lull of sleep. His body still ached by and large. The dull throbbing of his nose became increasingly prevalent as he laid there staring at the ceiling. He could waste time counting the boards and tracing the grain in his mind again. “Heh, grain and grain. Maybe my dad is the god of puns…”

“What’re ye muttering about lad? Ye teaching yerself a new spell on the fly?” The captain asked him, tipping his hat up to get a better look at the hammock strewn sailor. Wilkes smiled up at his potential father in law to be. What a mouthful of a title that is.

“Nah, no new fancy tricks. That last one nearly killed me.” Wilkes only half joked “If I had to cast it again as I am, don’t reckon I’d see Bea again.”

“Right, then no more casting for ye until we set your boots on solid ground. That’s an order. I understand wanting to help where yer able, I taught ye that much, but ye better not go getting yerself hurt for our sake.” Captain Tellish’s voice wasn’t near as gruff as it used to be. An overturned bucket scooted along until it acted as a temporary seat for the wind weary sailor. He nodded slowly from the Hammock.

“Aye, aye Captain. Gonna lay here until ye need me to do anything beyond that.” Wilkes shifted on the rope bed before daring a question. He held his breath after asking.

“Rangpar make it back with the dinghy yet?”

“Aye lad, he did. Leif is a bit worse for weather, was half drowned by the time he’d been found. He’s making a turn around though. Erik is rattled to hell and back, won’t say a word to anyone. Been pacing the deck like the tread of his boots can be worn down to find gold.”

A firm hand pressed on his chest when he started to sit up. Being physically restrained forced an annoyed grunt out of the young sailor. Jonah shook his head slowly. Wilkes knew he was still injured and probably shouldn’t be walking about, but he wanted to be up there all the same. To be helping rerig the ship, checking in on his crew mates, and most importantly doing something besides lay around. So what if he felt like shit in a mop bucket, he ought to be working for his living. If he got too used to being wounded long enough to let the money trickle in on its own the people counting on him would suffer for it. The fire in his eyes was quenched by the hint of concern in the captain’s.

“Stay. Ye need rest, in your current state yer more likely to stumble into the way than clean anything. Ye did more than enough, whatever ye did split a hole in that storm long enough to let the crew rejoin completely. It also nearly killed you. Now rest.” Jonah ordered him. He slumped back against the hammock, his weary body not wanting him to put up a fight. Sinking into the rope’s embrace he swung idly. There was little he could do except for that. Except scheme and plan of course. Sure he wasn’t primarily the scheming and planning type, but faced with nothing else to do he could learn to be. There were a handful of things to reflect on.

First, the now open secret of his ability to use magic. He knew that magic use was widespread enough to be comparable to athletic prowess in most places. He’d be little more than a champion in most people’s eyes. A potential fighter for entertainment in others’ eyes. He had no interest in being a slave soldier or mercenary. Beatrice thankfully knew ahead of the curve. Hannah and Amy’s reactions were still something to consider. Friends of the woman he’s chosen to be consort for. That’s such a courtly term, but he hasn’t given a ring yet so betrothed doesn’t fit either. As for potential scheming to be done there was only one line of thought to chase.

He needed to make it clear he did not have magic when the tide reapers attacked the first time. It’d be the first question on most people’s minds. Admittedly it’d been one on his own. If he could’ve slammed a few of them around with wind maybe there would’ve been fewer graves to dig. Maybe if he’d blown wind into the sails he would’ve made it back to Thellin faster. Maybe his mother would still be alive. Mights and maybes that had been haunting him. There wasn’t much more on that front to consider. Though he’d prefer if word of his magic didn’t spread through loose lips, the rumor mill had almost gotten him killed once already. If it doubled up with him using magic and some crazed wizard wanted to help pirates then he’d really be at a disadvantage.

Second, he’d had two breakthroughs with his magical abilities while in a life or death situation. First was that he didn’t necessarily have to be chanting verbally for his specific spells. Sure it helped, he knew that, but the idea that he could substitute it with other bodily measures was intriguing. He wouldn’t become some kind of blood sorcery, the idea of bleeding himself dry to keep casting was too much of a pyrrhic victory on paper. If he passed out from blood loss and someone he had missed mid battle just came over and stabbed him that’d be embarassing. Dying like that because he miscalculated would be likely reason enough for Beatrice to follow him into the lands beyond just to smack him. Maybe saliva, sweat, tears, or his piss could work? Did it even have to be fluid? Would finger nail trimmings, stray hairs, or small bits of skin? Could he peel off the scabs from small cuts and fire them off as spell bullets? While not being a blood sorcerer the practicality of using his body as even more of a weapon had a macabre appeal. However, exhausted as he was, the idea of keeping himself further trapped on the hammock was just not interesting. Perhaps when he could get his feet under himself again there was room for testing.

He laid there for a while, swaying slightly. The relative lightlessness down here was a bit disorientating. There was only one of the lanterns lit. He’d assumed they would be back by night, but with the storm coverings off it was probably lit just so that they could see him while checking on him since he was in the dark depths below. Try as he might he couldn’t scoot enough to get his feet back toward the floor. So trying to get up and check whether it was still daylight or not was out of the question. Being rocked gently while he heard orders being barked and feet running across the deck made him feel slightly relieved. At least it was still day. From the number of steps he heard it seemed like the whole crew was back together again. As much as reintroductions were in order he thought against it. Stubborn as he was, the captain had given him a direct order not to leave the hammock. He was too dehydrated to even There was one more thing to consider while the rhythmic noises of sailors at work prattled above him.

The long voyage was coming and Thellin would have coverage from the greater navy sure, but Beatrice would be lonely with just Daisy and her mother. Not just lonely but exposed. Something nagged at him about leaving Thellin when he knew the tide reapers were still around. Sure it had been months since their last run in, but the idea was a hungry rat gnawing at the rigging of his peaceful days. The lads had proved they could handle a storm, which was great progress for their first year of apprenticeship. They still had another three on the shortened, four if they kept normal pace. They knew the basics and basics alone. Would it be alright if they were left in Thellin? If the older sailors went with the captain along with some conscripts from nearby so they still had a full crew. It’d be more expensive, but it would keep everyone safer. Sure loyalty would be harder to expect, but safety would be more implicit. It wasn’t his call to make, and he’d already gotten socked in the teeth enough. Challenging Captain Tellish on this was just not an argument he had the mind to make currently.

Not to mention, the last time he had tried arguing Erik brought up Thomas. That was a bit too calculated even for Wilkes to defend him on. Sure his oldest friend missed some social cues here and there, but that was a wound that was still raw for the whole crew. No matter who you asked. Some would deny, others would just nod grimly and get back to work. Could they handle another loss like that? Another sailor they had grown alongside, poured uncountable hours of sweat and tears into training. Thellin could supply more people to learn for sure, but not before either the captain or Barry would age out of seafaring. Too many parents were shying away from it, despite the money, despite the prestige. No one wanted to see their sons or daughters grow up to be sailors. Not anymore.

Footsteps thumped down the steps, rapid and close together. Dortas’s diminutive form scampered up to him. Fresh drinking water was offered up with a half smile. Wilkes took it and drank greedily. Long gulps that made the onomatopoeia they were known for. That leather of the water skin was a welcome texture on his fingers compared to the coarse fibers of the rope he’d been laying on. At least it was something sensory beyond the rough seas, the coarse rope, and the irritating thoughts.

“Thanks lad. I was runnin’ parched there. Sounds like everyone else is back on the main deck?” Wilkes’s voice was a croak again. Apparently it had been hours since he’d last spoke and he hadn’t noticed. The lantern made all the more sense now.

“Aye. We were knocked a small ways off course by the storm. We’ll be back home in a few hours. Leif and Svend are filling in for you as Rangpar’s second set of hands. It’s taking both of them to match you honestly, but they’re tryin’. I’m stuck doing the work of all three of us… not that belly achin’ will make it easier.” Dortas remained at least mildly chipper despite it all. He spoke quickly while actively fetching the things he’d seemingly also come down for besides bringing water for his mentor.

“Sorry I went and rattled my skull lad, I’d rather be doing something besides layin’ here.”

“You did plenty…” The gnome spoke softly as he began to walk back up the steps. He stopped himself and spoke over his shoulder. “I know I’m ‘sposed to learn from ye, but a bit of advice; don’t kill yerself tryin to make things easier on everyone else.”

“Hmm. Ye, I ought not to do that. Good eye lad, ye’ll be a captain someday if ye keep that kind awareness.” Wilkes gave Dortas the first compliment to spring in his wind without any kind of lesson attached to it. The playful glint in his apprentice's eye turned into a brazier in the night. Even his footsteps sounded gleeful as he bound up the stars. Wilkes was left alone in lantern light. Without anyone to talk to, and with little more to be thinking about. He could keep crunching logistics, or perhaps try casting something again.

Sure he hadn’t eaten since his last big spectacle of magic, but perhaps he could force something out. He needed to find the wall of his limits, the exact point where he couldn’t push further without harming himself directly. If he could find it, he could run straight to it and learn to stop right on it. Dortas’s words still hung over him. They were even further in the direction against using his body as fuel. Instead he had to find what the seemingly arbitrary casting limit was. A way to pin a number to it. He knew he probably could’ve cast sailors’ shelter now, or maybe two or three strong gusts. He did neither. There wasn’t a reason to. Though, he thought about it clearly now.

Under extreme duress, when already burning his blood as fuel for the magics, he had found a new spell within himself. He had created a sanctuary against the natural onslaught literally raining down on them. That posed two questions in his mind immediately. If all of his spells were learned under duress, could he even learn from written magics? Was he doomed to have to hone whatever magical instincts lay inside him? Was that how all demigods worked, or had he locked himself into a weaker line of learning through habit? Secondly, what other spells could he learn? Could he only move the wind with incantation? He had riled up the stream when arguing with Beatrice, another emotional burst. He closed his eyes hard, concentrating as he scrunched his face out of habit. There was water left in the water skin. There was a chance that here, privately, he could focus enough to exert his will over the scant droplets of water it held. If he just pushed hard enough he knew the words would come. Just like with the other two, they’d burn in his mind then tumble out of his mouth.

Squeezing hard enough to give himself a headache brought nothing. He relented. If the first nature of his magic was panic, or anger, or some kind of survival instinct that’d prove hard to replicate. He wasn’t dying of thirst, wasn’t even all that thirsty if he was honest. It clicked in his mind there. His intention had always been founded on survival. With an excess of one he could force the other. His excess of intention and body let him cast without the incantation before. It was also how he’d discovered his own incantations so far. They were like three nets of fish over the side of his boat. He could haul them all up and go to the market where he didn’t necessarily have to distribute them evenly, just have all of them present to any degree. Or better he could trade the excess of one to cover the absence of another. He smiled at the planks that made the ceiling now. He’d had a breakthrough without nearly dying. In earnest he was probably some kind of prodigy, or maybe being a demigod just made you a prodigy. He’d have to find someone else like him to find out. For now however, he would mentally log his discovery to share with Erik once they could speak freely again.