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((26 Solace, 34 Dragon; Gwaren Docks; Sunset; Follow-up to Down At The Sailors' Rest))
((Inspiration for this thread from Last Watch, by Stan Rogers))
Maker, but the salt air was sweet in his nose! He’d been able to smell the ocean from his room in the Anchorage, but it hadn’t been the same, blocked by the buildings that crowded around and tainted by the stench of sewage. It had felt as though he’d been dead and buried, like they did in Nevarra, but here, with the breeze off the harbor kissing his face and the gentle sway of the deck beneath him, Douglas Spivey was reborn.
He’d argued long and hard to be allowed to take this watch; his eyes might not be what they’d once been, but a night of sleep on board – even if it had been on the cot in the infirmary instead of his old hammock – had done wonders, and he knew the feel of the Wicked Grace as well as he knew the rhythms of his own body. Knew the feel of feet coming up the gangplank, knew the difference between movement caused by incoming swells and that of someone trying to climb the anchor chain.
The cap’n and Brannigan had agreed, and even though they had bundled him in blankets like a swaddling babe and set him up in a chair next to the rail, it felt fine to be back where he belonged. Working one hand out from under the blankets, he reached out to touch the rail, seeing the polished wood in his mind’s eye, as beautiful as the first time he had laid eyes on her …
((94 Blessed, Starkhaven))
He strode along the docks, trying hard to look as though he knew what he was doing, as though the massive boats tied up at every slip weren’t an utter mystery to him. At the age of seventeen, Douglas Spivey ‘d had his fill of scouring pots in his father’s tavern, listening to the sailors tell tales of their grand adventures as they downed their ale and whiskey. It was high time that he had some adventures of his own!
He passed by the river barges without a second glance. They were squat, ungainly things that would never travel past the mouth of the river. The Minanter ran deep and broad from just east of Hasmal all the way to the ocean, and it was the seagoing vessels that traveled upriver when the winds were right, then rode the current back down again, that he sought, and one ship in particular.
The town had been buzzing for weeks about 'Monroe's Folly': how wealthy merchant Quinton Monroe, gone mad with grief after the death of his wife in the plague of Blessed 92, had spent his entire fortune letting a dwarf – a dwarf! - build him a sailing ship from scratch. Common wisdom had evolved over the ensuing two years, from the dwarf taking the money and running to the project being abandoned half done to the ship sinking to the riverbed as soon as she was launched, with the current dire predictions all some variant of ship and crew being lost in the first storm at sea, right down to Monroe's wee son, Daniel.
Spivey thought they were all full of shit. The ship looked seaworthy. More than that, she looked beautiful: her sleek lines and graceful profile a stark contrast to the barges; the polished wood on her decks and the whiteness of her sails setting her apart from the more weathered sailing ships, her name carved into the planks of the bow, stained for greater contrast: Wicked Grace. The card game was played often in his father's tavern, and he'd learned it at an early age. Luck decreed the cards that you were dealt, but it was the skill with which you played what you had and read other players that determined the outcome. A fine name for a ship, Spivey thought, and made for the Wicked Grace with all the confidence he could muster.
((Inspiration for this thread from Last Watch, by Stan Rogers))
Maker, but the salt air was sweet in his nose! He’d been able to smell the ocean from his room in the Anchorage, but it hadn’t been the same, blocked by the buildings that crowded around and tainted by the stench of sewage. It had felt as though he’d been dead and buried, like they did in Nevarra, but here, with the breeze off the harbor kissing his face and the gentle sway of the deck beneath him, Douglas Spivey was reborn.
He’d argued long and hard to be allowed to take this watch; his eyes might not be what they’d once been, but a night of sleep on board – even if it had been on the cot in the infirmary instead of his old hammock – had done wonders, and he knew the feel of the Wicked Grace as well as he knew the rhythms of his own body. Knew the feel of feet coming up the gangplank, knew the difference between movement caused by incoming swells and that of someone trying to climb the anchor chain.
The cap’n and Brannigan had agreed, and even though they had bundled him in blankets like a swaddling babe and set him up in a chair next to the rail, it felt fine to be back where he belonged. Working one hand out from under the blankets, he reached out to touch the rail, seeing the polished wood in his mind’s eye, as beautiful as the first time he had laid eyes on her …
((94 Blessed, Starkhaven))
He strode along the docks, trying hard to look as though he knew what he was doing, as though the massive boats tied up at every slip weren’t an utter mystery to him. At the age of seventeen, Douglas Spivey ‘d had his fill of scouring pots in his father’s tavern, listening to the sailors tell tales of their grand adventures as they downed their ale and whiskey. It was high time that he had some adventures of his own!
He passed by the river barges without a second glance. They were squat, ungainly things that would never travel past the mouth of the river. The Minanter ran deep and broad from just east of Hasmal all the way to the ocean, and it was the seagoing vessels that traveled upriver when the winds were right, then rode the current back down again, that he sought, and one ship in particular.
The town had been buzzing for weeks about 'Monroe's Folly': how wealthy merchant Quinton Monroe, gone mad with grief after the death of his wife in the plague of Blessed 92, had spent his entire fortune letting a dwarf – a dwarf! - build him a sailing ship from scratch. Common wisdom had evolved over the ensuing two years, from the dwarf taking the money and running to the project being abandoned half done to the ship sinking to the riverbed as soon as she was launched, with the current dire predictions all some variant of ship and crew being lost in the first storm at sea, right down to Monroe's wee son, Daniel.
Spivey thought they were all full of shit. The ship looked seaworthy. More than that, she looked beautiful: her sleek lines and graceful profile a stark contrast to the barges; the polished wood on her decks and the whiteness of her sails setting her apart from the more weathered sailing ships, her name carved into the planks of the bow, stained for greater contrast: Wicked Grace. The card game was played often in his father's tavern, and he'd learned it at an early age. Luck decreed the cards that you were dealt, but it was the skill with which you played what you had and read other players that determined the outcome. A fine name for a ship, Spivey thought, and made for the Wicked Grace with all the confidence he could muster.