The Dream Vessel Read Online Free Page A

extravagances of her youth—oh, ten years ago—had been braids down to her tailbone. But now practicality ruled. Just while swimming, the drag caused by hair merited the shaving. But add to that the danger of entangling it while sprinting through the island bramble—or of giving an enemy something to grab.
    Every few days she dutifully chased her mirror around the tent. There was an answer to this foolishness of the spinning mirror, of course. Hanging the mirror from two strands of twine, not one. She would work on that—hoo, any day now—next time she found the spare minutes to hunt down the string.
    Later, Tym would not think of the next sequence of events as continous time. She would remember it in a series of three vivid snapshots.
    First, there was the numbing roar—an explosion of green tent canvas, singed rope, smoke and fire.
    Second, unaccountably mobile, she was on her feet and bounding across the suddenly hellish tent yard toward the jungle.
    Third, trapped. Flailing in a net like a frantic beast in the dark. Then a large mean weight fell upon her, another human, maybe two or three, and there was a flash of steel—in her own hand. Tym was going down in a hard way, but someone else was going to be sorry he had tackled a wild animal holding a shaving razor.
    When she came to, Tym found herself shackled to a bench in the belly of a slave ship called the Lucia.

5
A Bloody Problem
    Quince was wondering how to make himself bleed—preferably in the least painful, least obvious way. He sat naked on the mattress, really a large burlap sack filled with dried grass. He studied his dark skin, the veins in his arms, his legs, and his ankles, which were red rimmed from shackles. How would he draw blood?
    He had told Dirk the plan, and now Dirk was squatting, looking exasperated in the far corner of the cell under the barred window. “Brains of a pig,” he muttered, “you got the brains of a pig. Worse than that. You got pig shit for brains. Pig shit.”
    Quince studied the room again and found nothing of help: whitewashed cinder block walls, rebuilt from the ruin of some ancient hotel; two mattresses; a tiny window with Thomas Bay visible outside if you stand on tiptoe; the door, thick steel with a food tray slot; empty plates. The plates. Maybe he could bend one of the tin plates until it broke. He could slash himself with the jagged edge.
    No. Ach. He hated this. He was a scribe, not a warrior or hunter. He hated blood, especially his own, and he hated pain. This made him think of doctors—their leeches and fever rooms and scalpels. He remembered himself as a little rugger in the waiting room of a doctor, a vile old blood-letter who seemed to thrive on fear and agony. When the doctor’s assistant pushed through the door and motioned for him, little Quince had fallen forward in a dead faint onto the planking. His nose had broken, and ever since…ah, this was the answer, of course: Ever since, his nose had bled very easily!
    He stood and snatched up an empty cup from the floor by the door. “Dirk, I have it. You will punch me in the nose. I will bleed, easily, I know it. Like Waterfall of the Wise—and it will only hurt a little.”
    Dirk still looked perturbed, but he pushed away from the back wall and stopped at an arm’s length from Quince.
    “I won’t do it,” Dirk said. He stared now at the floor, embarrassed to refuse his friend and cell mate, a fellow Rafer. “Your plan is dangerous—it will get you killed. They say we will be boated to the mainland any day now, so why not wait? On the mainland, there will be more places to run. On this island you will be found quickly.”
    Quince had been holding the cup under his face expectantly, but he frowned now and dropped his hand. “If we leave the islands, I’m afraid that we’ll never see home again,” he said grimly. “What is the word now—how many have died among us? Ten? More?”
    And then Quince’s vision was filled with a large brown fist,