The Voyage of the Unquiet Ice Read Online Free Page B

drove Dow to close his eyes, swing himself out and then scramble desperately over the crow’s nest lip to fall upon its floor.
    He found himself staring at a pair of bare feet, horned and dirty, one of which was missing several of its toes.
    â€˜You look green as fresh kelp, boy,’ said a dry voice.
    Dow stared up to see a weathered face gazing down: the lookout. To Dow’s surprise he was an old man – or at least, older than any other common sailor Dow had encountered upon the ship so far; a shrunken individual with ugly gaps in his teeth, and with long grey hair hanging in a thin fringe from an otherwise balding scalp. Then again, the man was obviously hale enough to climb high aloft, and now, as the sky reeled behind his head, he was propped casually against the rail as if he was lounging against a solid wall.
    â€˜And you ain’t done yet, neither. To the very top, that’s your course.’
    Dow made no response, merely rose to his feet. He felt an enormous safety, now that he was enclosed by the barrel – and a savage reluctance at the thought of having to leave that safety. For the test was not merely to climb to the crow’s nest, but to climb to the mast’s very tip.
    He looked up. The last twenty feet speared above him, slender and smooth, and bearing only a single crossbar two thirds of the way to its tip. There were no more shrouds to cling to – the mast was, essentially, just a flagpole now, and he would have to shinny up without supports.
    â€˜But hark now,’ his crow’s-nest companion warned. ‘If you’ll be heaving your guts out – as seems likely – then get it done now. Rain your puke down on me from up there, and there’ll be trouble.’
    Dow’s stomach was in turmoil – he might have eaten rotten meat for breakfast, instead of almost nothing at all. If only the Chloe would stop rolling a moment. It didn’t seem possible that the mast could describe such arcs and not rip itself out of the bowels of the ship. But a glance northwards showed him that there was no end in sight to the procession of swells.
    â€˜Get on with you,’ the old lookout scorned. ‘You reckon this heavy weather? Nah – when there’s a gale up and the seas are eighty foot high on the beam, then you’ll know what rolling is. This bucket up here gets tossed two hundred feet in a heartbeat, fast enough to suck the breath out of you. You lash yourself to the mast then, or be sent flying.’
    Dow couldn’t listen to any more. He grabbed hold of the mast and began to shinny up, hanging on as tight as his cramped arms and legs would allow. He reminded himself that he’d climbed hundreds of trees, almost this tall, back in his home forests. He reminded himself that he’d braved the very maelstrom, and that this was nothing so dreadful in comparison.
    It didn’t help. He’d thought he was immune to sea sickness, now he knew he wasn’t. He’d thought that heights held no fear for him, but these heights did. He was mortally afraid. It was an act of overpowering will just to force each arm and leg, each finger, to move. And all the while the wind plucked at him, and the gulf below sang its siren song to just let go and fall and fall …
    His hands found the crossbar. He needed now only to stand on that bar, reach up, and touch the metal cap of the mast, and he would be done. But he couldn’t do it. His limbs would obey him no more. He had reached his limit, his eyes squeezed shut, his hands ice, his stomach churning, and nothing in the world would convince him to rise any higher.
    Harsh laughter sounded from the deck far below, lofted up on the wind, and then from much closer, at his feet. ‘I told ’em all it’d come to this,’ was the lookout’s comment. ‘Small boats and whirlpools is all well enough for a green hand, but tall ships are another thing. You’re frozen there,