The beach was chaos, which was usual for the Expedition. At least this time they weren't being attacked by birds, though being mobbed by shipwrecked survivors was little better, especially when you didn't have good news to deliver.
Riley Lynch was asking awkward questions--"Where did you put out from?" "Are you going to Ollam?" "Can you take us back to civilization?"--and Deslock seized on the opportunity to not answer him for a moment longer.
"Prithis show you!"
"All right, then," said Deslock. "Thank you, Prithis, though I think my men are more capable than you give them credit for. Someone, follow the freaky goat-man, he knows where to get food."
"Could you just--" Mr. Lynch began.
"One
moment, please," interrupted Deslock, "thank you sir. I need to get things organized. Our ship was damaged recently, as you may have noticed, and we need to effect repairs. Do you know of any good trees to use as a mast?"
"You could just take the
Osprey's," said Mr. Lynch. "I doubt she'll be needing it. Captain Cravis--may he rest in peace--rode the wave pretty far inland. The
Osprey's no longer a ship, really, seeing as she's halfway up a damn mountain."
"Excellent!" said Deslock, happy for once. A moment's reflection brought the realization that this might not be the best sentiment to be expressing to a man who just saw his ship wreck and his captain die. "Thank you, sir, for your assistance. The repairs will go much faster if we don't have to cut a new tree for the mast."
There was a pause in the conversation, filled with other people moving about. Sailors tied down the longboat, Expedition members charged off into the jungle intent on their usual explorations, and birds sounded strange calls in the distance.
"Mister Lynch, let me be frank with you," said Deslock. "We are the Grand Expedition, en route to the Unknown Continent with the aim of exploration. We aren't going back to civilization for some time."
There was silence.
"If you want to join us--or if any others from the
Osprey want to join us--you are welcome to do so," Deslock said, in an effort to fill that silence. "But anyone who does won't see Lorin again for months, at the very least. Maybe years."
There was silence, again.
"Thank you for telling me," said Riley Lynch, sounding a little choked. "I--we'll have to think about it, for a little while."
"Take your time," said Deslock. "In the meantime--hey, you there! Run out another boat, get more people over here! There's work to be done!"
______________________________
The Doctor's overgrown cat was sitting near the railing of the
Cepolada, watching Nex pace back and forth. Deslock hadn't allowed him on the first boat, not after the last island. Deslock hadn't wanted to explain to the University Arcana how he'd lost their representative by letting him land first on potentially hostile ground. The Doctor himself was sure Hunter could handle any threat, but in the end it was not his choice. He waited and watched the longboat and the shore, and was slightly disappointed when the exchange occurred entirely peacefully. His restriction to the main ship had been a complete waste of time.
Grummond was standing on on the quarter deck, watching the shore through a telescope. For lack of anything better to do, the Doctor badgered the captain for coordinates, maps and times, and wrote it all down in a new notebook. Time ticked away second by second.
Eventually the longboat returned to the
Cepolada and Doctor Nexaddo all but leaped into it, followed closely by his tiger.
______________________________
"When you said that your ship ended up halfway up a mountain," Deslock said, "I didn't think you meant, you know,
actually halfway up a mountain."
"Yeah," said Riley Lynch, somewhat bitterly. "Unbelievable, isn't it?"
They were standing not far beyond the treeline, looking up at a peak that loomed over the rest of the island. There were two mountains on this island, north and south, and the
Osprey had plowed a trail of destruction from the waterline up to a point that was about a quarter of the way up the southern mountain. The wave that had brought it there had left most of the vegetation intact, if wet. The heel of the ship had not been so kind. There was a trail up from the beach and through the trees, littered with the limbs of broken trees and fragments of bough, ending in the stern of the fallen
Osprey, resting amid the ruin two, maybe three hundred yards from the waterline.
"It's not pretty, what happened to the old girl," said Mr. Lynch. "She's a good ship. She didn't deserve this."
"I'm sure she didn't," said Deslock. "But this is where she ended up. We--"
Doctor Nexaddo raced past, riding his tiger, bouncing eagerly in his makeshift saddle.
After a moment, Riley said, "The hell was that?"
"That was the Doctor," said Deslock dismissively. "Don't pay him any attention, it only encourages him." He turned and shouted. "Mister Kurier! If you could ensure that the Doctor doesn't get in any trouble, I would--oh sod it, he's vanished already. Never mind. Start organizing a crew to get the mast from the
Osprey, then. And Mister Lynch, I cannot thank you enough for this, I really can't."
Riley shrugged. "It's not as if she'll ever sail again anyway," he said, staring up at his ship.
