untitled short bit

They name their ships after the disasters they wish to avoid: Shipreck, Catastrophe, Mutiny, Arson, Infidelity and Scurvy can all be found docked in the ports of the larger cities of the world. If you name your ship after something, they say, that's almost like asking for it to happen, and everyone knows that the things you most want, the things you long for, are the things that will be lost, the things that will perversly wriggle out of your grasp right when you think you finally have them, the things you will always glimpse but never own. To them, a ship is a most sacred thing, home in a way other nations can't will never grasp. Such a name is the greatest protection a man can give it, they will insist, laughing. They usually laugh at the stories behind the names too.


They laugh a lot, the Sea-Riders, as they are usually called by men who go out to sea once or twice in a lifetime at most. When one of them dies they share out his things according to his wishes and throw his body into the waves with the most minimal of ceremony. Then they dance, and bring out the funeral-minstrels and jokers and mimes. Up to a third of a crew has a minstrel or joker suit for such occasions. They drink and dance and fool, laughing until their bellies hurt from the strain. To them, the somber mood and tears of the landed nations' funerals are incomprehensible: of course you are sad at the death of your relation, your friend, your shipmate. Must you show it off then, get together to compare who can show their pain most clearly, who can sob loudest and longest of all? That pain is yours, for yourself and those closest to you. In the open, with others, it is best to remember what is lost and what you still have, to live in the moment and laugh deeply as you breath in a salty night breeze.


They laugh, too, when they tell their history to their children, each generation passing the words on to the next. More bitterly, perhaps, but they do, when they tell of the island they once called their own, with the lush trees full of fruit whose nectar they could trade for a fortune, the villages and long, narrow homes. They laugh when they tell of the mountain that suddenly exploded into ash and flame, that poured smoke so thick it choked whoever was caught in its cloud, the liquid fire that smothered everything, everyone but those few skilled or lucky enough to pile onto the small fleet of trading boats. And too, about their journey half across the world, from one capital to the next begging for refuge and shelter and being denied until they finally decided to make those boats themselves their land, their shelter, the only place in the world they belonged. The dark waves and his final snort, giggle, or weak grin, is all, each Sea-Rider knows, that will be his in eternity.