It began, as many such things do, in a pub. No ordinary pub was this. It was a veritable center of the world for those partaking in the effervescent nectar that entered in barrels and exited in singing bellies. From the smokehouse forming an exterior vestibule there flowed such odors as to tempt king and commoner alike, and as the afternoon became evening, it had not failed to draw a throng of hungry souls for their daily deliverance from toils.
In those days, there were not many cities, or large towns, but in Magistal Coast, a long and greedy border tracing out the land touched by sea from the neighboring counties, was the exception. Roughly halfway up this strip of seaside lay Loneport, unique for it’s harboring the merchant vessels that came this way from the tropical Southern islands to the treacherous worlds across the high seas.
But in the Angler Pub, for that was it’s name, thoughts of such far away places entered the minds of none of the ravenous patrons, save one. Seated against the wall of roughly hewn and stacked timber, with a face far away from the noise of the present, is a young man of some twenty years. His hair, a dark black and wispy affair, fell over his eyes leaving only a chin furled in deep thought, resting on a fist. His other hand clutched the handle of a now empty mug, still laced with fresh foam. Arthur, the owner of the face just described, recalled the events of the passing day with reluctant disdain. His thoughts rested on one particular moment, which he relived in a cycle of murmurous silent motions of the mouth, followed by pauses of stillness, as at the present.
How long he might have remained in this state will never be known, as at that moment his solitude was broken by the boisterous sudden presence of a man both markedly older than Arthur, and yet more youthful in manner.
“Arthur what ails ye?” He begins, in an accent reminding one of snowy mountains, cold green pastures, and the rough austerity of islands too small for any greenery but moss. He plops down on the opposite bench, and slides a plated leg of smoked turkey, sliced in shingles, and dripping with a brown sauce to the disgruntled youth. “I brought your dinner” He proclaims again with emphasis, waiting for response.
Arthur shifts backwards from the table, letting his face appear from beneath the veil obscuring it, and acknowledges his companion’s presence with a wry smile.
“I heard you were back ashore, what brings this?” The enthusiastic man continues.
“I don’t want to talk about it” Arthur looks away.
“But what else is there to talk about? First you run away, leaving only a note, and now you show up back on dry land, sitting in your old booth like you never left?”
Arthur stares at the deliciously steaming repast for a long minute before finally making use of it for refreshment. Through a full mouth he begins to recount the events leading to the present moment with distant words, as if he were speaking of someone else.
His tale was not a novel one. In a great city like Loneport, fathers often urge their sons to join the clergy, or practice law, as a means of ensuring a better station for the future head of their house. Years of study this required, and tutorship was a new enterprise, with few men able to devote their lives entirely to such a trade. Arthur’s father had, through great pains, secured a tutor for Arthur, and for some years, the young man’s time had been spent in the school, or in the library, which were both on the same grounds. Such imprisonment of the body, to one accustomed as Arthur to boyish adventuring was the very meaning of torture, and 6 months past, the lad had finally broken free. He had arranged, as was a simple matter in such a place, to join the merchant fleet as a deck hand, and sail across the treacherous seas to lands unseen.
One night he made his escape, writing to only his closest of friends as to his course of action, and left, or so he thought, his old life behind. When he at last arrived in his tale to the moment that captivated his whole mind not long before, he paused.
“I always thought I’d be a great sailor George, but, well I’m not. I kept blundering things, tying knots this way instead of that, or falling down in a tossed sea, or a hundred other things. The Captain was finally so tired of my clumsy person that he ordered me off his vessel soon as they made port, which was last night.”
The youth nearly wept, and lifted an empty mug to his lips for respite, only to realize his error, and look away in embarrassment.
“Arthur,” his friend began in a new, but still friendlier tone, “Being a sailor is hard. You’ve lived your life for years in reading and writing. How’d you expect you’d just pick up the skills of a seaman overnight?”
“I don’t know!” Arthur interjected, but after a pause relented, “You’re right, it was foolish of me to try then, and it was foolish still to have kept at it long as I did.”
“There you are wrong friend,” George continued, “It is a hard thing to break out like you did, courage that takes, boyish as it was,” he finished, in a paternal tone uncharacteristic of his usual manner.
“Well what should I do?” Arthur now seemed to hang on the words of his friend, who signaled the barman for another draught.
“I think your old tutor would have you back, if you were patient with him, and make an apology?”
“No, that’s just it, I can’t be there in that stuffy place anymore, reading how such and such condemned so and so for breaking this and that obscure statute, or the dead writings of the old poets, it’s all rubbish! The smoke left after a fire has gone out.”
“A poet yourself there aye! Well ok, I suppose you can’t really go back to all that if you aren’t set on doing so. But you must have something you’ve thought to do, in such a big city as this.”
“You know George, there really is only one thing I’ve ever wanted, and now that is finished.” He said, with a finality as he brought the new mug from the barman’s hand down on the table with a thud.
“Life is never finished until it is finished.” George rebounded, “A young lad such as yourself, with good learning, and some newly found knowledge of the world, can go a long way these days. Drink up tonight, no need to cry over spilt milk at the present. We shall solve this trouble tomorrow, till then, you stay with me.”
“My father must be furious.” Arthur changed tone, as though he had just remembered something forgotten of great importance. “What will he say?”
“Ah, the old man will come around, to himself he’s just happy your safe ashore, don’t mind whatever abuse he gives you with words otherwise. I’ll see to it he learns of your return in a cautious manner, and we shall arrange to meet him once he has come to his senses.”
Arthur was somewhat relieved and felt the slight anticipation of one about to receive a new opportunity, though he was at present wholly unsure what to anticipate.
A narrow slit in a pair of window drapes let in a single shaft of light into the small corner of a house in which a small room was constructed. The house is divided into a row of such rooms, half facing the rising sun, the others, still in shadow, being forced to wait for the present in the lee of that shining orb. An angular wooden frame supporting walls of grayish brown plaster, of a color nearly unreproducible in scenery devoid of houses built in precisely such a manner, formed the facade of the tenantry. This narrow sunbeam, like a rope stretched tight by a gale filling the sail it restrains, slowly moved across the wall, and the sleeping form lying on the day-bed filling half of the space it pierced into. A few small shelves are fixed to the wall opposite the window, and the trifles seated thereon cast sparkling rays of starlight into that last hold of night in a world now awake. Steadily, the light moved from chest to neck, from neck to chin, and, seeming to slow at this point, finally crossed the threshold of the sleeper’s eyelids.
Suddenly animated, he sits up straight, but so over-estimating the force by which such a motion would normally be effected, that with flailing arms, he is cast by his own accelerated body into a writhing mess between the small day bed and the closed door. After a few seconds of absolute disorientation, he manages to sit the right way up, and free his head from the knitted blanket that so recently formed his cocoon.
“Blasted sea legs” he mutters, accustomed to awakening in a sailor’s quarters, where security on one’s bunk is a matter of the tack by which the ship is underway, and awakening on a level unmoving surface, required some adjustment.
The door soon opened, and George entered, a look of amusement on his face.
“My dear Arthur, tis but the morning has come, not the invasion of the Eastern horde!” He finished with a chuckle.
With his hair still a hopeless tangle on his all but concealed eyes, Arthur jumped to his feet, and sits back on the bed, signaling a shoeing motion to George, who sidled out of the closet of a bedroom into his own, slightly larger lodgings.
Arthur looked about, remembering his near destitution of clothes. For months he’d worn the simple working gear of his short lived occupation, and now back on land, the only uniform he had left was a short yet baggy pair of trousers, the tunic and cloak from his former school uniform, and nearly threadbare cap with a single button at the top.
He fixed his hair with what meager toiletries were strewn on the dreadfully inadequate ledges to either side of the door that to someone had once passed as “shelves.” A wooden comb, missing a few tines, and a brush that appeared to have been last used for dusting were all he could secure for this purpose.
He paused before placing the cap on his head. Given him by the School on the day he’d begun studies, it was a symbol of all he had left in his former act of rebellion. Yet, with feet back on land, it seemed now to have a sweetness in its fading colors. The green and white stripes, topped by a crimson button, brought back the memory of all those days spent with his schoolmates, and every triumph he’d had when he finished this book or that, or recited perfectly in an examination.
All these moments now seemed a shadow of themselves, like they had happened to a friend, a friend he was happy for, and yet somehow jealous.
Thank you for reading this far! stay tuned for the next installment!
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