Epilogue
"That were right pretty."
Richard's awareness was swimming: sometimes up; sometimes down.
"That shot. That were right pretty."
Something about that voice sounded familiar. Thinking about it made Richard's consciousness swim up almost to the surface. But then the pain came back and he descended into darkness again for a bit.
"And I've seen me lots of shots before."
Richard was suddenly mostly awake, and fully in pain. He couldn't decide what hurt more: the aching destruction of his chest or the fiery agony of his back. He guessed that he had been kicked in the chest into a fire by a mule.
"Nnnnh..." he said.
"Now you just rest there a bit, Richard. Leech says ye'll be a bit sore f'r a week'r two. Oh, an' ye'll piss blood f'r a stretch. Not t'worry. Ye had a back full o' cabin an' ye took a cannon in t'chest. Happily it were the back end o'th'cannon. Did gunner not tell ye never t'stand behin't th'cannon?"
"Nnnnh..."
"I guess we'll never know until ye can start talkin' t'enlighten us. Gunner is not much f'r talk, bein' dead."
"Nnnnnn..."
"Though he'd be right proud o'that shot o'yers. I figgers the odds o' hittin' that skiff be about zero, an' ye not only hit th'skiff but th' kedge chain. Wi'out a kedge I expects the Revenge be still there, not quite in t'harbour an' not quite out. I still chuckle about that, me son."
"Mmmmary..."
"I'm here, Richard."
And Richard realized that someone was holding his hand. And something else was curled up on his belly and apparently purring.
"Young Mary ne'er left yer side, Richard. Though truth be told she were confined to this here cabin with ye on account o' some skillful nautical things we were doin' as didn't require a bystander. But let's say she ne'er left yer side. An' she plucked out enough wood an' glass out o'yer hide to rebuild t'cabin. Although ye'll have t'make due wi' a bit o' sail to cover up t'hole until we makes harbour someplace wi' trees. In th' mean time enjoy a nice refreshin' breeze."
"Jonathon..."
"Jonathon is running around the ship like it were a town fair. The Captain has given him freedom of the ship and he's using it to the full." said a woman's voice.
"Aye, I've let it be known that if'n the lad has a question then he'll get an answer. His education be sorely lacking, not that Mary could've done aught about it where she was."
Mary shot a look at Avery, though Richard couldn't focus on anything in particular so he missed it.
"Never seen a lad wi' quite s'many questions, though. He be a right pain in t'arse, always underfoot. Still, if ye tells him summat then he knows it."
"...Tonker."
"What did he say?"
"Harr! He's askin' about 'is tonker!"
"Your tonker is fine, Richard. You were squatting behind the gun to sight it, so your chest took the recoil, not your lower parts."
"You...?"
"Yes, I checked your tonker and everything else about you. It's not the first I've seen, believe me. You were covered in glass and wood and blood and would have died from the rot. And no one else was likely to spend any time on you."
"Not that we didn't appreciate what ye done, me lad. We was all mostly aft tryin' t'sink they bastards as had the kedge behin't us. But pistols at a quarter cable an' yer more likely t'hit th' back o' yer own head as anythin' in front o' ye. So what do we see but a single shot from t'chasers as takes out t'skiff an' t'kedge. It were so beautiful I nearly cried. But then th' reality o' bein at the point where t'harbour entrance was, an' there be t' Speedy too, hove to, why I had me hands full. Lucky the Speedy wan't in a mood t'sink us, no doubt weighin' the relative weight o' her instructions t'detain the Fancy but also the captain and its passenger, alive so to speak. So she made ready t'follow us, but she's got twice t'draft o' the Fancy so when we took a clever route round back o' the rock, she wisely decided to remain hove to and pick up t'pieces o' the Fancy when t'storm cleared. Well, she'll be lookin' a'right, but all the pieces o' th' Fancy remain mostly intact so she won't find any."
"Where...?"
"We be around back o'th' rock. The storm be lashing about in a grand manner still but here it's as peaceful as tea time at yer gran's. We'll be gone afore anyone tries t'follow us, an' no one but us either knows about nor can use this here little cove anyways."
Richard rested for a bit. It was hard to say exactly how long. It might have been a few minutes or it could have been a few days. But whenever he checked, Mary was still there fussing over him. However long it was, the Captain seemed to be back when he was awake enough to check. Jonathon as well. And that damned cat. Macready was right; she was a minion of hell and knew exactly where the most painful injuries were. Richard lacked the strength to fling her off his chest.
"Ye're not a complete twat, Richard, tho' ye remain a harf twat f'r standin' behin't t'gun." said a small, piping voice.
"Jonathon! You may talk that way outside this cabin but inside I will have civil words!" said Mary.
"Yes, mother. Sir Richard, I must remind you that standing behind the gun at any time or for any reason is considered bad for your gentlemanly parts."
"Thank you, Jonathon." Richard was regaining his senses and his voice, and could hazard complete sentences, although the effort drained him.
"Now, Richard. We be leavin' this rock soon. An' it would be a help t'know where we're goin'. Ye has some manner o' map?" inquired Avery.
"The map is safe."
"Happy though I am t' hear that, Richard, it would be helpful t'actually see the map. I must confess to having made a rudimentary search o' th' premises and I've come up short. Ye has some special place ye keeps it?"
"Yes. In a grandfather clock. In my hallway. At Home."
"Ye're tellin' me that we been through all this shite f'r a map that we don't even have?"
"The map is useless. It's a thousand-year-old doodle by someone with no use for maps. Unless all coastline is made from potato peelings. The man who made the map was a monk. A literate man, and quite the seafarer, but no map maker."
"Then what in God's name is this all about?"
"It's about Promise. The land of the saints. Far to the west of here. The subject of a religious allegory written a millennium ago. This allegorical tale became the Navigatio Sancti Brendani Abbatis."
"I will admit me knowledge o' saintly matters be somewhat thin, Richard."
"It was a best seller. More than a dozen copies. But it turns out that it wasn't an allegory at all. The man actually sailed to the island, and took detailed notes and a rather sketchy map of his adventures. There's only the one full version of the Navigatio to have survived that I'm aware of, the one with the detailed notes of the journey, the map, and what he found enroute."
"And where might this full version be, Richard?"
"Well for the longest time it was in the monastery where it originated. But then, through the vagaries of war and time it found itself far to the east. Where a young knight managed to acquire it for rather a pittance. The man who had it thought it a crude though pretty trinket written in what to him must surely have been gibberish, but sufficiently important looking to dupe a foreigner out of some coin. The fool. Even if it were simply a thousand year old book it is worth a tidy sum."
"God's wounds, Richard! Where is the damn book?"
"In my sea chest."
Avery went to the sea chest. He apparently had a key, or could in any event open it easily. He held up a smallish book, ornately bound in some manner of leather.
"This little book all written in churchy language? Can ye read this shite?"
"I can. From Fairyland, Captain, although it had a more 'churchy' name when the book was written, the book says that you follow the noon-time sun as it would be in mid-June for two weeks, as could be sailed in a round boat with a square sheet for a sail. Then we come to the land of Promise."
"And what be that to us?"
"Well for one thing, it would be the new furthest point west in the known world. What would it be worth to own Fairyland? This will be the new Fairyland."
Avery considered. "That would put a bug squarely up t'arse o' Macready."
"It would indeed. But that's not all. The book, and to a lesser degree the map, both talk of a route to the other side of the world, accessible from the island, using it as a base. What would that be worth, do you suppose?"
"That would put a bug squarely up t'arse o'th' King himself. But how do ye propose t'claim ownership of the island?"
"By planting a crop, raising a structure, and living in it for a winter. It is Terra Nullius. The first person to do these things owns it. The only issue we have is that the seeds are ruined, unfortunately."
"Well that be n'problem, me lad. Potatoes."
"I'm sorry?"
"Ten sacks o'potatoes. Compliments o' your weaselly friend Scuppers. They grows a treat at these latitudes."
"Do tell." That was very good news indeed.
"But what if we don't exactly discover t'land, it being inhabited already, as is likely enough t'case? 'Twere the case with Fairyland."
"You are talking about savages who do not fear God. That is why God, in his infinite wisdom, gave us the guns."
"Aye..." said Avery, considering all the angles and finding no fault. "It were about time I slowed down. A farm ye says? Might be I could settle down summat. Just the odd voyage, mind. Of discovery, as it were. Keep me feet wet, in a manner o' speakin'."
"And so there you have it, Captain. The biggest adventure there has ever been in the history of the Kingdom. The biggest reward there could possibly be. Me needing you to sail the ship. You needing me to read the churchy shite. Are you up for an adventure, Captain?"
The cat got up and stretched, before finding a more painful spot on Richard's chest to curl up. "Rowwrrr." she said, giving the small rodent that only she had noticed in the corner of the room a disdainful look before ignoring it. The same disdainful look she gave everyone before ignoring them. Because, in her estimation, everyone who was not a cat was therefore a rat. Just some were bigger than others was all.