Марк Энтони - The Cataclysm

They had finished wrapping up her head and everyone was gathering around her to talk when I came over. No one paid any attention to me, so I went right up and stood beside the cot where she lay, and I put down the satchel, which Ark had forgotten to take back from me right then but did later. Goodwife Filster looked terrible, but she was breathing and that was good, I guess.

“Goodwife Filster?” I whispered, and when she didn’t do anything, I asked again, “Goodwife Filster?”

She groaned then and half-turned so she could look at me through all the rags that were tied over her head. Her eyes opened, but they looked like they were dead.

“You were pretty mad at me for asking about Istar, weren’t you?” I asked.

Goodwife Filster just stared at me and didn’t make any noise, but I assumed her answer was yes. No one else said anything. They all just looked at me, so I kept going.

“I was supposed to ask that question for Astinus of Palanthas, to help out Ark,” I said. “I was just thinking about it all, and I think I know the reason Astinus wanted to find out what people thought of the Cataclysm. It goes like this:

Nobody liked Istar very much, except maybe for you and a few other people. But, then, from what I’ve heard, nobody really liked anybody at all very much back then, and things don’t seem to have gotten much better now, because everyone down deep still hates everyone else. Asking people about Istar brings out all the worst in them and opens up all the old wounds, though I’m saying that as a metaphor and not because you have so many wounds right now, really. I think Astinus knew that would happen, and he wanted to find out just how bad things really were now, and maybe he wasn’t so much interested in Istar after all. Astinus is really worried that someday something bad will happen that will need all of us to pull together and work together and maybe fight together to set things right again, and if we don’t learn that being different is really okay, then we aren’t going to make it in the long run and we’ll be just like the Karkhovs’ melons and be swept away by the ocean or whatever it is that Astinus is afraid will come at us. What do you think?”

Goodwife Filster kept staring at me while her lips moved. I had to lean close to hear her. “Astinus and you?” she asked. “You were both doing this?”

I nodded. “Yup. See, Ark made me a field recorder, and I decided to—”

I’m afraid I didn’t get much further with my explanation, because at that point Goodwife Filster sat up on the cot and yelled out that both you and I should get together and do something that was remarkably disgusting and which I’ll bet is physically impossible, but which I have to admit sounded pretty funny to me later on, though you might not think so. Then she tried to get off the cot and come after me, but the Wylmeens got to her first.

After things calmed down a bit, Ark and Widow Muffin carried me back to the shop. On the way, we picked up Woose, the dwarf, and Cotterpin, the tinker, and Magistrate Jarvis and Kroogi and several other people who were friends of at least one of us, and when we got back to the shop, Ark closed the back door and everyone cleaned me up and fed me while Ark and the widow told the story of how I had saved them. They put fresh dirt over all the lamp oil Goodwife Filster had spilled in the shop and swept it out, but it still smelled almost as bad as the gas Ark gets from eating cheese pastries, which I guess he won’t eat anymore. In the process, I heard that the Wylmeens’ dog, Mud, was still alive but he wasn’t the same old Mud and was actually pretty quiet now and wasn’t chasing or biting anyone this evening and maybe won’t do it again, or so I hope.

Eventually everyone went home and Ark took his facts machine and satchel away from me, and the machine was a little dirty but not broken, and Ark never once asked me if I’d seen the widow’s letters, and I never once brought it up. I never even asked why the widow happened to drop by the shop while I was gone or where her shoes had gone. (When I got the satchel and facts machine back just a few minutes ago to send this to you, I noticed that Ark had taken the letters out of the satchel and had hidden them somewhere else, but I won’t try to find out where they are, as I don’t think I could stand the shock. Widow Muffin stayed on with us tonight, but I didn’t mind. She and Ark seem the happier for it.)

This will be my last report to you, Astinus. I told Ark that being a recorder was very exciting, but it was maybe a little too exciting, and I would rather be a cobbler for now and later an amanuensis, though to tell the truth I have given some thought to being a cave explorer or a sea pirate (I didn’t tell him that part, though).

I also asked Ark if tomorrow he would show me where my mother is buried so I could say hi to her and maybe visit her once in a while. Ark said yes and also said he was sorry he had never told me about her before and said it had hurt him to even think about it. All he could remember about her was that she was pretty. I thought about it and finally figured that I could forgive him, because I don’t know what I would have done had it been me finding a baby Ark, and it was all past anyway.

I have been thinking about the question I tried to answer for you and how much trouble that one question caused, and for a while I was feeling bad about myself for asking it, but now I don’t so much. I feel sorry for Goodwife Filster, even if she is so crazy and angry that she lost control of herself, but there are a lot of people like her around who have bad attitudes and don’t want to make life better for anyone else. If you are afraid that people haven’t learned anything about working together as a lesson of the Cataclysm, then it seems to me you have a lot to worry about. But Ark and I (and maybe the widow, too, though I haven’t asked) have it figured out most of the time, so there’s still hope.

It was fun working for you, Astinus. Maybe I will get to see you again someday when I sail my own pirate ship. Be looking for me!

A dense red haze surrounded the sun in a hot, silent sky. The sea was calm, though swirls and eddies showed on its surface. The violent upheavals in the air and water had lasted through the long night; now they were done. Across this desolate scene drifted the merchant ship Sunchaser , listing hard to port, its tangled yards and spars trailing in the oily water.

The ship’s master, Dunvane of Palanthas, slipped the loops of rope from around his wrists. In the worst part of the storm, he had lashed himself to the ship’s wheel. His wrists were raw and bloody from the hemp’s chafing. Dunvane took the wheel now and turned it left and right, but the steering ropes were slack and the ship did not respond.

He drew in a deep breath and coughed. Feathers of smoke clung to the Sunchaser ; the shredded sails were still burning. Dunvane had never seen anything like the blazing hot tempest that had swept down upon them. The wind was like fire itself, and it consumed more than the ship’s sails. Those sailors who’d had the ill fortune to be standing on the windward side of the ship had ignited like candles. Half of Dunvane’s crew of fourteen died in that instant. He and the others who’d been on deck had burns on their faces and hands and arms.

Then came the waves. Breakers as high and solid as cliffs fell on them. Only Dunvane’s seamanship had saved the Sunchaser , as he turned stern first to the crushing waves. The ship rode out the extraordinary storm, but with all the spinning and turning, the captain had no idea where they’d come to be.

What crewmen remained were scattered on deck, laid out by exhaustion. Dunvane staggered to the waist of the ship, shaking the sailors awake. Four men, he found, were beyond waking. Within a short time, the only three survivors of the Sunchaser’s crew were on their feet.