Robert Asprin - Shadow Of Sanctuary

The sun was a full two handspans above the horizon when Hort appeared on the Sanctuary docks; early in the day but late by fishermen's standard. The youth's eyes squinted painfully at the unaccustomed brightness of the morning sun. He fervently wished he were home in bed ... or in someone else's bed ... or anywhere but here. Still, he had promised his mother he would help the Old . Man this morning. While his upbringing made it unthinkable to break that promise, his stubbornness required that he demonstrate his protest by being late.

Though he had roamed these docks since early childhood and knew them to be as scrupulously clean as possible, Hort still chose his path carefully to avoid brushing his clothes against anything. Of late he had been much more attentive to his personal appearance; this morning he had discovered he no longer had any old clothes suitable for the boat. While he realized the futility of trying to preserve his current garb through an entire day's work in the boat, newly acquired habits demanded he try to minimize the damage.

The Old Man was waiting for him, sitting on the overturned boat like some stately sea-bird sleeping off a full belly. The knife in his hand caressed the stray piece of wood he held with a slow, rhythmic cadence. With each pass of the blade a long curl of wood fell to join the pile at his feet. The size of the pile was mute testament to how long the Old Man had been waiting.

Strange, but Hort had always thought of him as the Old Man, never as Father. Even the men who had fished these waters with him since their shared boyhoods called him Old Man rather than Panit. He wasn't really old, though his face was deceptive. Wrinkled and crisscrossed by weather lines, the Old Man's face looked like one of those red clay riverbeds one saw in the desert beyond Sanctuary: parched, cracked, waiting for rain that would never fall.

No, that was wrong. The Old Man didn't look like the desert. The Old Man would have nothing in common with such a large accumulation of dirt. He was a fisherman, a creature of the sea and as much a part of the sea as one of those weathered rocks that punctuated the harbour.

The old man looked up at his son's approach then tet his attention settle back on the whittling.

'I'm here,' Hort announced unnecessarily, adding, 'sorry I'm late.'

He cursed himself silently when that remark slipped out. He had been determined not to apologize, no matter what the Old Man said, but when the Old Man said nothing...

His father rose to his feet unhurriedly, replacing his knife in its sheath with a gesture made smooth and unconscious by years of repetition.

'Give me a hand with this,' he said, bending to grasp one end of the boat.

Just that. No acceptance of the apology. No angry reproach. It was as if he had expected his reluctant assistant would be late.

Hort fumed about this as he grunted and heaved, helping to right the small boat and set it safely in the water. His annoyance with the whole situation was such that he was seated in the boat, accepting the oars as they were passed down from the dock, before he remembered that his father had been launching this craft for years without assistance. His son's inexpert hands could not have been a help, only a hindrance.

Spurred by this new irritation, Hort let the stem of the boat drift away from the dock as his father prepared to board. The petty gesture was in vain. The Old Man stepped into the boat, stretching his leg across the water with no more thought than a merchant gives his keys in their locks.

'Row that way,' came the order to his son.

Gritting his teeth in frustration, Hort bent to the task.

The old rhythms returned to him in mercifully few strokes. Once he had been glad to row his father's boat. He had been proud when he had grown enough to handle the oars himself. No longer a young child to be guarded by his mother, he had basked in the status of the Old Man's boy. His playmates had envied his association with the only fisherman on the dock who could consistently trap the elusive Nya - the small schooling fish whose sweet flesh brought top price each afternoon after the catch was brought in.

Of course, that had been a long time ago. He'd wanted to learn about the Nya then - he knew less now; his memories had faded.

As Hort had grown, so had his world. He learned that away from the docks no one knew of the Old Man, nor did they care. To the normal citizens of Sanctuary he was just another fisherman and fishermen did not stand high in the social structure of the town. Fishermen weren't rich, nor did they have the ear of the local aristocrats. Their clothes weren't colourful like the S'danzo's. They weren't feared like the soldiers or mercenaries.

And they smelled.

Hort had often disputed this latter point with the street urchins away from the docks until bloody noses, black eyes and bruises taught him that fishermen weren't good fighters, either. Besides, they did smell.

Retreating to the safety of the dock community Hort found that he viewed the culture which had raised him with a blend of scorn and bitterness. The only people who respected fishermen were other fishermen. Many of his old friends were drifting away - finding new lives in the crowds and excitement of the city proper. Those that remained were dull youths who found reassurance in the unchanging traditions of the fish-craft and who were already beginning to look like their fathers.

As his loneliness grew, it was natural that Hort used his money to buy new clothes which he bundled and hid away from the fish-tainted cottage they called home. He scrubbed himself vigorously with sand, dressed and tried to blend with the townsfolk.

He found the citizens remarkably pleasant once he had removed the mark of the fishing community. They were most helpful in teaching him what to do with his money. He acquired a circle of friends and spent more and more time away from home until...

'Your mother tells me you're leaving.'

The Old Man's sudden statement startled Hort, jerking him rudely from his mental wanderings. In a flash he realized he had been caught in the trap his friends had warned him about. Alone in the boat with his father he would be a captive audience until tile tide changed. Now he'd hear the anger, the accusations and finally the pleading.

Above all Hort dreaded the pleading. While they had had their differences in the past, he still held a lingering respect for his father, a respect he knew would die if the Old Man were reduced to whining and begging.

'You've said it yourself a hundred times. Old Man,' Hort pointed out with a shrug, 'not everyone was meant to be a fisherman.'

It came out harsher than he had intended, but Hort let it go without more explanations. Perhaps his father's anger would be stirred to a point where the conversation would be terminated prior to the litanies of his obligations to his family and tradition.

'Do you think you can earn a living in Sanctuary?' the Old Man asked, ignoring his son's baiting.

'We ... I won't be in Sanctuary,' Hort announced carefully. Even his mother hadn't possessed this last bit of knowledge. "There's a caravan forming in town. In four days it leaves for the capital. My friends and I have been invited to travel with it.'

'The capital?' Panit nodded slowly. 'And what will you do in Ranke?'

'I don't know yet,' his son admitted, 'but there are ten jobs in Ranke for every one in Sanctuary.'

The Old Man digested this in silence. 'What will you use for money on this trip?' he asked finally.

'I had hoped ... There's supposed to be a tradition in our family, isn't there? When a son leaves home his father gives him a parting gift. I know you don't have much, but...' Hort stopped; the Old Man was shaking his head in slow negation.

'We have less than you think,' he said sadly. 'I said nothing before, but your fine clothes, there, have tapped our savings; the fishing's been bad.'