Hwicca stepped back, her face hurt and bewildered. Eodan went past her
into the cabin. Phryne brought him a sponge and a bucket of salt water.
He cleansed himself and lay down on one of the mattresses. Sleep came
like a blow....
He woke suddenly. Lamplight met his eyes. The air had cooled, and the
ship was rocking. He heard singing and the stamp of feet, but remotely.
He sat up.
Hwicca sat beside him. Her hair was loose, rushing over her shoulders
so he did not at first see she wore her best gown. She hugged her knees
and regarded him with troubled eyes.
"Is it night?" he asked in the Cimbric.
"Yes," she answered, very quietly. "Tjorr said not to waken you. He
said he had brought order on the new ship. They released the slaves and
locked up the crewmen and such of the rowers as did not want to join
us. He got the wounded below decks over there--and everything--" She
held out a leather bottle. "He said to give you this."
Eodan ignored it. He stepped to the door and glanced out. The grappling
plank was taken down, and only ropes and a single lashed gangway joined
the two vessels; the hulls rocked enough to break any stiff bridge. It
was dark and empty on this ship. Torches flared on the other, bobbing
in a crazy dance, hoarse voices chanted and laughter went raw under a
sky of reborn wind and hurried clouds.
"What is that foolishness?" he snapped.
Hwicca came to stand at his side and look, almost frightened, at the
Tartarus-view. A naked black outline, hair and beard one mane, capered
against fire-glow. You could just glimpse a circle of others, leaping
and kicking with hands joined around the ship's hearth.
"There was wine on board," said Hwicca.
"Oh ... oh, yes. I remember now. And Tjorr let them have the cargo?"
"He told me he could not stop them. It seemed best to grant them this
night's drinking. Then tomorrow we could all take the big galley--"
"And let the crew of that one have this. Hm. It is not such a bad
thought."
"You would let them go?" asked Hwicca, astonished.
"I gave them my word," he said. "And what good would it do to kill
them?"
He closed the door again, muffling the racket. He picked up the leather
bottle and drank thirstily. "Ah! But did they also have some food fit
to eat on that ship?"
"I do not know. I prepared what I could from the stores here." Hwicca
pointed to a bowl of stew. "I fear it got cold while you slept."
Eodan lowered the bottle. The roof was so low his head had to bow down
to hers. "Why are you here?" he asked.
"You should not sleep unguarded." She touched the knife in her girdle.
His longsword lay drawn by the wall. He realized that he was unclothed.
"Phryne could have guarded me," he said.