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Title: Swept Away! - Two Boys Adventures on The Great River
(“With A Thousand Elephants!”) - A Pseudo Victorian Boys Adventure
Author: Derien
Genres: Science-fiction/Victorian Adventure/Queer Teen Romance.
Notes:(Please go Back to Chapter One for full Notes)
This chapter = over 4,359 words.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License.
Previous chapters can be found on my own site here,
or read on LiveJournal: CH 1 / CH 2 / CH 3 / CH 4 / CH 5 / CH 6 / CH 7 / CH 8
Chapter Nine: Fire and Fish
The shot rang out against the hills for a time which felt like an age to Tom, in the moment of hearing and identifying the sound and knowing that he must immediately rejoin Phipps on the raft and then reminding his legs how to run. The sling, nearly full of rocks, banged hard against his thigh, feeling like a bruising impact after only a few dozen strides. He struggled to tear it off without stopping, but retained it in his grasp as he realized that it was possibly the best weapon he had available to him at the moment, the gun being with Phipps. His knife might do in a pinch, but he didn't want to get near enough to a lizard-bear or panther-wolf to use it. The threat he now ran toward, branches slapping his face and under brush tearing at his feet, could be either of those or any number of other dangers which he could not imagine. For all he knew that shot may not have come from Phipps's rifle at all - it may have been bandits which had followed them, or other wild men who had left the colony running from the noose or for their own reasons.
At this thought he slowed his pell-mell course a bit, trying to see ahead. He thought he must be near, though all these woods looked the same to him, and he drew closer to the bank. There, that was the limb he had used to pull himself up on, and directly below - he leaned out, trying to stay low amongst the brush - there was the raft.
Phipps lay quite still, curled against the wagon wheel, the gun lying nearby, and did not move as Tom climbed down. All else appeared as still as though the gunshot had never sounded, though his careful survey of the area noted the v-shaped ripples of some small animal swimming toward the opposite bank.
"Sir?" he ventured to call softly. When there was no response he tried again, a little louder. "Sir, it's me. LaPierre." He put his sack of rocks down quietly, nervous in the complete calm, so different from what he had expected to find, and knelt by the boy, touching his forehead hesitantly with the back of his hand - it was burning.
Phipps's eyes flew open wide and he drew a gasp. "The tentacles!" As he had regained consciousness his entire body had gone stiff with fear.
"Did you fire at something?"
"The poor rats!"
"You shot rats?" Though why he would have shot them if he felt sorry for them Tom was unsure.
But the boy was shaking his head. "No... the tentacles!"
"Here, let me get you a drink of water." The jug and cup were nearby and Phipps eagerly gulped down the water while Tom held it for him, supporting himself on his good elbow. He was clearly quite exhausted, and soon fell back with his eyes closed. Tom found the bowl again, filled it with fresh, cold water, and, wetting the rag, again drew it across Phipps's brow and patted his neck with it. Phipps's eyes fluttered open again and the water seemed to revive his senses a bit.
"What happened?" Tom asked, finally, struggling to sound as quietly unconcerned as though he hadn't spent frantic moments dashing through the forest, as though his breathing had not just returned to its usual rate, hoping that calmness would help Phipps conquer the terror he still evinced.
"I hardly know," Phipps responded, slowly gathering himself. "I saw something floating down the river. Sometimes it looked like a dead tree and at other times it appeared as though it were moving, writhing... obscene! As it approached more nearly it appeared to be struggling with creatures who were attacking it. They looked at first like huge rats, and then at other moments these creatures appeared to me not as animals but as small people, who were not attacking so much as simply trying to save themselves. When one would break free, he was loath to leave his comrades, and would return to fight for the others. Perhaps this was why I felt that they were people. I was overcome with a sort of horror at the thought of these people losing their friends to violence..."
Phipps's voice trailed off, and Tom understood well that he would have said "...as we have." Whether all this were real or some hallucination or some strange misperception - animals playing with a dead tree, perhaps? - Phipps had interpreted it as a situation much akin to what he had recently experienced, and could not ignore it, or treat it as a passing entertainment.
"So you shot at the... thing? With the tentacles?"
"Yes. I took the first opportunity that I had, when it was nearest and there came a moment when all of the rat people appeared to be out of the way. And I must have hit it well, for it thrashed wildly for a moment, whipping the water into a froth, and then it was gone. And the little people... the creatures... were swimming away."
Tom pictured rats with waistcoats and watchfobs, as in some children's book, and couldn't suppress a smile. "Your fever is up."
"I didn't hallucinate this! It was real!"
"Well, sir..." He found himself at a loss for what to say, and paused with his mouth open, finally settling for, "Why don't you get some rest for the moment? I see you've caught us two more fine fish, and as soon as I get a fireplace built we'll have a good meal. You could sleep until then."
Phipps huffed, but closed his eyes, and was asleep within moments while Tom proceeded to assemble the walls of his intended fireplace. Inexplicable events aside, Tom still needed to eat.
Although he realized he had given Phipps the impression that he did not believe him, in fact either possibility seemed equally likely to Tom as he turned the reported events over in his mind while he worked. He had not heard of a tentacled thing that looked like a dead tree, but he himself had shot at something which had looked very much like that on the first night they were on the raft. (Only the evening before, he thought with a jolt. It seemed almost an age ago.) Rat people? Tom's formal education had consisted of basic numbers and letters and a fear of God, imparted by Mrs. Babbage and Father Cole - he had no reason to think that rat people were not a possibility.
Meanwhile there was the fireplace to be concerned with. The weight of the rocks, sand and mud which he felt necessary to insulate the wood properly from the fire was excessive, and now caused the entire raft to lean precariously so that the water lapped up to the back edge of his fireplace. He had to face the fact that this was no solution for the longer term, despite all his work - the raft could not safely continue to float down the river with this weight upon the corner. However, for the moment he decided to build the fire and cook the fish as best he could that they might eat them before they turned.
Tom wrapped the fish in a thick coating of clay from the river bank and cooked them in the embers of the fire, and by the time they were split to reveal their steaming and succulent centres they had been well seasoned by appetite, and he thought he had rarely smelled anything better. He woke Phipps again with no doubt that the boy would be as eager to tuck in as he himself was, and was therefore surprised at his response.
"What a disgusting smell. It turns my stomach!"
"Fevers often take a person's appetite," Tom responded. Although his traitorous fair skin had reddened with annoyance at the rudeness of the boy's comment, he tried to be conciliatory. "But unless the fever is high you should still try to eat at least a little. Especially someone as thin as you."
"I'm not thin. I'm svelte," Phipps pronounced, raising his chin.
"Whatever you may call it, you must eat or you'll be nothing, soon."
Grudgingly, the younger boy allowed Tom to help him to sit up and accepted a bowl of fish, which he picked at for a while. Eventually, however, he handed Tom the bowl, wordlessly, a substantial amount still in it, and sat back, seemingly exhausted.
Tom helped him back to his bedroll, and sat still for a few moments watching Phipps as he fell asleep, sorry to again be left alone even if Phipps were such a contrary companion. He sighed very quietly to himself, finished eating the young Lord's dinner, and addressed himself to washing the dishes and considering what to do next. His little fireplace would have to be abandoned, and he sighed in frustration at all the work which would need to be done over again on the bank. The rocks were too hot at the moment to take the fireplace apart, so even though he was quite unhappy with staying tied to the shore and all it's myriad possible dangers, he realized that they would have to do so or risk being swamped in the open stream with the raft so unbalanced. And the possible tentacle monster of the deep waters might be hoped to be less danger to them here near the bank, so perhaps it was for the best that they remain here for the night.
With this thought he resolved that he would worry no more about it for this evening. He therefore set himself to cleaning and reloading the gun in case they might need it again at a moment's notice, and laid himself fully clothed under the wagon with a corner of blanket over him, not even taking off his boots. He was determined to ignore the dark trees and simply try to be ready to wake at any odd noise, as he realized he could not remain awake for much longer.
Throughout the night he slept fitfully, awakening at every rustle of breeze, every snap of a twig. Most often he started up only to see all quiet, the only movement that regular sway of branches, and the green gleam of the small moon playing upon the water; twice the disturbance was Phipps whimpering and moaning with the fever. Tom filled the bowl with cold water and mopped at the boy's brow. Phipps clutched at him, mumbling unintelligibly and calling him by odd names, but Tom muttered soothing noises at him and eventually he slept quietly again.
The green moon was later replaced by the more ruddy glow of the larger moon just before the birds and other creatures began their morning cacophony. When that began Tom squinted his eyes shut and had a bit more sleep, which somehow seemed all the better despite all of the noises and the light. Eventually, however, he faced the fact that he needed to rise.
This day promised him more of the same challenges as the last, with the added disadvantage that he was feeling quite slow and dull from his restless night. There was the boy's wound to be washed and bandaged and more food to be found, and the fireplace to be built all over again.
He could avoid none of it, however, and so he began first by splashing water over his own head to clear his thoughts. Phipps complained of Tom's noise and rolled over back-to, then seemed to go directly back to sleep. At least he was quiet, and Tom thought, rather uncharitably, that if all he could do was complain even silence was better. Then his stomach rumbled and his thoughts turned longingly to porridge. He took a handful of the trail food and chewed it over, thoughtfully. It was nuts and berries, not cereals, but anything could be boiled. Hot food would do the boy good, if he could be made to eat it. If there were still that little kettle which had been in the cart - he was almost sure he had seen it, hiding near the fancy irons...
He threw himself into tearing the fireplace apart, cleared a space on the top of the bank above, reassembled the fireplace, found the kettle, and tossed two handfuls of the precious nuts and berries in, adding a little of the dried meat and a good deal of water, and set it to warm, then thought he probably should already have set his fishing line up in it's little holding frame as well.
Meanwhile Phipps grumbled and whined a bit, but he didn't seem to be in the throws of the sort of fitful mumbling and ranting which characterized fever, so Tom endeavoured to ignore him and think kind thoughts about how little restful sleep the boy must have had with his fever peaking as it had during the night.
It was only when he stopped for a moment during his work, while the porridge cooked on the bank above, that Tom began to wonder what time it might be, and missed the sun. The day had not really ever dawned, merely gotten lighter, but the sky was darkening again and it couldn't even be noon. This was not so unlike the sort of weather he had been used to all his life in the city, so he had given it little thought, but he remembered that on this side of the mountains storms might be sudden and violent. He thought of the river, whipped into a frenzy by wind, and began work on lashing the cart down and doubling the lines holding the raft to the bank.
Would it even be safe to be on the raft if the weather came down quite nasty? He thought perhaps it would not, but the only alternative would be to make some shelter of sorts near the fire on the bank above. He pulled out one of the bolts of cloth, the heaviest sort he could find, a dark blue velvet. Probably not the best thing for shedding water, but there was a great deal of it, perhaps he could make it do if he could layer it up well enough.
Loop after loop of the cloth went over a low tree branch, with rocks to hold the loops down where they touched the ground. It wasn't much of a shelter, certainly, but he did scrape the requisite small trench around it to drain off water, as the men in the caravan had taught him, and he thought that at least it might keep a little of the worst off.
When at last he paused in his flurry of activity he checked the porridge and decided to declare it done, and removed it from the fire.
The young lord grumbled at moving, complaining of his stiffness and how sore his shoulder was, and cursing while Tom bodily hauled him up the embankment by his good arm, but he appeared completely coherent, if cranky, and his temperature seemed much lower.
"Why do we have to do this?"
"I have breakfast for you."
"And why can't it be served on the raft?"
"Sir, you may not have noticed, but the weather looks as though it may be turning. I'm afraid a storm is coming, and it seemed it might be prudent to get off the water for the moment."
Phipps made no reply, but stood at the top of the bank cradling his injured arm in the good and blinked, swaying slightly, then he nodded. "Very well. This is to be our shelter, then?" He twitched his chin toward the makeshift tent, and, in response to Tom's affirmative, walked over and slowly settled himself in the doorway, stiff as an old man. When presented with the bowl of simmered trail food Phipps eyed it mistrustfully, tried the tiniest nibble, and pronounced it not only the most aesthetically unpleasing dish he had ever encountered but quite unpalatable besides.
Tom's sympathies, somewhat aroused by the boy's evident illness, were quite dashed by this rudeness, yet still he urged, "Do try to eat a little. It may not taste like much, but it's nourishing."
"If I throw it back up again it won't help at all," Phipps grumbled, but he managed a few more spoonfuls before he thrust the bowl away, insisting he couldn't choke down another bite, and curled up inside the makeshift tent.
Tom ate what he felt was his own share and set the rest of Phipps's share aside, hoping that in a little while the boy might decide that he were hungry after all. He didn't think it was really all that bad, considering what he'd had to work with and his own complete lack of knowledge about cookery.
There was nothing for it, though, he would have to forage and hope that he could find something, and now, while the boy was asleep, was probably the best time. After fetching the bedrolls from the raft and pushing them into the tent to the boy's muttered complaints, he took up the gun, and, as quietly as he could, moved off through the brush and along the bank, upstream.
Most of the vegetation had the shots of reddish colours in their leaves which he had always been told to avoid, and even among those which were the proper green shades which he had been told to look for in plants which would be easily digestible, none looked familiar. Possibly he would just have to try something. Perhaps if he only tried a little, it wouldn't make him very sick? He decided that there was nothing to be gained by not trying, so, when he saw some berries, he picked one and nibbled just half, wandering on and marking a few more plants that looked likely, but not wanting to try anything else before he found out what would happen with the first.
Within a half hour he knew he had made a mistake. As he wiped his mouth shakily with the back of his hand he reflected ruefully that all his hard work of the morning had been lost in only a few moments, and he decided that further experimentation should be suspended. Not only were his efforts so far fruitless, but the sky was now lowering in earnest and the threatening rumbles of thunder had been steadily louder. He was sure the rain would be arriving any moment, he could smell it in the air - he needed to get back to the tent and make sure everything was ship-shape before it came down.
He would keep his eyes open for something he recognized certainly was an edible plant, but for the moment they would fall back on the few things that were left on the raft. Most of these were sweets, though a few were dried fruits which only grew in the warmer Northern climes and were treasured in Abernetty, and he thought he had seen a jar of preserved fish, a particular favourite which was only to be found in salt water. One of the things his own father may have had a hand in supplying, for he was a fisherman, gone for months at a time on board ship. It would be months before Tom's father got the news that he was missing, presumed dead. He didn't know whether to be grateful for that fact. Perhaps he could arrive home before his father ever heard, and save him the grief. The little voice in the back of his mind whispered that they probably would never arrive home at all, but he squashed that voice firmly.
Not far from the camp fire he noticed the paw print of some animal in a muddy spot, and wondered vaguely that he hadn't noted it before, the marks of large claws being sharply defined, but decided it didn't signify as he probably had just been looking another direction when he walked by it. In that moment his reverie was interrupted by a crack of thunder, and the rain the rain came down. All thoughts of the print were driven out of his head in his pell-mell run for the makeshift shelter, shoving himself inside unceremoniously.
"You're wet!" Phipps yelped.
"Yes - " Tom stopped himself from voicing the sarcastic answer that had leapt at once to his lips and modified it to, "Sorry, sir."
"Is there no other place for you to be?"
"Not really."
"Then just stay on your own side would you? There's a good lad."
Tom tucked the gun against the wall and busied himself clipping the front of their tent together with clothes pins. It quickly became dark as the inside of a pocket, and the thrum of the rain in the trees was somewhat muffled, though they could still hear the crash of thunder clearly, and see the flashes of lightning through the cracks.
It took a very few minutes for the velvet to begin soaking through; Tom noticed it on his side just before Phipps cursed. From then on there were barely moments of quiet from Phipps. He subjected Tom to a continual stream of complaints as to his incompetence, his own bad luck, the very unkindness of the weather and the affront of it's raining on him.
Tom managed to bite his tongue for some time, but finally he could stand it no longer. He reached for the clothes pin holding the front closed, but, hitting the cloth clumsily with his arm, popped it off instead and the clothes pin went flying.
"What are you doing you idiot?"
"Leaving!" He had intended it to be stated coolly and levelly, but it came out a roar as he burst forth into the rain.
"You can't! What? Fine!" Phelps emerged from the tent, livid. "You needn't bother - you can stay with your benighted tent; I'll be leaving!" Phipps glared and then stamped off, quickly disappearing into the bushes.
Tom was aghast. The ridiculous little twit, couldn't he even allow Tom to be righteously angry? He had to top everything and make it somehow his own. Stupid little... Why, Tom should really let him wander in the rain until he fell off the riverbank and drowned, until he caught his death of fever, until he starved - no, he'd never live long enough to starve, the helpless little tantruming child; he wouldn't get far.
"Here, come back!"
Tom crashed into the under brush in the direction Phipps had gone, surprised at how faint the noises of the smaller boy's passage already sounded. But the wood was thick, here, and sight and sound were both severely impeded as well by the rain. He had gone barely twenty feet before he was almost upon Phipps, screened from him by only a little brush. The boy moving slowly, slipping on the wet leaves beneath his feet, muttering to himself; the word 'idiot' was prominent. Tom leaped, shot his arm out, and grabbed blindly at Phipps's shoulder, and Phipps shrieked, spun, and punched hard with his good hand, connecting with Tom's chest - the shoulder he had laid hold of was the injured one.
"Here, stop that! Calm yourself!"
To the contrary, as usual, Phipps launched himself into a full assault with his good arm. Tom was surprised at how fast the injured boy was, but he managed to seize both his arms, and as Tom pushed the boy back a little, Phipps shrieked again and crumpled to the ground, his hurt arm folding back. They both found themselves on the wet leaf mold of the forest floor. Phipps seemed inclined to struggle for a moment more, but it was clearly evident that he had no chance and he soon went limp. The rain hid any tears, but Tom guessed that they were there.
"I'm sorry, but you really must calm yourself. It'll be all right"
"It's not going to be all right. Nothing's all right. We're going to die."
"We could, yes." No point in lying, Phipps knew much better than that and would not think better of him for it. "We almost certainly will if we lose our heads. We need to stay calm and work together."
"Work together? I'm useless! I'm worse than useless, I'm dead weight. You might do all right if it weren't for me!"
"Oh come now. Are you calm? Here, sit up." Tom sat next to Phipps, shoulder to shoulder, a gentle but firm contact to keep the boy calm. "After that failure of a tent I made? You were absolutely right, it was terrible."
"Well. Yes. It was. Did you have nothing else you could have used?"
"I didn't want to take the tarp off the wagon, and I think that's the only thing we have that's really made for that sort of use. I've seen velvet shed a few drops of water quite well, when I spilt some on a dress my mother was making for a lady, but that's the extent of my knowledge of velvet."
Phipps looked up at him, a little surprised, then looked down almost as though he were blushing, though his colour did not change, as the fever, while lower, was keeping a faint rosiness in his grey skin.
"I went on a hunting trip with my father and George once," Phipps began, "I think it was one of my father's attempts to make me more useful... It didn't work. We had a tent, but George made himself a little shelter of branches. It took a while and I couldn't see the point, he could have brought a tent, too, but it made him happy. Perhaps we could figure out how to do something like that?"
Tom grinned. "Brilliant! See, you are useful! I'd never have thought of that. Here, let's get off this muddy ground and go stoke up the fire." He easily lifted the slender boy to his feet, and continued to support him with a hand under his elbow as found their way back to their camp site.
****************************
Chapter Ten
(“With A Thousand Elephants!”) - A Pseudo Victorian Boys Adventure
Author: Derien
Genres: Science-fiction/Victorian Adventure/Queer Teen Romance.
Notes:(Please go Back to Chapter One for full Notes)
This chapter = over 4,359 words.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License.
Previous chapters can be found on my own site here,
or read on LiveJournal: CH 1 / CH 2 / CH 3 / CH 4 / CH 5 / CH 6 / CH 7 / CH 8
Chapter Nine: Fire and Fish
The shot rang out against the hills for a time which felt like an age to Tom, in the moment of hearing and identifying the sound and knowing that he must immediately rejoin Phipps on the raft and then reminding his legs how to run. The sling, nearly full of rocks, banged hard against his thigh, feeling like a bruising impact after only a few dozen strides. He struggled to tear it off without stopping, but retained it in his grasp as he realized that it was possibly the best weapon he had available to him at the moment, the gun being with Phipps. His knife might do in a pinch, but he didn't want to get near enough to a lizard-bear or panther-wolf to use it. The threat he now ran toward, branches slapping his face and under brush tearing at his feet, could be either of those or any number of other dangers which he could not imagine. For all he knew that shot may not have come from Phipps's rifle at all - it may have been bandits which had followed them, or other wild men who had left the colony running from the noose or for their own reasons.
At this thought he slowed his pell-mell course a bit, trying to see ahead. He thought he must be near, though all these woods looked the same to him, and he drew closer to the bank. There, that was the limb he had used to pull himself up on, and directly below - he leaned out, trying to stay low amongst the brush - there was the raft.
Phipps lay quite still, curled against the wagon wheel, the gun lying nearby, and did not move as Tom climbed down. All else appeared as still as though the gunshot had never sounded, though his careful survey of the area noted the v-shaped ripples of some small animal swimming toward the opposite bank.
"Sir?" he ventured to call softly. When there was no response he tried again, a little louder. "Sir, it's me. LaPierre." He put his sack of rocks down quietly, nervous in the complete calm, so different from what he had expected to find, and knelt by the boy, touching his forehead hesitantly with the back of his hand - it was burning.
Phipps's eyes flew open wide and he drew a gasp. "The tentacles!" As he had regained consciousness his entire body had gone stiff with fear.
"Did you fire at something?"
"The poor rats!"
"You shot rats?" Though why he would have shot them if he felt sorry for them Tom was unsure.
But the boy was shaking his head. "No... the tentacles!"
"Here, let me get you a drink of water." The jug and cup were nearby and Phipps eagerly gulped down the water while Tom held it for him, supporting himself on his good elbow. He was clearly quite exhausted, and soon fell back with his eyes closed. Tom found the bowl again, filled it with fresh, cold water, and, wetting the rag, again drew it across Phipps's brow and patted his neck with it. Phipps's eyes fluttered open again and the water seemed to revive his senses a bit.
"What happened?" Tom asked, finally, struggling to sound as quietly unconcerned as though he hadn't spent frantic moments dashing through the forest, as though his breathing had not just returned to its usual rate, hoping that calmness would help Phipps conquer the terror he still evinced.
"I hardly know," Phipps responded, slowly gathering himself. "I saw something floating down the river. Sometimes it looked like a dead tree and at other times it appeared as though it were moving, writhing... obscene! As it approached more nearly it appeared to be struggling with creatures who were attacking it. They looked at first like huge rats, and then at other moments these creatures appeared to me not as animals but as small people, who were not attacking so much as simply trying to save themselves. When one would break free, he was loath to leave his comrades, and would return to fight for the others. Perhaps this was why I felt that they were people. I was overcome with a sort of horror at the thought of these people losing their friends to violence..."
Phipps's voice trailed off, and Tom understood well that he would have said "...as we have." Whether all this were real or some hallucination or some strange misperception - animals playing with a dead tree, perhaps? - Phipps had interpreted it as a situation much akin to what he had recently experienced, and could not ignore it, or treat it as a passing entertainment.
"So you shot at the... thing? With the tentacles?"
"Yes. I took the first opportunity that I had, when it was nearest and there came a moment when all of the rat people appeared to be out of the way. And I must have hit it well, for it thrashed wildly for a moment, whipping the water into a froth, and then it was gone. And the little people... the creatures... were swimming away."
Tom pictured rats with waistcoats and watchfobs, as in some children's book, and couldn't suppress a smile. "Your fever is up."
"I didn't hallucinate this! It was real!"
"Well, sir..." He found himself at a loss for what to say, and paused with his mouth open, finally settling for, "Why don't you get some rest for the moment? I see you've caught us two more fine fish, and as soon as I get a fireplace built we'll have a good meal. You could sleep until then."
Phipps huffed, but closed his eyes, and was asleep within moments while Tom proceeded to assemble the walls of his intended fireplace. Inexplicable events aside, Tom still needed to eat.
Although he realized he had given Phipps the impression that he did not believe him, in fact either possibility seemed equally likely to Tom as he turned the reported events over in his mind while he worked. He had not heard of a tentacled thing that looked like a dead tree, but he himself had shot at something which had looked very much like that on the first night they were on the raft. (Only the evening before, he thought with a jolt. It seemed almost an age ago.) Rat people? Tom's formal education had consisted of basic numbers and letters and a fear of God, imparted by Mrs. Babbage and Father Cole - he had no reason to think that rat people were not a possibility.
Meanwhile there was the fireplace to be concerned with. The weight of the rocks, sand and mud which he felt necessary to insulate the wood properly from the fire was excessive, and now caused the entire raft to lean precariously so that the water lapped up to the back edge of his fireplace. He had to face the fact that this was no solution for the longer term, despite all his work - the raft could not safely continue to float down the river with this weight upon the corner. However, for the moment he decided to build the fire and cook the fish as best he could that they might eat them before they turned.
Tom wrapped the fish in a thick coating of clay from the river bank and cooked them in the embers of the fire, and by the time they were split to reveal their steaming and succulent centres they had been well seasoned by appetite, and he thought he had rarely smelled anything better. He woke Phipps again with no doubt that the boy would be as eager to tuck in as he himself was, and was therefore surprised at his response.
"What a disgusting smell. It turns my stomach!"
"Fevers often take a person's appetite," Tom responded. Although his traitorous fair skin had reddened with annoyance at the rudeness of the boy's comment, he tried to be conciliatory. "But unless the fever is high you should still try to eat at least a little. Especially someone as thin as you."
"I'm not thin. I'm svelte," Phipps pronounced, raising his chin.
"Whatever you may call it, you must eat or you'll be nothing, soon."
Grudgingly, the younger boy allowed Tom to help him to sit up and accepted a bowl of fish, which he picked at for a while. Eventually, however, he handed Tom the bowl, wordlessly, a substantial amount still in it, and sat back, seemingly exhausted.
Tom helped him back to his bedroll, and sat still for a few moments watching Phipps as he fell asleep, sorry to again be left alone even if Phipps were such a contrary companion. He sighed very quietly to himself, finished eating the young Lord's dinner, and addressed himself to washing the dishes and considering what to do next. His little fireplace would have to be abandoned, and he sighed in frustration at all the work which would need to be done over again on the bank. The rocks were too hot at the moment to take the fireplace apart, so even though he was quite unhappy with staying tied to the shore and all it's myriad possible dangers, he realized that they would have to do so or risk being swamped in the open stream with the raft so unbalanced. And the possible tentacle monster of the deep waters might be hoped to be less danger to them here near the bank, so perhaps it was for the best that they remain here for the night.
With this thought he resolved that he would worry no more about it for this evening. He therefore set himself to cleaning and reloading the gun in case they might need it again at a moment's notice, and laid himself fully clothed under the wagon with a corner of blanket over him, not even taking off his boots. He was determined to ignore the dark trees and simply try to be ready to wake at any odd noise, as he realized he could not remain awake for much longer.
Throughout the night he slept fitfully, awakening at every rustle of breeze, every snap of a twig. Most often he started up only to see all quiet, the only movement that regular sway of branches, and the green gleam of the small moon playing upon the water; twice the disturbance was Phipps whimpering and moaning with the fever. Tom filled the bowl with cold water and mopped at the boy's brow. Phipps clutched at him, mumbling unintelligibly and calling him by odd names, but Tom muttered soothing noises at him and eventually he slept quietly again.
The green moon was later replaced by the more ruddy glow of the larger moon just before the birds and other creatures began their morning cacophony. When that began Tom squinted his eyes shut and had a bit more sleep, which somehow seemed all the better despite all of the noises and the light. Eventually, however, he faced the fact that he needed to rise.
This day promised him more of the same challenges as the last, with the added disadvantage that he was feeling quite slow and dull from his restless night. There was the boy's wound to be washed and bandaged and more food to be found, and the fireplace to be built all over again.
He could avoid none of it, however, and so he began first by splashing water over his own head to clear his thoughts. Phipps complained of Tom's noise and rolled over back-to, then seemed to go directly back to sleep. At least he was quiet, and Tom thought, rather uncharitably, that if all he could do was complain even silence was better. Then his stomach rumbled and his thoughts turned longingly to porridge. He took a handful of the trail food and chewed it over, thoughtfully. It was nuts and berries, not cereals, but anything could be boiled. Hot food would do the boy good, if he could be made to eat it. If there were still that little kettle which had been in the cart - he was almost sure he had seen it, hiding near the fancy irons...
He threw himself into tearing the fireplace apart, cleared a space on the top of the bank above, reassembled the fireplace, found the kettle, and tossed two handfuls of the precious nuts and berries in, adding a little of the dried meat and a good deal of water, and set it to warm, then thought he probably should already have set his fishing line up in it's little holding frame as well.
Meanwhile Phipps grumbled and whined a bit, but he didn't seem to be in the throws of the sort of fitful mumbling and ranting which characterized fever, so Tom endeavoured to ignore him and think kind thoughts about how little restful sleep the boy must have had with his fever peaking as it had during the night.
It was only when he stopped for a moment during his work, while the porridge cooked on the bank above, that Tom began to wonder what time it might be, and missed the sun. The day had not really ever dawned, merely gotten lighter, but the sky was darkening again and it couldn't even be noon. This was not so unlike the sort of weather he had been used to all his life in the city, so he had given it little thought, but he remembered that on this side of the mountains storms might be sudden and violent. He thought of the river, whipped into a frenzy by wind, and began work on lashing the cart down and doubling the lines holding the raft to the bank.
Would it even be safe to be on the raft if the weather came down quite nasty? He thought perhaps it would not, but the only alternative would be to make some shelter of sorts near the fire on the bank above. He pulled out one of the bolts of cloth, the heaviest sort he could find, a dark blue velvet. Probably not the best thing for shedding water, but there was a great deal of it, perhaps he could make it do if he could layer it up well enough.
Loop after loop of the cloth went over a low tree branch, with rocks to hold the loops down where they touched the ground. It wasn't much of a shelter, certainly, but he did scrape the requisite small trench around it to drain off water, as the men in the caravan had taught him, and he thought that at least it might keep a little of the worst off.
When at last he paused in his flurry of activity he checked the porridge and decided to declare it done, and removed it from the fire.
The young lord grumbled at moving, complaining of his stiffness and how sore his shoulder was, and cursing while Tom bodily hauled him up the embankment by his good arm, but he appeared completely coherent, if cranky, and his temperature seemed much lower.
"Why do we have to do this?"
"I have breakfast for you."
"And why can't it be served on the raft?"
"Sir, you may not have noticed, but the weather looks as though it may be turning. I'm afraid a storm is coming, and it seemed it might be prudent to get off the water for the moment."
Phipps made no reply, but stood at the top of the bank cradling his injured arm in the good and blinked, swaying slightly, then he nodded. "Very well. This is to be our shelter, then?" He twitched his chin toward the makeshift tent, and, in response to Tom's affirmative, walked over and slowly settled himself in the doorway, stiff as an old man. When presented with the bowl of simmered trail food Phipps eyed it mistrustfully, tried the tiniest nibble, and pronounced it not only the most aesthetically unpleasing dish he had ever encountered but quite unpalatable besides.
Tom's sympathies, somewhat aroused by the boy's evident illness, were quite dashed by this rudeness, yet still he urged, "Do try to eat a little. It may not taste like much, but it's nourishing."
"If I throw it back up again it won't help at all," Phipps grumbled, but he managed a few more spoonfuls before he thrust the bowl away, insisting he couldn't choke down another bite, and curled up inside the makeshift tent.
Tom ate what he felt was his own share and set the rest of Phipps's share aside, hoping that in a little while the boy might decide that he were hungry after all. He didn't think it was really all that bad, considering what he'd had to work with and his own complete lack of knowledge about cookery.
There was nothing for it, though, he would have to forage and hope that he could find something, and now, while the boy was asleep, was probably the best time. After fetching the bedrolls from the raft and pushing them into the tent to the boy's muttered complaints, he took up the gun, and, as quietly as he could, moved off through the brush and along the bank, upstream.
Most of the vegetation had the shots of reddish colours in their leaves which he had always been told to avoid, and even among those which were the proper green shades which he had been told to look for in plants which would be easily digestible, none looked familiar. Possibly he would just have to try something. Perhaps if he only tried a little, it wouldn't make him very sick? He decided that there was nothing to be gained by not trying, so, when he saw some berries, he picked one and nibbled just half, wandering on and marking a few more plants that looked likely, but not wanting to try anything else before he found out what would happen with the first.
Within a half hour he knew he had made a mistake. As he wiped his mouth shakily with the back of his hand he reflected ruefully that all his hard work of the morning had been lost in only a few moments, and he decided that further experimentation should be suspended. Not only were his efforts so far fruitless, but the sky was now lowering in earnest and the threatening rumbles of thunder had been steadily louder. He was sure the rain would be arriving any moment, he could smell it in the air - he needed to get back to the tent and make sure everything was ship-shape before it came down.
He would keep his eyes open for something he recognized certainly was an edible plant, but for the moment they would fall back on the few things that were left on the raft. Most of these were sweets, though a few were dried fruits which only grew in the warmer Northern climes and were treasured in Abernetty, and he thought he had seen a jar of preserved fish, a particular favourite which was only to be found in salt water. One of the things his own father may have had a hand in supplying, for he was a fisherman, gone for months at a time on board ship. It would be months before Tom's father got the news that he was missing, presumed dead. He didn't know whether to be grateful for that fact. Perhaps he could arrive home before his father ever heard, and save him the grief. The little voice in the back of his mind whispered that they probably would never arrive home at all, but he squashed that voice firmly.
Not far from the camp fire he noticed the paw print of some animal in a muddy spot, and wondered vaguely that he hadn't noted it before, the marks of large claws being sharply defined, but decided it didn't signify as he probably had just been looking another direction when he walked by it. In that moment his reverie was interrupted by a crack of thunder, and the rain the rain came down. All thoughts of the print were driven out of his head in his pell-mell run for the makeshift shelter, shoving himself inside unceremoniously.
"You're wet!" Phipps yelped.
"Yes - " Tom stopped himself from voicing the sarcastic answer that had leapt at once to his lips and modified it to, "Sorry, sir."
"Is there no other place for you to be?"
"Not really."
"Then just stay on your own side would you? There's a good lad."
Tom tucked the gun against the wall and busied himself clipping the front of their tent together with clothes pins. It quickly became dark as the inside of a pocket, and the thrum of the rain in the trees was somewhat muffled, though they could still hear the crash of thunder clearly, and see the flashes of lightning through the cracks.
It took a very few minutes for the velvet to begin soaking through; Tom noticed it on his side just before Phipps cursed. From then on there were barely moments of quiet from Phipps. He subjected Tom to a continual stream of complaints as to his incompetence, his own bad luck, the very unkindness of the weather and the affront of it's raining on him.
Tom managed to bite his tongue for some time, but finally he could stand it no longer. He reached for the clothes pin holding the front closed, but, hitting the cloth clumsily with his arm, popped it off instead and the clothes pin went flying.
"What are you doing you idiot?"
"Leaving!" He had intended it to be stated coolly and levelly, but it came out a roar as he burst forth into the rain.
"You can't! What? Fine!" Phelps emerged from the tent, livid. "You needn't bother - you can stay with your benighted tent; I'll be leaving!" Phipps glared and then stamped off, quickly disappearing into the bushes.
Tom was aghast. The ridiculous little twit, couldn't he even allow Tom to be righteously angry? He had to top everything and make it somehow his own. Stupid little... Why, Tom should really let him wander in the rain until he fell off the riverbank and drowned, until he caught his death of fever, until he starved - no, he'd never live long enough to starve, the helpless little tantruming child; he wouldn't get far.
"Here, come back!"
Tom crashed into the under brush in the direction Phipps had gone, surprised at how faint the noises of the smaller boy's passage already sounded. But the wood was thick, here, and sight and sound were both severely impeded as well by the rain. He had gone barely twenty feet before he was almost upon Phipps, screened from him by only a little brush. The boy moving slowly, slipping on the wet leaves beneath his feet, muttering to himself; the word 'idiot' was prominent. Tom leaped, shot his arm out, and grabbed blindly at Phipps's shoulder, and Phipps shrieked, spun, and punched hard with his good hand, connecting with Tom's chest - the shoulder he had laid hold of was the injured one.
"Here, stop that! Calm yourself!"
To the contrary, as usual, Phipps launched himself into a full assault with his good arm. Tom was surprised at how fast the injured boy was, but he managed to seize both his arms, and as Tom pushed the boy back a little, Phipps shrieked again and crumpled to the ground, his hurt arm folding back. They both found themselves on the wet leaf mold of the forest floor. Phipps seemed inclined to struggle for a moment more, but it was clearly evident that he had no chance and he soon went limp. The rain hid any tears, but Tom guessed that they were there.
"I'm sorry, but you really must calm yourself. It'll be all right"
"It's not going to be all right. Nothing's all right. We're going to die."
"We could, yes." No point in lying, Phipps knew much better than that and would not think better of him for it. "We almost certainly will if we lose our heads. We need to stay calm and work together."
"Work together? I'm useless! I'm worse than useless, I'm dead weight. You might do all right if it weren't for me!"
"Oh come now. Are you calm? Here, sit up." Tom sat next to Phipps, shoulder to shoulder, a gentle but firm contact to keep the boy calm. "After that failure of a tent I made? You were absolutely right, it was terrible."
"Well. Yes. It was. Did you have nothing else you could have used?"
"I didn't want to take the tarp off the wagon, and I think that's the only thing we have that's really made for that sort of use. I've seen velvet shed a few drops of water quite well, when I spilt some on a dress my mother was making for a lady, but that's the extent of my knowledge of velvet."
Phipps looked up at him, a little surprised, then looked down almost as though he were blushing, though his colour did not change, as the fever, while lower, was keeping a faint rosiness in his grey skin.
"I went on a hunting trip with my father and George once," Phipps began, "I think it was one of my father's attempts to make me more useful... It didn't work. We had a tent, but George made himself a little shelter of branches. It took a while and I couldn't see the point, he could have brought a tent, too, but it made him happy. Perhaps we could figure out how to do something like that?"
Tom grinned. "Brilliant! See, you are useful! I'd never have thought of that. Here, let's get off this muddy ground and go stoke up the fire." He easily lifted the slender boy to his feet, and continued to support him with a hand under his elbow as found their way back to their camp site.
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Chapter Ten
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