Book 3 : 665

11 April 665

Manafariiba is here at Manafa. Anwar has come to visit us as usual, but he brings sad news: Mkembi died three weeks ago. She was teaching a new recruit, and was rescuing his sail from a ditching when she just keeled over. By the time the doctor reached her – just a few minutes, they said – she was dead.

No-one knows how old she was, but the doctor estimated about seventy. She’d been with the company for fifty-five years. She’d sailed on Riba’s maiden voyage, ten years ago, and had stayed with her ever since.

12 April

I have received the Riba accounts from the purser. Mkembi was over two million nrega in credit, which funds go to the sailors’ pension fund, in absence of any contrary expressed wish of the deceased (to use the official language).

She could have been claiming her pension herself for years, but she wouldn’t have known what to do. She’d never married and had no children, but half the sailors in the company were her children. I was. And however annoyed she might have been about Aari, Aari was, too.

28 April 665

I am 31 today, unless I’ve lost track of the days at some point. Nobody knows except Aari and me. And Pili. She is still our best friend in Manafa, and Aari helps out there sometimes.

We were thinking maybe to stay in Manafa for the rest of our lives, and start a family here, but the family hasn’t started. Aari’s got pregnant a couple of times, but then she’s lost the baby very early.

We’ve decided to take our pay and go on a voyage, maybe all the way to Ballerra and back¹. That’s the opposite end of the route from Faguri. We’ll ask about Laanoha at every port – I’ve not been asking here, because I’ve not wanted to worry my employers, and anyway we’re pretty sure no-one would know. But we can afford to take a break now and worry about work when we get back – or start a new life near Laanoha, maybe, if we can find it. Maybe if we start afresh near Laanoha Aari will manage to produce a child or two. Or three or four, she says.

Or maybe we’ll just visit Laanoha, and maybe Mezham, and come back to Manafa.

We will see what happens. Tomorrow I shall ask for a four month leave to go to Ballerra and back, and see what the reaction is.

29 April

They must value me more than I realized. The new ship of the line, the tenth, Manafaraani, will be ready to make her maiden voyage sometime in June. They said they had already decided to offer me the job as purser, but weren’t going to say anything just yet. But would I accept the job, rather than taking four months’ leave?

Yes, I would. I did, without even consulting Aari first. She doesn’t mind at all. She is very pleased.

It means we cannot visit Laanoha on the first trip, even if we find out where it is. A passenger, or even an ordinary sailor, can leave a ship whenever they like, but a purser can’t. Not if they ever want a job again. It also means we’ll have a lot more savings by the time we do decide to visit Laanoha.

It is not yet decided whether Manafaraani’s maiden voyage will be to Faguri or to Ballerra first, or perhaps even a short voyage just to Yambai and back. There are extra cabins and the company is hoping to attract passengers in significant numbers.

That makes the purser’s job harder, but I will manage.

Aari says she will work in the kitchen. I am doubtful: there could be some resentment at the purser’s wife depriving kitchen staff of work. Not even as an occasional extra hand when they’re especially busy? Maybe. Or maybe in a special role, serving food to passengers? Yes, that might be a solution.

I am now quite proficient in written Manafai. Adapting to Manafai numbers was easy, and I was always good at arithmetic. Aari says my spoken Laana is quite passable, and I can read and write it, albeit not always perfectly, but quite as well as most Laanohans she says, and then she corrects herself – those that can read and write at all, which is not a large percentage.

One thing I have still not mastered is Captain Senghor’s mizma. He gave me lessons and said I was the best pupil he’d ever had, but I could not, and cannot, recreate the beautiful music he produced, apparently so effortlessly.

Aari says I shouldn’t try. I should create my own music, not try to copy someone else’s, however much I might admire theirs. There is sense in that, of course, but it’s hard advice to follow.

Then Aari picks up the mizma and produces her own beautiful music, without having had any lessons at all. I feel like an imbecile beside my wife. But she says, No, you are trying to do something really complicated, and when you achieve it, you will be far ahead of what I just did, or what I could ever do.

I wonder if that’s true, or whether she’s just trying to be kind. She says it’s true, and I have to believe her, because that’s how our relationship works. We both tell each other the truth, or at least what we believe to be the truth. I translate what I have just written for her, and she nods.

11 June 665

Tomorrow is Raani’s first trial. Aari and I will not be aboard, but we will be at the initiation ceremony. I have never had a uniform before, and I feel uncomfortable in it. Aari, on the other hand, wears hers as if she’s worn such clothes all her life.

Aari thinks she may be pregnant again. We hope against hope that she is, and that she can hold onto the baby this time, if she is. She is quite at ease about having a child on board. She says she trusts the ship’s doctor as much as she trusts any doctor or midwife in town. And as purser I’m entitled to have my family aboard.

One of the captains on Gana has his wife and two children on board.

At my suggestion, Aari asked Pili if she wanted to close up the cafe and come to run the kitchen on Raani, but Pili said no, she doesn’t know if she’d get seasick and then her cafe would be gone. These big ships aren’t like small ships, but in a rough sea even they might possibly affect a few people badly, it’s true. Aari is sad, but Pili is probably wise. This is not news, Aari says.

13 June

We have six days to prepare for Raani’s first voyage.

It’s to be a return trip to Yambai, with twenty-four cabin passengers in twelve cabins, and an unknown but probably large number of deck passengers. Barriers are being constructed on deck to keep the passengers from getting in way of the flyers. This has never been considered necessary before, but passenger numbers have never been like this before.

We have an almost normal amount of cargo – twelve cabins-worth less. If we can keep the cabin passenger numbers up, our finances will be good, but I hope we don’t always have deck passenger numbers like this.

If the office actually sells as many tickets as they think they will. We will see. Sales are going well so far. All the cabin tickets are sold, and there are reservation lists for future voyages, even though there are no specific plans yet for them.

28 June

I have been too busy to write in here. But I must write this. Writing helps me to think. We are at Yambai.

I am still Gordon Beer, because I’ve been in continuous employment with the company. Aari insists I’m Mezhab Birgom, and I’m very happy with that. But perhaps it’s just as well that I haven’t changed my name yet.

Aari is hiding in our cabin, and doesn’t know what to do. She was pale as a sheet when I found her there. She’s sure that Kaasham didn’t recognize her, but she’s sure he did, too. She’s twenty years old now, and she was six or seven years old last time he saw her, but she says she has a Laanohan face, and she’s sure he must have seen her go pale when she saw him.

Mezhab Kaasham. A flyer on my ship. Possibly trained by Mkembi, but maybe trained on one of the other ships. Recently trained: he’s still only flying a second sail.

Why was he ashore at Yambai? We lost two flyers because they got drunk, but weren’t there any more experienced flyers looking for work? Or perhaps Rembran thinks it’s worth saving a few nrega by employing someone less experienced. Or, to be fair, we can use a second sail flyer, we’re well prepared to do training, and developing additional experienced flyers is always good for the company. Rembran is an experienced captain; I’m just a purser.

So we have Mezhab Kaasham aboard. Aari half thinks this is a godsend – maybe he knows how to get to Laanoha? – and half thinks it’s terrifying. She doesn’t know how he’ll react to her.

She’s half afraid that he’s deliberately sought work on our ship because he’s heard her name, maybe from Anwar or Mkembi, and if he has, she doesn’t know what his intentions are.

There is only one solution to this. I will have to find him, and talk to him. If he hasn’t deliberately sought her out, and hasn’t noticed her, then I might be drawing his attention needlessly. But I can try to work him out without giving anything away. If he has sought her out, or has noticed her, then we need to know his mood. I need to think how to approach this.

2 July 665

We needn’t have worried. Before I’ve even approached Kaasham, he’s taken the first opportunity to come to my office.

Mkembi had asked him where he was from.

She’d not met many Laanohans, just Aari in recent years.

Aari? From Laanoha? About twenty by now?

Seventeen three years ago.

It had to be her.

Mkembi told him how a flyer called Gordon had rescued Aari, and that she’d heard I was now working in the port office in Manafa. He started looking for work on the first ship headed for Manafa, and then there was Aari on Raani. Obviously Aari. And then he heard that the purser’s name was Gordon, which clinched it.

He wanted especially to meet me and say how happy he was, how worried he’d been about Aari’s future.

The only reason he had stayed with her father, rather than heading back to Laanoha while there were still ships going that way, was to look after Aari if anything happened to her father, and he was heartbroken when he was put ashore, and never really knew why he had been. He says he was never drunk in his life. He thinks Aari’s father simply wanted to sever any connection with Laanoha, perhaps in grief...but he noticed my expression at that point, and added, or perhaps because he had something to hide. But if he had, Kaasham doesn’t know what it was.

He says he doesn’t, anyway. He was obviously worried something might happen to her father, though. I wonder what did happen to him?

Aari gives me a look, and says she still wonders that, too. He wasn’t so old, she says. How old? say I. Mid-forties, maybe, she thinks.

Kaasham says he doesn’t want to take advantage of his connection with us, he knows he’s an ordinary sailor, and quite happy to be so. He’s no fool; he’s reasonably numerate and literate in Laana, but not in Manafai. If he ever gets back to Laanoha, perhaps he’ll be a first mate again, or even a captain, but if he becomes a fully proficient flyer on a ship of the line he’ll be satisfied. The conditions are better on these ships than on small ones, he says, whatever your rank.

He has just one favour to ask: do we know how to find Laanoha? I couldn’t help laughing, and told him we were going to ask him the same thing. Like Aari, he’s not sure whether he’d like to return there to live, but he’d very much like to visit, and see how he feels then.

He says, and he is right, that although we are friends now and always will be, that we must not be seen to be friends, or we will both suffer. But he will try to stay on our ship, and if we ever find out how to reach Laanoha, please would we let him know.

Aari is thoughtful. I will not disturb her thoughts by translating that for her for the moment.

Except that she has asked what I have just written.

She says we must think about what our plans should be now.

She remembers coming through straits when she was a little girl. Wide enough for a ship like Raani to run or reach through, but too narrow for a really big ship to beat through. She remembers beating through them in their little ship. She’s not sure whether it’s one long strait, or more than one, or whether they went back and forth through them, or what. But she remembers straits, and is sure that’s why the big ships don’t go that way. Maybe there are other routes to Laanoha with no narrow straits, but with wild country where no-one wants to go.

Maybe Kaasham knows more, even if he doesn’t know enough to find his way?

We will find a chance to talk to him sometime. There’s no hurry, and we mustn’t seem to be too friendly with him. I’ll keep asking in ports, anyway.

16 July

We are back in Manafa. For five days. After that we are heading for Ballerra, which suits us very well. This was decided not long after we left for Yambai, but of course we didn’t know until we got home.

It’s an open sea crossing all the way to Ngtok, maybe five or six days in this direction apparently. Our twelve passenger cabins are all booked that far, but only two of them all the way to Ballerra. Word has gone ahead of us to take bookings from Ngtok. We shall see.

The port office has anticipated our captains’ decision about deck passengers. They’ve only taken forty firm bookings, and wait-listed the rest. Those will have to wait: the captains want the barriers removed, and strictly limited deck passenger numbers.

The flyers will be much relieved.

There is some turnover of crew, as usual here. Kaasham is with us again, as expected. Interestingly, from my point of view, some of the new names look possibly English – Browth’s kind of English, if not mine. Written in Manafai letters, so I still haven’t seen whether they write English the same way I do.

Not many people on board know that I’m English, or that I speak English, and I certainly don’t want any of these chaps to know. But my name? Will they guess?

Aari, as usual, has the solution. I’m off to talk with Rembran, he will understand.

17 July

All three captains laughed, but they’re agreeable. My hair and beard are now neatly trimmed, and Aari has short hair. And the purser on Raani is now Mezhab Birgom, and his wife is Anaari. All the officers know, and apart from Kaasham, none of the crew are familiar enough with the purser to notice. Or if they do notice, they may not be sure, or they may think they’ve not caught my name properly. Almost certainly none of them can read. And what’s a purser’s name to them? Foreign, anyway.

21 July

The first, and so far the only, crew member to notice is Vropeno, our senior flyer – Raani’s answer to Riba’s Mkembi. He’s happy with the idea that Birgom is just Gordon Beer backwards, a version that’s easier for people to say. He’s not noticed the Mezhab bit at all, which pleases me. With luck no-one will notice that our family name is the same as Kaasham’s. Not that it matters hugely, I don’t think.

Some people’s family names are used because their personal names are common, but Kaasham is the only Kaasham aboard, and I’m probably the only Birgom in the world. Nobody will bother with our family name.

I’m still crossing my fingers a bit over all this.

Aari says I worry too much. So what if some of them realize I speak English? They’re not going to come reading our diary. They probably can’t read anyway.

Maybe some of them know Browth? Not very likely, and even if they do, they probably hate him. Aari is right. As usual.

26 July

Ngtok. A good, fast passage. An attractive city in the evening sunlight. I’ve never been here before, but Aari remembers it. She’s been here several times with her father.

Yes, she says, like nearly everywhere else. The only places she’s been since we met that she’d never been before were Bankarh and Uguhhr. We both have mixed feelings about Bankarh. The end of our old life, and the beginning of this one.

27 July

Our passengers have all gone ashore. In addition to the four who always intended to go all the way both ways, six more say they will continue for at least one more passage and will spend the nights on board.

I wonder how many tickets the port office here has sold, but they’ll only be wait listed so there’s no problem.

I have to visit the port office, and I can spend some visiting the town for my own purposes, but I can’t spend too long. I have work to do on board.

There’s no reason at all why Aari shouldn’t come with me, no. We will not wear our uniforms. We haven’t been wearing them on board. We will only wear them for special occasions.

They have sold two more tickets, as far as Gurung – two passages. So we have six vacant cabins. This is disappointing, but not serious. Cargo is our main income, and it’s still possible we’ll get more passengers in the next two days.

For the first time in years, I have heard English spoken. Not the same as the English Browth or the sailors I met on Riba spoke, but more like theirs than like mine. Two sailors, not ours, in a cafe. I didn’t say anything to them, but Aari and I sat close to them to eat our meal, and I listened. She and I talk in Laana, and no-one seems to understand us here.

It was interesting to listen to the English conversation. I think they realized I was listening, but I think they thought I was just interested to hear their strange language. I don’t think they realized I could understand them.

Interesting, but not useful. Well, somewhat useful: they both came from Ballerra. So presumably Ballerra is where they speak English.

They complained about their captain, and wished they knew enough Manafai (they pronounced it Manaafei) to find work on another ship. I found work on Riba on the strength of my riveting skill, with strange English and no Manafai at all, but I wasn’t going to say anything.

I doubt the captain they were complaining of was Browth. In fact, I wonder whether Browth’s home is closer to the other end of the line than to Ballerra. You never hear English in Manafa. And I know now that there are at least two different sorts of English this side of The Weather.

28 July

We went ashore again today. The port office has sold more tickets. One extra passenger will travel with us all the way to Ballerra, and has already booked for two to travel back all the way to Manafa, with separate cabins. Small blessings. He probably speaks English, to judge by his name, but I shan’t say anything.

We have still heard no Laana, and no more English today.

We asked in a few cafes whether they’d ever heard of Laanoha, but no-one had. We got some funny looks. It seems that one scruffy sailor asking odd questions is one thing, a respectable couple asking odd questions is a different matter.

If I get an opportunity to talk to Kaasham without attracting attention, I shall suggest to him that he does the asking.

Aari looks at me. If he’s really interested in a visit to Laanoha, why hasn’t be been asking these questions himself ever since he left Vamura? What has he been doing in the last four or five years?

A question. No answer. Is it a worrying thought? I don’t know, and that’s worrying. In fact, are you thinking what I’m thinking, Aari?

She wants me to say what I’m thinking, but I can see in her face that she’s thinking something very similar.

Aari looks at me again.

There’s no reason why the people in Vamura would lie, no reason at all. And all of them said much the same things. Kaasham left Vamura four or five years ago, beyond a doubt. He really was left there by your father, he wouldn’t have chosen to become a beggar. Then four or five years ago, he managed to get a job sailing.

Then three years ago, your father disappeared in Yambai.

Where was Kaasham then?

Another thought, says Aari. When exactly did Kaasham meet Mkembi? He’s still only flying second sail, he’s not graduated to full sail yet, so not so long ago. When did Mkembi die? Who was the trainee flyer?

Did Mkembi know you’d killed my pimp? You wouldn’t have told her that, would you?

No, I wouldn’t. She knew we’d escaped, and had to swim for it rather than get a boat somehow, but I didn’t tell her anything else. I’ve never told anyone but you. Not about fighting with pirates, either.

Good, says Aari. So he doesn’t know how capable you are in a fight. And I’m sticking close by your side until we can get rid of him somehow. Maybe he’s innocent, but I’m not going to take any chances.

We must talk to the captains. It would be good to hear what the doctor who attended Mkembi thought, but we can’t do that until we coincide with Riba in some port. Where is Riba just now?

I ought to know that, more or less. I can’t remember, but I can work it out.

She was in Manafa about the tenth of April. That’s when Anwar told us Mkembi had died. She was heading to Faguri after that.

Via Yambai. Where we picked up Kaasham. So when do we meet Riba again?

Not for ages. They’re nearly at the other end of the line by now, and we’re still heading towards Ballerra.

Funny that he talked about Mkembi without mentioning that she was dead. Unless he wasn’t on Riba that trip, and doesn’t know she’s dead. In which case, why is he still only flying second sails? He’s not stupid, and he’s not a weakling. They wouldn’t have been teaching him to fly if he was.

For sure he was on that trip. Did they put him ashore for some reason? Why else would he leave the ship at Yambai?

If he was trying to catch us, he’d have left the ship at Manafa, surely?

Maybe he was worried about raising suspicions about Mkembi’s death? Perhaps he wanted to return to Manafa secretly, rather than letting anyone put two and two together if anything happened to us so soon after Mkembi?

Did he kill Mkembi? Why?

Who knows? But it’s too suspicious to ignore. Perhaps she knew too much, or he thought she might have guessed too much.

Maybe we’ve guessed too much, or maybe he thinks we might have. I’m going to talk to the captains.

Aari says she is coming with me. She is afraid to be alone.

She’s been scared about Kaasham all along.

“Yes,” she says, “but I didn’t know why.”

Speech marks! she says.

29 July

Kaasham is in jail. He protests his innocence, and claims that he doesn’t know why he’s in jail. No-one is telling him for now. He is staying at Ngtok until we return from Ballerra, when we will take him to Manafa. The guards have promised to treat him well, as it is possible that he is innocent.

Aari and I have our doubts, but we have no proof.

I suddenly think of my time in Faguri. The guards did treat me well, really.

There is a spring in Aari’s step that I haven’t seen since she saw Kaasham.

Rembran jokes – jokes! – that if you want to surprise an old friend, wait for them in Manafa; if you want to surprise an old enemy, wait for them in Yambai. Apparently it’s an old saying, a real one, only the other way around. He says it was probably true the other way round a long time ago, but times change.

He says the people are the same in both places – some bad, some good – but the places are different.

I asked him about Faguri, and he laughed. Don’t wait there at all, he said. In fact, don’t go there unless you have to. I don’t think he knows what happened to me there.

Then he added, unless you have friends in Kep and need to find a ship going there. So he knows about Kep, or maybe he does know something about my history.

10 August 665

Bingung. A day longer than average getting here – unfavourable winds.

Here I am, writing, when this is really my busy time. Not so busy between ports, but Aari and I have been spending time on deck, watching the coast gliding by, or coming up close and then disappearing in the distance again when we’re beating. Have we been passing a string of huge islands, or is this a coast with many huge inlets? We could have passed a dozen straits leading to Laanoha. There are a few small boats coming and going in some places, but no ports big enough for us to bother with.

When we crossed the open sea from Manafa to Ngtok, who knows what we might have passed? I don’t want to ask our captains, and I don’t know whether they’d know anyway.

They know that I don’t come from Ballerra, even though I speak English, and that Aari and Kaasham come from Laanoha. But I sometimes think they think England and Laanoha are imaginary places for people with shady pasts. I sometimes start to wonder myself.

Aari reminds me that she and I have our own conversations in Laana these days, and imaginary places don’t have their own languages. Not enough to hold whole conversations, anyway. And everyone clearly trusts Aari and me well enough.

Our possibly English speaking passenger speaks good Manafai. Whether he actually speaks English I don’t know, because there’s no-one for him to speak it with, and I shan’t introduce myself. I guess he’s probably literate in Manafai, but my name gives nothing away – except to anyone who knows Laanoha, and they will be misled.

Aari has taken like a duck to water to her role looking after the cabin passengers. They say she also serves who stands and waits, which is true enough, but she also listens. She will learn more that way than we could ever learn by asking questions in cafes.

But I will continue to do that. I will go alone this time. I cannot be a scruffy sailor again. Everyone will know that I am the ship’s purser, or some official from the ship, but what of it? What do a few funny looks matter?

Aari tells me I must be careful. The kinds of places we used to visit cheerfully in our scruffy days are not always very safe places for a respectable gentleman. I remind her that I have fought pirates and a pimp, and she points out that success in such ventures is not guaranteed. Add to which, I don’t have the physique I used to have.

Okay. Point taken. I shall stick to respectable areas in daylight.

Make sure you do, she says.

I may not learn so much, but such is life.

Life is more important than learning, says Aari.

11 August

We have another cabin passenger. Just going as far as Lillat. He will join us tomorrow, just before we sail. Is it a problem if he has a couple of cats? No, but there will be an extra charge because of the cleaning. That isn’t a problem, the port office says.

16 August

Lillat. Or Lillaat, depending who you talk to.

The cats have gone, and the cabin is clean. Aari says that we must not carry cats again unless we take on someone to do the cleaning. A man with no sense of smell, she says.

How much we have both changed, in so short a time.

There have been complaints from the other cabin passengers as well. We will not carry cats again.

23 August

Our English speaking passenger is literate in Manafai, and has noticed my name. He asked me whether I come from Laanoha! Without thinking, I answered, no, but my wife does. Which confused him for a moment.

Backwards names I knew about, he said, I didn’t know men took their wive’s names in Laanoha. It’s not as simple as that, I said, and he looked at me.

He knows about Laanoha, thought I. What better chance do we have? I have to take him into our confidence, thought I.

I asked him whether he spoke English, and he gave me that look again, only more so.

Aari isn’t sure whether to be angry with me or hopeful. Hopeful, of course, she says, but I can see both in her face. You know me too well, she says. No, well enough.

Smile.

Did you ask him in Manafai, or in English? she says.

In English.

Never mind how he looked at you! What did he say?

How he looked at me struck me more than what he said. He paused for several moments, then, speaking slowly, asked me why I asked him, of course he speaks English, he’s Ballerran, but why do I speak English? I’m obviously not Ballerran.

So I had to tell him I’m English, from England, and he looked that look at me again. Where’s that? he said, I’ve never heard of it.

Aari wants to know what I told him. I asked him if he knew Kep, and he doesn’t but he’s heard of it. It’s the end of the world, he said. And I told him, no, there’s whole lot more world beyond it, but very few people make it alive from one to the other. And he says he wants to hear more of this story, but he has work to do. And he went off, I think to his cabin.

Do you think he believes you? says Aari.

I don’t know. But if he knows about Laanoha, that everyone else thinks is a fairy story, maybe he’s ready to believe in England.

Aari looks at me, and I add, hurriedly, that I know Laanoha is real, of course. I’ve never doubted it for a moment.

Truth? she asks. Truth. Really.

Well – only when I’ve started to doubt the existence of England as well, and my own sanity.

She has work to do, and so have I.

24 August

If the weather’s bad, the cabin passengers have their meals in their cabins, but normally they are out on deck, in the area behind the bow pilot flyer and forward of the bow second flyer, just above their cabins. The deck passengers are at the stern, just forward of the stern pilot flyer.

The Ballerran man was the first cabin passenger on deck for his breakfast. Aari went to take his order. Much to her surprise, he addressed her in Laana, apologizing that his Laana was not very good, and asking if she was my wife. He’d guessed that she was, he said, because she looks Laanohan. When she confirmed it, he gave her a note for me.

Other passengers arrived shortly afterwards, and she went to take their orders. He clearly didn’t want other passengers to realize they’d been talking, and attended to his breakfast, only speaking briefly, in Manafai, about ordinary day-to-day matters.

That’s probably for Aari’s sake.

Yes, of course, she says.

The note is in English, but written in the Manafai script:

Aari wants to know what the note says, so I translate for her.

It’s actually a different skill, reading English in Manafai script and translating into Laana, from reading normal English and translating into Laana. It’s not easy, and I’m making mistakes.

I wonder if he wrote it in Manafai script because he realized that I must know Manafai script to do my job, but thinks that I might not be literate in English? Or maybe they use Manafai script for English in Ballerra?

Maybe you’ll find out, says Aari, or maybe you won’t. Does it matter? Meaning that she thinks it doesn’t.

She nods.

We arrived at Ornom just before noon. It’s a small place, but the port is busy because it’s at the end of a strait leading to several other small ports. We will be here for three days, exchanging cargo with numerous smaller vessels that are able to navigate the strait easily. I wonder whether this is the strait – or one of the straits, if there are several – that leads to Laanoha, but I’m prepared to bide my time and wait for the answer to come to me, rather than going in search. For the moment.

Two of our cabin passengers decide to beg a trip up the strait and back with one of the small ships, and I wish I could go too, but I have a lot of work to do here, and they’re expecting to be gone for two days.

I’ve visited the port office this afternoon, and will go again before we leave. With luck I’ll have a little time to take a wander around he town and chat or listen in a few cafes. Don’t forget what I said about being careful, says Aari.

I won’t, I promise.

The last time you promised me anything you nearly got yourself killed, she says.

Yes, but it was worth it.

Smile.

And a big kiss.

What did you have to write that for?

It’s a diary. A record of our lives.

There’s a lot of stuff missing then.

True. I don’t want to spend my entire life writing.

Sometimes you seem to. STOP IT!

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On to Book 4