#part 71

Shells | Part 71 (shelliott stardew fic)

all parts | <- previous | next ->

i cried too i swear

thanks to cutethulu and mongoosingisme for the proofreading!

Jungwoo smiled and watched Eunji with the heartiest of heart eyes as she laughed. You guessed that as long as she was laughing and having a good time, he didn’t really care about anything else.

Luna turned to you. “Wow, y/n, you look really nice in your dress.”

Here we go.

“Thanks.”

“Normally you’re dressed so comfortably.” She smiled.

“Well I thought about bringing a canvas with me as well but it wouldn't fit in my purse.” You shrugged as you acted like the idea was just, ‘who would have thought?’

She smiled and nodded. “You really clean up well. You’re so pretty when you make an effort.”

You smiled, the expression covering the rage you could feel bubbling up inside. You looked to your right to see if anyone else had heard the conversation and found Taeyong and Eunji staring back at you as they pretended to pay attention to whatever it was Jungwoo and Yuta were talking about. You took a sip from your glass.

“You’re just drinking water? That’s so funny.”

You pretended you didn’t hear her and looked off into nothingness and saw Jaehyun turn to you out of the corner of your eye. You didn’t acknowledge him, you didn’t want to get him involved in… you weren’t even sure what it was. Vague insults? Some kind of weird pissing contest that was being unwillingly forced on you? Wait, is this what it’s like to be negged? You sipped your water as if it was extremely flavorful and delicious and put the glass back and turned to the conversation between Yuta and Jungwoo.

Once dessert came out - three small birthday cakes for the birthday boys and the dessert everyone else had ordered - Johnny tapped his glass to make a toast.

“Hey guys,” he started.

You all said “Hi, Johnny” like you were in a support group and then laughed.

“I just wanted to thank everyone for coming out today. I know it’s not our usual scene, but I’m glad we could all be together for--” he gestured to you.

“The Super Mega Ultra Birthday Bonanza,” you held up a hand like you had something to present.

He nodded back. “That.” And laughed.

“And thank you, so much, to Jaehyun for paying for everyone,” Luna said.

Everyone clapped for him and he nodded awkwardly.

It didn’t escape you that the only reason why he had to pay for everyone was because of her. It didn’t escape anyone else at the table either. But the way Johnny smiled told you it might have escaped him.

“Impact the gee, everyone!” Jungwoo said and hit the woah. You all laughed.

When Johnny, Jungwoo, and Jaehyun had each tried their cakes, Luna cut a piece off of Johnny’s and offered it to Jaehyun. She reached across the table - you were across from her and Jaehyun was on your right - to offer the piece of cake. You were eating your dessert before she started reaching across your plate, not that her trajectory should have taken her across it in the first place.

“I’m fine.” He said.

“Try it,” she smiled.

“I think they’re all the same,” he said and focused on cutting his own small cake with his fork.

Taeyong and Eunji looked at each other and back at Jaehyun. You interceded, eating the piece of cake by clamping down onto the fork and pulling it out of her hand with your teeth. The look of shock she gave you was almost worth putting your mouth on the same fork that had been in hers.

“Delish. Thanks a ton.” You said as you pulled the fork out of your mouth and handed it back to her with the kind of smile an overworked retail worker uses when they want to get into a fight with a customer but can’t. 

She looked stunned as she sat back in her seat. Taeyong and Eunji both caught your eyes - their own now wide and somewhere between panic and delight - and Taeyong pointed at his phone.

“Thank you,” Jaehyun whispered.

You hoped he didn’t see the messages and put your phone in your lap before turning to him.

“I have to pay you back for the food somehow,” you whisper with a smile.

He smiled back.

“Can I try a piece of yours? I want to see something.”

Jaehyun cut a piece of his cake and fed it to you. 

“Yeah, they’re exactly the fucking same.”

You looked out of the corner of your eye at Luna, who was now feeding Johnny’s cake to him. As they giggled together, even you could admit they looked like a cute couple, were it not for the weirdness that just happened and seemed to be immediately forgotten.

You couldn’t quite figure out what she was up to.

previous | main cast | masterlist | next

Tag list: @tansyfleurwhisper​​ • @sista7-7​ • @hey-thatslove • @kimjngws​ • @leagreenly • @daegalfangirl •

“You don’t,” she replied stonily, turning to face Sarfin.  Her eyes were glistening with unshed tears.  “You do what you have to do and pray to the Dragons that you don’t have to kill again.  The one thing that you can’t do is let your own folk be the ones who pay the price of unreadiness.”

In a lighter tone Sula went on, “Now, we are guests.  Let us pay our respects to our host, the Honored Huld.”

Crewmen guided Captains Urson and Farrol away to guest quarters.

Sula led Sarfin to a companionway amidships.  As Sarfin followed, he said, grateful for a way to change the topic, “Something has been nagging at me since we first met.  Why do you call Captain Huld ‘Honored’?”

Sula smiled at the thoughts and memories that the question brought up. “That’s a bit difficult to explain.  He is Honored because in his whole life, whatever the difficulty, he has never done anything unethical or dishonorable.  His decisions in matters of honor and ethics between others are considered to be absolute by the Council that meets on the Wind.”

“OK, now I’m just as curious as before but confused as well,” said Sarfin.  “The Council that meets on the ‘wind’?”

“You will have to take my word for this one.  The Barant fleet Council is in continuous session.  The Captains meet in a way that they call talking on the Wind.  It allows them to communicate without misunderstanding, no matter the distance between them.  Since I learned of them I have also been a part of that Council.  Not only can you not shut them out, you don’t want to.  It is possible to ignore them for a while sometimes, especially when you think that you are right --- Even if you’re not.”  Sula pushed open a sliding door and escorted Sarfin into a cabin.

“Shouldn’t you have knocked first?” Sarfin asked as he entered.

“No need.  I told him that we were coming and he invited us to tea,” said Sula lightly.

“Tea?” said Sarfin curiously, “What is that?”

“It’s a Barant ceremony involving a hot water drink made with especially prepared seaweeds, dried and flaked.  He is doing this to give you honor before his crew,” Sula knitted her brows as she tried to explain.  “By Barant fleet standards you are not a Captain, and neither was I until a short while ago.  According to their rules you have to be able to talk on the Wind to be a Captain.  This ceremony will let his crew know that you are worthy to command in spite of your disability.  That is the same status that I had until recently.”

Sarfin looked around the chamber and realized that it was both of Spartan simplicity and one of the most harmoniously prefect cabins that he had ever seen.  The walls had tall scroll-like paintings of ships and boats on the sea with cloudscapes behind them.  They were done in monochrome gray inks on a material of startling whiteness.  Each ship was unmistakable, yet it had been artfully reduced to only a few lines and some shadows.  Among them, he recognized his own Dorton. It was hung just back of Huld where he sat cross-legged behind a low table.  The floor was covered with a soft matting that was made of long narrow strands of material tied together into bundles.

“Welcome are you, Council Master Sarfin, Sula – Captain and friend.”  He placed both hands palms together, fingers down and bent his head toward them.  Sula repeated the gesture and sat on the floor next to the table.  After the briefest of hesitations, Sarfin did the same.

Huld serenely said, “North we go as swiftly as sail will carry us.  Let us now the time spend to know each other.  Share tea, share self. Barant way it is.”  

He picked up a bow-drill kit and with only a few quick strokes of the bow, had smoke curling up from the tender of fluffy, dried brown seaweed.  A small puff of breath brought a tiny flame which Huld applied to the wick of an oil lamp.  He set the lamp under a small Hag skin pot of water to heat it.

Altogether, the ceremony and its attendant small talk took over an hour.  As they emerged from Huld’s cabin, Sarfin said to Sula, “That tea was amazing!  I’ve never tasted anything like it before.  Do you know how I might get some?”

“Certainly,” said Sula promptly.  “I have a few hundred pounds on the Dark Dragon that I’d be willing to sell.”  She smiled.  “Can’t sell too much or I’d have a mutiny — and I’d have to join the mutineers.  We count it as one of our basic stores.”

“I can see why.  We’ve never had flavored water in the Naral fleet. . . Um . . . Where are we going?”

“Visitor’s cabins.  We don’t need a guide because Huld and I have been working together for a long time.  We know each other’s ships well.” Soon they were settled into adjoining cabins.

At the pace that the Soaring Bird was making, they would be in the vicinity of 00 West, 800 North by what ought have been early to midmorning.  In those latitudes, at the present time of the year, the sun did not fully set at all.  It only got low in the sky.  Sarfin found it disturbing to have no nightfall.

Sarfin spent as much time as he could studying the Soaring Bird and the way that it was run.  This kind of vessel was truly new to him.  At first he thought that the big lobster claw sails were simply exotic looking.  A short talk with the Soaring Bird’s sail lofter taught him the error in that assumption.  They were, in fact, the most efficient sails to be found on all of Sea.

Aboard the Grandalor, Darkistry stood at the steering tackle, making small adjustments to keep the Longin approaching from directly downwind. She was so careful that it appeared to be completely accidental.

While the ships were closing to hailing drum range, Thunderhead came soaring up from the south directly over the Longin and plunged into the water between the ships.  Shortly, he surfaced in a splash of spray and made a take-off run.  He had a fish in his beak.  Now that he was back, his family had to be fed.

Skye leapt from the nest and swooped to greet her mate.  They did a short aerial ballet, sweeping past each other and spiraling tightly, so close that wings gently rubbed.  The dance ended above the nest and Thunderhead dropped into it, casually checking his fall at the last moment with widespread wings and tail.  He perched on the rail and began the process of dividing the fish, sharing it out among youngsters now ready to begin flying.  That done, he flipped off the side of the rail and dropped on a long angle to land solidly on Tanlin’s shoulder, where he rubbed his beak along her jaw in greeting.

“Glad t’ see ye, too, T’under’ead,” said Tanlin as she reached up and scratched him in his favorite spot under the wing.  “Ugh, ye’re all wet.  Let m’ get t’is ‘arness off.  Ye did good, ye ‘andsome ‘Awk, ye.”  She unbuckled the message harness and gave it to Arnat, who was standing near.

“‘Ere, Arnat.  Stow t’is in our cabin.  Ye know w’ere ‘t goes.”  As Arnat scampered off to put away the harness, the Longin began to signal with her Hailing Drum.

“Return the prisoner Kurin to us and surrender to Council Justice!” the drum demanded imperiously.

“That’s not Master Clard’s hand on the drum,” said Kurin worriedly.  “It sounds more like his apprentice Degan.  Now I’m sure something is wrong.”

TO BE CONTINUED

<==PREVIOUS   NEXT==>

Return to the Master Story Index