Awakeners by Sheri S Tepper

“Nailing canvas over the hatches to keep water out.”

“Waves?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never been in a bad storm. Rain, I suppose. Waterspouts, maybe. I’ve seen those.” Thrasne was suddenly deeply depressed. The Gift was about to be assaulted and he had no idea how to protect her. “If things get violent, you might rig some straps over the bunks and strap yourself in. Less likely to be hurt that way, I should think.” He turned and blundered out, needing to see what Blange was up to. Surely there would be something he could do.

When he emerged from the owner-house door, he was shocked into immobility by the wall of black that confronted him. The Gift rocked in a tiny pocket of clear water. Straight above them Potipur bulged toward the west, pushing his mighty belly toward the sunset in a tiny circle of clear sky. Elsewhere was only cloud and the ceaseless mutter of thunder. At the base of the cloud lay a line of agitated white, and Blange pointed this out, his face pale.

“There’s the wind,” he said. “Those are the wave tops, breaking up. It will be on us soon.” He turned away, shouting for men to help him cover the other hatch.

“The ventilation shafts,” Thrasne cried suddenly. “We have to cover the ventilation shafts.”

“I’ll help,” said a small voice at his side. Medoor Babji. “Taj Noteen and I will help you. We can do the front shaft.” Indeed, she knew well where it was, for she had sat there many an hour during the voyage, watching as Thrasne himself had once watched. Birds. Waves. The floating stuff that the River carried past.

“Get tools from Obers-rom,” Thrasne said, hurrying away to the aft shafts, one eye on the rushing cloud.

Obers-rom gave them a hammer, nails—worth quintuple their weight in any nonmetal coin. “Take care,” he growled at her. “Don’t drop them, Medoor Babji. These are all we have.” He sent one of the other men to carry the cleats.

She and Taj Noteen scrambled across the owner-house roof and dropped onto the grating above the shaft. They would have to squat or lie on the grating and lean downward to nail the cleats across the canvas. There was not roofs for two of them.

“Get back up,” she grunted. “You can hand me the cleats as I nail them.” She spread the canvas beneath her, holding it down with her body, pressing it against the outside of the square shaft, reaching behind her to take the cleat.

The wind struck. The Gift shuddered, began to tip. Medoor Babji cursed, thrust the hammer between her body and the canvas, and held on. Above her, Taj Noteen shouted, but she could not understand what he was saying.

The wind got under the canvas, lifted it. Her hands were clenched tight to it, her eyes shut. Only Taj Noteen saw her lifted on the bellying sail, lifted, flown, over the side and down into the chopping River. The water hit her and she screamed then, opening her eyes, seeing the loom of the Gift above her. Under her the canvas bulged like a bubble, air trapped beneath it, floating her. She was moving away from the boat. Away. She screamed again, soundless against the uproar of the sudden rain.

Then something struck the canvas, brushed it, away, brushed it again. The Cheevle. It bowed toward her once more, and she grabbed the side, lifted by it as it tilted away from her, pulling herself in. The canvas was tangled around her legs. It followed like a heavy tail, and she rolled onto the cover of the Cheevle. The wind stopped, all at once, and glassy calm spread across the waters.

Medoor Babji shouted. There were figures at the rail of the Gift, staring at her. Blange shouted at her. “Get under the cover, Babji! Get under it and lace it up. The wind is coming back. There’s no time to pull you in. . . .”

She had scarcely time to comprehend what he had said and obey him, hurriedly loosening the lacing at one side of the little boat enough to crawl beneath it. She lay in the bottom of the boat, on the blankets tumbled there, and tugged at the lacing string with all her strength, pulling it tight again only moments before the wind struck once more. It was like being inside a drum, then, as the rain pounded down upon the tight canvas, and she clung to the lacing strings, flung this way and that by the wind, protected from battering only by those tumbled blankets and the wet canvas that had almost killed her, then saved her from drowning.