Proper Pirates

There weren’t always dragons in the valley. When father was a child it was all dry earth and a village deep down in the belly where a village should never be. To-ka says she remembers this too but she has no business remembering this because she is six and father says the water came a long time ago. He told her to stop showing off because who are you showing off for and she didn’t get any meals for two days until she got dizzy and had to lie down. When she was allowed back at dinner her fingernails were all eaten right to the bottom. That’s how hungry she was. I’ve never been that hungry because I don’t show off like To-ka.

We have been three days at sea. I know because there are three marks above the big door. There’s a barrel by the door and I stand on that to look at the marks and count them all up. Three isn’t so many. Sometimes there get to be so many that I have to count four or five times because I keep forgetting. Three is a good number. We still have salted fish and hard cheese at meal times to go with our bran and the water barrels are full right to the top. I know because I check every morning. It is very bad when the water is low so its worth keeping an eye on it.

When I look over the side into the water, I feel strange in my tummy thinking about the valley down in the dark. It’s been that way a long time. Before mother had to go away she used to give us lessons before bed so I know. She said the villagers who lived there tried to stop the flood. They built dams and dug trenches to divert the water away. But the water had already been diverted there by the giants and the water was tired of being diverted. Some of the people got away but lots are still down there. Mother said it was a tragedy and that the valley is haunted by ghosts.

Then father said it was a stupid place for a village anyway and we should all be grateful it happened. Then he told mother he thought that was quite enough lessons and we should all go to bed and mother’s mouth went into a dark line. But father was right, because if the village was still here then there would be no dragons for us. So I am grateful even though looking down into the water makes me feel strange in my tummy and mother isn’t here anymore to make me laugh and feel okay again.

There have been two dragon sightings so far which is very good for three days at sea. It is my job to check the compass when there is a sighting and then I tell father and he checks to make sure I am right. I am very good at it so I usually am. Then he writes it down in the big book and sometimes puts a hand on my shoulder. It is a very important job and I am glad to do it. To-ka doesn’t have a job because father doesn’t trust her like he trusts me. She came down last night swearing she’d seen a dragon off the bow when she was up there alone which father said was awfully convenient wasn’t it and so it didn’t count.

Once I was the very first person to see a dragon and To-ka is jealous. I really saw one though and she is just pretending.

I was keeping watch in the crow’s nest. Nobody told me to but it is always worth keeping an eye out. At first it looked like nothing much, a darker bit of water and ripples like a diver bird had just gone down. Then something came up through the surface and I thought it was a rock, all dark and jagged and water running down the sides. It kept coming, bigger and bigger, and then it turned and looked at me. That’s when I knew it was a dragon and I hollered and pointed even though that’s not what you’re supposed to do. Everyone on the deck turned and saw and later father said I was turning into a proper pirate. When I went to bed that night I kept thinking about him saying that and it filled me right up to the top.

I didn’t tell father but I was scared seeing the dragon. Usually you don’t see much all that much of them because they’re underwater. You get them and then you use the big saws and take them up out of the water in pieces because they’re too big unless you chop them up. Then the slabs go right down into the very bottom of the ship. I help carry the smaller pieces. It’s easy to find the way because the floor gets all dark and sticky and you can follow the path all the way down. For days everyone is red right up their arms and all down their front and the bottoms of their feet. You’d think it would smell bad but after a while it doesn’t smell of very much at all.

But the dragon I saw from the crow’s nest wasn’t cut up and it looked at me. I never thought about dragons having eyes. It seems silly to say now but I didn’t. Its eyes were big and silver, all shiny like coins, but it didn’t have a face for them to go in. The eyes were just in the side of the rock that wasn’t a rock and they looked at me and a shiver went all down my back. I stayed like that for a long time and it was only when the dragon began to go back down that I hollered. I don’t know why but I couldn’t before that. Mother would have known why.

Father said mother isn’t coming back so that’s how I know we’ll never see her again. To-ka says we’ll run away together and find her one day but To-ka is just showing off. If she’s not careful father will hear and then where would she be. She doesn’t remember what it’s like to run out of space above the big door and its alright now with the water barrels still full up to the top but you’ve got to get all the food you can before there stops being any. I have to make her understand so she can be more like me and then father won’t have to knock her about. It’s for her own good but I still curl up in my sleeping bag and put my hands over my ears when the sounds come through the walls.

It’s silly and I can’t ever tell father but when that happens sometimes I talk out loud. It is dark and it is just me so it doesn’t matter. I talk to To-ka even though she can’t hear me. I tell her we’ll be okay. She just has to learn. We’ll be okay without mother.

I’m going to teach her so she can be a proper pirate like me.