Summer Break

I seem to be on a summer break. Not by choice--but I'm in a traveling troupe of actors and so in rehersal all week, and I'm also in the process of making a short film. All this combined with the chores I've been putting off to do this summer make me very busy. I'm so sorry. I will return, just possibly not till September.

End of World Walker Episode 1

Let me know if you're up for more Worldwalker or if you'd prefer I go back to WUC...

Back!

and:

What's Up

I'm super busy in "real life" right now. Auditions, school, and rehersal...my "hell week" for the show I'm in is next week. All really cool, except they mean there probably won't be any more posts util May. Then--I promise!--there will be, but until then I think I'm just reading.
Till later then!

As promised...

More Worldwalker

The Earl Chooses a Tutor

Calling on the Farriers was one of the most awkward experiences the Earl had had in a while. He did not know who made it most awkward. Elinor, evidently pleased to see him, was somehow hidden away under her spinster's cap; Edward, who had in the last two years had grown very haggard, seemed just as good natured but perhaps a bit weary. Only little Charles in Edward's arms seemed to have any true energy in that stifling, fashionable drawing room. The cause of these changes, or so the Earl guessed, sat on settee and did not rise from it the entire time he called. She told him how pleased she was to see him after so long, and her face searched his for some sign that what she had was a victory. The Earl turned away to the last face in the room, that of a young scholar Edward was recommending. And there he found great relief in the energy of a round, cheerful face. The youth introduced himself as Joseph Turner, said his interest was Ancient Literature (which was what Edward taught), and surprised the Earl by inquiring after Charlie.
The Earl knew his home life to be somewhat gloomy and austere, and though it was mainly his own choosing he wondered if it were best for his son.
This young scholar seemed not only unobjectionable (all he had requested) but in fact rather a nice change of pace. He gave the young man his card and found himself immediately more cheerful, even in Davina's stifling drawing room.

Are you dead, Sydonie?

No, no, I swear--I'm just kinda busy. I've got most of the pictures for the next Worldwalker post and when I get a moment that will be posted. Hopefully I'll get back on schedule in the next week or two when things calm down. Then we'll do a whole arc of Worldwalker and then back to WUC.

I'm so excited!

My first World Walker post is up. Check it out!

To add:

The Ship's Boy

Sir Frederick found 28 men aboard his ship the first day. The second day, searching for the supply records that his men had hid (lest he find out how much they'd spent on whisky) he discovered a boy. The boy was the ship's boy. Many ships had them, boys who were either ragamuffins come off the streets or who were related to a crew member. They mended ropes and washed dishes and scrubbed floors and in general did whatever the sailors needed. They served the captain, as well, if he wanted a servant.
In the month and a half between the time the crew was commissioned and the time Sir Frederick arrived, the men had sat idly aboard the ship during the day, and went not-so-idly off into the city when night fell. It was one of these nights, returning home from a pub, that a few of them encountered the ship's boy. He came running towards them. It was dark, and they were drunk, and the boy narrowly missed Ponsby as he shot past them. A moment later a man emerged from the doorway in front of them and glared into the night. "You lot! Didja see a boy run that way?"
They slurred and mumbled and giggled a general affirmation. "I'll tan the bloody twit. Where the hell did he go?" They had no idea. The man pushed through the rabble and disapeared down the empty alleyway. The sailors started forward again. Suddenly a small voice adjacent to Ponsby's elbow inquired, "Are you sailors?" "Eh? How did you get here? I saw you run off!" "The doorway. Are you sailors?"
"No, soldiers," Ponsby said and they all laughed. They were sailors.
"Can I join you?"
"And do what?"
"Whatever you do."
They laughed madly. "I can drink. I once had a pint of ale." Raucous laughter. But they were too drunk, or perhaps they found him too funny, to swat him away. And he certainly wasn't leaving the cover of their company. The next morning they found him getting water to boil and decided that he would be a useful blighter to have around, and so he stayed.
When Sir Frederick came everything changed. The men had to work, scrubbing the whole place and checking for leaks and going to bed at funny hours in preperation for shifts once they went to sea.
Sir Frederick discovered the ship's boy sleeping in beetween two barrels in the store room.
He simply looked at the bruises on the boy's shin and asked him his name. Kit, the boy told him, though his mother had called him Christopher.
From then on the boy slept in Sir Frederick's room. He was given a bath, new clothes, and (this was the biggest change of all) a bedtime. He had to work--no mistake. He got calluses from the ropes and once he burned himself making supper. But the bruises went away and did not return, and Sir Frederick told him he was a good worker. He felt proud for the first time in his young life.

The Closed Room and the Mysterious Door

The Earl had picked one of his least favorite mourning suits, one he had rarely worn, but even so his heart pounded a little as he put it on. He was not sure what he was afraid of, but he rather thought he was afraid that the pain he had felt when he wore it last would come rushing back to him. There was no such flood, to his relief. He could feel the empty place inside him where the flood would have gone, and it was--tentatively--simply empty.
He nearly jumped when the door opened.
"Father?"
"Ah--Charlie. Knock next time, pup. Where's your nurse?"
"Helping Maddie pour out the bathwater."
The Earl loved to take long baths, and he could well imagine it took two to lug the tub up to the window.
"Are you--going to church?" Charlie skipped past his father to the other end of the room.

"Yes, for a funeral. Matty's Aunt. Do you remember her?"
"Yes. But is she really dead?" Charle was smiling as though the words had no meaning.
"Of course she!--unfortunately. Come here, Charlie."
Charlie came obediently, but he was secretly disappointed. He was rarely allowed in this room, which was usually locked. It was not his father's bedroom, but for some reason it had some of his father's clothes in it. The most fascinating part was the door at the other wall. Charlie suspected it was locked, too, but he would have liked a chance to look. Instead he stood in front of his father.
"Now listen up. I'm going away for a little while, and I want you to behave yourself."
Charles was confused. He did not usually get a lecture like this when his father went into the town.
"My Friend Edward wrote me a letter recently, and it reminded me that I have been skimping on your education, young man. I'm going to visit him, and with any luck I will come back with a tutor for you."
So he was going to London again! "A tutor?"
"He'll teach you and watch you during the day."
"Nurse Thale does that."
"Yes, but she doesn't teach you what you are ready to learn. Reading, writing, Latin, French, music, Science..."
None of this sounded appealing to Charles. "What about Nurse Thale?"
"She'll go help Lady Arnold during the day. Lady Arnold will need it, with her new baby coming."
Charles took it all in silently. He was rather sorry he had come in at all. He was even sorrier when his father grinned and and ushered him out into the hall a moment later, for he had missed another chance to look at the mysterious door.

Death and Life Come to the Bede House

Death was coming to the Bede house, but Father Zachary did not yet know it. It was nearly dawn, and he sat alone in the front room. He was very tired. From his bedroom, he could faintly hear the sounds of movement, of footsteps and hurried speech. Occasionally there was a gasp or two that might have been Maria, but otherwise he had no idea what what going on behind the closed door. Just as he was beginning to fall asleep, he heard the sound of an infant's reluctant cry. His eyes snapped open and he came to stand by the door. He wished he could come in, he wished he could see the child, but all he could hear was Dr. Pershing and his wife moving hurriedly around the room.
"A swab, Janet," Dr. Pershing was directing their maid.
There was more clatter and then, "You could bring him out, now."
There were sudden footsteps towards the door and it was thrown open. Mrs. Pershing held a baby in her arms. She pushed him back before he could see more than a glimpse of Maria. "It's a boy!"
It was, a small, pale one with surprisingly pale hair. Father Bede took him.
"How is she?""Maria? Tired. Let us clean her up and then you can see her."
His anxiety must have been evident, for she said, in a kind, managerial sort of tone, "Why don't you show him to Maria's aunt? She would love to see him..."
Father Bede nodded carefully, the warm, wet weight of his son in his arms. Elijah, they had agreed.
Aunt Wilcox had been sent to bed around midnight on the pretense that the baby wasn't coming any time soon. This was really an excuse to get her and her senseless chatter out of the way, but she had swallowed it easily enough and gone to bed. Father Bede thought this was just as well considering Maria's state during her heaviest labor with Matthew. It was best to get her aunt out of throwing range. Come to think of it, he wondered why there had been no such fury this time.
He came into the room quietly, for he had no free hand to knock and did not want to call out for fear of waking the baby now sleeping on his shoulder. But Maria's aunt lay sound asleep, and so he called out to her. "Aunt Wilcox?"
There was no response. For a moment he thought to call her by her Christian name, but then the odd feeling that had been floating around the tired mist in the back of his brain hit him fully.
Aunt Wilcox was a terrible snorer, so much so that he and Maria could hear her from their room. The room was perfectly quiet now.
All at once he understood. He did not have to come closer, or even to touch her, though he would have found her cold. There was something about the stiffness of her features and the limpness of her body that told him.
"Oh, I suppose you can come in now," said Mrs. Pershing. She was fussing with the pillows on their bed. Maria was looking tired but otherwise fine as she lay on one side of it. She was indeed only tired, and he smiled at her in relief. Better yet, she smiled back. Father Bede handed Elijah to Mrs. Pershing. He turned to the Doctor.
"Could I speak to you outside?" he murmured.

It would be a be a busy day for the doctor and a busy week for him.

Sir Frederick Learns His Value

The official base of the Second Sea Lord was a ship, but of course he had a office in the city. Fredrick did not realize it, but as he stepped into the naval offices building he was already beginning to feel as though he were on a ship again. The endless blue, the narrow stairs and railings, and the high veined windows all gave him the sense that he was in fact at sea.
Frederick entered the Second Sea Lord's office just as apprehensively as he had entered the converted fisherman's shed the first time he was recruited. Then he'd been assigned an ordinary rank, a ship, and been asked for an address in case they ever had to write home. Things were different now, and yet they felt eerily the same. Vice-Admiral Sir Horace Hennet was simply a small, balding man with an outdated mustache and thinning auburn hair. He was giving Frederick a studied look, but he seemed satisfied."Good Morning, Sir Frederick." "Good Morning, Sir."
Sir Horace sat and so Frederick did so as well."Your ship is the HMS Ino. A good small ship."
"I'm glad," said Fredrick, rather puzzled. The navy would never claim to sail a bad ship, and...
"How small?"
"A schooner. Tiny, really. Six guns. 28 men."
"But what do you expect me to do with that? I--" Surely they hadn't dragged him all the way from Cennanceaster and his wife to command a little messenger ship. Such ships hardly needed captains anyway! "What did Lord Harbries tell you about your position? I was under the impression you understood what you were going to be doing."
"I--what? I was simply told I was needed. That was all I needed to hear."
"Ah. Let me begin again. Your assignment is not an ordinary one. Tea?" "No, thank you."
"Well, I don't mind if I have some myself. Let's see...I don't remember whose idea it was, but I believe it was Sir Peter's. I can't be certain..." "What was his idea?" said Fredrick, unusually impatient.
"Well you see, we needed a very specific person for the role. Clever, calm, has the men fierce like bulls and yet docile like lambs to his commands..." "Please, sir," said Frederick. "What is my position?"
"Oh! I haven't even said! Oh dear! You are to command a spy ship."
Frederick had never even heard of such a thing, and when he was recovered enough to say so, he did. It took two of Sir Horace's sips of tea. "Well, of course you must have realized we've always had such things." said Sir Horace.
In fact Sir Frederick had not. To him war had been an open plane, upon which one fought fairly and deftly and honorably and occasionally grimly, but calculated espionage was not part of it. Or at least that was what he had believed. But now that he thought about it, he realized that as a soldier he had been given a lot of "information" which must have come from somewhere. He had received it unquestioning, as though it were directly from some Divine Being, but Frederick had lost enough companions to suspect that the Divine Being mainly kept to himself in such affairs, and so indeed such ships and other means of "information" must have existed all along.
"How do I do that?" he said at last. "I--have no experience..." "It's fairly simple," said Sir Horace. "You take the ship just to the edge of where it will not be seen. Then you send men in a smaller ship to search the coastline. I'm afraid we only found one that speaks french, but anyhow if you take nets and civilian clothes you shall pass off as fishermen. Not that you will be seen, most likely. And when you have discovered a place or activity of interest--we are looking for supply ships, ports, even the smallest inlet that harbors a ship or two--you will return and let a scout ship know. There are three others of your kind, one further North and one near Spain. And with some luck you will help us discover where Napoleon is hiding all those damn ships."
Frederick could not think of anything further to say. The idea of attempting to pass as French fishermen was hilarious, the concept of needing to not quite so. One did not tell the Second Sea Lord that he was mad, nor that the Lord High Admiral must be. At last he said, "Why did Lord Harbreis recommend me? To Sir Parker, I mean." "Well he heard about you past actions, of course. Quite commendable."
"Yes, but there are many men who you could have said the same of." "Are there? But anyhow, there is another advantage. We are not the only nation to employ subterfuge. The less well known you are the less likely anyone will wonder whether we have employed you in such measures. And as far as Lord Harbreis could tell, you spent most of your time at home with a reclusive and gloomy Earl of a small town. What could be more ideal?"
Frederick could think of several more ideal situations that the one he was currently in, but he was too dazed and too determined to say anything else.
"Good day, Sir Horace. Thank you for the briefing and the appointment. I shall report this Monday as we previously communicated." "Good day, Sir Frederick," said Sir Horace and he lazily lit his pipe.