Half the World (Shattered Sea) - Joe Abercrombie Page 0,46

an ax.”

Thorn was one of five carrying the part-carved mast. Brand could feel her eyes sharp as arrows in his back and guessed she was still furious over what he’d said about her mother. He hardly blamed her. Wasn’t Thorn who’d trotted off and left Rin to fend for herself, was it? Seemed whenever Brand lost his temper it was really himself he was angry at. He knew he ought to say sorry for it but words had never come easy to him. Sometimes he’d spend days picking over the right ones to say, but when he finally got his mouth open the wrong ones came drooling straight out.

“Reckon I’d be better off if I never said another word,” he grunted to himself.

“You’d get no bloody complaints from me,” he heard Thorn mutter, and was just turning to give her a tongue-lashing he’d no doubt soon regret when he felt a jolt through his rope that dragged him floundering into a heap of leaves, only just keeping his feet.

“Easy!” roared Dosduvoi, and hauled back hard on his own rope. A knot slipped with a noise like a whip cracking and he gave a shocked yelp and went flying over backwards.

Odda squealed out, “Gods!” as he was jerked onto his face, knocking the next man over so he lost his grip on his own rope, the loose end snapping like a thing alive.

There was a flurry of wingbeats as a bird took to the sky and the South Wind lurched forward, one of the men on the other side shrieking as his rope tore across his shoulders and spun him around, knocking Fror sideways, the sudden weight dragging the rest of the men over like skittles.

Brand saw Koll leaning in with his pitch, staring up in horror as the high prow shuddered over him. He tried to scramble clear, slipped on his back under the grinding keel.

No time for first thoughts, let alone second ones. Maybe that was a good thing. Brand’s father had always told him he wasn’t much of a thinker.

He bounded off the track in a shower of old leaves, dragging his rope around the nearest tree, a thick-trunked old beast with gnarled roots grasping deep into the hillside.

Folk were screaming over each other, timbers groaning, wood snapping, but Brand paid them no mind, wedged one boot up against the tree and then the other. With a grunt he forced his legs and his back out straight, leaning into the rope across his shoulders, hauling it taut so he was standing sideways from the trunk like one of the branches.

If only he’d been made of wood too. The rope twanged like a harpstring and his eyes bulged at the force of it, hemp grating against bark, slipping in his hands, biting into his arms. He clenched his teeth and closed his eyes and gripped at the rags around the rope. Gripped them tight as Death grips the dying.

Too much to lift. Way too much, but once the load’s on you what choice do you have?

More grinding in his ears as the South Wind shifted and the weight grew, and grew, and crushed a slow groan out of him, but he knew if he let his knees, or his back, or his arms bend once the rope would fold him in half.

He opened his eyes for an instant. Sunlight flickered through leaves. Blood on his quivering fists. The rope smoking about the trunk. Voices echoed far away. He hissed as the rope twitched and pinged then slipped again, biting into him surely as a saw.

Couldn’t let go. Couldn’t fail his crew. Bones creaking as the hemp cut into his shoulders, his arms, his hands, sure to rip him apart, the jagged breath tearing at his chest and snorting from his clenched teeth.

Couldn’t let go. Couldn’t fail his family. His whole body trembling, every last thread of muscle on fire with the effort.

Nothing in the world but him and the rope. Nothing but effort and pain and darkness.

And then he heard Rin’s voice, soft in his ear. “Let go.”

He shook his head, whimpering, straining.

“Let go, Brand!”

An ax thudded into wood and he was falling, the world turning over. Strong arms caught him, lowered him, weak as a child, floppy as rags.

Thorn, with Mother Sun behind her, glowing in the fuzz on the side of her head.

“Where’s Rin?” he whispered, but the words were just a croak.

“You can let go.”

“Uh.” His fists were still gripping. Took a mighty effort to make