In a world of steamships and Progress, no one who sails due south across the Wild Sea ever returns.
No one knows why.
Dale Mortensen intends to solve the mystery. With the help of an old sailor and a reformed playboy searching for his missing sweetheart, he locates a captain and crew ambitious—not to mention crazy—enough to undertake the journey across the Wild Sea.
The Infinity and her crew sail south, but the truth of what really lies on the other side of the horizon is more amazing—and terrifying—than anything they can imagine.
It’s the adventure of a lifetime—and it may just get Dale and his friends killed.
Find out how this Young Adult steampunk adventure unfolds chapter-by-chapter every Thursday! Click here to start from the beginning. Or if you want to read it at your own pace, buy the ebook for $6.99 from Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Smashwords or Sony, or get it as a trade paperback from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or Book Depository.
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE HORIZON
E. R. PASKEY
EIGHTEEN
DALE BLINKED, STUNNED. “DID YOU JUST SAY our world?”
“I did.” Taking off his spectacles, Riley began to polish them with a handkerchief he pulled from his coat pocket. “You see, my boy, the reason people disappear when they sail due south on the Wild Sea is because the Rift pulls them in and brings them here.”
Setting aside the matter of another world for the moment, mostly to preserve his sanity, Dale leaned forward. “Why doesn’t anyone ever sail back then?”
Riley said nothing, but continued cleaning his spectacles. When he finished, he perched them back on his nose and looked soberly at Dale. “Two reasons. Rocks and Streamers.”
Rocks Dale could understand—the Infinity had smashed into them, after all. But… “Streamers?”
“Oh, yes. The storms are nothing new—but the Rift opens very close to the rocks littering the shoreline. Combined with constant storms, it’s too dangerous for any ships to attempt to sail into it. And, well…the Streamers are always looking for a meal.”
Cold realization began to dawn on Dale. He tipped his head toward Manji. “You mean—”
Riley regarded him with sympathy. “I’m afraid so, Mr. Mortensen. They chewed on your friend over there.”
Shaken, Dale sank back against his pillow.
“This is their world, you see,” explained Riley conversationally. “We humans just stumbled here by accident via the Rift. Frankly, I’m amazed as many of your crew survived as you did—usually, we’re lucky if we find two or three alive.” He cast a considering glance toward the window. “It must have been the ferocity of the storm that saved your lives, kept them from coming after you. They probably didn’t fancy getting beat to death by the surf.”
“I don’t understand.” Dale shook his head, feeling an ache build in his temples. “What are they?”
“It’s difficult to say, really. I have some sketches at the office; afraid I didn’t bring them with me today.” Riley patted his coat pockets just to make sure he really, truly, did not have them on his person. “But in a nutshell, we believe Streamers are some kind of water-based alien life form.”
“And they eat people?” Dale asked in disbelief.
“Yes.” The faint wrinkles in Riley’s face deepened. “Believe it or not, Streamers are actually not much bigger than your average human.”
“Are they fish?”
“Not precisely.”
Dale stared at the other man. This conversation had taken on a very surreal cast; he was not entirely sure what to make of it. “But you have sketches of them?”
“From eyewitness accounts, yes. I apologize for not bringing them with me, but I wasn’t entirely sure I would have the chance.”
Before Dale could puzzle out what that meant, Riley continued, “You said you were from Port Ruby?”
“Yes.”
“Have you always lived there?”
The question struck Dale as slightly odd, but he was desperate for more information. If answering a few strange questions inclined Riley to level with him, so be it. “I lived there up until the tsunami wiped out the coast and then my uncle took me to live in Falconcrest.”
“Ah. I see. Your family… yes.” Riley sounded apologetic.
“I ended up in Port Ruby again a couple of—” Dale abruptly broke off as a thought flashed through his mind. “Did a man named Peabody come through the Rift on a dirigible a few months back?”
“A dirigible?”
“It’s an airship,” Dale hastened to explain. “Peabody was trying to cross the Wild Sea with it and he disappeared.”
Behind his spectacles, something passed through Riley’s eyes before he shook his head in polite incredulity. “That’s quite a story, Mr. Mortensen.”
“Believe me, Mr. Riley,” said Dale grudgingly, “I wish it was.”
Mr. Riley opened his mouth to say something, but at that precise moment the door opened again to admit Mrs. Weatherby.
“Mr. Riley, what are you doing here?”
Riley jumped up out of his seat as though he had been shot. “Mrs. Weatherby! How lovely to see you. I was just filling Mr. Mortensen here in on a few of the details he’ll need for—”
“You are well aware that no visitors have been authorized for these patients yet.” Mrs. Weatherby fixed him with a stern glare. “Kindly remove yourself from the Hospital and I won’t report you.”
“Begging your pardon, ma’am, but—”
“Out.”
With one last, rather mournful look at Dale, Riley went. He shut the door quietly behind him, as though wishing to avoid upsetting the head matron further.
After he had gone, Mrs. Weatherby approached Dale. “I understand your curiosity, my boy, but you’ll just have to wait.” She checked his knee and then went to fuss over Manji, who was starting to come out of his drug-induced haze.
Guilt sliced through Dale like a razor-sharp knife; he had forgotten about Manji for the span of a few moments. He stared down at his big hands for a moment, before looking around the ward with quiet desperation. He needed to get out and see things for himself. I need to know the rest of the story.
His eyes fell on Minh and stayed there; his friend was awake and looking at him. The cook’s face was expressionless, but his eyes revealed his horrified bewilderment.
Dale lifted his eyebrows and tilted his head in a silent question. Did you hear all that?
Minh nodded slowly. His chapped lips formed soundless words. What do we do?
Despite himself, Dale hunched his broad shoulders. Shaking his head, he looked away. I don’t know.
~oOo~
MANJI died late that night. The injuries he had sustained were too extensive; he had lost far too much blood for his body to cope. He moaned and groaned and writhed with pain, which only made things that much worse.
Dale knew he was a grown man and far too old for such behavior, but he wanted to curl up like a child with his hands over his ears. Listening to Manji suffer made him sick to his stomach; he clenched his hands into helpless fists. He would do anything, give anything, for the man not to be in pain, but he was trapped. They were all trapped. There was nothing he could do, except join Raphael in pleading with Mrs. Weatherby to please, for the love of God, give Manji something for the pain.
Apparently, morphine, laudanum, and the like were in scarce supply on this side of the Rift. The head matron and two of her nurses held several furious, low-voiced debates over the course of the next twelve hours. At one point, they brought in the head doctor. In the end, they gave Manji everything they could spare, to take the edge off the pain.
It was not enough.
The relief that swept through the ward when Manji’s labored breathing and pitiful moans at last tapered off into permanent silence was palpable. The backs of Dale’s eyes burned; he closed his eyes to stave off tears. His relief almost instantly mixed with guilt at feeling relieved, and then guilt that he had not been the one to suffer and die just yet.
A brief burst of noise occurred when the nurses called for a stretcher and two grim, unnamed men carried Manji’s body out of the ward, and then silence descended on the survivors again. It was Belly who broke it at last, his voice thick and rough. “Poor bastard.”
“He was my friend,” said Minh quietly, unexpectedly. He did not speak again the rest of the night.
“That leaves five of us,” said Raphael in a hollow voice. “Only five of us to survive.”
Which is still more than they expected, Dale thought, but it failed to ease the weight on his chest.
Opening his eyes, he stared up at the ceiling. Sleep was a long time in coming. The ward might be quiet now, but the echoes of Manji’s dying groans lingered in Dale’s memory. When he did finally sleep, he dreamed of being chased by dark leviathans through a sea of blood, unable to reach Raphael and Yutha’s drowning forms.
~oOo~
THE next day, Mrs. Weatherby deemed Dale’s knee sufficiently recovered that he might get up and walk around a little, provided he promised to be careful. He agreed willingly, more than ready for a chance to go exploring.
Raphael, of course, vociferously protested his exclusion from said impending exploration.
With a sigh that was more indulgent than impatient, Mrs. Weatherby pinned Raphael with a stern look and indicated the cast enclosing his left leg from just under his knee to the tip of his toes. “Mr. Avarez, you will not be going anywhere until I bring you crutches.” She turned her head to include Dale in her stare. “In any case, neither of you have been authorized to leave Hospital grounds yet.”
“Then let us explore the grounds, Mrs. Weatherby,” Raphael hastened to say.
“I’m afraid that is quite out of the question.” Mrs. Weatherby pointed her finger at him. “It’ll be this room or nothing at all until you’re cleared.”
“I’d like to see Yutha,” said Dale unexpectedly. “We haven’t seen him since we got here. His father—” surely it was not wrong to call Inzin that, not after the way he’d looked after the boy, “—was killed when the ship went down.”
Mrs. Weatherby’s face softened. She did not elaborate as to why the boy had been placed in a different ward, but nodded. “I’ll bring him by.”
She was true to her word.
An hour later, the door banged open and Yutha hobbled in on crutches. His dark face had a thin, pinched-look caused by grief, but he brightened when he took in Dale, Raphael, Belly, and Minh. “You’re alive!” He stumped over to the line of beds holding Minh, Raphael, and Dale. He wore a cast like Raphael’s on his right leg. “They told me you were fine, but I’m glad I get to see for myself.”
A little of the tension cording Dale’s muscles melted away. Whatever else had happened, at least Yutha appeared to be all right.
“Where are you staying?” inquired Raphael.
Yutha waved a vague hand in the direction of the door. “Mrs. Weatherby put me in the children’s ward.” He scrunched his face into a grimace. “I told her how old I was, but she wouldn’t listen.” His grimace fell away. “There are some kids there. One of them has a broken leg too. We race each other when the nurses aren’t looking.”
They all smiled at that, even Minh.
“Have you been outside yet?” asked Raphael.
“Nope. I’ve tried to sneak past the nurses, but they catch me every time.” Yutha looked truly disgruntled by this. He peered around at the beds, clearly searching for familiar figures that were not there. “Where’s the captain? Where’s Manji?”
They all stopped, at a loss for words. Apparently, no one had told the boy anything. Dale’s tongue threatened to cleave to the roof of his mouth, but he forced himself to answer. “They didn’t make it.” His voice sounded rough to his own ears. There’s no need to tell him exactly what happened to Manji. A glance at Raphael, Belly, and Minh told him they were thinking the same thing.
Yutha’s face fell, his dark eyes filling with renewed grief. Dale understood that—these men had been his family. Maybe not as near and dear as Mr. Inzin, but family nonetheless. The boy swallowed and savagely swiped a sleeve across his eyes, as though daring any of them to comment. Then he straightened. “What do we do now?”
That, Dale thought, is an excellent question.
“We need to get out of here,” said Raphael firmly. “If this…Rift…is the other side of the Wild Sea, my Elena and her father may be here as well.”
They all looked at him. Raphael was in dire need of a shave—his goatee was in danger of disappearing—and his curly hair was bedraggled, but his dark eyes blazed with determination. Determination covering… fear.
In that split second, Dale realized that his best friend was terrified and striving valiantly to overcome it. He would not believe there was a chance Elena had drowned or been eaten by the mysterious Streamers—he could not. If he let himself believe it, even for a moment, he was in grave danger of losing himself in a deep, dark pit from which he could never return.
“Yes,” said Dale, before anyone else could answer. “We made it. No reason she and her father couldn’t either.”
Raphael shot him a look of gratitude.
Dale ignored the more reproving look Belly was giving him. “We can’t give up now. The answers to all our questions are right here.”
“An’ how do you propose to get ‘em?” challenged Belly.
Raphael answered before Dale could get a word out. “We speak to whoever is in charge, of course.” His eyes kindled again. “I believe this will require calling for Mrs. Weatherby.”
Find out how this Young Adult steampunk adventure unfolds chapter-by-chapter every Thursday! Or if you want to keep reading right now, buy the ebook for $6.99 from Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Smashwords or Sony, or get it as a trade paperback from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or Book Depository.
Copyright © 2013 E. R. Paskey