Amelia was not unaccustomed to filth. She had earned her spending money by emptying chamber pots, mopping the floor after drunken brawls, and cleaning her fathers festering wound.
Purging the entrails of the green dragon that hot afternoon, didn’t bother her one bit. What did, was the fact that Milo had still not shown up with the lime, and that meant that the quality of her project was in jeopardy. One hundred feet of intestine lay coiled on the rocks overlooking the north sea. Amelia had finished stripping them of their contents the night before, now she had set out several tubs of varying sizes, and was cutting the intestines into yard-long sections, and placing them in simmering water.
It was mid-day when she saw her cousins sailboat coming out of the west. When he ran aground at the shore, she came to him with the intent of berating him, only to step back in surprise. Instead of a bucket of white lime, there was two filled with a grey paste, that she took for wet ashes. There was also a dead shark on the floor of the boat, about four feet long. She frowned and looked quizzically at her cousin.
“Pat Tanner says that potash is the best to use, and that we’d need sharkskin to finish the product. I caught him an hour ago, so we’ll have enough skin when the time comes.” He hefted the dead monster over his shoulder and grabbed a pail with his free hand, Amelia grabbed the other pail and showed him to her operation.
There were six tubs. Two were made of tin and sat over small fires, simmering with the guts. The rest were made of wood and filled with fresh water from a spring amelia had found nearby. She also had some stripped sapling staves that she had raked through the fire to harden and had wedged them in between the crevices in the sea worn stones. Together, the two cousins strung a rope between the posts and returned to the task of preparing the gut for processing. They scraped off fat with dull knives, peeled off the outer coating. When the material was uniformly pale in their hands, the moved onto the next porton; leaving the half finished product to dry. Eventually they would tie a knot in one end and let pebble fall through the tube. Using the pebble as a grip, they would twist the tube, glazing it with a solution of potash and water when it grew tough and dry. Twist and stretch.
The day became two, then three. It was a slow process. They didn’t talk much, but on the third day, with most of the gut cured, twisted and hanging to dry; Amelia began to play her harmonica by the fire. Milo, having hung up the last bit of gut, sat down across the fire from her and spitted a seabass. She played a nonsensical song, playing off of one chord after another. After a few minutes of picking at the harmony, she paused and gave the fire a stir. Milo cleared his throat.
“We need to talk about what happened.”
Amelia frowned, “Must we? It’s not high on my list of prefered memories.”
“We must.” Milo’s face was set. “It’s important.”
“How so?”
Milo settled himself. “I heard what happened from his companions. They were honest and told me everything they saw. Some of it doesn’t make sense.”
“How so?”
“They think he was seeing things, not simple hallucinations. They saw you, but he he was talking to someone else.”
Amelia was silent for a moment. “The gaunt, young man.”
Milo raised an eyebrow. “So you did here him. What did he say?”
“He was giving my father a choice. Him or me.”
Milo sighed, “I was afraid of that.”
Amelia waited for his explanation.
Milo began slowly. “A man can have anything, if he’s willing to sacrifice. I read that in an old book in the library at Tempered Vale. It stuck with me, and at the time I thought it meant that if I tried hard, and sacrificed myself on the altar of the world, I would become the man I wanted to be. Now I find myself as the man that I am, and I realize that the words were a bit more literal.
I’ve seen how people offer up sacrifices in hopes of receiving favour from deities. If such beings exist, they are for the most part indifferent to the sufferings of the few and more concerned with the bigger picture. I’m not so sure of that anymore either.
A sacrifice is a lot like a deal. The difference is the price. It has to cost you on every level, personal, physical, spiritual. Your father sacrificed himself for you.”
Amelia felt numb, but pressed on. “So he traded his life for my protection?”
“Yes, but it’s part of the equation, we’ve got to think about the other side of the transaction. What did this fiend get?”
Amelia felt a chill in her gut. “His life.”
“It’s his now. His life for your safety. I think that’s a persistent deal. So long as he is in possession of that life, I think that he won’t be able to touch you or anyone that uncle loved for that matter.”
“You think?”
“This is supposition on my part. I’ve been giving it some thought.”
Amelia breathed out, but she was no less at ease. Her father's love could still protect her, but it wasn’t enough. She wanted him back.
“Do… Do you think it’s reversible?”
Milo shook his head. “There is no refund for a sacrifice.”
She hugged her knees and stared at the fire. They sat like that for a while, as the sun sank over the coast. Suddenly a question came to Amelia.
“What was your father like?” Milo was taken aback by the question. “I ask because I cannot remember him. I barely remember my mother.”
Milo chewed on an answer. Finally he spoke. “He was taller than your dad. Golden hair, like mine.” He paused, thought it over a bit more. “He was quiet, always thought about what he would say before talking. I remember him being polite, calm.” He seemed torn in in his recollection, but would not say why. Amelia let him stew.
At length he spoke again. “She had black hair, and she loved to laugh. She lit up the room every time she entered it. She said she loved your father because he gave her something to dance to.”
Amelia was taken aback by this revelation. She’d heard it all before, but it never meant as much as it did now. She drew out the harmonica again and began to blow into it again.
Tomorrow they would polish the cords with sharkskin and dry grass. Once that was done, they would loop the chords and package the product. They would sail back to Whytecliff and sell the product, build the instrument and go on. Missing some people on their journey was just part of it.
