Another extract from The Tramp Steamer

CHAPTER 1

Twenty Years later

Lochlann West hadn't been this near his grandmother's house for years. It had taken him most of the day to lazily meander up the hill from the western marina. As he neared the summit of the High Hill he paused. The wind had been playing havoc with his shoulder length throughout the climb. Finally here in the shelter of the Lost Rock he found some respite. He spat out the remaining mouthfuls of hair and surveyed his surroundings.

It seemed to Lochlann, even from this distance, that his ancestral home was even more imposing than the town's old cathedral. He laughed to himself, only here in this backwater city could the large iron church have been described as a cathedral.

He remembered the stories his late uncle Samson had told him of the great temples of Mshmeer and the foreboding monastries of The Monorvern Order. He tried to picture the great gothic structures perched high on the cliffs of the Monorvern Mountains but he could not. He had never left the Island but then neither had his uncle Samson.

Lochann was forced to follow the exterior walls of his estranged grandmother's manor. He stooped low on the gravel road and took his time choosing a particular rock from the hundreds that littered the verge. His rock was heavy and fit his palm well. Idly he tossed it end over end as if he were trying make it gain momentum.

Minutes after he'd begun circumventing the great house he reached the main gates. It was here that the mansion seemed most impressive. The gates symetrical and ornate were decorated like the cover of one of the Monovern texts he'd seen so often in the cathedral. The house was closer here too. Barely fifty feet from the rusting portal. He stared at it for as long as he could stomach.

The dark iron walls looked even uglier than the gargoyles which adorned them. The copper roof had leaked a tainted green residue all over the manors facade. He threw his rock waiting only long enough to hear the satisfying crack from what he hoped was an irreplacable stained glass window.

He pulled a antique pewter flask from a pocket of his frock coat and carefully took a swig. He coughed and wrecthed and spat the amber fluid out onto the wet grass. He was utterly unable to understand how his uncle had been able to drink the horible spirit let alone allow it to consume his life. Lochlann had spent most of the day ascending the High Hill and from here he turned and looked down at his home.

The long isle of Havant sat in the sea like some misplaced piece from a great jigsaw puzzle, a piece of emerald forest admist a scene of azure skies. White sand covered the western shore like a petticoat, and lush ever-green forest rose gently from the waterline to cling precariously to the island's hily interior. The island's capital, also known as Havant, boasted ports on both sides of the island. From here Lochlan could see the eastern and western shore. Havant's first city sat as if it were riding a huge wave perched on the Islands thinnest point.

The island was the only true haven between the riptides and whirlpools of the western seaboard and the foul and seemingly endless storms and tempest of the raging east ocean. Visitors to the rugged isle were few although not unheard of.

In the distance to the west he could make out the Iron Isle. As always it was shrouded in flocks of seabirds. Nothing but the puffins and gulls lived on the dead mountain of blood red rock. Lochlann even thought he could even make out the rusty waters that perpetually leaked from its ore rich shore. He was still amazed by the size of it. Every boat that had ever sailed from the fair Isle and most of the houses had begun their life here, yet the island was as vast as it had always been. Far to the northwest he could almost see the makings of the wash.

Traversing the Northern Wash, the dull never-ending placid canal that circled the turmoil of the Western Ocean, was time consuming and tedious, and few beyond the western seaboard thought Havant worth the effort. Adventurers and brigands occasionally did descend upon the sheltered little land looking for glory or refuge but rarely did they find either.

The people of Havant were a robust lot, used to the harsh life of their enviroment. They had little use for braggers or hoodlums. All but the sturdiest and maddest of adventurers had fled back the way they had come, and almost all of the privateers had been harried back out to sea. No one had ever come from the East. The few who did take sail into the maelstrom never returned.

The few maps of the East that did exist had likely been drawn from nothing but eyesight and the cartographer's own imagination.


Once a year or so, some wander-lustful youth would announce their attempt to paint new ink into blank map parchment. Despite warnings, scorn and the odd arrest, these brave idiots would plough their modified steamers, schooners and cogs into that furious blue expanse.

Weeks later their name's would appear on the Lost Rock on the High Hill. A great stone tablet that stood between the fort and the church. The great grey monolith was both a monument to the brave dead and a warning to the adventurous living. It was nearly two thirds complete with carefully carved obituries but it never stopped others from trying.