293AC
"Gah" Lady Asha cursed as I marked my third X into the sand. "How do you keep doing that?"
When the men on shore returned in the evening, they brought word that we had hit the northern end of an archipelago, rather than a singular island and that the island possessed a sheltered bay on its eastern face that was suitable for careening and repair work. Thus when the tide came up in the morning we beached the vessels like great whales in the fairly sheltered bay, relocating to a camp on the beach for the time being while repair work was done on the vessels.
In the meantime I had been running the gamut on ways to entertain lady Asha that were both appropriate and not tests of strength and had settled on a number of children's games, progressing through them as she got bored and started complaining. It was looking to be going that way for Tic-tac-toe, as the young woman grumbled in frustration. It was clear, even from the moment that she started demanding attention that she was taking the loss of her ship and crew harder than she was willing to admit, and I had to remember that this was her first voyage as well, and with far less confidence in her purpose than me. I hadn't spotted them immediately, but yesterday there had clearly been signs of crying around her eyes.
I wondered how much of her abrasiveness and flirting came from her putting on a brave front to someone she saw as a potential enemy or rival. Would she have been more polite and reasonable if she wasn't under so much stress? It was hard to say.
The fact that she was still being a bitch remained though.
"I'm getting sick of these games Arthur." I suppressed a wince at the casual use of my first name. "What on earth do you all day onboard your ship, surely not just play children's games?"
"I manage accounts, Navigate, and read when I have the opportunity," I said, gesturing to the chest that had been pulled out of my cabin which contained my collection of books. "Do you read High Valyrian by any chance, I could let you borrow part of my collection if you'd like."
"Really? That's all? You must be bored all the time."
I rolled my eyes at the young woman. "I'm sure your ship is much more exciting, but since my company is probably making a bit less money in a year than all your islands put together I'm willing to spend most of my time keeping track of it."
"Uhuh, I don't believe that's all you do. Nobody is that boring." Asha said, defiance lighting up her eyes.
"There is a time and a place for fun, but a sea-voyage isn't the place for it."
"Hah, that's the only place we have fun. You've never seen the Iron Islands, Little Prince." The young woman let out a bitter laugh. "There is a reason the Ironborn roam the world, and it is not solely for loot and whores."
"Have you ever been to Dragonstone, Lady Greyjoy?" I countered fairly easily. "It has changed nowadays, largely because of my own investment in it, but just a few years ago it was as bleak as any of your Grey islands."
"Then that only means you should have more to do on your ship. What do your men do when they aren't half mad doing repairs or bailing out water?"
"Gamble their wages, Sing, drink. I imagine a few other things I would rather not know about, and they would rather I not know about, but that's about the shape of it."
"They don't take whores at port?" Asha laughed. "Or do you not know what a whore is yet?"
I ignored the crack at my age and answered her plainly, keeping a straight face. "If they do they're discreet about it and know better than to try to bring them onto my goddamned ship."
The Greyjoy let out a burst of cackling laughter, before sighing, her eyes taking on a bit more weight in them as her facade dropped a bit. "So… what's your plan, for me I mean. I don't suppose you intend to sail me back to Pike yourself."
I paused for a moment, having expected another barb rather than an apparently honest question. "Well, there's quite a bit going on there," I said recalibrating my brain for a less adversarial confrontation. "I haven't quite decided even how I'm going to deal with the current situation. Our current location is uncharted to my knowledge. Presuming we get back to Westeros though, I will likely not personally deliver you to your home, presuming you want to return anyhow." I hoped that I had read her tone right before, and wasn't overstepping my bounds too much by suggesting that she might not want to return to her father.
The woman let out a long sigh. "I'm not some Salt Wife for you to take little Prince, don't get your hopes up." She chuckled dryly. "Still, what's this about the island being uncharted? I thought we were in the Summer Islands."
I shook my head. "Not by my calculations at least. One of the captains had the decency to keep his men running the hourglass after the storm, and we're much too far west. If the storm had thrown us that far east we would be on Sothoryos." I went to the crate, pulling out one of my larger maps. I pointed out a large circle in the sunset sea. "This is roughly the area I think the storm covered, and we were spat out somewhere on its southern backside edge, and it's had us on a southwesterly course ever since. A fast one too, despite the damage to the ships, in four days we've done what might take three weeks in a cog at normal speed."
I gestured up at the shape of the hill behind us. "At first I thought we were probably at the islands recorded from the voyage of the Sun-Chaser. And it still might be the same chain of islands, they might have just missed the rest of the Archipelago during their voyages. My man only spotted it with his telescope."
"Telescope?"
"Ah, a Myrish Eye, my apologies." I gestured to several lines I had drawn out of the potential courses we might have taken. "These are the courses I predict we might have taken, given winds and currents, that would take us into this region of the ocean."
"Are you sure?"
"The giant lizards are a pretty good indication. The Lady Meredith reported such creatures in and amongst these islands, and some of the men have reported them swimming about the place and eating fish, so I suspect they can move about the archipelago."
Asha sat for a moment with that one, digesting the information with an odd look on her face. "So what's the problem with getting back to Westeros?"
I gestured to the clouds, which continued to move southwest, towards a distant continent I had no name for, no particular desire to visit at the moment. "The wind only seems to be going one way. It took the Lady Meredith three years to return to Westeros. I need to be faster, much faster."
Who knew what could happen while I was gone.