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“So that’s it, then.” She smiles warmly in spite of the weather. Her yellow beanie and red coat are littered in snowflakes.
“It doesn’t feel like it’s concluded.” I say, voice cracking from disuse and exposure to the frigid air.
The only noise blowing through the Pale Reach is the howl of the wind and lapping of the sea. It only felt right to fill the merchant in on my venture through the island, given her essential role in forging an icebreaker - helping me brave the thick icy crusts accumulated in the water. As sad as it may be, I consider her one of my only companions - yet I don’t even know her name. I feel I am past the point of asking now. Then again, she never asked for mine. We are simply ‘Travelling Merchant’ and ‘Fisherman’. Two people united by docks and professionalism.
She snaps me out of my daze by handing me a mug of something warm. I meet her eye and nod in thanks. I am grateful for whatever it is - so powdery and diluted I cannot discern the flavour. Vegetable? Chicken? The drink helps me resurface from the maelstrom of my thoughts momentarily before I am inevitably dragged back in.
“The horn crumbled. The heartbeat stopped. The creature disappeared from sight.” The words surging forth uncontrollably from my mouth. “But did I do the right thing? Is it over? What if I was deceived?” The hulking icebound form of the beast looms in my mind’s eye. It’s monstrous height enough to block out the sun, pulsating angry eyes boring into my soul. I was relieved when they left, but apprehension makes my gut twist.
The Travelling Merchant skips over to my battered (‘narwhal’-clawed) fishing boat, as if she hadn’t heard me at all, to admire its two new spoils. The anchor and trawl net glitter and gleam of their own accord without any regard for the paltry sunlight. It’s unnerving. She finds them delightful - a curiosity to be studied. A promise of something beyond her extensive knowledge - of something more. She has convinced me to keep them, at the very least in storage as mementos. I am undecided. I have dabbled in the occult (unwillingly through spells cast on me and my ship), but it is not something I am keen to make a habit of delving into. I do not doubt their power or utility but my stomach churns just looking at them. They feel forbidden and arcane. There has to be a cost for such a violation of the natural order. There is no give without take.
“I think if something bad was gonna happen it would have by now. A creature of that size would have made a racket.” She provides, voice warm.
Ah, so she was listening, better yet, she believed what may as well be the ramblings of a madman.
“Perhaps. We can only say for sure when the ice thaws.” I admit sullenly. And when would that be? Millennia? Centuries? Decades? Years? I hunch in on myself, the motion does not make me feel any more warm or secure.
“Why second guess yourself now?”
“I feel… I get swept up in these things regardless of my own accord. It’s difficult to know if you’re making the right choice when you’re on your own.” I wring my hands. We both know being on the water too long (even without affront-to-nature-narwhal-monsters pursuing you) can play tricks on the mind and make it hard to think straight. The ocean is a beast of its own.
Her eyes alight with sympathy. (And yet I recall never having seen her look anything close to sad.) “That’s fair. You know, I have a theory, I mean it’s kind of funny that those stones that promised treasure gave you a trawl net of all things, right?”
“If the captain and crew had survived the ordeal to receive it I am sure they would have been disappointed.” I shrug, sucking on the dregs of soup powder to savour them. I had not paid it much mind. It was an odd and out of place reward, and as I could not fathom its significance my mind simply shut the train of thought out.
“No, I think it might have been a gift tailored to you! Like- don’t think that monster would have gave you a trawl so maybe it was those poor souls you freed. A net seems like a fitting enough reward for a fisherman. And not too hard to conjure up with one’s… ghost powers… hypothetically.”
I look to where the sea and sky adjoin, then incline my head further up to the vast expanse, away from the water and ice. “That would be nice.” I admit, in a low voice.