Page 49 of Astrid at Sea

“Gustav would have something to cook if Jerrik caught some fish,” Hammond piped up, fuelling the already blazing fire. He was sitting in the same spot against the rail as this morning, refusing to move as if to preserve his energy. It was a good idea, but adding to an argument was not.

“Don’t try to turn this on me,” Jerrik scoffed, defensive. I didn’t blame him. I had gone fishing with Jerrik these past few days and experienced first-hand the frustration of returning to The Serpent day after day empty-handed. “If you all sailed the ship faster, maybe we could get into waters that actually have some fish for me to catch.”

“Caspian is always at the wheel,” Latham frowned. “I always tell him I’m better at the wheel, and he should let me take over, but he never does. His ego won’t allow him to admit I’m better than him.”

“Why is this suddenly being turned around on me?” Caspian shot up in his seat, his eyes fiery and accusatory as he glared at Latham. “I steer the ship because no one else likes doing it fora long time. If you’re a better sailor than me, why did we hardly move last night when you were on night duty?”

“There was low wind! How is that my fault? I can’t control the wind!” Latham growled, looking as if he would reach for Caspian and shake some sense into him if they weren’t standing on opposite sides of the ship.

“Odin could have told us about the wind,” Dagfinn muttered under his breath, but we all heard him. “Maybe we could have done something about it if we knew about it earlier.”

“What would you have done if I did?” Odin asked, annoyed.

“We could have planned accordingly.”

“How do you plan for no wind?” Laurence laughed.

Dagfinn shrugged. “I don’t know. Garth could have played around with the sails or something.”

“Don’t look at me like that,” Garth snapped, an unpleasant scowl on his face. “I may have the most experience out of us all, but I can’t control the weather.”

“And since when was it necessary for me to provide daily weather updates?” Odin huffed, matching Garth’s expression. “We can prepare if there’s a storm coming. But how are we going to prepare for no wind?”

I tugged on Viktor’s sleeve to get his attention. “They need to stop arguing,” I huffed and tuned out the argument. All the back and forth was starting to give me a headache. “Everyone is just hungry and are getting riled up for no reason. They’re wasting their energy. This will only tire them out quicker and make them even more irritable.”

“This was bound to happen sooner or later,” Viktor groaned. “This job is hard enough on a full stomach, but it’s even harder when none of us has eaten anything in two days.”

“Thanks to Crosby,” I snarled. We would have never been in this mess without Crosby and his selfishness and pettiness.

“Yes, exactly!” Manny spoke louder than we had heard before, demanding our undivided attention. “Why are we blaming each other when Crosby is at fault here? If it weren’t for him, we would have the dried food and flour for bread to eat while we sail into waters that actually have fish for Jerrik to catch. Don’t you see that turning on each other only hurts us when the man truly at fault here is locked away in the bottom deck?”

“Manny’s right.” I agreed with a nod. “There’s no point turning on each other when we’re not at fault. Crosby is.”

“It’s still not too late to make him walk the plank,” Caspian grumbled under his breath, and we all laughed.

“We just need to make it till morning when we reach that island, and then we’ll finally be able to get some food,” I said, trying to stay positive.

All everyone needed right now was a little bit of hope.

“The morning, did you say?” Roscoe called out, speaking up for the first time. Something in his tone caught my attention, and I turned to look at what he was staring at.

“Yes,” I murmured, using the same mystified, disbelieving tone as him.

In the not-so-distant distance, I could see the shadow of an island about half a day earlier than we expected.

“Is that what I think it is?” Jerrik whistled under his breath as he walked closer to the rail where Roscoe was standing, trying to get a better look at the mound in the distance.

“It sure is!” Caspian grinned and pumped his fist into the air. Everyone else was quick to follow in his celebrations.

I felt sick as I continued staring at the island, but that could very well be because I had consumed only water for the past two days. Regardless, I pushed the gnawing feeling away and focused on the positives, choosing to be hopeful.

This mystery island, which the crew had marked on the map in passing on their last mission, was our only chance of survival right now.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

As we headed toward the island, The Serpent glided hurriedly through the water. We had yet to find out whether they were friends or foes, but right now, all that mattered was getting our hands on food.

Hopefully, even if they were foes, we could buy hot meals and enough provisions to last until we reached Greenland. The one place where gold coins held no value was at sea, when there was nowhere to go and no one to buy anything from.

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