Page 118 of Valour

“Aiming there,” Hester said, pointing ahead.

“If I’m right, this is King Haakon Bay,” Septimus said. He sat next to her, the mainsheet in his hand.

“We’re the wrong side of the island for the whaling ports, but Winston needs rest.” She cast a glance towards her bosun, huddled in the bow. Hester bit her lower lip. He’d been in and out of consciousness.

“There’s no doubt about that. I’m not sure the boat will make the journey round to the north coast. It would be best to land on this side and try and get him well,” Septimus said.

“We could walk for help. Over the land.”

Septimus was quiet for a long moment. “I have never heard of anyone crossing the interior of the island. Mountains, glaciers, crevasses. One wrong step and we would be dead.”

What other choice was there? The boat was about to fall to pieces. “We shall be the first to cross.” Grim determination settled in Hester’s stomach. She heaved at the tiller, changing their course for the bay. “We land here, then you and I will cross the island for help.” She hung onto the tiller, narrowly avoiding a reef. “It’s a fine thing I’m so bloody good at this,” she said through her teeth.

Septimus huffed a laugh. “And modest to boot.”

She smiled. No. She had never been modest. If she didn’t cheer for herself, who else would? The knot that had taken up residence in her stomach since her mother had vanished under the waves tightened. She was gone. Whatever was left of her. Just gone. And Hester barely knew what to do with the grief other than to keep going as she always had done. As she needed to for her crew. After all, she’d lost something she’d never really had, and was that a loss at all? She bit the inside of her lip, tasted the iron, swallowed down her sorrow.

The Tempest hit the beach, pebbles scraping on wood, and Hester let out a soft sigh, finding a grin for Peggy, who lay between Winston and Frank. Peggy’s face cracked into a smile, a tear in her eye. “We made it?”

“We made it, my friend. Eight hundred miles across the world’s most deadly ocean, in this tiny, glorious lifeboat.” She kissed the tiller.

A great number of elephant seals lay further along the shore. Hester licked her chapped lips, her stomach growling its approval. “And I spot lunch.” She hopped out of the boat with Septimus, and Frank half-fell over the side, laughing and rolling on the stones. For a moment, Hester wished Snowball were here. The dog would have done the same thing. And Snowball wouldn’t have asked questions she wasn’t ready to discuss the answers to when she hugged her, unlike Septimus. She had told him it was her mother who bound the demon. Knew he wouldn’t have been able to see the sacrifice she made, but she was not ready to delve further into the feelings. Had never been good at talking about feelings, despite his insistence that talking would help.

“Looks like there’s a cave up there. I’ll go and investigate.” Septimus staggered up the shingle, weaving like a drunkard, and Hester turned her attention to Winston, forgetting her mother in the face of taking care of her friends.

Peggy shook him awake. “Winston. Wake up, we made it. Let’s get you settled and you’ll feel better in no time.”

Hester vaulted back into the Tempest, helping Peggy and Frank to lift Winston, who was only half-conscious. They laid him higher up the beach. Hester rolled up her coat and placed it under his head, brushing hair out of his eyes.

He blinked at her. “Hester? Where are we?”

“South Georgia. You’re going to be alright, Winston.”

“Yes,” he murmured, closing his eyes again, his chest rising and falling slowly.

Hester’s eyes burned. He had to be alright. He just had to be.

16th May 1916, Elephant Island

Charlotte crawled through the canvas tube and into the hut, Marjorie behind her. The stench was awful. Sweat, oil and rotting meat. There was no ventilation, and the thirteen crew spent the majority of the time sheltering within. The floor didn’t bear too close an inspection, littered as it was with penguin feathers, crumbs and hair from the ever-shedding reindeer sleeping bags.

Rufus was frantically picking bits out of the stones and rocks of the floor, muttering to himself.

“What is it?” Charlotte asked.

“I dropped my entire week's worth of salt ration on the floor,” Rufus said, sitting back and looking at her with baleful eyes. “It’s gone everywhere.”

“Let me help.” Charlotte got to her knees and picked the salt crystals from between the stones, setting them in her cupped hand.

“Thanks, Boss.”

Rufus sat back on his heels an hour later, a smile on his face. “I do declare, I think I have three weeks’ worth of salt now!”

“I’m not sure it’s all salt,” Charlotte murmured, sure he had a mix of all sorts of disgusting things in his hand, but she smiled back.

Outside, the gun-crack of the glacier calving echoed across the bay.

17th May 1916, King Haakon Bay, South Georgia