If only Arn could drink the flakes of skin that fell off his neck. His burns had finally tanned, though Shar’s progress was a day or two behind. The burned skin was peeling off now, reminding Arn how thirsty his throat was and how dry his skin was. He lay on the raft and felt the tug of the water churning around them. They drifted across the Deep slowly, sluggishly. The raft was close to death, it seemed, or they had neared that part of the Deep.
“I need another one,” Shar said. He reached into the sun-blasted leather sack that was tied to a branch in the raft’s composition. There were fish in there, but only four.
Arn swatted away his hand, a motion that brought him up to his knees and shook his mind with dizziness. Shar withdrew, glaring at Arn. The scarred warrior tucked in the folds of the sack the way they had been and said, “There’s not enough, Shar. This is supper, unless we catch more.”
“Then try to catch some, instead of lying around like a withered vine.” Shar tugged the oar into the salt water again.
A withered vine. Arn remember sawing one with a knife, once. Loklar had slid down to his death that day, and Arn had begun his ascent from common hunter to leader of the tribe on Razaad. He laid back weakly. He missed Thalla, and his brothers. And Little Rat, whom he had shoved from his hut. Tears welled up in his eyes, unbidden. He didn’t have enough water for them, did he? They dried up quickly.
Arn picked up the thin spear they had made from a sliver of the raft, and folded his legs near one corner of the big raft. As they rifted up and down the waves, he stared down into the depths of hell and waited for a fish to nibble on.
That evening, just after dark, Arn was awoken by the patter of water drops on his face. Was Shar still up paddling? He looked around, to see Shar’s motionless slumber, and the black haze of a cloudy night. More drops landed on his hand, clenched as it was against the rough deck of their raft. That was rain. “Shar, Shar,” he called. He shook the man awake, then turned his mouth skyward. They had missed a rain once, sleeping right through it. Back in the days they had still the muscle to work all day on the oars. They couldn’t afford to miss any rainfall now.
The drizzle picked up and they opened the now-empty leather pack to catch as much water as they could. The rain picked up into a downpour and Arn felt his mouth filling with fresh, cool moisture. He gulped loudly, and felt those tears on his eyelids again. Shar laughed as they both gaped at the sky and held open each side of the bag.
Arn had an idea—even out here on the Deep his clever mind suggested them to him. He passed his side of the pack to Shar. The man watched from the corner of his mouth, face still skyward, as Arn scrambled to the other side of the raft and proceeded to tear up a few of the varnished branches that made up the floor. He grabbed the discarded canteen, which had been dry for days, and held it into the dip. Sure enough, the downpour began to fill it as well. Shar and he laughed, giddy with delight, and drank whatever the sky gave them.
They could live another two days on this! That was so much more than Arn had learned to expect.
Shar’s laughter subsided first, and something about his demeanor changed. He drank the water with his mouth lifted up still, but his fallen shoulders had been reminded of what Arn had just thought—that a day ahead was a long time to assume they could live.