Not again. I thought I wasn't going to do this again.
Whatever Telson presumed about seafaring, he quickly realized, did not change the inherent truths: He was on a ship, and the ship moving. The ship was moving on an ocean. Oh, it had been fine enough in the port where Telson could see the little waves splashing fruitlessly against the shore. The sway of the deck even felt comfortable. But now that they had put out to sea... It was not possible for a man to know true suffering until he had experienced sailing, and Telson decided that ever single sailor in Dol Amroth was either mad or being bribed. Heavily bribed.
Fortunetly, Avershire seemed to perceive his feelings on the subject, and so while Devon and Callath worked at menial tasks and Calnan learned navigation, Telson was down below, studying maps and strategy. For this he was glad, because he liked the mysterious aura he seemed to carry with the three, and having them see him sick and whimpering over the port railing would tarnish that image somewhat. Plus, on the whole, the approach of ship-to-ship battles was a fairly simple matter of maneuverability and luck. What made his research difficult, ironically, was Avershire. Telson supposed the old man must have been a marvel in his younger days, and understood quite acutely with the soul who brought up his corsair past.
It was probably some poor young soldier, Telson thought mutinously, staring with glazed eyes at a map of Belfalas, trapped onboard and forced to listen to every story and every half-minded musing under the sun. Not to mention the hourly, the bloody hourly lecture on why the navy is better than the army.
As he lay his head onto the cabin table in a bout of sickness and frustration, Telson wondered at how the man had enough vigor to run an undermanned ship and torture him at the same time. The battles hadn't even started yet.
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