Passed 50k. woot.

1 files changed, 23 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/lbh.txt b/lbh.txt
index 1c2ab5b..69050c7 100644
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+++ b/lbh.txt
@@ -1965,6 +1965,29 @@ Even now somewhere out in that blackness her people were trying to slip out of t
 
 Aunt Māra getting away was the beginning of that plan and that had worked. So far so good. Birdie rolled over toward the wall of grass siding. She wished she could slip out the hidden door and disappear. But she could not leave her father.
 
+---
+
+It all happened so fast that Lulu never had a chance to feel anything. She and Henri were off down the trail headed for Delos before it really even hit her that Birdie was not with them. It wasn't until she was knee deep in pluff mud, helping Kobayashi push Delos into deeper water that it hit her, where was Birdie. It was like something in the center of her had switched off, a vast open space created where there had been none. She wasn't positive, but she was pretty sure she and Birdie had never been apart for more than a few hours. Even then, Birdie was out fishing, or Lulu was down the river at Kadiatu's, they were both here. And now they were not. 
+
+Kobayashi lifted her over his head and she strained up until Tambo's huge rough hands gripped hers and she was lifted up over the gunwale and onto Delos' deck. Tambo fed a line down to Kobayashi and he walked himself up the side and onto the desk beside her. He nodded as her, 
+"thank you."
+
+Lulu nodded back, but said nothing. She saw Kobayashi and Tambo exchange a look out of the corner of her eye. She ignored them and started to go to her place in the bow, to watch for sand bars, submerged trees, anything that might snag them.
+
+"Not this time Lulu," said Tambo. "We need you at the helm. Henri," he turned to Henri who sat by the wheel, picking at a splinter. "We need you in the bow. You know the drill? Call out anything you see, even if you're not sure."
+
+Henri nodded in excitement and darted up to the bow. Kobayashi and Tambo went below to row. Delos had room for four oars. Or four guns, Lulu reflected, which suddenly seemed like maybe they might have their uses. She wondered if her father was changing his mind about cannon on the ship. Probably not. Four guns wouldn't do much good against the ship-of-line sitting outside the river mouth, presumably waiting for them. 
+
+She brought Delos out into the wide channel of current. She felt the boat slip and shudder at the current of the river met the current of the incoming tide. She could feel the oars lifting her, driving her against the current. Still, they were slow. What would they have done if the tide wasn't in their favor. Could Tambo and Kobayashi really row Delos up stream? It felt like they were having trouble as it was. Lulu glanced at the sun and thought for the minute. The tide would shift soon, she guessed the crest would be another hour. Then it would run out and the marsh would be impassible for Delos for the better part of eight hours. They would trapped somewhere up river until well after nightfall and then they would have the ride the river into the oncoming tide and either row, or, if they got lucky perhaps an offshore breeze could push them through the southern marsh and out the tk river mouth to the sea. That way the warship would miss them. Once they were at sea, nothing could catch Delos. She knew that. Or at least she believed the adults who told her that. Kobayashi swore by it. Only an outrigger could catch this boat he'd told her once. She hadn't known what an outrigger was, but he'd explained how the doubled thin hulls paired with a sail and some of the best sailors in the world made the outrigger the fastest, and possibly the best, boat on the sea. Lulu desperately wanted to sail an outrigger.
+
+"Hard port!"
+
+"Coming port!" She spun the wheel and Delos swung to port. Lulu ran to the gunwale and watched as the limbs of a tree slipped by, like two bony fingers reaching out of the river, trying to catch them.
+
+She turned Delos back into the middle of the river and squinted at the trees in the distance. They seemed so far away. Delos felt so exposed out here. She wanted to turn around and look, but she could not. Were there soldiers there on the shore watching them slide upriver. Had they captured her father and Birdie? She could not bring herself to turn around and look. It was better to wonder than to know that that had happened. There was nothing she could do anyway. She tried to force thoughts of her father and Birdie from her mind. Just focus on what you have to do. Take note of what's going on, because bad things may happen, but you can't react to them now. Never react, always act. Her father's words in her head. She tried. But somehow Birdie kept creeping back into her mind and she felt afraid. She shivered and tried to focus on the river, on the wind, the current, Henri's voice, but he sat silent in the bow. She wondered if he felt the great emptiness inside her that she felt. Is it different when you're a twin she wondered, or did everyone feel this way?
+
+Finally, after what seemed like hours, Delos drew near the trees that marked the inland border of the marsh. Then they slipped into the wider current of the river. Here the current was slower, the water deeper. Another hour brought them to the stand of flooded Cypress they'd prepared years ago in case they need to hide Delos. She brough the boat alongside the edge of the largest of the trees and Tambo and Kobayashi, exhausted from rowing, but running on that same adrenaline and fear that Lulu had used to pilot Delos, managed to secure Delos. They lowered the dingy over the side with a block and some tackle. Using a bow line, Tambo rowed the small boat further into the thicket of trees and then, wrapped the line around a large cypress, ran it back through the tackle, and slowly winched Delos into the tree grove. An hour later could have been paddling up river within twenty yards of Delos and not seen her. Lulu knew this because she took the dingy and paddled twenty yards out to fish for dinner and she had troubel finding her way bak the Delos with her three large catfish.
+