Islands in the Sky

3.6

Sema walked until she found an eating house. It was a large room in an ancient building, behind what had obviously once been a wide, full-height window. Now the window was gone, and the room and street outside it were covered with trestle tables. People were sitting at the tables, eating from bowls.

There was a sign outside the eating house which probably said what was being served, and which also had a picture of a bowl and a spoon. Sema assumed the bowl meant soup, or stew, or gruel. The eating house was half full, though, so it couldn’t be that awful, and the smell coming from inside it was good, as well.

Sema stood there for a moment, unsure if she should go inside. She watched, trying to work out how the eating house was organized. There was a kitchen window halfway along one side wall, where bowls of food were being handed out. People seemed to pay there, too, although Sema couldn’t see what they were trading. They did what they did, though, and then were given a bowl, which they sat down and ate at a table. Then, as they left, they passed the empty bowl through another window to where it was presumably washed.

Sema wondered if she should eat. She was hungry, and sick of year-old apples, and hadn’t had anything more substantial than that in several days, since the last of her grains had run out.

She hesitated, a little nervous, then decided to had to talk to someone eventually.

She went up to the window where food was being served, and looked through it, hesitantly. There was a kitchen through there, where several people were working, chopping and stirring and talking, and where several large metal pots were simmering over a wood-burning stove, producing the smell Sema had noticed. There was a woman at the counter too, right in front of Sema, with empty bowls at her elbow, and another large pot beside her with a ladle sticking out the top of it.

The woman glanced at Sema, and said something in a bored voice, but Sema didn’t quite catch what. It wasn’t hello, and didn’t seem to be asking what Sema wanted. It might be asking what Sema wanted to trade, Sema thought.

“Excuse me,” Sema said. “What do I trade for food?”

“Trade,” the woman said, sounding confused.

“I’m sorry,” Sema said. “I want to eat. I don’t know how.”

The woman looked at her, and laughed, and then called the other people in the kitchen, “Listen to this one.”

Sema flushed.

“Say it again,” the woman said.

Sema didn’t.

“Go on,” the woman said, and after a moment Sema decided that she might as well, since it cost her nothing, and might make the woman better disposed towards her.

“I want to eat and I don’t know how,” Sema said, and they all laughed.

“Chew,” someone said, and they all laughed again.

Some of the customers, who had overheard, were laughing too.

“Especially chew this gristle Harrita calls meat,” one of the customers called.

The woman at the counter banged her hand down onto its wooden top, loudly, and shouted, “Hey,” at that man. He kept laughing, but shrugged and went quiet.

Everyone else laughed at him now.

“Please?” Sema said, after a moment’s hesitation. “I’m sorry, but I don’t know what I need to do to have you give me food.”

“Pay me,” the woman said. “Two coins.”

“I want to trade,” Sema said. “Can I trade something?”

“You can’t trade, girl,” the woman said. “You have to pay.”

“With what?” Sema said.

“Money,” the woman said, surprised.

“Oh,” Sema said, and nodded, understanding. She did know about money, now she thought on it a little. It had been used at home, sometimes, but mostly only to store wealth, and to keep aside to give to traders for plastic, or a new axe or plough, on one of the infrequent occasions an island or ship passed by.

Sema knew about money, but not money used like this. Here they must use it for little things as well as large ones. At home, in a situation like this one, Sema would simply have made a promise to be settled later. If Sema needed a loaf of bread now she would promise six eggs tomorrow, when they were laid, and then deliver them as she had said she would. Here it couldn’t work like that though, she realized. Here no-one knew anyone, and someone who promised eggs tomorrow would probably disappear and never be seen again.

Here you needed money in your hand just to eat, Sema realized. Which was useful to know, even though it was something of a problem right now.

“I don’t have any money,” Sema said.

“And why ever not?”

“I have only just arrived. At the docks. In this city. I can trade, though.”

“What’s wrong?” a man called from further back in the kitchen. One who was stirring a pot, and who had laughed at Sema earlier.

“She can’t pay,” the woman said. “She’s only just arrived in Anew-Hame.”

“So tell her to go away.”

“Reger,” the woman said, sounding outraged. “Don’t be such a heartless fool. She made you laugh, and she has no money, so now the least you can do is feed her.”

The man shrugged, and didn’t answer, which seemed to be an answer in itself. The woman looked at him, then spooned a ladle-full of soup into a bowl and handed it to Sema.

“Thank you,” Sema said. “Thank you very much.”

“It’s fine, child. Put the bowl over there when you finish.”

Sema nodded, and said, “Thank you,” again, then went and sat down and ate.

It was good soup, thickened with barley, as she was used to at home. It was filling, and warm, and she was glad to have it. She ate, feeling a little sad again, remembering all those who had died.

She ate quickly, not wanting to outstay her welcome, then left the bowl where she’d been told. She said thank you again, through the kitchen window as she left, and then went back out into the city, trying to decide what to do next.