In the Sea Beast
He reeked of sweat and wine and rotting fish, and so did everyone else who sat shivering and trapped in the gristled black of the beast. The man squatted alone in his tweed rags to prod the thick shallows with a sharpened pole. He waited, silver-haired and asthmatic with his hands shaking and coralled over in splinters. He couldn't see a thing, there, in that sweating dark.