The captain's roar woke Rav like a bucket of ice water. The man was somewhere down the hallway; in his cabin, by the sound of it. Had he realized this was sabotage?

"This demon-damned ship! This demon-damned ship!"

There was another roar, and the sound of ripped box spilling glass shards over the floor. Something slammed down at their side. It sounded like the captain was throwing notebooks. Rav lay back, his hands shaking. He was not sure his legs would support him until he was sure his last night's visit had been entirely blamed on the ship.

The captain's cabin door slammed. Two stomps later, the bathroom banged open. Rav squeezed his eyes shut and clutched the blanket to his chest.

It was more a screech than a roar this time. Something heavy scraped the floor, then hit the wall with a clang. Something metallic rattled after it. It sounded like the cage, and it didn't sound intact.

"Indra!" bellowed the captain. "Come screw this thing back on before someone falls through it! And before I burn this entire ship!"

Rav finally dared to wriggle into day-clothes and slide from his hammock. He pulled his boots on, suddenly glad the chill of the room gave him an excuse to be quaking like a kicked dog. He cracked the door.

"Indra!"

Rav leaped back. The captain stormed past without noticing. He had the dragonette's cage in one hand. Crushed by the rogue floor-panel, its dainty metal bars had been warped and battered beyond repair.

If Dreamcatcher had been a person, Rav would have hugged her.

Indra and the captain were shouting at each other somewhere at the ship's other end. Something to do with the engines. Had they broken again? Rav pressed both hands to the floor. No, the engines were both fine, and their vibrations didn't have the warped feel lent by a damaged propeller. Indra must just be maintaining them after a beating by the storm.

Rav shut the door quietly as Indra stormed past. When the man was gone, he slipped out and ran to the kitchen to ask if he could make himself useful. Better to be here and working than raising suspicion by his absence.

The ship broke out of the clouds midway through the morning. Rav stood in the lookout bay with Sanjay, calling out the first island they saw. It took two more islands to find where they were on a map, by which point the ship had descended enough to bring the sparkle back into the waves. Sanjay taught Rav how to use the ocean's wrinkles to find islands not yet visible on the horizon. They would reach the biological station's archipelago by midafternon.

"Hold onto that line, cabin boy! Get down there and moor us!"

Rav crouched on the railing until the ship was within fifteen feet of the ground, then hopped over the side and slid down the mooring line. He hit the dock with a thump and ran along it, whipping the rope around a mooring mast before the wind used up its slack. The ship pivoted with a creak of protest. When it was held and steady, he caught the new, thicker line Sanjay tossed him and fed it into the rusty winch at the dock's end. The gears at least were well oiled. Turn by turn, Dreamcatcher settled to the ground like a nesting mother quail.

"Well done," grumbled the captain as he stepped off the rope ladder. He was still brooding over his destroyed collection, but the praise lifted Rav's spirits. Nobody suspected him. Even Indra, who had spent the morning wrestling with needlessly temperamental engines, seemed to have deemed an accusation not worth the effort.

"Captain Kumalan?"

A woman stood at the end of the dock with her arms crossed and a polite smile that did not reach her eyes.

"That's me." The captain ignored her gaze as he finished securing the ship, having chased Rav off when the winchwork was done. "Sanjay, give them the delivery. Then we'll stock up and be out of this place."

Rav glanced at the woman as her mouth betrayed the twitch of a smirk. She was in her mid thirties, perhaps, with her hair pinned up around her head and her rich green sari rippling in the breeze, patterned with leaves and flowers. She didn't seem the least bit scared of the captain. Other women joined her as the Sanjay brought the miraculously intact delivery out of the cargo hold and down to the dock.

"Thank you," said a motherly woman when he reached them. She put out her hand with a finality that took no argument. Sanjay handed over the box. The woman balanced it on her hip and sauntered away as though a full-stand microscope, replacement parts, and a fat wad of mail and paperwork weighed less than a bundle of laundry.

The captain had gotten into another argument with Indra, neither of them being very polite about it. The first woman turned her back on it with a warm smile for Rav. "Salai. Is this your first time travelling with the ship?"

Rav nodded, trying his hardest to keep his eyes off the small bird perched on another woman's shoulder. The first woman followed his gaze and laughed. "It looks like Tika is interested in you. He doesn't usually come to greet visitors."

"Can I..."

The woman with the bird offered it her finger, then held it out to Rav when it hopped on. It fluttered to his head and tapped his forehead with a delicate beak. Rav held up his hand with a grin. Tika hopped to his finger.

Greetings and introductions were circulated, and laughter as Tika returned to Rav's head and pecked curiously at his flyaway hair. There were six women at the station, all of them here. Two more remained on the mainland to see to the political side of running the station.

"How long are you staying?" said the first woman, Shravya.

"I don't know." Rav glanced over his shoulder. There were now engine parts on the dock.

Gurdeep the motherly woman had returned while names were being exchanged. She raised an eyebrow at the half-disassembled engine. Rav got the distinct sense that she knew exactly what they were doing with it, and fully planned not to help. "Overnight at least, at the rate those repairs are going. Come. Have you eaten?"

He hadn't had a bite since morning, but an answer didn't seem required of him anyway. Rav found himself shepherded off the dock and away into the forest.

"Bring some for the crew, too," called Shravya as Chandani the bird-woman went ahead to what Rav knew must be the station. He wondered if the captain was included in that.

The whole walk to the station, Rav kept nearly running into trees as he gazed around at the forest. It was the lushest he had ever seen, replendescent with vines and fronds and flowers so large and colourful they could be mistaken for birds at a glance. He had yet to see the same insect or kind of tree twice. He knew only half of them.

The station proved to be a small collection of buildings, all in surprisingly good shape for being in the middle of a jungle. The biggest was lifted three feet off the ground on wooden piles. Its broad, screened-in front and wooden-walled back encased a room filled with tables. Rav could see a kitchen at the back of it, and at least two microscopes. A brightly coloured parakeet bobbed back and forth on the roof. It fluttered down to Rav's shoulder and nibbled his earlobe.

"I see you've found the other one," said Chandani, rejoining them. "Cheentee, leave the boy alone." She held out her finger, but the parakeet just scooted to Rav's other shoulder.

"It's okay," said Rav. "I like it."

They ate together, then toured the station by the light of a lantern, careful to watch for toads and spiders on the elevated wooden walkways. The dormitory was the final building. Surrounded by trees, it felt nestled in the dark and the musical sound of the night jungle, cradled by the warm night air. The nights smelled so good out here. Nothing like the city.

Six people lived at the station, but there were eight doors in the dorm. Rav refused to think what that might mean yet, so he ventured the safest question. "Are those... for the two on the mainland?"

"Oh no, those are empty," said Chandani.

The captain would kill him.

Father would kill him.

He—

"Are you looking for people to work here?"

He'd said it. Rav stood rooted. What was he thinking? He could feel his heart all the way up to the back of his throat, so close he feared he might choke on it.

He was thinking he didn't want to work for the captain anymore. Well, that was true, wasn't it? And as for Father...

"You think your captain could spare you?" said Gurdeep. "Our last apprentice had to leave for family matters two months ago, and we could use a new hand. It's not often we find someone willing to work out here."

Chandani snorted; a derisive agreement. People were scared of the Khaalee Navachandr.

He was not scared of the Khaalee Navachandr. Not anymore. If that made him a fool, he could at least be a happy fool. "Really?"

"You had the guts to make it all the way here on that ship," said Chandani. Cheentee tugged Rav's hair. "We only take people who can stand up to that captain."