10 Saun 716
The small sloop bobbed up and down on the open ocean, moving with the calm waves. In the distance, the shores of Rynmere looked like a greyed cut-out of rolling hills and distant stone buildings. The wind had died down and the sun that beat down on the boat was almost unbearable. Bronik pulled a rag from his back pocket and leaned over the edge of the boat to soak the cloth in the salty water, bringing it up to wipe his face with before fixing it over his head like a makeshift bandana. His skin was starting to burn, the tops of his shoulders and tip of his nose already tender and red. He worked in the shade of the sail making sure the fishing nets didn't tangle as they cut through the water slowly.
Behind the boat on a short piece of rope, Bronik had tied a smelly, two day old dead fish which had been cooking in the sun. He had decided to use it as bait in order to try and attract sharks, the kind of game the locals had been asking after at the fish-markets down on the docks. Shark-fin soup was very popular in Rynmere and had become quite fashionable in some of the southern territories.
Seven of the shark’s fins were used in the soup, excluding the top of the tail. These included the primary dorsal, secondary dorsal, pectoral, pelvic, anal, and caudal fins. Most of the meat went to waste in Rynmere, but Bronik wasn’t a fan of throwing away perfectly good meat, which meant going to some extra effort drying, smoking, or salting the fish. Scrapes were used for fish bait, and the bones, minus the large teeth which could be used to make necklaces, were thrown back into the sea for the little fish to pick clean.
Today Bronik was hunting Mako, a shark well known in the southern waters of Andaris for its bad temper and nasty bite. He had managed to pull in a young shark and towed it behind the boat having looped rope around its tail. Water washed backwards through the gills was an effective way to kill, or rather drown a shark without getting bitten, something the young sailor didn’t want to risk.
He got his hook ready and walked to the back of the sloop, avoiding the sail by ducking down low as the breeze caught it. At the back of the boat he had notice another dorsal fin rise up out of the water. Something was after his fish. Bronik took the rope attached to the young Mako he had caught earlier and pulled it in, dragging the metre and a half long shark up onto the boat. He touched its eye to make sure it was dead before looking out for the new arrival, and jumped out of his skin as the animal came up alongside the boat, its sinister, triangular shaped head and pointed nose raised as if to size the man up.
