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What follows is the working slang of the Reaches’ skyfarer trade. It is not formal language; it is cant — the practical, often unromantic shorthand that develops among working people who share the same dangers and the same boredoms. Every reach has small variations. The terms below are common across the Quiet Reach, the Copper Ring, and most of Ironvale; the Veiled-folk villages keep some of their own words and have lost some of these.
A greenhand is expected to know perhaps a third of these terms by their second crossing. The rest accumulate. Most working skyfarers could not tell you which terms are cant and which are simply words; the distinction has stopped meaning anything to them.
Ships, crews, and ranks
- Hand — a sailor of any rank below officer. “I have eight hands and three officers.”
- Greenhand — a first-crossing apprentice. Not derogatory; descriptive. A greenhand becomes a hand at the second crossing’s end, by trade-tradition
- Old-hand — a sailor with twenty or more crossings to their name
- Stoneward / stone-talker — the ship’s officer responsible for the aetherstones. Stoneward is formal; stone-talker is friendly
- First-hand — the captain’s deputy. Older trade-tongue says first mate; both are in use
- Three-stone — a captain who has commanded three ships and survived them all
- Crewmate — anyone you have crossed with. A binding word in the trade
- First-named — someone whose given name (before travel-name) you have been told and given permission to use
- Shore-friend — a friend on land. Skyfarers use this with mild condescension; landfolk should not adopt the term
Crossings, harbours, and movements
- Crossing — any passage between two named harbours
- Long crossing — any passage that takes more than a single day, or any passage in the Veiled Reaches
- To take air — to begin a crossing. “We take air at second bell.”
- To make landing — to arrive at port
- To shake the rope — to weigh anchor; literally, to shake the mooring-rope as a signal to the dock-hand
- Veil-work — any crossing in the Veiled Reaches. Pays more, costs more
- Cold-hauled — a crossing made without aetherstone-lift, by sail and ballast alone. Rare, usually emergency, sometimes fatal
Weather and conditions
- The lift — aetherstone-borne flight, in general. “We’ve had the lift since dawn.”
- Quiet weather — deceptively still conditions, usually preceding a bad turn. Sailors do not rest on a quiet day
- Salt-broth — rough weather. Named for the way the mist tastes when it whips up
- Bone-cold — the kind of cold that reaches into the timbers of the ship. Predicts ice on the hull
- Breath-light — weather so still you can feel the ship breathing
- Bell-light — conditions where ship-bells carry across the mist for unnatural distances. A folk-omen; not always bad
- Mast-ringing — when a mast hums in certain pressure-conditions. Considered an ill sign by most working captains
Disasters and losses
- A fall — when a ship loses lift and drops below the mist-line. Most do not return. The trade’s worst word
- To take a fall — to suffer one. “She took a fall last winter.”
- Drift — when a ship loses navigation and ends up off-course in the deeper currents. Distinct from a fall; sometimes recoverable
- To dim — when an aetherstone weakens. “The bow stone has dimmed.” Stonewards take dimming personally
- Stone-fast — the practice of holding a ship in port while a stone recovers. Costs the crew their share for that period
- Foundered — a ship that is lost. The trade’s flat word
- Strung — a ship abandoned at sea but found again, salvageable. Rare. Strung ships are folk-thought to be unlucky for the next crew
- To go below — euphemism for death at sea. “He went below somewhere off the Stormring.”
- The deeper down — where the dead go. A folk-phrase, slightly archaic; rare in younger crews
Pay, cargo, and politics
- Crew-share — a hand’s portion of the cargo’s value. Standard 4-5%
- Captain’s hand — the captain’s portion. Standard 15%
- Owner-share — the ship’s portion. Standard 40%
- The share-board — the public record of which captains paid out a full crew-share for the season. “She’s been on the share-board five years running.”
- To keep faith — to pay out a full crew-share when the cargo’s margin would have allowed shorting the hands. The trade’s highest compliment to a captain
- Brassmarket-talk — gossip from the Copper Ring; treated with skepticism
- Wren-talk — scholarly gossip; treated with deeper skepticism
Folk-phrases and gestures
- To kiss the mist — the gesture of touching one’s lips after stepping aboard for the first time on a crossing. Universal
- Pike’s-luck — a narrow escape. Named for the harbour
- Captain’s nod — when a captain trusts the navigator’s judgement over their own. A particular form of courtesy
- Stone-luck — when an aetherstone has been performing well. “We’ve had stone-luck this season.”
- We cross because we cross — the trade’s only real philosophy. Not meant to be parsed
- The notch — a small cut made in the rim of a ship’s bell to mark a crewmate lost to a fall. Old captains’ bells carry many
A greenhand learning the trade is told, by tradition, to listen for a season before speaking. Most do. Most also begin using cant before they realize they have started. By their fourth or fifth crossing, the trade-tongue has taken — and they have stopped sounding like landfolk, even when they are speaking to landfolk, and even when they wish they weren’t.
“I told my father I had taken air. He frowned and asked what I had taken. I had been a hand for two years. I had not noticed I had stopped saying ‘we left port.’ He had not seen me in three years. We sat in his kitchen and I tried to remember how to speak as he spoke, and I could not always do it. The trade-tongue is the easiest way to lose your father, after the trade itself.”
— from a private letter, sender unknown, found in a drift wreck off the Quiet Reach, undated