The Tree of Water (45 page)

“But someone must know what she is to be called,” Ven said, mostly to himself, as his father was now talking to the shipwright. “Someone will have to paint the name on her prow before the christening ceremony.”

“That won't be you.”

Ven jumped at the sound of his second-oldest brother's voice behind him.

“Morning, Nigel.”

“Morning, and many happy returns of the day, Ven. I'd say ‘bless your beard,' but of course you don't have one yet. Now get your oversized fanny to the end of the causeway where the others are waiting. We're drawing straws to see who has to do the Inspection. Now that you're of age, you have to throw your lot in with the rest of us. No more free ride for you, little brother. Even if it is your birthday.”

Ven nodded excitedly. He had long been aware of the need for the final check of the ship's fittings that was made on the open sea outside the harbor just before its christening. It was the last chance the ship's builders had to make certain the vessel was seaworthy before turning it over to the new owner.

His brothers dreaded Inspections. They feared the water and could not swim, so the eight-hour voyage on seas that were often rough was torture for them. Whenever it needed to be done, they had drawn hay straws, making the loser in the game undertake the Inspection.

Unlike his brothers, however, Ven could swim, and he loved to sail. His heart was always dreaming of adventure beyond Vaarn, the bustling seaside city in which he lived. So the opportunity to do an Inspection—taking a ship with a small crew out of the harbor and into open sea—made his skin prickle with excitement.
I hope I get the straw!
he thought, but he said nothing, following Nigel over to meet with three of his other brothers.

He could see them from quite a distance; his siblings, like Ven himself, had hair the color of ocean sand, and their heads stood out in the sea of darker-haired people milling about the docks, despite their being shorter than everyone else. Besides, most folks knew to give the Polypheme boys plenty of room in case one of their frequent scuffles broke out. Their good-natured horseplay had bumped more than one innocent bystander into the water.

Vernon, Osgood, and Jasper didn't appear especially happy to see him. They glanced up from the model of the ship's hull they were examining, then went back to arguing among themselves. Arguing was how the Polypheme family communicated.

Ven watched nervously as Jasper squatted down and pointed to a line of miniature lead rivets that fastened a small board to the keel of the ship's model. He grew even more anxious as his brother spat on the pier and continued to point at the model's hull. Ven had worked on that part of the model, and had forged many of the actual iron rivets for the ship himself.

Scale models of the ships they built were the Polypheme family's stock-in-trade. They fashioned whatever vessel they were crafting in perfect miniature detail, from stem to stern, in all its fittings, down to the last rivet and dead-eye, at one-tenth the size it would be when the ship itself was finished. In this way the Polyphemes could be certain the design was sound, and catch any problems before the vessel sailed into the harbor for Inspection.

At least that was the hope. It didn't always turn out that way.

On Osgood's first Inspection, a design flaw with the bilge pump caused the ship to start taking on water at alarming speed. By the time the leaky sloop returned to the pier, it was riding very low in the water, and Osgood was gibbering like a panicked monkey.

But for the most part, these models served to prevent problems in the enormous projects of building sailing vessels. Whether it was a frigate, a sloop, a galleon, or a fishing boat, before the first iron rivet or steel nail was forged to fasten it together, the Polyphemes had already built a smaller version of it. The model for this one was lying in great sections on the planks of the dock in front of their family factory.

Jasper pointed a stubby finger at Ven, then indicated the bottom of the model again.

“There's twice as many fastenings here as there needs to be,” he said, scowling. “Ya think we're made of gold or something, Ven? Do you have any idea of the
cost
of this?” Jasper was in charge of the factory's finances.

“I know that the ship stands twice as good a chance of holding together if it hits a reef because of them, Jasper,” Ven replied. “Since that might save the entire cargo and crew, by my reckoning it's cheap. Just looking after the family's reputation.” It was his birthday, so he decided to risk a playful poke at his brother's stinginess. “Wouldn't want skimping on rivets to cause the loss of the ship and the business at the same time.”

Jasper's face turned an unhealthy shade of purple. Even though he was half a head shorter than his youngest brother, he strode over to him angrily and bounced his belly off of Ven's.

Ven knew the belly blow was coming and braced himself. So when it came, Ven didn't move an inch, but it sent Jasper sprawling backwards, landing on his backside with a resounding thump.

“Stow your bickering,” ordered Nigel, holding out a curled fist from which five straws popped. “Time to draw. Short straw inspects. Since it's your birthday, Ven, you can draw first.”

Swallowing his excitement, Ven stepped forward to get a better look at the ends of the straws, trying to determine which of them was the shortest. He inhaled the salty air, hoping it would bring him luck. Then he took hold of one end, closed his eyes, and plucked the straw from Nigel's hand.

At first he thought he must have dropped the straw because of his eyes being closed. Ven opened them quickly, feeling nothing in his hand, then looked.

The straw between his thumb and forefinger was not even the length from his fingertip to the first knuckle.

Nigel opened his palm. Every other straw was at least the length of his hand.

“Tsk, tsk; hard luck, bucko,” said Osgood in obvious relief, wiping the nervous sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. “Your first draw, and your first short straw. Too bad.”

Ven nodded but said nothing, knowing that any word out of his mouth would betray his jubilation. He turned away from his brothers and walked slowly down to the end of the pier, where the all-but-finished ship was moored, still waiting for its sails to be brought aboard.

As Ven moved beyond earshot, Vernon turned in disgust to Osgood.

“You sniveling baby,” he said contemptuously. “Why are you sweating like a prisoner about to be keel-hauled? You knew all along the draw was rigged.”

Ven was too far away to hear when Osgood tackled Vernon, too caught up in excitement to notice his brothers rolling around on the docks, pounding each other's heads into the planks. The sight was a common one anyway.

Instead, he was listening to the call of the sea wind, to the scream of the gulls, to the glad song his heart was singing of adventure beyond the harbor of Vaarn, where he had spent his entire life.

It was an excitement none of his family could possibly understand.

In the distance he could make out a tiny moving shadow against the sun, flying in great circles on the warm updrafts.

The albatross.

Ven touched the long feather in his cap.

“Thank you,” he whispered into the wind. “Seeing you seems to have brought me luck this day after all.”

He had no idea how much—or how bad.

 

READERS
'
GUIDE

About This Guide

The questions and activities that follow are intended to enhance your reading of
The Tree of Water
. Please feel free to adapt this content to suit the needs and interests of your students or reading group participants.

Before Reading the Book: Writing and Discussion Activities

The pre-reading activities below correlate to the following Common Core State Standards: (W.4-9.3) (SL.4-9.1, 3)

• Ask students about a time they might have had to keep a difficult promise. Why was it hard? What are the choices they have to make—to stay true to the promise versus disappointing or making someone they care about angry? Would it be difficult to keep a promise that they were afraid of or that required them to give something up? Which choice did or would they make?

• Invite students to discuss times when they may have thought they understood what someone else wanted, only to find out that the person wanted something entirely different. Have they ever described something they wanted to another person only to get something very different? Discuss.

• Discuss times when tasks required of students were or are more challenging than they expected. Did they feel they could accomplish those tasks or did it make them nervous? What are some ways to get past those worries?

• Pose these questions to students for a general discussion: Have you ever taken a long journey that did not turn out exactly as planned? What was supposed to happen that didn't? What happened instead?

Discussion Questions

The discussion questions below correlate to the following Common Core State Standards: (SL.4-9.1, 2, 3, 4) (RL.4-9.1, 2, 3) (RH.4-8.6)

• Different people want Ven to do different things for them. Amariel expects Ven to come explore the sea with her. Char wants Ven to refuse Amariel's demand and stay on land. The Cormorant wants Ven to go to the Summer Festival and get some guidance about the attack on the Gated City from the Sea King. Why does Ven decide to do or not do what each of these people expect of him?

• The Lost Journals of Ven Polypheme series is what the publisher refers to as “faux nonfiction.” This means that while Ven is called the author of the journals, the actual author is pretending that Ven existed in the real world. Why would a writer put part of the story, the “journal” pages, in Ven's voice? How is Ven's voice different from the third-person narrator's voice?

• Merrows, Sea-Lirin, the Epona, and the Vila are all human-like creatures of the sea. How are they alike and how are they different?

• Ven gets redirected several times in the course of the book. Do you think that each time someone changes his original plan, it confuses and frustrates him, or do you think it leads him in better directions in finding out the purpose of his journey by the end, as Madame Sharra tells him must happen?

• In Chapter 18, the worst fight to ever happen between Ven and Char takes place. What do you think would have happened if the Vila had not attacked Char at that moment?

• At various parts of the story, different characters have to apologize in some way for another character's presence or behavior. List some examples. List some apologies that work and some that do not.

• When Coreon introduces Spicegar to his new friends, each of their expectations about this sea dragon turn out to be wrong. How does each person handle being incorrect? How does his or her opinion of Spicegar change? In your opinion, what does Spicegar think of each of the children?

• Make a list of all the mistakes Ven and Char make in the sea. Then make a list of all the positive outcomes that came of them.

• Do you think Ven is responsible for the death of the herring in the herring ball? Or do you agree with Amariel that what he called “terrible,” most people would call “lunch”?

• Do you think the Cormorant is a good or bad person? Why? When he sends the children on their mission to the Summer Festival, how does Coreon decide that the Cormorant will not be guided by the Sea King's answer? Is he right?

• From the very beginning, Ven has had the power to undo any moment of time that he wanted if he thought things had gone too far. Should he have? Which moments? Have you ever wished you had that power, and if you did, when would you have used it?

• The book introduces the concept of thrum, talking underwater by way of thoughts. How does thrum make the action of the book easier? If there was no thrum, how do you think communication would have happened?

• In
The Tree of Water,
we see words that mean one thing to one person and something different to another. Ven explains that he has heard both his mother and Amariel use the word “brazen.” To his mother, the word is negative, meaning something inappropriate or pushy. To Amariel, it is a positive word, meaning brave and proud. Do you know of any words that mean different things to different people?

• The friends learn things in each of the different realms they travel through. What does the setting of each place they go to—the kelp forest, the Lirin-mer Drowning Cave, the skelligs, the Sea Desert, the Festival grounds, Lancel's lair of lost ships, the Abyss with the soul cages, the Trenches—have to do with what they learn there? How does each place limit or encourage what they can do?

• What does Teel the hippocampus have in common with Ven? List physical characteristics, how they treat the people they care about, and their reasons for being with Amariel.

• How much of Ven's journey would you have been willing to undertake? At what point would you have stopped, or would you have finished the journey as he and Char did? Why?

• How does the author make you like Amariel even though she is obnoxious? The Sea King does not particularly like the Sea Queen—why? How is humor used in this scene?

Writing and Research Activities

The writing and research activities below correlate to the following Common Core State Standards: (L.4-8.4) (RL.5-6.5) (RL.4-9.6) (RL.4-9.7) (W.4-9.2, 7)

• In the kelp forest where the children meet Spicegar the sea dragon, they come upon the stump of a giant oak tree, a kind of tree that grows on land, not under the water like kelp. Because Spicegar is annoyed, Ven and his friends are asked to leave, and they do not get a chance for him to tell them the story of that tree. Pretend that you are Spicegar, and are not as offended as he was. Write a tale telling the story of the giant oak tree. Why it is under the water, and what happened to it? Illustrate your story.