So I had Hilfa on the boat every day, and he’s maybe not as strong as a human, and sometimes he does things that make no sense, but he’s better adapted to the temperatures, and he’s keen, always at work on time and ready to stay on late if needed. It was Dion’s decision to take him on, a year and a half ago, when Dion was still going out most of the time, before he broke his leg slipping on the icy deck last winter. (I told you it was dangerous.) Dion’s lucky it was his leg and not his neck, and lucky Hilfa caught him before he slid off the side and into the water. I’d not been sure about Hilfa at first, but I’d come to appreciate him even before that. After that, of course, green hide or not, he might as well have been my brother.

My other crew member was even stranger, in her way. Marsilia’s not an alien, but she’s aristocracy. Not only that she’s a Gold, which ought to mean she spends her time on politics and philosophy, not fishing; but her father’s Neleus, and his stepfather is Pytheas. I wasn’t going to refuse her when she came asking, was I? But truthfully, it wasn’t so much because her dad had been consul umpty-ump times or her step-grandfather was a god in mortal form, or that she’d recently been elected consul herself. It was because I’d been in love with her sister Thetis since we were both fifteen and in the same shake-up class coming up to qualifications. Not that Thee had ever looked at me. I’d always been too shy to say anything to her about how I felt.

I used to wonder sometimes how it was that Thetis and Marsilia were sisters. Thetis looks like a goddess—tall, but slight of frame, so her breasts look like every boy’s dream of breasts, or maybe only mine, I don’t know. She has a broad brow, hair the color of obsidian flowing down her back, soft brown eyes—well, I suppose to be fair Marsilia has the same eyes. But you don’t notice them as much because Marsilia’s face is flat, and she has jutting teeth. Their skin is the same velvety brown. But Marsilia’s squat, with broad hips, which is good for the boat. She keeps her hair short, like most people. Thee looks fragile, but Marsilia can pull a full net out of the water. Marsilia definitely takes after Neleus, and so I’d think Thetis takes after their mother, but Erinna is the Captain of the Excellence, and anyone less fragile you have never seen. Even now, when she must be sixty, Erinna has muscles on her muscles, as they say.

It’s funny when you think about it.