Assuming Grimworld had cycles of day and night that were similar to those of Earth, then it was after mid-day when Marcus climbed a dune and saw the sea. A line of silver was drawn straight and thin under a whiteness that only became azure blue far above the horizon. The sea was several kilometres away, across an exposed terrain of dunes and mud and clusters of grasses.
Breathing heavily, Sina joined him. 'Oh no. I thought we were closer. I'm so thirsty.'
'We don't have to reach the sea though, we can turn here.'
'All right. Let's do that then.'
They tramped along the top of the dune, the treeline of the forest on their left and the sea in the distance to their right. The waves were too far away for Marcus to hear them, nor could he hear the cries of the sea birds that were evident, diving and wheeling in large numbers. Those birds would have eggs somewhere, but probably in cliffsides that were hard to access.
'How many hours would you guess we've been walking?' Sina had drawn alongside, a light breeze lifting her black tresses so that he couldn't see her eyes.
'Four?' Marcus offered and Sina nodded thoughtfully.
'And would you say that the sun has crossed the sky to about the same degree as it would have in four hours on Earth?'
He could feel the star around which Grimworld orbited warming his head. 'I would. I was thinking that myself.'
'How long then, do you think we have before dark?'
There was anxiety in her question. An understandable anxiety. Were these suits equipped with lights? 'Six or seven hours, don't you think?'
'I agree, that was my assessment. Six hours.'
They walked on in silence. Then the princess asked, 'do you know what I'll miss the most?'
'Servants?' Marcus answered as a joke, but he immediately regretted the quip.
'Mine was a rhetorical question, to which no response is necessary other than an enquiry as to learn my answer. It certainly did not call for a mean-spirited response by someone who doesn't know me at all and has no grounds for making assumptions about me.'
'Mea Culpa.' Marcus threw open his arms. 'You are right. It's just with the sun and the sea air and my youthful body, I'm in great form. I was trying to be funny.'
She said nothing. Nor did she look anywhere but directly ahead.
'What will you miss, Sina?'
'Music.'
Marcus was relieved when she spoke. Her voice was natural, not angry. 'Music?'
'It's my passion. I couldn't care less about sports. Literature I will miss somewhat. Cinema too. But music. We don't have Bach here; every day back on Earth I played his music for practice.'
The sincere look of loss in her eyes affected Marcus and for a moment punctuated his own high spirits. He reached across and patted her arm. 'I once read an anthropology book that said early humans, because they lived in relative freedom and were not slaves to their work, probably produced a dozen Mozarts with every generation. Perhaps there is music here, amazing music.'
'Were these early humans cannibals and slavers?' she asked scornfully.
'Ahh, probably not.'
After walking for another an hour it seemed to Marcus that it was likely that they would find a river soon, for looking towards the sea, Marcus made note of the darker tone of the mud and an increase in the number of wader birds out in that direction. He did not, however, comment on this in case he was mistaken. There was no need to raise Sina's hopes only to dash them if he was wrong.
Just a few minutes after that thought, Marcus crested a slight rise and looked down from a grassy bank to a stream that ran from the forest to the sea in long, sinuous loops. It had been hidden by the gully it had made. The water was shallow and about a metre wide. A screen opened.
Congratulations! You have completed the Quest: Discover Clean Water
You have obtained a source of drinking water.
Reward: refresh your thirst.
'Did you see that?
'Thank God. Is it safe?' Made clumsy by her suit, the princess slid down the bank, gathering a long streak of mud along her leg, which made Marcus consider the value of mud as camouflage. Their suits were bright white and easily seen from a long distance.
'I have a quest complete message. It's safe.'
She was standing in the flow of the stream now, looking at the cheerful, bright ripples on the water but unable to drink as her gloves were too awkward to bring the water to her mouth. Casting about for something he could fashion into a cup – a hollow log? – Marcus stopped searching when he noticed her unfastened a glove. Rinsing it in the stream, the princess filled the glove with water and then was able to use it to pour the water into her mouth.
Marcus blinked and a shiver ran through his body. There was something profoundly beautiful about this moment. Sunlight; drops of water, each a glittering universe. A smile. Pleasure. Intense relief. Closed eyes with a stray drop of water on an eyelash. Above all, the most perfect human face he'd ever seen. Even as the moment changed and she bent to dip her glove into the steam again, Marcus knew that somehow he would sculpt that face and catch that exact expression, that moment of gratification when a desperate thirst is slaked with clean, cool water.
Quest: Create Sculpture
Create a sculpture of satiated thirst.
Requirements: 1 unit of timber; whittling tool; artistry 1; crafting 1.
Reward: a work of art whose value is related to relevant skills.
The planet was listening.
'Princess?'
'Yes Marcus?'
'I think we should stop here and build a camp. We have water, which is the main resource we need. There's the forest nearby for wood and perhaps berries...'
'And the sea, for fish,' she finished for him. 'All right. And what about safety? Predators?'
After a pause, Marcus said, 'They might come to the stream to drink,' he looked around. 'Let's move away to those bushes?' he pointed upstream, in the direction of the forest, to an area of dense green foliage.
'All right.' The far bank of the stream was a little less steep and Sina scrambled up it. Thirsty himself, Marcus copied her strategy of using a glove to catch the water and after drinking his fill with immense satisfaction, climbed up beside her.
When they reached the bushes, Marcus was pleased to see that there were areas of space between them that were sufficient for a lean to. Rather like a patch of rhododendron on Earth, the bushes were tall and extensive, but if you pushed through the branches, you could find regions that were free of the green branches and rubbery leaves.