处子译：乔治马丁《风港》序章
前段时间淘到马丁大的风港，突发奇想花三个晚上翻译了序章（龟爬）。
由于是第一次翻译这么长的东西，全文条理和流畅性方面尚多不足。就比金山快译好上那么一线吧。
望各位大大多多批评挑出不足之处~
风港 Windhaven
George R R Martin&Lisa Tuttle
序章
风暴肆虐，夜夜如此。
和母亲挤在床上，女孩缩在扎人的羊毛毯子下，听着。雨水敲打在木板上，绵绵不绝，隐约有雷声传来，电光便从屋顶的漏洞里倾泻而下，明如白昼，转瞬即逝，复归黑暗。
女孩听见雨水滴落地板，便知屋顶又增新漏。如此一来地板会变得泥泞起来，而母亲又会烦恼不已吧。母亲不擅长修理顶棚，又雇不起任何人来做这差事。母亲告诉她终有一天这座棚屋会毁于风暴的摧折“那样我们就可以见到你爸了。”父亲的脸庞已然模糊，母亲却总不停念叨。
棚屋在一阵狂风中微微摇晃，恐惧感油然而生，木板嘎吱作响，窗纸啪啪鼓动。母亲却依然沉睡，毫无知觉。风暴时起，而母亲总能安然沉睡。女孩不敢吵醒她，母亲脾气不算好，不会喜欢因为她的小小恐惧而被扰醒。
墙壁再次摇晃，雷光轰然而至，女孩在毯子下瑟瑟发抖，疑虑是否今晚便与父亲相逢。
幸好不是。
终于风暴消逝，雨水止歇。漆黑且安寂。
女孩将母亲摇醒。
“怎么了？”母亲惺忪醒来“出事了？”
“风暴过去了，妈。”
女人点头站起。“穿好衣服”她边说边摸索自己的衣服。离破晓还有小时光景，但依然得快点赶去海滩。女孩知道暴风会无情碾碎一些逗留太晚或是驶离太远的小渔船;有时大型商船也会遭遇不幸。倘在风暴之后出外，会发现各式各样的东西被冲到沙滩上。她们曾找到把金属打造的匕首，卖掉的钱让她们舒服地过了两个礼拜。如果想找到好东西，你就得勤快点儿，懒人总等到破晓出来，也总一无所获。
母亲肩头背着用来装东西的帆布口袋，女孩的裙子也有好几个大口袋。她们都穿着靴子。母亲拎着把装着钩子的长杆，以防遇到漂浮在距离之外的东西。
“快点，丫头。”她喝道“别磨磨蹭蹭的！”
沙滩阴冷且黑暗，从西面吹来强劲的海风。她们不是最早到的人，已有三两个人在沙子里翻找着。海潮不断吞没他们留下的脚印。偶尔有人停下察看。他们有个人拎着灯笼。她们也从有过一个，但父亲死后不得不变卖掉了。母亲总是为此抱怨。她没有她女儿在晚上看得清楚，不是在黑暗中磕磕绊绊，也总是遗漏原本可以看见的东西。
她们像往常一样分头行动。女孩沿着沙滩向北，母亲则往南。“天一亮就回来”母亲说道“还有别的活儿要做，反正天亮后也剩不下什么。”女孩点点头，沿着沙滩开始寻找。
这个晚上收获稀薄。女孩沿着海边，紧盯地面，走了又走，看了又看。她挺喜欢找东西，如果她能带块金属碎片或是一根和她手臂差不多粗细的海龙牙回去。母亲会难得地微笑称赞她是个好姑娘，可这种事稀有发生。大多数母亲只会喝斥她的“愚蠢到极点的问题”和异想天开。
破晓的晨曦逐渐吞噬星辰时，她只找到两块乳白色的海晶和一只大海蚌。那是个足有她手掌大小的蚌。粗糙的外壳说明这是那种最美味的类型，肉质肥厚甜腻。但她只找到一个。冲上海滩的基本上都是毫无价值的木头。
女孩正准备按母亲所吩咐地回去，却看到空中有耀眼光芒闪过，亮银色的光芒，如同新星诞生，光辉遮蔽一切。
光芒出现在她北方的海上，她凝视着光芒消逝的地方，片刻之后光芒再次闪现。这次略微偏左，突然她知道那是什么了：一个翔人的银翼咬住了朝阳的第一丝光束.
女孩想跑上前看看，她喜爱看着鸟儿们的飞行，小小的水鸟或是凶猛的夜鹰.而翔人飞得比任何鸟类都好。但此时已近破晓，母亲让她在天亮前回去。
女孩开始奔跑，如果抛得够快，跑去再跑回，或许在母亲开始担心前可以多看几眼。她开始拼命奔跑。跑过那些这时才出来搜寻沙滩的懒人。蚌在她的口袋里弹跳着。
当她赶到翔人的所在时，东方的天空已是一片橘红。这是块宽阔的沙地，翔人们通常会从上方的悬崖上起飞，再在沙地上降落。女孩喜欢爬上那堵悬崖鸟瞰，风穿过她的发，小小的脚丫在天空的边界晃悠。
但今天她没时间这么做了。得赶在母亲发怒之前回去。
可即便是这样，她来的还是太晚了。翔人正准备着陆。
他优美的从沙地上方飞过，双翼高高举在头上，女孩停下脚步，眼睛瞪得大大的。接着，翔人倾斜着身体，银翼一上一下，在空中划出巨大的圆弧，直直地向岸边飞来。优雅地降低着高度，掠上沙滩，双脚几乎着地。
沙滩上还有别人。一个青年和一个上了年纪的妇人。翔人下降时他们一路奔跑，将他拦下，帮他卸下双翼。而翔人也将绑在身上的皮带一一解下。
女孩发现那正是自己喜欢的翔人.她知道世上有许多翔人,她曾见过不少，甚至还认得出几个，最常见的却还是岛上那三个。在女孩的想象中他们生活在高高的山崖上，住在用无价的亮银制成的如同巨大鸟巢般的房子里。他们当中一个是个灰色头发，表情抑郁的女人，另一个则还只是个小男孩，黑色的头发，端正的面孔，悦耳的声音，她更喜欢那个男孩一点。可他最喜欢的还是面前这个。
“嘿，你!”
女孩抬头，惊慌地发现那人正对着自己微笑。
“别害怕”他说“我不伤害你的。”
女孩后退一步。她是经常看着那些翔人，可之前从未有人注意过她。
“这女孩哪来的？”翔人转而问他的帮手，那个捧着银翼走在他后面年轻人。
对方耸耸肩“某个挖蚌人家的孩子？我不确定。不过我好几次见过她在附近转悠，要我把她赶开么？”
“没必要”翔人又对着女孩笑了下“干吗这么害怕？”他问“没关系，我不介意你到这边来，小家伙。”
“……我妈让我别去打扰……翔人”女孩迟疑了一会儿，说。
他大笑起来“哦、哈、没事，你没打扰我。也许等你长大后你也会成为我们的帮手，就像我的伙计们那样，你喜欢么？”
女孩摇摇头“不~不太喜欢。”
“不？”他耸耸肩，却依旧微笑“那么你喜欢什么？飞?”
羞怯地，女孩缓缓点了点头。
年长的妇人嗤笑起来，翔人扫了他一眼，微微皱眉。他走向女孩，弯腰牵起她的手“好吧，如果你想飞的话，你得多加练习？你喜欢练习么？”
“嗯!”
“不过你现在还应付不了银翼。”他用强壮的手将女孩抱起，让她骑在自己的脖子上。女孩的小脚垂下他的胸前，小手在头上游移，不知道该放在哪。
“嘿，这样不行，如果想成为翔人，你就不能抓住任何东西，手臂就是你的双翼。把胳膊伸直。”
“好的。”女孩抬起双臂，向翅膀一样伸展着。
“过不了多久你的手臂就会累得抬不起来，然而想成为翔人就不许放低，翔人的双臂强壮有力决不会累。”
“我的也很强壮！”女孩坚持着。
“嗯，不错，现在准备好飞了么？”
“准备好了。”她开始上下挥舞双臂。
“不不不，不是这样，别这样拍。你知道我们和鸟不一样，我想你见过我们是怎么飞的。”
女孩试图去向他们飞行的姿态“风筝”她突然想起“你们就像风筝那样飞！”
“有时确实是那样”翔人高兴地回道“也像夜鹰那样飞，像所有可以展翅翱翔天际的鸟儿那样飞。你知道我们不是真的在飞，我们如风筝般滑行，我们御风而翔！所以别那样扑扇。你得讲双臂伸得笔直，去感受风。现在感觉到么？”
“嗯~”这股风夹杂着海的味道，温暖而又强烈。
“接下来，用你的双臂去迎接它，让它把你托起来！”
女孩闭上眼睛，试图用双臂去感受。
然后，她开始飞了。翔人举着女孩小跑着穿过沙滩，如同御风而行。风渐渐缓和，他也降低速度，突然一个转向。女孩的双臂伸得笔直。风再起，愈发强烈，翔人开始加速，越来越快，女孩在他的肩上轻轻弹起又落下。
“喂！！你要把我们飞进水里了！转向！快转向！！”
女孩侧过她的双翼，就如她所见那些翔人一般，一手高一手低。翔人便向左偏转，划出一个又一个圆圈，直到她重新恢复水平，而他也偏离了落水的命运。
他不停地跑，她也不停地飞，直到两人都气喘吁吁，放声大笑。
最后，他好不容易止住狂笑“好了，够了……初学者不该飞这么长时间。”他将女孩从背上提起，放到地上，依旧微笑“安全着陆。”
她的双臂因为举得太久而酸痛，但依然兴奋不已。此时回去已免不了一顿责罚，太阳已高高悬在水平线之上了。
“谢~谢您。”她依然为刚才的飞行兴奋得喘不上气。
“叫我鲁斯.”他说“什么时候想再飞一次，尽管来找我。此外，我也没学徒。”
女孩急切地点点头。
“那么你呢？”他边说边掸去身上的沙子“我改叫你什么呢？小家伙。”
“玛瑞丝。”
“挺不错的名字。”他微笑地回味“那么，我现在得走了，或许我们下次再飞一次，嗯？”他微笑了最后一下，转身准备离开沙滩。他的助手们也跟上，捧着叠好的银翼。他们逐渐走远，交谈着，女孩可以听到鲁斯的笑声回荡。
突然，她追上前，小脚使劲踩下，用力提起，奋力追上他。
他听到女孩追来，转过身来。“怎么了？”
“这个给你。”小手伸进口袋，掏出海蚌，递给他。
惊讶之情溢于言表，又逐渐消融为和煦的微笑，他郑重地收下这份礼物。
女孩瘦瘦的手臂圈过他，用力抱紧，松开。她两臂伸展着跑开，跑得是那么的快，就像是在……
飞。
Prologue
THE STORM HAD RAGED through most of the night.
In the wide bed she shared with her mother, the child lay awake beneath the scratchy woolweed blanket, listening. The sound of the rain against the thin lemon-wood planks of the cabin was steady and insistent, and sometimes she heard the far-off boom of thunderclaps, and when the lightning flashed thin lines of light leaked in between the shutters to illuminate the tiny room. When they faded, it was dark again.
The child could hear the patter of water against the floor, and she knew that the roof had sprung another leak. It would turn the hard-packed earth to mud, and her mother would be furious, but there was nothing to be done. Her mother was not good at patching roofs, and they could not afford to hire anyone. Someday, her mother told her, the tired cabin would collapse in the violence of the storms. "Then we will go and see your father again," she would say. The girl did not remember her father very well, but her mother spoke of him often.
The shutters shook beneath a terrible blast of wind, and the child listened to the frightening sound of creaking wood, and the thrumming of the greased paper that served them for a window, and briefly she was afraid. Her mother slept on, unaware. The storms were frequent, but her mother slept through all of them. The girl was afraid to wake her. Her mother had a fierce temper, and she did not like being awakened for something as small as a child's fear.
The walls creaked and shifted once again; lightning and thunder came almost together, and the child shivered underneath her blanket and wondered whether this would be the night that they went to see her father.
But it was not.
Finally the storm subsided, and even the rain stopped. The room was dark and quiet.
The girl shook her mother into wakefulness.
"What?" she said. "What?"
"The storm is over, Mother," the child said.
At that the woman nodded and rose. "Get dressed," she told the girl, as she hunted for her own clothing in the darkness. Dawn was still an hour away, at least, but it was important to get to the beach quickly. The storms smashed ships, the child knew; little fishing boats that had stayed out too late or ventured too far, and sometimes even the great trading ships. If you went out after a storm, you might find things washed up on the beach, all kinds of things. Once they had found a knife with a beaten metal edge; when they had sold it they had eaten well for two weeks. If you wanted to find good things, though, you could not afford to be lazy. A lazy person would wait till dawn, and find nothing.
Her mother hung an empty canvas sack over her shoulder, for carrying things. The girl's dress had big pockets. They both wore boots. The woman took down a long pole with a carved wooden hook on its end, in case they saw something in the water, floating just out of reach. "Come on, child," she said. "Don't dawdle."
The beach was cold and dark, with a chill wind blowing steadily from the west. They were not alone. Three or four others were already there, prowling up and down the wet sands, leaving boot-marks that quickly filled with water. Occasionally one would stoop and examine something. One of them was carrying a lantern. They had owned a good lantern once, when her father was alive, but they had to sell it later. Her mother complained of that often. She did not have her daughter's night vision, and sometimes she stumbled in the darkness, and often she missed things she ought to have seen.
They split up, as they always did. The child went north along the beach, while her mother searched to the south. "Turn back at dawn," her mother said. "You have chores to do. Nothing will last past dawn." The child nodded, and hurried off to search.
The findings were lean that night. The girl walked for a long time, following the water's edge, eyes on the ground, looking, always looking. She liked to find things. If she came home with a scrap of metal, or perhaps a scylla's tooth, long as her arm, curved and yellow and terrible, then her mother might smile at her and tell her what a good girl she was. That did not happen often. Mostly her mother scolded her for being too dreamy, and asking foolish questions.
When the vague predawn light first began to swallow up the stars, she had nothing in her pockets but two pieces of milky sea-glass and a clam. It was a big heavy clam, large as her hand, with the rough pebbly shell that meant it was the best kind for eating, the kind whose meat was black and buttery. But she had only been able to find one. Everything else that had washed up was worthless driftwood.
The child was about to turn back, as her mother had told her to, when she saw the flash of metal in the sky— a sudden silver gleam, as if a new star had come to life, outshining all the others.
It was north of her, out above the sea. She watched where it had been, and a moment later it flashed again, a little to the left. She knew what it was: a flyer's wings had caught the first rays of the rising sun, before they quite touched the rest of the world.
The child wanted to follow, to run and see. She loved to watch the flight of birds, the little rainbirds and the fierce nighthawks and the scavenger kites; and the flyers with their great silver wings were better than any birds. But it was almost dawn, and her mother had told her to turn back at dawn.
She ran. If she hurried, she thought, if she ran all the way there and all the way back, she might have time to watch for a while, before her mother could miss her. So she ran and ran, past the lazy late-risers who were just coming out to wander on the beach. The clam bounced in her pocket.
The eastern sky was all pale orange by the time she reached the flyers' place, a wide expanse of sandy beach where they often landed, beneath the high cliff from which they launched. The child liked to climb the cliff and watch from up there, with the wind in her hair and her little legs dangling over the edge and the sky all around her. But today there was no time. She had to go back soon, or her mother would be angry.
She had come too late, anyway. The flyer was landing.
He made a last graceful pass over the sand, his wings sweeping by thirty feet above her head. She stood and watched with wide eyes. Then, out above the water, he tilted himself; one silver wing went down and one went up, and all at once he came around in a wide circle. And then he straightened and came on ahead, descending gracefully, so he barely touched the sand as he came skimming in.
There were other people on the beach—a young man and an older woman. They ran alongside the flyer as he came in, and helped to stop him, and afterward they did something to his wings that made them collapse. The two of them folded up the wings, slowly and with care, while the flyer undid the straps that bound them to his body.
Watching, the girl saw that he was the one she liked. There were lots of flyers, she knew, and she had seen many of them and even learned to recognize some, but there were only three that came often, the three who lived on her own island. The child imagined that they must live high on the cliffs, in houses that looked something like the nests of birds, but with walls of priceless silver metal. One of the three was a stern, gray-haired woman with a sour face. The second was only a boy, dark-haired and achingly handsome, with a pleasant voice; she liked him better. But her favorite was the man on the beach, a man as tall and lean and wide of shoulder as her father had been, clean-shaven, with brown eyes and curling red-brown hair. He smiled a lot, and seemed to fly more than any of them.
"You," he said.
The child looked up, terrified, and found him smiling at her.
"Don't be frightened," he said. "I won't hurt you."
She took a step backward. She had often watched the flyers, but none of them had ever noticed her before.
"Who is she?" the flyer asked his helper, who was standing behind him holding his folded wings.
The young man shrugged. "Some clam digger. I don't know. I've seen her hanging around before. Do you want me to chase her off?"
"No," the man said. He smiled at her again. "Why are you so afraid?" he asked. "It's all right. I don't mind your coming here, little girl."
"My mother told me not to bother the flyers," the child said.
The man laughed. "Oh," he said. "Well, you don't bother me. Maybe someday you can grow up and help the flyers, like my friends here. Would you like that?"
The girl shook her head. "No."
"No?" He shrugged, still smiling. "What would you like to do, then? Fly?"
Timidly, the child managed to nod.
The older woman sniggered, but the flyer glanced at her and frowned. Then he walked to the child and stooped and took her by the hand. "Well," he said, "if you're going to fly, you have to practice, you know. Would you like to practice?"
"Yes."
"You're too little for wings just now," the flyer said. "Here." He wrapped strong hands about her, and hoisted her up to his shoulders, so she sat with her legs dangling on his chest, and her hands fumbling uncertain in his hair. "No," he said, "you can't hold on if you're going to be a flyer. Your arms have to be your wings. Can you hold out your arms straight?"
"Yes," she said. She raised her arms up and held them out like a pair of wings.
"Your arms are going to get tired," the flyer warned, "but you can't lower them. Not if you want to fly. A flyer has to have strong arms that never get tired."
"I'm strong," the girl insisted.
"Good. Are you ready to fly?"
"Yes." She began to flap her arms.
"No, no, no," he said. "Don't flap. We're not like the birds, you know. I thought you watched us."
The child tried to remember. "Kites," she said suddenly, "you're like kites."
"Sometimes," the flyer said, pleased. "And night-hawks, and other soaring birds. We don't really fly, you know. We glide like the kites do. We ride on the wind. So you can't flap; you have to hold your arms stiff, and try to feel the wind. Can you feel the wind now?"
"Yes." It was a warmer wind, sharp with the smell of the sea.
"Well, catch it with your arms, let it blow you."
She closed her eyes, and tried to feel the wind on her arms.
And she began to move.
The flyer had begun to trot across the sand, as if blown by the wind. When it shifted, he shifted as well, changing directions suddenly. She kept her arms stiff, and the wind seemed to grow stronger, and now he was running, and she bounced up and down on his shoulders, going faster and faster.
"You'll fly me into the water!" he called. "Turn, turn!"
And she tilted her wings, the way she had watched them turn so often, one hand going up and one down, and the flyer turned to the right and began to run in a circle, until finally she straightened her arms again, and then he was off the way he had come.
He ran and ran, and she flew, until both were breathless and laughing.
Finally he stopped. "Enough," he said, "a beginning flyer shouldn't stay up too long." He lifted her off his back and set her on the sand again, smiling. "There now," he said.
Her arms were sore from holding them up so long, but she was excited almost to bursting, though she knew a spanking was waiting at home. The sun was well above the horizon. "Thank you" she said, still breathless from her flight.
"My name is Russ," he said. "If you want another flight, come see me sometime. I don't have any little flyers of my own."
The child nodded eagerly.
"And you," he said, brushing sand from his clothes. "Who are you?"
"Maris," she replied.
"A pretty name," the flyer replied pleasantly. "Well, I must be off, Maris. But maybe we'll go flying again sometime, eh?" He smiled at her and turned away, and began walking off down the beach. The two helpers joined him, one carrying his folded wings. They began to talk as they receded from her, and she heard the sound of his laughter.
And suddenly she was running after him, churning up the sand in her wake, straining to match his long strides.
He heard her coming and turned back to her. "Yes?"
"Here," she said. She reached into her pocket, and handed him the clam.
Astonishment broke over his face, then vanished in the warmth of his smile. He accepted the clam gravely.
She threw her arms around him, hugged him with a fierce intensity, and fled. She ran with her arms held out to either side, so fast that she almost seemed to fly.
