Gods and Warriors

by Michelle Paver

  When the thirst became unbearable, he scooped up a handful of seawater and drank it. It made him retch. He peed in the boat and tried some of that, but it tasted so bad he spat it out.

  He still had the bronze dagger strapped to his thigh, but he hadn’t seen a single fish; just some weird see-through creatures without eyes, that floated like pulsing veils. He caught one, but it stung worse than nettles, so he chucked it back.

  Then he had an idea. The willowbark twine had dried tight around his thigh, but he managed to unpick the knots and free the knife. Cutting a strip off the hem of his tunic, he dipped it in the Sea and wrapped it around his head. The wet cloth was blissfully cool. Much better. He splashed himself all over, soaking his tunic. Why hadn’t he thought of this before?

  The bronze knife shone fiercely in the Sun, and for the first time he noticed that there was a mark engraved on the hilt: a quartered circle. He wondered what it meant.

  He caught sight of his face in the blade. He looked bony and determined. It made him feel stronger. There were things he could do—and the knife could help.

  Hacking another strip from his tunic, he cut two slits in it and tied it around his eyes. At once the sun-dazzle became bearable.

  Next, he took the willow twine and strapped the knife by the hilt to the narrow end of one oar. There. A fine, sturdy spear. It was much heavier than a proper spear, but as he hefted it in his hands the blade flashed, and his heart swelled with pride.

  He was not alone. Not while he had the knife.

  He’d thought the spear would bring him luck, but by mid-afternoon he still hadn’t seen any fish; and the seabird was gone. Black spots swam before his eyes. He was so hungry it hurt.

  He’d never imagined the Sea would be so vast and so strange. It had no smell, no shelter, no tracks. He stared at the red dust under his fingernails: the last trace of the mountains. His spirits sank. Scram was dead. Telamon and Issi were far away. He was lost in a wilderness of water.

  Leaning over the side, he peered into the deep. Back at the coast, the Sea had been a sunlit blue, but out here it was nearly black. He couldn’t see the bottom. Did it have a bottom?

  Far down in the dark, something sped past.

  Hylas gripped the side of the boat. He knew that the Sea was full of horrors. Paria told tales of monsters with many limbs that seized ships and dragged them to their doom; of giant man-eating fish with teeth like knives…

  Suddenly he was sharply aware of how he must look from below, huddled in his fragile little shell, waiting to be eaten.

  A splash behind him. He spun around.

  The Sea was calm, except for a trail of foam rocking on the water.

  Another splash, this time in front.

  He saw it: a fish leaping clear of the waves. At least, it looked like a fish—but it had wings.

  Openmouthed, Hylas watched it glide through the air and drop back to the surface, where it thrashed its tail and leaped again, spreading its strange spiny wings in another soaring arc.

  The fish that fly… The Keftian’s voice echoed in his head. It reminded him of—what? He had a nagging sense that there was something he’d forgotten to do.

  No time to think of that, the waves were alive with flying fish: leaping, churning the Sea white as they fell and flew and fell again.

  Grabbing his spear with both hands, Hylas lunged, missed, and nearly fell in.

  Then he spotted something familiar: not a fish but a turtle, swimming slowly in the shade of the boat. He jabbed at it. Yes! The dagger caught the soft underbelly. He leaned out to drive it deeper—

  He fell in.

  Down he went into the cold green Sea. It roared in his ears, rolling him in a net of bubbles till he couldn’t tell up from down. Keep hold of the spear, don’t let go!

  Kicking toward the light, he burst from the surface.

  The boat was gone. Around him he saw nothing but waves.

  The swell lifted him up, then sucked him under. Coughing and gulping air, he prayed to the Lady of the Wild Things and to the Earthshaker, the great god who rules the Sea.

  The Sea bore him up again, and he caught a choppy glimpse of the boat, alarmingly far away.

  Clutching the spear in one hand, he battled the waves. He’d only ever swum in shallow lakes and rivers; this was much harder. Then the swell sucked him under again—and slammed him against the boat.

  Spitting out seawater, he scrambled over the side. He hauled the spear in after him and lay panting with relief, staring at the Sun. He gave a jittery laugh.

  The turtle was still feebly twitching on the end of the knife. Hylas thanked it briefly for giving its body to him, and ended its pain with a twist to the neck. Then he untied the dagger from the oar, slit the creature’s gullet, and drank its blood.

  As long as he lived, he would never forget that salty sweetness coursing down his throat; the squelchy coldness of the turtle’s eyeballs bursting on his tongue like grapes; that wonderful cool wet flesh.

  Now he felt a lot steadier. Crows or no Crows, he was going to survive.

  Cutting off the rest of the meat, he set it out to dry, then scraped the shell clean, gnawing every last shred of flesh. He’d lost his head-coverings in the Sea, but the shell would do instead; and he could use it to bail out the water that kept collecting in the bottom of the boat.

  When he’d finished, he cleaned the knife and thanked it. “We did well, you and me,” he told it. The bronze glinted in reply. He felt a surge of pride that it had come to him, and nobody else.

  Bronze. He’d never thought much about it, but now he was struck by its magic: this stone that was not stone, that was born from earth and fire, and possessed the power of both; that never grew old…

  He’d forgotten to make an offering.

  Casting the turtle’s head overboard so that its spirit could swim off and find a new body, he tied two of the legs in a bundle with a length of gut. Then, muttering a heartfelt thanks to the Earthshaker and the Lady of the Wild Things, he held the offering over the side and dropped it in the water.

  Giant jaws rose from the deep and swallowed it.

  12

  Hylas heard the gentle lapping of water. He saw little waves rocking where the monster had been.

  Jaws bigger than the boat. Teeth sharp as boars’ tusks. If he’d drawn back his hand an instant later, it would have bitten off his arm.

  And it was somewhere beneath him.

  Not daring to touch the sides, he leaned over.

  Sun-dazzle and shadow. It could be anywhere. He pictured it sliding through the green water—water in which he himself had only just been swimming.

  He grabbed the spear; except it wasn’t a spear but an oar: He’d untied the knife to cut up the turtle. He grabbed the knife—then dropped it with a clatter. He fumbled to tie it to the oar. Come on, come on.

  At last it was done. Clutching the spear, he scanned the Sea.

  Every wave, every patch of wind-darkened water became the monster. He spotted a fast-moving shadow sliding toward him…

  The seagull screeched, and its shadow faded from the Sea as it flew higher.

  Hylas sagged with relief. Shakily, he took off his turtle shell cap and wiped the sweat from his face.

  It was only a seagull, he told himself as he settled the shell more firmly on his head.

  He froze.

  The monster lay just beneath the surface on the other side of the boat.

  In one appalling heartbeat, Hylas took in its pointed fin and its sickle-shaped jaws. Its fathomless black eye.

  Once, Paria had told him that there were two tribes of giant fish in the Sea: dolphins and sharks. If you ever meet one, she’d said, you’d better pray it’s a dolphin. Dolphins are sacred, and they don’t eat people. Sharks do. Hylas had asked how you told them apart, and Paria had cackled. A shark never smiles, and its hide is rough as granite. But if you’ve gotten that close, it’s too late.

  Hylas didn’t need to touch that flinty hide to be sure that thi
s was a shark. No hunter he’d ever seen in the mountains—no lion or bear or wolf—had such a stare. There was no light in it. It was a pit opening on Chaos: on the yawning void where even the gods fear to tread.

  With contemptuous ease, the shark flexed its massive tail and slid beneath the boat.

  Hylas waited.

  The shark did not reappear. It might be anywhere.

  The wind dropped to a hush. The heat grew stifling. The sky was a sullen yellow, darkening to gray where it touched the Sea.

  Something bumped against the boat; just hard enough to make it rock. Hylas rearranged his clammy hands on the spear.

  Lazily, the shark lashed its tail and swam away. Hylas saw the ripple of its gills, and its gray fin scything the waves.

  With alarming speed it turned and came at him again.

  Bracing his legs, he readied his spear.

  The shark swam closer. Hylas drew back the spear and jabbed at its head. The shark twitched, nearly wrenching the weapon from his hands. He yanked it free with a jerk that almost flung him overboard and sent his turtleshell cap flying. The shark swam under the boat and seized the shell in its jaws. Thrashing its great head from side to side, it savaged the shell, crushing it as easily as if it had been birchbark. Then it dived, leaving a scattering of shards drifting on the foam.

  Streaming with sweat, Hylas lowered the spear. He could still feel the awesome power as the shark had wrenched itself free of the spear, but in the water he saw no tinge of red. He hadn’t even drawn blood. No knife—not even the bronze dagger—could kill such a monster.

  And it would be back.

  The Sun sank toward the waves, and still the shark circled. Hylas dreaded the coming of the dark.

  Then, far to the south, he glimpsed something that kindled hope: a jagged black shape jutting from the edge of the Sea. He shaded his eyes with his hand. It wasn’t a ship. It was land.

  He started to row—clumsily, as the knife was still strapped to one oar. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the gray fin following. He couldn’t outrun it, but if he could keep going until he reached land…

  The wind picked up, pushing him onward. The Sea was helping him, carrying him toward it.

  The shark kept pace with the boat, sometimes hanging back, sometimes drawing closer, but it didn’t attack—almost, Hylas thought uneasily, as if it was waiting for something.

  He noticed that the swell was getting bigger, and that the waves were now rimmed with white foam. The boat was rocking harder, water sloshing over the sides. He had to keep throwing down the oars and bailing with his hands.

  With a cold clutch of terror, he realized what the shark was waiting for. To the north, the sky was black. The shark didn’t need to attack the boat. There was a storm on its way. His little boat would be no match for it. The storm would pitch him into the Sea.

  The wind strengthened fast. Soon it was tearing at his tunic with invisible claws, whipping his hair into his face. The boat was bucking like an angry bull. Hylas struggled to stay in and still keep a grip on the oars.

  It flashed across his mind that he couldn’t do both. If he left the knife strapped to the oar, it was bound to go overboard; but if he untied it, he lessened his chance of fending off the shark. He had to keep the knife. Besides, what use was a spear in a storm?

  Bracing his legs against the sides of the boat, he struggled to untie the knots, then frantically strapped one end of the twine around the knife-hilt and the other around his wrist. He’d scarcely finished when the Sea lifted the nose of the boat out of the water, then slammed it down with a bone-jolting thud that sent both oars flying. Hylas clung on desperately.

  A deafening crash of thunder—and the storm broke and the rain hammered down. In a heartbeat Hylas was streaming wet. The Sky Father was battling the Earthshaker, with him caught in the middle. Waves as tall as trees were clawing at the clouds, the wind screaming its fury as it savaged the Sea, ripping off great stinging sheets of spray and hurling them at the sky.

  Again the Sea tossed the boat clear out of the water and smacked it down, but this time the sky was gone. Hylas was in darkness—he was inside a wave as big as a mountain. With relentless force it sucked the boat upward to its crest; it held him there, he was staring into an abyss; then it flung down the boat and he was plummeting faster and faster, racing toward a wall of black water…

  The boat smashed into it and shattered like an eggshell.

  13

  No wind. No waves. Hylas floated under the stars on the quiet, black, breathing Sea.

  He was cold. He’d been in the water so long that his skin was wrinkled and peeling. He couldn’t quite believe that he was still alive.

  The knife had saved him. In the storm its tether had gotten wrapped around a plank from the shattered boat, and as the other end was tied to his wrist, this had kept him afloat. The plank was just long enough to lie on, and at times he did, paddling with hands and feet and dagger; but he hated being unable to see behind him, so then he would sit astride the plank—only now his dangling legs felt horribly vulnerable, so he would lie on his belly again.

  Either way, he’d been paddling forever, although the land at the edge of the Sea never seemed to get any closer.

  The bronze knife gleamed in the light of the waning Moon. It kept him company, but it couldn’t keep him safe. He hadn’t seen the shark since before the storm, but he knew it was out there.

  He was exhausted, but he didn’t dare stop paddling, because then he would fall asleep and the shark would get him…

  Something brushed his foot. He jerked awake. The water around him was alive with fish: slivers of starlight flashing to the surface to feed, the bigger ones chasing the smaller.

  He started to paddle, and the fish stayed with him. Then they were gone as swiftly as they’d come.

  He stopped paddling. What was the point? He would never reach land. Like those fish, he was here to be eaten.

  The dying Keftian had told him that the Sea would give him answers, but now he knew that wasn’t true. The Sea was playing with him, as a lynx plays with a mouse.

  A breeze sprang up, murmuring in his ear. Suddenly he remembered the promise he’d made to the Keftian. He’d promised to give his hair to the Sea, to set his spirit free.

  Amazingly, the hair was still there, a sodden tangle tied to his belt. Wearily, he unpicked it and flung it across the waves. “Take his spirit,” he mumbled. “Let him be at peace.”

  Silence.

  Part of him had hoped that the Sea would give some sign to show that it had heard him; perhaps the Fin People—whatever they were—would come for the dead man’s spirit, as the Keftian had said. But the lock of hair rocked forlornly on the water, and the night wind died with a defeated sigh.

  Hylas lay down on his belly and shut his eyes. He couldn’t go on. It was too hard. He was going to die out here, alone in the dark.

  Let it be painless, he begged. Let me slip away into the arms of the Sea and never wake up.

  In his head, he began to say good-bye. Good-bye, Telamon. Sorry I couldn’t meet you like we’d planned, I’d have had a lot to tell you. Good-bye, goats. To the ones the Crows killed, sorry I couldn’t save you. To the ones that got away, you stay in the wild, don’t let Neleos catch you.

  “Sorry, Scram,” he mumbled out loud. His throat closed. His eyes stung. “Sorry I couldn’t avenge you…” He drew a deep breath. “Issi… Issi, I’m—”

  His sister’s name was like a slap of cold water in his face. It wasn’t only his life he was giving up. It was hers. He was her big brother. He was supposed to look after her.

  His one memory of their mother was of her telling him to do just that. He’d been lying under the stars wrapped in the bearskin, with Issi snuggled against him. It had been too dark to see their mother’s face, but he’d felt her warm hand on his cheek and her long hair tickling his nose as she leaned down and whispered, “Look after your sister…”

  If he gave up now, he doomed Issi and dishon
ored their mother’s memory. Something inside him—a hard, fierce kernel of strength—couldn’t let that happen.

  Wearily, he hauled himself upright. He struck the plank with his fist. He started to paddle.

  The stars brightened. The bronze knife gleamed, urging him on.

  Then he saw it. A fin, keeping level with him a short distance away. Just when he’d decided to live, he was going to die.

  He drew in his legs. He heard the soft splash of wavelets against the plank. He watched the fin move ahead of him—then cut a wide, lazy ring around the plank.

  The shark’s head rose above the surface, then sank back. Its fin turned. It was moving toward him.

  Nothing existed but the shark. Again it raised its head, and now Hylas saw its gaping jaws and its jagged in-curving teeth. Its black eye locked on his. He lashed out with the knife. The shark swerved. His fist grazed granite as it swam away.

  Hylas watched the fin scythe the water in another lazy ring. It disappeared. He huddled on the plank, peering about him.

  The shark erupted behind him. He jabbed at it—missed—and nearly fell off the plank. Again it swam away. Again it circled.

  He knew now what it was doing; in the mountains he’d seen wolves do the same thing. It was testing the strength of its prey. It would come at him again and again till he was too exhausted to fight, and then it would make the kill. He didn’t think it would have to wait long.

  Something slithered against his thigh. He cried out.

  It was only the Keftian’s hair, drifting on the waves. With the tip of the knife he flicked it from him, and it lay like a snake on the black water.

  Wildly, he cast about—but he could see no sign of the shark. The Moon’s path was a trail of beaten silver across the Sea.

  A black fin cut across it. It turned and started toward him. With a moan, he drew in his legs.