by Hugh Cook
'That's the custom where I come from,' said Drake, who knew he would vomit if he dared another morsel. 'The gods demand it.'
Molly let that pass.
By this time, Drake was incapable of boozing. He simply had no room left to take drink aboard.
'That does for that chance,' he muttered.
For he thought they would soon leave for D'Waith, to visit workshops, timber yards, warehouses, sail-makers and ship-chandlers. But the pirate chiefs had settled down to talk the day to death: D'Waith would be there still on the morrow.
In time, Drake's stomach settled, so he set about debauching himself. He sampled the wine of grapes and dandelions; he tippled on vodka and gin. He gulleted down punch, brandy, porter and perry. He tried seventeen types of foreign liquor, seasoning his drinks with samples of half a dozen different drugs.
All to no effect.
He thought of his earnest prayers to the Demon, of his sacrifice of rats and cockroaches. He had worshipped as best he knew how: and the Demon had failed him!
T didn't ask much, did I?' said Drake bitterly.
But answer came there none.
Over the next few days, while repairs were made to the ship with the contentious name, Drake thought hard about the Demon. Perhaps his sacrifice had been no good because Walrus and Warwolf had ended up eating it. Or maybe it had just been too small.
Drake unstitched gold coins sewn into his sealskin jacket, and went shopping in D'Waith. He picked up a couple of changes of clothes, including some woollens (he was heartily sick of sealskin) then sought proper sacrifice material. He made diligent inquiries, but found D'Waith had no virgins - three men claimed to have made sure of that personally. No cattle were to be had, either, 'not since last year's plague'.
In lieu of a virgin and a spotless calf, which would undoubtedly have found favour with the Demon, Drake bought two sheep, a goat, seventeen dogs, twenty turtledoves and a whole cask of arak, then sacrificed the lot on an enormous pyre. As the flames of this holocaust ascended to the heavens, he prayed again for alcohol to be given its full powers over his body and mind.
Then tried to get drunk.
He failed.
For the first time in his life, Drake lost faith. His belief in the Demon had till then been absolute and unyielding. But now it was destroyed.
'Hagon does not exist,' said Drake to himself, in the dull voice of one who has suffered an unimaginable catastrophe.
In truth, Drake's prayers were unanswered only because of problems with distance. Further than fifty leagues from Stokos, it was not the slightest use whimpering to the Demon, for He was an entity with strictly localized links to the world of events.
Hagon, then, was not nearly as grand as His temple claimed Him to be. He was not a world-dominator. Nor was he the inventor of the Gift, the First Drunkard, the First Client of the Oldest Profession, or, indeed, most of the other things He was claimed to be.
However, had Drake been on Stokos, his earnest prayers, supported by sacrifices, would have won him the Demon's help. For Hagon's strength, though not equal to its publicity, was nevertheless impressive. He was far more of a Force (and far more accessible to His worshippers) than, say, the Demon of Estar.
Hagon had a measure of temporal power. Also, true to His temple's claim, He could indeed eat the souls of the dead, and did (as advertised) perform that service for any worshipper who died on Stokos - the dreaded alternative being eternal torment in one of the hells designed by the sadistic Ghost Gods (not to be confused with the True Gods, the High Gods, the Chaos Lords, Those That Are, Those That Will Be, or Those Who Were).
Thus, as they sailed north from D'Waith, Drake endured an unfulfilled spiritual longing, i.e. a wish to get drunk which he had no hope of gratifying. Plus doubts about Demon and Flame. Shortly, Drake sought out Yot and broached the subject of religion:
' Yot, me old mate, I think it' s time we had a chat about old man Muck and that Flame of his. I've begun to think maybe the scungy old bastard was onto something after all.'
But Yot - not realizing the enormous effort it had taken Drake to make this confession - found Drake's approach off-putting, and quite refused to discuss theology. After all, Yot had it on Muck's authority that Drake, the Demon's son, could never be anything other than a mortal enemy of the Flame.
'Sully,' said Drake desperately. 'You don't understand! This is serious! I have to talk to you about the Flame!'
'Not so,' said Yot. 'You want to sniff around till you learn where to find Zanya Kliedervaust. When you know that you'll kill me. Right? You only let me live because I'm the only one who can tell you where she' s gone to.'
'You're paranoid, man,'said Drake.
Tmno such thing,' said Yot.
'I know where she is anyway,' said Drake. 'I met her in Burntos. Didn't you ever hear about that? She went to Drangsturm. I went there withher.'
'Ah!' said Yot. 'But Burntos and Drangsturm were just the first parts of her mission. You don't know where she went from there. But I do.'
A smug smile grew on Yot's face, somehow finding space in amongst the warts for a full-fleshed existence.
'You were talking of life and death,' said Drake, with more death than life in his voice.
Fortunately, at that point Jon Arabin happened along, and told them it was training time. Drake, indeed curious about Zanya's whereabouts, questioned Yot as they practised sword under the stony gaze of the weapons muqaddam.
'Did Zanya go to Veda, perhaps?' yelled Drake.
'Nay!'jeered Yot. 'You'll never know! You'll never find her!'
He danced round Drake, feinting and slicing something wonderful. Tall lanky sod! Drake, angry, smashed the flat of his blade against the flat of Yot's weapon. Sclapl Yot's blade flew from his hand and spun overboard, lost forever to the slathering sea.
'Gaaai' screamed Drake.
He hacked at Yot's neck. He halted his blade just before contact, or tried to - but the heaving deck tricked him, and Yot got a pimple-scratch cut from the steel. The weapons muqaddam grunted.
'Yot,' he said. 'Grip, remember? Relaxed yet firm. How many times must I tell you? Go below. Get another weapon. Quick, man!'
But Yot's fingertips had found his cut. They brought him the savage scarlet of his own blood. Staring at it, he rocked unsteadily on his feet. The ship rocked under him, and he fainted.
'Drake,' said the weapons muqaddam, 'get a bucket of water.'
All this happened on a ship again known as the Warwolf. Jon Arabin had had a showdown with Slagger Mulps, threatening to kill off the Walrus's friend Draven unless the
ship reclaimed her original title.
The great lord Menator, their imperial master, would doubtless be angry with Arabin. But Jon Arabin, who had further considered this empire business, was already making careful plans to deal with Menator permanently on his return.
25
Penvash Channel: wild stretch of water running between eastern end of the Ravlish Lands and north-west coast of Argan; connects Central Ocean with Hauma Sea; gives access to the North Strait (known in Tameran as the Pale) between Argan and Tameran.
The Penvash Channel was notorious for storms, but the Warwolf enjoyed good weather as she ran for the north. The most trying thing the crew had to cope with was the hair-raising scream of the blue-feathered mocking gull. They shot at it with crossbows, and with some success, not knowing that Hostaja Sken-Pitilkin, wizard of Drum, had put it on his Endangered Species List.
There was, at the start of this sea-passage, a mutter of mutiny from men who, being still loyal to Slagger Mulps, were upset at the ship reverting to the name of Warwolf But serious trouble did not begin till their vessel neared the island of Drum - and then it was trouble of an altogether different nature.
On a bright day in the Penvash Channel, not far from Drum, Drake renewed his acquaintance with dolphins. With something close to joy, he watched them bounding through the brisk seas, as slick as soap and every bit as fast as legend claimed.
'Harly!' y
elled Drake. 'See!'
Harly Burpskin came, saw, and frowned. Months ago he had made a bet with Drake that dolphins and sea serpents
were mythical; the manifestation of dolphins was, therefore, unwelcome.
'Well,' said Burpskin, 'we still haven't seen a sea serpent.'
'We will,' said Drake, with confidence. 'We will.' But would they?
He could hardly expect to be lucky twice in one day.
The Warwolf strove through the seas with the wind straining against her green canvas. The weapons muqaddam was in one of his organizing moods, meaning hard times for idle hands, whether they were theoretically off watch or not. Drake kept out of his way, and got talking with a passenger: the youth he had first sighted playing cards with Bluewater Draven in the tavern at D'Waith.
They had not yet had time to get properly acquainted when the ship shuddered as if she had hit a rock or a whale. Then she was struck again, and out of the water rose a bullock-girthing sea serpent. Up, up it rose, slick with the glittering sea.
Then sank again.
But before Drake had time even to laugh with relief, he realized there were at least five more of the brutes in the water. Under threat of doom, Jon Arabin gave the orders he must. The ship's women were dragged up from below and thrown overboard in an attempt to glut the monsters' greed.
'That's murder!' cried the passenger, clearly shocked. Drake felt himself grin.
'Them or us,' he said, talking nice and spritely to conceal emotions he would have been ashamed to acknowledge as fear and horror. 'Which would you prefer?'
That gave the stranger pause. But, before said passenger could come up with an answer, he was seized by the weapons muqaddam, dragged to the stern rail - kicking, screaming, biting and scratching - and thrown overboard himself. There was something so amazingly comical about his performance that Drake collapsed to the deck, laughing.
He was still rolling around giggling - which was perhaps preferable to the alternative, which was to writhe around screaming - when the stranger who had been thrown overboard came bumping back onto the deck.
How?
Drake had no time to find out, for a sea serpent hit simultaneously, smashing the stern rail. He waited to see no more, but fled.
Drake was high in the rigging when the stranger - a born survivor, that one - climbed up beside him. Down below, a regular slaughter was going on. But, since they were so high above it all, it seemed unreal; the funny little figures scattering and screaming looked like caricatures of human beings, like puppets. Drake felt an enormous calm descend upon him. Benevolently, he turned to the stranger, who was sniffing a bit - well, almost snivelling, if truth be told.
'Enjoy your swim?' asked Drake.
He got a reply of sorts, but in strangely accented Galish too full of rage and fear to follow. Criticism, perhaps?
'What did you expect?' said Drake. 'We're pirates! You got off lucky, though.'
He elaborated, increasing the stranger's fury. Which subsided soon enough. Shortly they exchanged names: Drake for Forester.
Before they could start a proper conversation, a sea serpent pulled down the mast. Drake, falling, closed his eyes. The sea smashed into him. Breathless, he struggled, floundered, gasped. A bewilderment of sea-thrashed sun. Water up his nose. The sea-rinse blurring his vision. Ropes tangling his feet. A free-floating spar trying to brain him.
And Forester?
The boy had been thrown clear. He was floating away. Drake, clinging to the wreckage of the mast, called on him to swim - but the stranger was carried away by the current.
The Warwolf plunged onward, listing badly with one mast trailing, and Drake holding fast to that trailing mast.
Three sea serpents were grappling with the ship. Surely there was something brave, intelligent and constructive for Drake to do. Yes. But he couldn't for the life of him think what it was. Closing his eyes again, he committed himself to his death.
On board, Jon Arabin, three monsters locked in mortal combat with his ship, made no such commitment.
'Fire!' he yelled, seeing the cook staggering about the deck with a dazed expression on his face. 'Go below, man! Bring me fire!'
Then Arabin grabbed a battle-axe. He hacked at the nearest sea serpent. As most of the human meat had run for shelter, the monsters were trying to crack the ship open, as woodland animals might try to rend a rotten log to get at the maggots within.
Jon Arabin, sweating, succeeded only in blunting good steel against a monster's scaled armour. The cook returned with a pannikin of hot coals. Arabin looked around for helpers.
'Mulps, me beauty!' he roared, seeing the Walrus trying to lever away an armoured scale with a crowbar, while Ika Thole stood ready to drive a harpoon into any flesh exposed by that strategy. 'Mulps! Thole! To me! To me! It's a fire we're setting!'
There was an ominous graunching sound from the ship's timbers. They could not take much more of this.
Willingly, Mulps, Thole and the ship's cook laboured with Jon Arabin to set a fire. It spread swiftly, sending up thick black smoke. One of the masts began to burn, like a tree struck by lightning. There was a bellowing blubbering scream of outrage from one of the sea serpents, which slid to the sea to escape the flames.
That left two.
'Bucks Cat!' shouted Arabin. 'And you! Mike! Whale Mike! Grab yourself over here!'
Six men versus two monsters. Impossible odds?
'Cat! Mike!' said Arabin. 'Go below. Bring up the chain.'
'Alone?' asked Bucks Cat, knowing the chain in question was that which had guarded Pram Harbour in Hexagon before the pirates stole it.
'If that's the only way,' said Jon Arabin, calmly. 'Or perhaps you can find some gnomes and fairies to help you do it. Now bugger down below and get it done!'
The pair of strongmen returned shortly with the chain, plus the shackles that went with it, and sixteen quaking cowards they'd forced to give assistance.
'Those monsters there,' said Arabin. 'Sling the chain round the first brute. Make a loop. Then loop it round the second. Shackle it back on itself. Graft the near end to the capstan.'
'Aye man!' shouted Mulps in high excitement, seeing his plan. 'That's the story!'
The men picked up the chain and ran with it, a feat even Arabin would have believed impossible. In a trice, it was strung in loops round both monsters and connected to the capstan.
'Bar on, boys!' roared Arabin. 'Bar on! Haul away!'
With a will, men threw themselves against the twelve bars of the capstan. They heaved. Flames roared upwards from the burning mast. The ship pitched and heaved in the lumbering seas. Heroes pushed muscles to bursting point. No time for sea shanties! But Arabin started a chant which the others took up, simply:
'Go! Go! Go! Go!'
The slack disappeared. The chain tightened. The monsters pulled away senselessly, sea serpents having an irresistible instinct to pull away from captivity (which is the only hope of survival for a baby sea serpent snaffled by octopus or squid).
Animal strength fought leverage. Leverage won. Unable to escape, the monsters began to panic. In a rage of fear, they began to fight, savaging each other with hysterical jaws.
Then one of the monsters in chain-torture threw its head high and vomited a fountain of blood. Its scales crushed inwards, its flesh ruptured, and, a moment later, the chain-loop tightened to nothing, cutting it clean in half.
The other sea serpent screamed. It thrashed wildly. The corpse of its deceased comrade slid back into the sea, drenching the waters with gouts of gore. The other monsters still swimming there went wild. In a feeding frenzy, they bit at anything and everything in sight - including the surviving chained serpent.
With its lower third torn to shreds, the chained brute collapsed to the deck, perfectly dead.
'The fire, boys!' roared Arabin. 'No resting! We've five to kill!'
At that moment, a squall hit, bringing drenching rain. The fire wavered; with a bucket of sea serpent blood, the pirates began to assault
it.
Meanwhile, Drake, still clinging to wreckage dragging from the ship's side, watched with detached interest as sea serpents fought amongst themselves, their battle slowly taking them away from the Warwolf. The nearby wreckage was entangled with an enormous chunk of dead sea serpent. He wondered, vaguely, if the scales would make good souveniers.
Then he saw an evil-looking dorsal fin cutting through the water. A shark? No - dolphin, surely. Thus thought Drake. Then saw his new neighbour snout into floating sea serpent remnants, tear out a huge chunk of meat and worry it under. It was a shark! And . . . looking around, Drake realized it was not alone.
The next instant, Drake was scrambling up the wreckage trailing from the deck of the Warwolf. He moved as fast as a greased cat chased by lightning. He could not say how he got to the deck, but he was there almost instantly.
Panting, he gaped at a wild mob of capering bloodstained lunatics, who were screaming out songs and whore-jokes, whooping with laughter and yelling battle-cries as they flailed at fire with ropes and whips, beat it with green bamboo, or lavished its fervour with water.
'Drake!' roared Jon Arabin. 'Trust you to be skiving off somewhere! Get your butt over here! Get to work.'
Drake looked around for Harly Burpskin, but saw him nowhere. Was he dead? Perhaps. Even if he was alive. . . maybe this wasn't exactly the best time to try to collect on a bet.
26
Tameran: northern continent dominated by the sprawling Collosnon Empire ruled by Yarglat chieftain named Khmar.
North Strait: hostile seaway between Argan and Tameran; characterized by high tides, treacherous currents, mist, fog, storms and ironbound coasts; known in Collosnon parlance as the Pale.
Ork: deeply-indented island east of the Pale.
That night, as a jury-rigged Warwolf struggled north, Jon Arabin sat up late. By lantern-light, he did his arithmetic, using a base-twelve number system, an abacus designed to cope with the same, and a set of knotted cords for records. (He was literate as well as numerate, but paper and parchment were too precious for scrapwork).
Arabin's concern was his responsibility for the women sent overboard -/some of them his own wives. A necessary move. Doubtless. Nevertheless, the death-debt would be set against his record. Before he died,, he must sire children in numbers at least equal to that death-debt, or his gods (who had brutal tempers at the best of times) would be most unhappy with him.
