by Allan Cole
As I sat there, wiping my eyes and adding my applause to the others, an odd feeling arose in me as if I were on the verge of an important insight or discovery.
I grasped for it but it was like trying to pick up an object from the bottom of a pool. Soon as your hand breaks the water’s surface it seems like it’s at an angle to your arm and the object itself proves to be not in the same spot your eyes have marked.
Then the feeling passed and I was left with a vague sense of loss and disappointment.
That night the ghost of old Gamelan came to me. In my dream I was sitting on the deck of the Tern idly sharpening my sword. None of the men were about which for some reason seemed quite natural. It also seemed natural when I heard Gamelan’s voice greeting me and I looked up, smiling and making a casual reply.
For those of you who’ve never heard of the master wizard, Lord Gamelan was Orissa’s Chief Evocator during the time of my brother’s discoveries and had accompanied me on the long pursuit of the last Archon of Lycanth. It was he who’d pressed me into realizing and accepting the magical side of my nature. And it was he who had been my teacher, introducing me to the wizardly arts.
Gamelan died in one of the greatest acts of heroism in our city’s history and if it weren’t for him that history would’ve been bleak indeed.
In my dream Gamelan looked as he had before he’d been blinded by the Archon. Above his long white beard his cheeks were ruddy with health and his eyes were dancing with gentle intelligence. He leaned forward, touching my knee and the dream was so real I actually felt the warmth of his frail old hand.
When he spoke it was as if we were in mid-conversation, casually discussing the day’s events. “What was the insight you were grasping for, Rali,” he asked, “after you listened to Lizard’s song?”
In an instant all my thinking of that moment came boiling back.
“It was probably nothing,” I said. “But it came to me there might be more to magic than even the great Janos Greycloak surmised.”
“That’s quite possible, my dear,” Gamelan said. “Greycloak broke new ground, to be certain. But there’s much still to be learned. What in particular do you believe he missed?”
I hesitated, then said, “I think there might be more to what Janos called the Natural World. More elements that make it up, I mean.
“Picture the scene this afternoon. There I was sailing in as serene a setting as anyone could beg from the gods. And I was as engaged with my companions as anyone could be. I’d shed class, rank and sex to join them. And in that shared moment the ugliest person in our crew was touching us as we’d rarely been touched. With a song, no less. Yet it wasn’t really the song but the voice - the human instrument - that caught us, that carried us away.
“And that human instrument had experienced all that we had and by subtle tone and measure and by the look on his face conveyed meaning. And that meaning made us all weep in happy congress.”
“I’m happy you had such a nice time, Rali,” Gamelan said. “But it was hardly odd. People come together frequently for such things. From grand concerts and festivals to drunken company in a tavern. What could such events possibly have to do with the laws of sorcery?”
In my dream I sighed as greatly as any weak-minded student who is suddenly stumped by the most obvious of questions.
“For the life of me,” I said, “I don’t know. Except that the feeling I shared with the crew was so strong that for a moment it seemed to be a force. As much a force as any Janos Greycloak described.
“Let’s list them,” the dream Gamelan said. “Janos Greycloak claimed the forces that make up the world about us are light, heat, attraction, motion and motion in the state of rest. He also claimed magic, the ability to cause or transform was as natural a force as any of the others. Most important of all he said all those forces, magic included, were actually the same thing. The same force. But expressed in different ways.”
When he was done, the old Evocator’s eyebrows arched high. “Now, once again, Rali,” he said, “I ask you to tell me what you think Greycloak left out. What did he miss?”
“That force I spoke of,” I said, growing more sure of myself. “The combined spirit of human beings brought together in joy, or sorrow, or adversity. To form a common soul. A common will.” Then I thought of all the women and men I’d fought beside over the years.
My emotions bubbled over and my words became heated. “By the gods who bedevil us,” I said, “I believe that will can be as great a force as any lightning or raging storm or any spell a wizard can cast.
“I think that a living creature’s will is a force that is the product of life itself and the supreme desire for all creatures to survive... To Live.”
The dream Gamelan suddenly became agitated, excited.
“Yes, yes,” he said. “I see what you’re getting at. You’re saying that’s what Greycloak had left out of his list of forces. Life and its desire to continue in that state. You’re saying it’s a force, a kind of energy like all the others.”
Gamelan slapped his leg in glee. “Go on, Rali,” he said. “I do believe you’re on to something. Now let’s take it forward and...”
Just then Lizard and Donarius and the others suddenly appeared in the dream. They were laughing and passing a ladle of grog around. Gamelan laughed with them, took a sip and passed the ladle to me.
My dreamself fumbled, spilling the spirits in my lap. There was much hilarity at my expense and I couldn’t help but join in the merriment.
I woke up giggling.
Then I gaped about - so real was the dream - surprised that I was alone in my cabin, my hammock rocking back and forth from the motion of the ship.
My heart lurched when I remembered what my dream had been about. Frantically I tried to reach back and seize the realizations that seemed to have been bubbling up.
But they were gone.
If they’d even been there in the first place.
As the days passed I kept trying to go back to that place to search for anything of value that might have been left behind.
I saw a group of dolphin playing in front of our ship and almost came upon the realization again. It was the same on another day when I watched a school of shark thrashing in our wake when Lizard cleaned the galley and dumped the leavings overboard.
But every time I tried to bring the idea to gaff, it slipped the net.
We sailed for many a day and for a time it seemed we were charmed.
The seas were empty of human life and human strife and the horizon beckoned us ever onward. Each dawn was a golden wonder, each dusk a rosy treat. Small clouds pranced above like colts at play and great schools of silver fish swirled and broke and formed again beneath our bows.
As I’d said to Gamelan in my dream, the waters of the south are the richest in the world. They are fished so rarely that the creatures who dwell there have no reason to fear finless things like ourselves. They seemed to view us as oddities and would turn from their course to come up to our ship and look us over. I don’t know how many times I gazed into the water - lost in my own thoughts when I would suddenly find myself staring into a fishy eye. It would study me and I’d study it and sometimes I swear I saw a glimmer of puzzlement.
Once we came upon a herd of whales - huge animals many times the length of our ship - grazing the waters and blowing towering columns of spume into the air through their breathing holes.
It was a calm day but it seemed as if a storm might be brewing far off. The waters were slate and here and there chunks of ice roiled in the slow swells. There were birds with immense wing spans swooping about the whales, diving after any tasty morsels their huge presence was stirring up.
I watched for a long time, marveling at how such immense things could be so graceful. A fast-moving squall swept by spattering me with cold droplets and I started to turn away to seek shelter. But something drew me back - an odd buzzing at my nerve endings. Not uncomfortable but not wholly pleasant, either.
The
n I saw the largest of the whales break away from the herd and come toward us. As the animal neared the ship I suddenly felt a powerful female presence.
Waves of sorrow flowed out from her, washing over me.
“What is it, sister?” I asked, almost overcome with her emotions. “What is troubling you?”
My answer was another piteous wave, so forceful it nearly drowned me.
All was blackness, currents both warm and cold swirled about my body. I felt the deck beneath my feet, the ship’s rails under my hands, could even hear some of the men moving about. But it was as if only part of me were there with them.
The rest was struggling through the rough seas of emotion that emanated from the animal.
I struggled up through it, came gasping to the surface.
I felt Carale’s presence beside me, heard his alarmed voice call out. “What it is, Me Lady? What’s amiss?”
“Go away,” I croaked. “Go away.”
I’m not certain he obeyed or even if I really spoke. Thought and speech became tangled. Then were one.
“How can I help you, sister?” I called out to the leviathan. “Please. What can I do?”
The waves of emotion descended on me again as she tried to answer.
Then pain hit me, as intense as anything I’ve ever experienced. I might have screamed - I can’t say for certain if I did. Faintly I felt hands clutch at me. Faintly I was aware of Carale and the others. And I wanted to draw back, to flee that pain.
Just as I thought I could bear no more the pain vanished.
I felt a gentle probing and knew it was the whale. She was saying she was sorry, that she didn’t know. That if I couldn’t help she’d leave immediately.
But I begged her to stay, to tell me what was wrong.
And, suddenly I understood.
I made my senses into fingers and probed carefully through the great pain she felt. I felt life, so tenuous it was almost a ghost, throbbing inside her.
“Ah,” I said. “Poor dear. You’re with child.”
“Help me,” she said, using her thoughts to speak, rather than her mind. “Please.”
It was then I felt the broken spear shaft inside her. In my mind’s eye I could see its jagged blade piercing the tube that gave life to the whale child.
I made a spell to give my magical fingers the skills of a surgeon and tried to gentle the spear point loose. The whale shuddered as I worked. But she held quite still, although I must have been hurting her greatly.
The spear point came loose.
Salty water mixed with blood shot out.
I felt the unborn creature stir, but weak... so weak. An infant’s heart fluttered. Stopped. Then fluttered again.
And then I felt the whale child die.
I drew away. Angry at my failure. Cursing myself.
“I’m sorry, sister,” I said. “So very sorry.”
I felt the creature’s sorrow deepen as she realized what had happened. But then fingers of forgiveness touched me. And I knew that at least the great pain was gone, if only to replaced by a different kind of wound.
And I asked her: “Who did this to you? Who killed your child?”
“Beware the hunters,” she said.
“Hunters? What hunters?”
An image floated up. It was the flag of the Ice Bear King!
Then she released me.
And I found myself standing on the deck of the ship, gaping at the huge creature as she slowly made her way back to the herd.
Blood trailed in her wake.
Carale took me by the shoulders and forced me around. His eyes were wide with alarm, his face pale.
“What happened, Me Lady?” he asked. “Are you all right?”
I unstuck his fingers and stepped back. I wiped the perspiration from my brow with an unsteady hand. Then I pulled myself together.
“We’d better get ready,” I said. “And we’d better be quick about it. I don’t know how much time we have.”
I told them all what had happened, but briefly. Sorcery and visions frighten people even if they come from someone on their side. And men tend to become extremely skittish on the subject of pregnancy, especially one that goes awry.
I noticed that although I hadn’t dwelled on the details of the whale’s agony and what I had attempted to do, they all turned green about the gills.
When I was done Carale cleared his throat as if something unpleasant had risen up from his innards.
“Do ye think they’ll be lyin’ in wait fer us, Me Lady?” he croaked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “But from what I just experienced they’ve clearly been in this area recently.”
“Beggin’ yer pardon, Lady Antero,” Donarius said. “That don’t mean they’re a knowin’ we’re about.”
“That’s very true,” I said. “But we’d best not take the chance.”
I had them clear the decks for action while I went into my cabin to investigate further.
I was weak from my encounter with the whale so I brewed up a thin broth made from fish bones on my little wizard’s brazier and added a hefty dollop of grog to give it heart. While it heated I stripped and daubed myself with a restorative much like I’d made for Daciar. In a little while I was feeling much better, glowing inside and out.
I donned a loose robe covered with faded Evocator’s symbols and drew my sorcerer’s trunk over by the brazier. I opened it, rummaged through the drawers and cubbyholes built into it until I found the proper ingredients.
Night was full on us by the time all was ready. I squatted in front of the small brass stand and puffed on the coals until they winked into life.
I sprinkled incense on them and a yellowish smoke arose. I breathed in deep, tasted flowers, then exhaled. The cabin walls dissolved and my spirit self floated up into the starry night.
I knew it to be cold and windy yet I felt nothing but a rushing sensation. Beneath me the lights of the Tern and the white foam of the breaking waves grew smaller. The moon was full and I could feel its chilly tug at my essence. But I resisted easily, coming to a halt just beneath a cloud bank. The Tern was a shimmering dot below.
At the horizon’s edge I could see high ice-clad peaks reflected in the bright moonlight. I pushed my senses in that direction cautiously as I could. It was like inching forward in a brush-choked gully, sniffing for sign of a waiting enemy.
I felt the ghostly touch of a tendril and nearly bolted. But the motion would have given me away so I stayed quite still, making my mind as blank as I could. The tendril moved about, touching my spirit self here and there. Then it grew bored and passed on.
I drew back slowly, knowing the slightest motion would signal the seeking presence.
Finally it was safe. I folded in and drifted back down to the ship. The cabin walls formed about me and once again I was whole, squatting before the dancing flames in the brass bowl.
I smiled.
Our enemies were waiting. But it was just where I wanted them to wait.
The next morning I huddled with Captain Carale, poring over our charts. With a finger I traced the outline of the nearest land mass, which was about a week’s sail to the southwest. It showed as a big bulge of a peninsula, shaped, Carale joked, like a fat man’s paunch. Beneath the paunch the coastline swooped downward for many leagues finally dissolving into small chart-maker’s dots where real knowledge ended and guess-work took over.
Before my previous expeditions nearly the whole chart had been nothing but the lines and dots of a cartographer’s imagination. The big bellied peninsula, for instance, was unknown to Orissans until my first voyage south. The whole coastline beyond had been mapped in my other expeditions.
I jabbed at a point some leagues east of the peninsula. “This is where I saw them,” I said.
Carale peered closer. The point I’d marked showed up as a series of small islands but we knew they were so low that they’d be under water during heavy seas.
“Aye,” he said. “Just as you said, Me Lady,
it ‘pears they swallowed our lovely bait.”
The bait he was referring to was the story I’d asked the crew to spread about our jewel hunting expedition. The islands lay just off the mouth of a river that cut west through the peninsula. This time of year the river would be mostly free of ice and if we followed it, according to tribes I’d befriended in the area, the river would lead to wondrous falls that thundered down cliffs studded with gems.
