“But he’s not falling,” observed Inch, already thoughtfully wiping his axe. These two knew how to control the after passions of the madness of combat. This was not callousness on our part, just an acceptance of one unpalatable face of life in a turbulent age. Truth to tell, we had been fighting Shanks, and so the reactions were all of a different kind from those we experienced after fighting with warriors of Paz.
“He’s burning, though,” observed Sasha with great satisfaction.
Oby held us low above the ground. We were drifting aimlessly, pushed by the breeze. Up there the Shank began to move. He turned into the breeze and increased speed, clearly trying to keep the fire blazing away aft in a fiery streamer. Well, we knew all about that.
He stayed in sight for some time, a blazing meteor high against the sky slowly sinking to the horizon and finally disappearing beyond a cloud bank.
Often enough in my life on Kregen I’ve felt like saying, as you know: “Well, now what?” I said it to myself, then, aboard a crippled voller drifting over the forgotten jungles of Chem.
My comrades were acting in the ways I expected of them, thankful we were still alive after the fight, speaking mostly in low tones, sometimes breaking into a boisterous — and not altogether incongruous — laugh. Rollo stepped down the deck to us, looking a trifle wild. His shout about the fire had saved some of our fellows, no doubt of that. Mevancy appeared, looking flushed, her color high. People began to drift over so that soon most of them were looking down from various vantage points. I felt a most peculiar sense of Theatre in the air. Most odd.
What the hell was I going to do now, what say to them? What did they expect of their famous and puissant Dray Prescot now?
Mevancy said in a clear voice: “Well, cabbage. What happens now?”
“That’s simple,” I said, making it brisk, making it brusque. “Now we can get on with doing the job we’re all down here for.”
Chapter ten
In pursuance of that policy — to use an amusingly pompous phrase beloved of the verbose governments of two worlds — we needed an army, a navy and an air force. We had one crippled flying ship.
“Once Deb-Lu or Khe-Hi regain contact,” said Seg in his big confident way, “we’ll soon have it all settled.”
A few of us were gathered in the aft cabin of Shankjid. This was not a Council of War, for, as you know, I have little faith in them. This was a meeting where we might take a breath and plan. As always, the final decisions would have to be taken by me. Had I ever, I remember thinking as we sat around talking and drinking there in the paneled after cabin of this strange voller, had I ever really got used to making Emperor’s decisions? Oh, I made them smartly enough, as this narrative will testify. All the same, running a King’s Ship is one thing, running an empire is quite another — or, is it? Do not the same imperatives apply? I half-turned to Seg and said: “You’re right. And we badly need to know where the armada from Vallia has gone.”
Delia said: “They are subject to the wind, just as we are now.”
Inch nodded quickly. “True; but the lads are busy at work on the sails and spars. If Dray has anything to do with it, we’ll be sailing soon.”
“Thank Opaz for small mercies,” I said. “The split in the bronze box—”
“But it didn’t, you old worrier, so think forward!” Delia sounded quite sharp, by Krun!
Milsi, quite calmly, said: “I’ve always maintained that one day some use would be found for Dray Prescot’s scarlet breechclout.”
“That does seem a more suitable function for it,” added Sasha with immense dignity.
We mere mortal men did not have the courage to exchange glances but stared busily at the ceiling or the floor. Eventually, Delia said: “If the prevailing wind has taken the Vallian fleet away then we can follow.”
A trifle uneasily, I said: “With Khe-Hi’s help, that is so. But I rather feel we ought to think about Queen Kirsty and her army, and about the rebellion in Tarankar, and about—”
“What, my old dom, do you think one sailing flying ship will avail against the Shank fleets?” Then, very very quickly, Seg added: “Of course, if we decide to go down there, I’ll—”
“Quite,” I said.
“Well?” demanded Delia.
“Precious little — except—”
“Except what?” demanded Inch. He had to sit a trifle crouched, for spacious as the cabin was, the overhead was too low for Inch and Sasha.
“Oh,” I said, making an irritable gesture with my fingers. “We could go around the different gangs, help ’em, train ’em, give ’em heart.”
“No.” Delia shook that delightful head so the chestnut tints in her gorgeous hair caught the light and put a golden bronze halo about her. “Oh, no. Utter waste. When the time is ripe the gangs can close in on Taranjin. They will no doubt do their best; they may turn out to be most useful although I have my doubts on that score.” Her voice hardened. “The Fish Faces have to be put down by armies and fleets trained to a better standard than theirs.” Then with a tiny sigh, a puff of sound almost inaudible, so typical of her, she said: “I do wish Deb-Lu was here!”
I knew — and the knowledge was at once uplifting and shaming — that Delia wished the powerful Wizard of Loh here so that he could protect me. Deb-Lu protected us all at a distance; Delia’s concern for me was matched only by my concern for her. And, yet! And, yet I allowed her to go off on hair-brained adventures for the Sisters of the Rose and I knew she risked her life over and over again. What a fool I was! Yet because I loved her I could not stop her doing what she wished. Deb-Lu’s distant protection was far more vital over Delia than anyone else. I agreed with Delia; I wished Deb-Lu-Quienyin, toppling turban and all, was here with us.
Following Delia’s earlier remark, Inch said: “The Hamalese at least are well trained.”
“And where in a Herrelldrin Hell have they gone to?” demanded Seg.
Milsi said: “Better to find them first. Then the vollers can tow the sailing fliers.”
That was sensible. From my personal point of view, no matter how well-trained the Hamalese might be, their ships did not have the ferocious lads of my Guard Corps aboard.
“Where the blazes is Deb-Lu!” I stood up restlessly. “Sink me!” I burst out. “I won’t be put down by a pack of Fish Faces!”
Delia looked at me with that special crinkle along her eyebrows, so I sat down and kept silent.
Each of us, in our way, knew what the other was thinking.
Balass the Hawk put his head in at the door, his powerful black face just sheened with sweat — it took a great deal to make Balass sweat. He said: “By the brass sword and glass eye of Beng Thrax! I might have known it. Here I am hauling ropes and lifting spars, and you lot are lolling about drinking parclear.” He licked his lips. “By Kaidun! I’m parched!”
Sasha said: “Here, Balass, a fine sazz.” She held up the goblet.
After Balass had drunk, he said: “Almost done. Want you to have a look at it, Dray. Oby isn’t too sure of the exact pitch of the yards.”
I smiled. “Young Oby feels degraded not having a voller’s power under his feet. Handling a sailer will be good for him.”
“He’s come a long way,” said Balass, “since the Jikhorkdun.”
“Aye,” I said. I didn’t like the note of heaviness in my voice.
We all went out onto the deck into an immense bustle as the lads erected the masts we’d cut from tree trunks and crossed the yards. Oby was standing with his hands on his hips, his head thrown back, yelling at the hands tailing onto the braces as the yard swayed up. The fellows on the halyards eased the yard up carefully. They’d done this kind of work before, of course, as so often in the past the Emperor’s Guard Corps had been forced to fly in sailing flying ships. Mistakes might be made; they’d get it right in the end.
Oby caught sight of me out of the corner of his eye, and in between shouts, called across: “Say when, Dray!”
I nodded. At the moment I c
onsidered appropriate, I yelled and the yard was snugged down. With only two masts and main course and fore course, the vessel would be a pig to steer. It was necessary, therefore, to rig fore sails and a funny little mizzen to carry a spanker.
Whilst all this was going on I went down to see if the emergency repairs done to the bronze box were holding. The minerals spilled had been carefully swept up and put in an empty jewel box for safety. My red breechclout had gone for laundry and the split had been thoroughly bound up with canvas and lashings. I shook my head. One day I’d figure out what all the minerals’ sources were. What we had now in this vessel was the ability to lift up in the air. We had no forward power. Because the boxes gave us the ability to reach down into the aetheric-magnetic lines of force about the planet we could, as it were, extend a keel and so use that as the very necessary resistance to enable us to make boards and tack against the breeze. The skills of the sailor were required now.
All the deck activity cheered me up. Something I understood was happening, and we were creating a living ship out of a crippled hulk.
My new friends from Tsungfaril and Tarankar had been assigned quarters and they tended to keep to themselves, no doubt feeling somewhat out of it in the general bustle. Only Rollo — who was, of course, from Whonban and a Wizard of Walfarg — joined in. He was clearly intent on striking up a friendship with Oby in connection with vollers. And he dearly would love to strike up a friendship with Seg Segutorio in connection with Bowmen of Loh.
Everyone in two worlds has ambitions and motives, drives and needs. Maybe many folk don’t even know what it is they want. When hope seems senseless in view of the current conditions, ambitions may shrivel; deep down in every person the needs crave on.
In the aftermath of that traumatic fight with the Shank voller we needed time to recuperate, to bring ourselves back to being ourselves. Rigging Shankjid as a sailing flying ship gave us something to do whilst we resumed normalcy. Or — as normal as anyone can be on that dreadful yet wonderful world of Kregen.
Yet that remark, too, is untrue. As you know, there are many many simple ordinary folk living on Kregen and leading ordinary simple lives. Not everyone is a rollicking adventuring hero swinging a sword. Sometimes, when I looked at Delia and saw her afresh and drank in her beauty and aliveness and sheer wonderful gloriousness, I could wish that I, too, was not who and what I was. But those dreams were foolish. The Star Lords would see to that. And, too, as you will readily perceive, these remarks indicate perfectly clearly that no matter who or what I or Delia might be, we would continue to love each other natheless.
Because Shankjid was — or had been — a voller flying under her own power she did not carry a vast quantity of spare rope so that my people had cut vines and lianas from the forest to twine and plait into substitute ropes and cables. I went off towards the stream to find a suitable source of lianas to make up for the spanker rigging.
Stepping away from the clearing it seemed to me that the forest closed in with uncanny rapidity. Our noise and activity had probably driven almost all the animal life away; anything not frightened off would prove unhealthy but would succumb to the varters. Moglin the Flatch with Larghos the Throstle walked towards me carrying a raffle of loose vines and Fan-Si trailed along lifting dangling ends. They passed me with a few short words, as one would hail good morning to an acquaintance across the street, and trudged on. I half turned, starting to sigh, and then I swung back as a voice at my shoulder said: “Drajak — Mevancy — she’s not herself at all, what with what’s been going on an’ everything.”
I was aware of two reactions. One, pleasure that Llodi had accepted the situation and continued to treat me as a friend, and second, a twinge of alarm over Mevancy. Unpredictable as she was, she could do just about anything as the situation that Llodi had accepted worked on her unstable emotions. There was concern in Llodi’s voice as he said:
“She’s down by the stream an’ all, and she’s not cutting vines.”
“I’ll see.”
Llodi moved on with his bundle of lianas and a long trailing vine slithered after him through the clutter of the forest floor, hissing.
When I reached Mevancy sitting slumped under a tree by the bank, I did, indeed, see. She sat in that withdrawn almost fetal position that denotes intense misery. At my approach she started up in terror, as though I were a jungle monster after her blood.
Not quite sure of the best tack to take I opened my mouth and she said: “What a mess I’m in!”
I sat down beside her, comfortably stretching out my legs. Somewhere a little upstream and masked by low bushes someone was cutting vines. Other voices could be heard echoing. It would rain the tropical rain shortly, in the eternal recycling of rain forest water.
For a space of time neither of us spoke. Then she leaned sideways and put her head on my shoulder. She was not crying. In a voice like a child’s lisp, she said: “If only I wasn’t a Sinnalix!”
“Then you wouldn’t have your bindles—”
“My bindles!” The venom with which she spat this out startled me.
“Your nasty little darts have proved more than useful in the past—”
“Oh, aye, cabbage, aye! And what they will cost me—”
“Cost you?”
“Yes, yes!” She was no longer speaking as a child but as a mature woman filled with spite and venom and frustration. “Don’t you know?”
“Rumors—”
“Well, they’re not rumors. I want to have children like any normal woman and if I have a girl I want her to have bindles to protect herself. But if I marry — Kuong, say — my daughters will be born as apims, without bindles studding their arms.”
“I see—”
“No you don’t, cabbage! If I want a daughter with bindles, as I do, of course, I must mate with a man of Sinnalix.”
“I see the problem if it is Kuong now—”
“What do you mean, now?”
“Ah — well—”
She gave me a look and then in a gush of words blurted out: “The males of Sinnalix are brutish, misshapen and ugly. They are hideous in the sight of any woman. Their touch disgusts. Yet I must mate with one of them—”
I felt for her, of course. That prospect would chill the heart of the bravest girl, particularly as Mevancy went on to explain further that the Sinnalix males were vicious of temperament and delighted in dominating their beautiful women. The men were cruel to their wives.
“And if we shoot them with a burst of bindles, our punishment is—”
Well, it was highly unpleasant, not fatal, and prolonged.
I said: “And I suppose it is the same with the sons?”
“Yes. A Sinnalix male will produce a monstrosity like himself.”
“But, pigeon, you told me your father was a good man who tried to enlighten the barbarism darkening Sinnalix—”
“Yes. I always think of him as my father, but, of course, he was my stepfather. My real father, so mother told me, was a typical Sinnalix male. He was killed in a raid and my father married my mother, who was wealthy.” Her voice carried no animation as she spoke of her childhood. She spoke in a dull, hopeless way. “If I’d married Vad Leotes, or if I wed Kuong, we will produce beautiful boys and lovely girls — without bindles.”
She did have a problem. Perhaps just talking about it helped to calm her down. She explained more details, although given the situation was self-evident, they were hardly necessary.
There was a chance here to clear up the further situation of Mevancy and Kuong. I fancied she was in the after-the-storm mood to confide her secret thoughts and desires. Delia — and I felt sorry for Mevancy — had come as a shattering shock to the girl from Sinnalix. About to widen the conversation so as to ask if she wanted Kuong and would marry him, my first words were interrupted by a shriek from upstream. Instantly, Mevancy and I sprang up.
A splashing and bubbling located the source of the scream. A mass of silver hair swirled in the current.
�
�Glima!” I shouted. “She’s fallen in the water!”
Flinging myself flat on the bank I reached out desperately. Into my fists I gathered a bunching double handful of Glima’s silver hair. I felt myself roughly jerked forward and my chest went into the water, my arms outstretched before me and my head up. “Mevancy!”
At once I felt her grip my ankles as I was dragged further forward. She held me. I started to swing Glima in to the bank and her head broke the surface. Her face turned to me, terrified, eyes closed, wet as a seal. I hauled in as gently as I could and called reassuringly to her.
“Glima. Open your eyes. Grab the root.”
Just below me a tree root protruded from the soil of the bank. Glima, splashing and gasping, managed to grip the root. Mevancy started to pull me in. Glima’s mouth contorted as she tried to breathe and scream at the same time. I let go of her hair with my left hand and took her right arm and pulled her in. Then I shouted: “Pigeon! Hold on!” and hauled Glima up.
Between me, Glima and the root, we hauled her out. Mevancy held onto me, Glima clung to her root until the last second, and I twisted and pulled.
Gasping water, Glima fell forward on the bank beside me.
Head down and held by Mevancy, I couldn’t see Glima on the bank, and I was in no position to wriggle myself back up. I put my hand on the root to get a purchase. At that moment, Mevancy, concerned for Glima and thinking her rescued and me about to haul myself out, let go of my ankles.
There was no longer any danger. All I had to do was push myself up with my hands on the root. No problem.
The root snapped.
Headfirst I toppled into the stream. Instantly the current swept me away. White water spumed each side and shining black boulders shot past. The force of the current held me locked as though in a vice. A thumping great smash on the back of my head half dazed me. It began to rain in a solid downpour. A chip in a millrace, I was swept helplessly downstream.
Scorpio Ablaze Page 10
