Kallista

by David Bell

  After what the fisherman from Balloso had told him about Korus, Sharesh was surprised that anyone should be brave enough to set foot on the place, even to leave an offering. Perhaps they kept their boat standing off, and threw the goat overboard so it had to swim ashore? It seemed a strange way of paying respect to a god, or goddess. You could see grass and other plants growing on the slopes of some of the low red hills, enough to keep a goat going for a long time. How long would a god wait before taking the offering? That goat couldn’t have been dead long: birds were very quick to spot anything dead and go for it. And they surely were going for it; he hadn’t seen such a mad flurry of birds since that time the big fishes swarmed off the harbour and chased the little fish so hard that they leaped out of the sea and the screaming seabirds fought each other to snatch them up. He looked again and was surprised to see the birds flying away from the island. He thought it would have taken longer than that for them to strip a goat’s carcass bare.

  Korus receded slowly astern of them, drawing in its black rocky claws like a great cat settling down to sleep. He looked at the steep-sided hill that formed the central part of Korus and realised that the black streaks and heaps on the slopes must be piles of the same sort of rocks that formed the coastline. The high hill was shaped rather like a soldier’s helmet. Was it the roof of the god’s underground cavern where the furnace burned, a furnace so big it would make Kakelus’s look like a single spark?

  “Boy there, to the bow; lively now. Let’s see if you can cast a line ashore.”

  Sharesh ran to the bow, dodging between crewmen who were drawing in their oars. The glum-faced lookout handed him a coiled rope. “Hold it like this and throw it higher and farther than you’d think you have to. You’ve only got one chance,” he added, encouragingly. “Throw now. Great Potheidan! Just right.”

  The ship tied up at a rough but strong-looking wooden jetty and the sealed jars of salt were carried on board and securely stowed. No one from the crew was allowed ashore. Kanesh came down from the stern cabin to exchange tally stones with the headman of the little settlement, recording the number of jars supplied, and then asked him about the order for the other merchandise that Dareka had placed. The headman looked embarrassed as he explained that they had only part of the order to hand. The rest was to have been brought in that very morning but the man responsible had not appeared. They were worried about what may have happened to him because he had set off in his boat for Korus before first light and had not been seen since. Kanesh told the headman to bring what he had while he went to speak with the master. The ship could not stay much longer.

  Potyr looked up at the sun, then out across the sound towards Korus. Sunlight was shimmering on the little waves and he took his time to scan the stretch of water from side to side all the way to the black and red island. He turned to Kanesh.

  “I can’t see any boats. Can you?”

  “No, but if we cast off now, we would still have time to skirt the island and see if he was stuck somewhere. That order is important to Merida.”

  “So is getting this ship back to harbour before night. We have a way to go before we can see the wind banner on the cape lookout tower, and I don’t want us to find too much of an onshore wind outside if there isn’t enough light left when we get there. Still, from all you have been telling me, I suppose this order could be important enough for us to take a look. Ask the headman to send one of his men to come with us. If we find the missing man both can return to Lemaka in his boat; if we find nothing the fellow will have to stay with us and walk home after we reach harbour. We could anchor off Balloso overnight if we have to, but that would lose us a day in getting ready for the Keftiu run. Helmsman, cast off as soon as the rest of the cargo is onboard.”

  Potyr ordered a course be set for a small bay on the coast of Korus that the headman of Lemaka had said was the place their man usually beached his boat. Just before they cast off, the young man sent to act as guide jumped on board. Kanesh joined Sharesh and the lookout on the bow as Typhis called out a fast time. The bow wave frothed and splashed the sides of the ship, and sunlight flashed on the oar blades as they lifted from the water and then dug in deep again, driving the ship onward towards the black shore of Korus. The lookout was muttering and shaking his head. Sharesh leaned closer to catch his words.

  “Bad luck, going to this place. Mad buggers from Lemaka, thieving things belonging to the gods; get us all cursed.” He pulled a tuft of hair from his head, yelping as he did it, spat on it and threw it over the side. “Lord Potheidan, save us.”

  “Shut up and get on with the job you’re here to do,” snarled Kanesh. “Or I’ll throw you overboard to your Lord Potheidan; he can’t want your hair because he’s blown it back and stuck it on the mast behind you. Watch that sea and the shore: we’ve a boat to find.”

  “It’s there! I can see it! It’s pulled up on that little brown beach under the black rocks,” cried Sharesh in great excitement.

  “Young eyes are serving us well today,” said Kanesh. He turned and signalled to Potyr, pointing towards the bay. On Potyr’s order the stroke was slowed and the ship crept slowly in with all three sets of eyes on the bow scanning the water suspiciously for hidden rocks. Potyr stopped her about two ship lengths offshore, holding her steady with gentle movements of the oars while it was decided what to do next. Potyr came up to the bow to take a look for himself. He bowed his head a little towards the island and then more deeply towards the sea, holding out his hands in the gesture of reverence.

  “No sign of the boatman and nothing in the boat except his harpoon. Can’t see much more from here.”

  “Send the boy up the mast. He has keen eyes and he’ll be up high enough to see over the edge of that cliff.”

  Potyr looked at Sharesh, a question in his eyes. Without a word the boy turned and jumped down from the bow deck, threaded his way past the oarsmen and stood for a moment at the base of the mast, looking upwards. The crewmen sat, resting their backs and eying him.

  “Watch what you’re doing, lad; never know what might be looking at you from over that cliff once you get up that mast,” said the nearest, giving him a slow wink. “You be careful what you say,” said the man next to him. “You can’t be too sure in a place like this. We shouldn’t be here.”

  “Bugger off,” said his mate cheerfully.

  Placing his hands one above the other, Sharesh climbed carefully but quickly up the swaying mast using the rope wooldings that were lashed in places along its length as footholds. With his feet on the spar parral and holding onto the bronze rigging eyes with his hands, he could see across the clifftop and the spread of shiny black rocks beyond to a low red hill with a wide pit at its top, and beyond that to the steeper slopes of the helmet mountain as he now called it to himself. He strained his eyes to see if there was anything out there besides rocks and boulders as black as charcoal, and red ash streaked with yellow along the edge of the hollow at the top of the low hill. He suddenly realised that this must be the hill where the birds had been flocking. There were none flying there now but there was something at the bottom of the hill that he could not see clearly. Namun was right; it must be the dead goat, or what was left of it, that the birds had been scavenging. That was all; nothing that looked like the boatman anywhere, as far as he could make out.

  He shinned down the mast and went up to the bow deck to tell Kanesh and Potyr what he had seen, adding what he and Namun had thought about the birds.

  “How far away is the thing you saw?” said Kanesh.

  Sharesh said not far, less than half the distance they had just covered from Lemaka, but it would be hard going over the first bit because of the piles of loose, sharp-edged rocks. Kanesh and Potyr looked at each other in the way that Sharesh knew meant that someone would have to go and see exactly what was over there at the foot of the hill. If it was a sacrificed goat, why should anyone go? Was it right to go?

  Potyr sighed deeply, then gave orders to drop anchor and have Namun sent up to
the bow deck. The boy arrived within seconds and stood before Potyr, alert but a little apprehensive. Potyr spoke briefly and quietly to him, pointing towards the beach. Namun hesitated, then nodded, and jumped overboard. He came to the surface and set off swimming strongly towards the shore. All eyes were on him as reached the narrow beach, dragged the boat into the water and paddled it back to the ship in very quick time. While this was happening Kanesh and Potyr had been discussing who should go ashore in the search party led by Kanesh. The choice fell on one of the less fearful crewmen, the guide from Lemaka, and Namun. Sharesh felt unjustly left out, even though he was secretly rather afraid of setting foot on the place he thought was forbidden ground. He appealed directly to Kanesh.

  “I saw the birds first and I went up the mast and saw the goat, or whatever it is, on the hill. I can take you there quicker than you can find it yourselves.”

  Potyr looked at Kanesh. “He has the right to go, if he wishes. As you said, he has keen eyes.” That decided it.

  The boat was small and it required two journeys to ferry the full party ashore. Sharesh went first with Kanesh, paddled by Namun. While they were waiting for the others, Sharesh walked along the little beach looking at the line of rusty slime that skirted the rocks at the water’s edge. The water felt very warm. He came back to ask Kanesh about this and to tell him that there were a few dead fish and a couple of bedraggled dead seabirds bobbing about in the waves at the edge of the bay. Kanesh listened carefully and went over to look for himself. Kanesh pointed at the water near the edge. Lines of bubbles were rising from the sand under the water giving off a damp smell like something decayed. When Sharesh asked him what he thought, Kanesh said he was not sure; he needed to see something else first, though he did not say then what it was.

  The walk was difficult at first as Sharesh had predicted, with the loose splintered boulders sliding under their feet without warning and their sharp edges slicing into skin like knives. The two boys, lighter on their feet, found it easier to jump from one large rock to another and did their best to find the shortest and safest route for the three men labouring behind them. Eventually the boys reached the red ashy ground at the base of the small hill where the going was easier, and waited there for the men to catch up.

  “What’s that smell?” said Namun.

  Sharesh knew. He had smelled something like it before; that other time when he had been close to Korus, with the fisherman and his son from Balloso; only it was much stronger this time and not really the same, more rotten, somehow. He told Namun that some people said it was the breath of devils. Namun’s eyes widened, then he grinned.

  “More like sailors’ farts after too much beer and duck eggs at the eating houses in Gubal. There’s another smell round here somewhere, a different kind.”

  At that point the three men reached them and stood for a while to catch their breath. All three sniffed the air and frowned, and put their hands over their mouths and noses.

  “Come on,” said Kanesh. “I think what we are looking for is just round this slope and we must not stay here much longer.”

  A little further on, the ground was streaked yellow and white and was very soft and warm under their feet. The bad smell was stronger here and they could see wisps of steam rising from cracks in the ground. The cracks and coloured streaks led up to a gash in the side of the hill that was red and curled at the lip, just like a gaping wound. Namun and Sharesh scrambled up the slope, holding their hands over their faces and breathing as shallowly as possible, and looked into the gash. Its sides were coated with little yellow spiky stones as shiny as jewels. Sharesh turned to call to Kanesh about their find but he and the other two men were out of sight. He told Namun he was off to look for the sacrificed goat, and the boys raced each other down the hill, slanting across the slope in the direction they thought the men must have gone. They found them at the bottom of the hill looking down at the ground. Kanesh looked round when he heard the boys coming and motioned then to stay where they were. Then he turned back to look at the body of a man lying on his back with several dead birds scattered round him.

  “It’s Meriton all right,” said the man from Lemaka. “I know his belt, he prized it, and those leather bags, he always used them for carrying the stuff. Look at his eyes! The bloody birds must have gone for him and ripped out his eyes. Why? He came here often enough and he never said birds had ever gone for him.”

  “Whole flock must have set on him,” said the crewman. “Gone for his gut and his… covered him, and killed him before he could get away, poor bugger.”

  “There is no blood running from his wounds,” said Kanesh. “He was dead before the birds got to him.” The other two stared at him. “The buckle on his belt, look at it; a bronze buckle he would have kept polished, but it’s black now. And he vomited, look.”

  “Well, what killed him then, if it wasn’t birds?”

  “The same thing that killed these birds lying here, and it will do the same to us if we do not leave now. Your friend was poisoned.”

  “We can’t just leave him like that,” said the man from Lanaka. “He needs the ceremonies; his wife…”

  “If you stand there much longer,” said Kanesh. “You won’t be able to leave him and you will need the ceremonies, too.” He strode away from them in the direction of the beach, calling the boys to follow him.

  “He’s right, you know,” said the crewman. “There’s something strange about this place. I’m beginning to feel a bit sick. Better go after him.”

  When they reached the edge of the black rocks pile, the air was fresher. Kanesh was there with the boys telling them to breathe in deeply. The man from Lemaka said to him:

  “How did Meriton get poisoned? And the birds, did they get poisoned by eating parts of him?”

  “Did your friend ever tell you he felt sick when he came here?”

  “He wouldn’t say much about it because he didn’t want too many to know he used to come because the Priestess had forbidden it. He didn’t tell me anything about feeling sick but he did have a bad cough sometimes. He used to drink honey and beeswax in hot water, to ease his throat, he said. Nobody else would set foot on the place, only throw a goat off near the beach or some salt fish, say some prayers and get away quick. He risked it because he was well paid for what he brought back. Now he’s done it once too often and they’ve done for him.”

  “Who’s ‘they’?” asked the crewman.

  “Devils, gods, I don’t know,” said the man, shuddering at the thought.

  “Back to the beach,” said Kanesh. “The ship must leave as soon as possible, and once we are on board you can take your friend’s boat back to Lemaka and inform your people. They can decide what is to be done with him, but I warn you, this place is dangerous. Tell the headman that an extra payment will be added for the merchandise and that it is to go to the widow.” Sharesh noticed that Kanesh had not answered the man’s questions. He would ask himself later on because he remembered how his own throat had felt sore after they had been to see the smiths at work. There were too many dead things in this place. He hurried on across the rocks, wondering what was in the leather bags that Kanesh had picked up and strung on his belt.

  The crew were glad to leave the shores of Korus and pulled hard at their oars. Typhis steered towards the sun which was now near halfway down the sky, and Potyr felt satisfied that they would see the lookout tower’s banner with time enough to decide whether to make the passage back to harbour if the wind outside the Lagoon were favourable. On the stern deck Kanesh recounted to Potyr what the search party had found.

  “You say the man was dead before the birds found him and that they died from the same poison. Did you find any? Is it in the leather bags you brought on board?”

  “It is not. They contain what the man braved the dangers of Korus to gather. We have enough for the order and I took more, for another purpose. The poison is in that place on Korus but it is invisible. It is a poisonous air that comes up from the depths and cannot be
seen except when its path brings it to the bed of the sea, and then it rises in bubbles through the water. We saw this near the beach. There were dead fish there and dead birds, too, which had dived to take them and been overcome.”

  “The man had been there before, I do not know how many times, without suffering serious harm.”

  “The air has changed, and recently. Previously it merely irritated. Now it has the power to blacken metal and kill silently. It is deadly.”

  “The Governor must be told, and no one else. Let the others go on thinking it is devils’ breath, which it may be.”

  A call came from the bow that the cape lookout tower was in sight and the wind banner bore offshore. At a sign from Potyr, Typhis bellowed out:

  “Put your backs into it! We haven’t got all day, and we don’t want to be here all night. Keep to the stroke.”

  With a light breeze part filling the sail they made an easy passage through the strait, rounded the cape and set course for the harbour. Potyr was thinking, not for the first time, that if a way could be devised of setting the rigging and spars so that the sail could be turned on the mast to pick up a wind that the fixed sail could not use, it would save a lot of muscle power and help a ship stand away when the wind was onshore. Perhaps Naudok, the Gubal shipwright, might come up with something, and if he did, they could try it on this old lady, and if it worked, well, the new ship…

  Sharesh and Namun were baling near the stern and flinging the water overboard, downwind from Typhis.

  “It wasn’t devils’ breath that poisoned that man. When I went with Kanesh to watch the smiths working, the master smith, his name’s Kakelus, said I had to wrap a rag round my face so I didn’t get poisoned when they roasted the stones on their furnace. And Kanesh said what they did freed poison from the stones and that let the metal flow free too. So, if men can do that, why believe it has to be devils breathing? The poison was coming out of the rocks. You remember it was hot there?”