by David Bell
“There is one other item,” said the agent, “but it will have to be loaded on the day before you sail.”
“And that is?”
“Vines,” said the agent. “The owner wishes to make wine like that of Halaba on his new estate.”
Potyr turned his mind to the matter of re-mounting the rudder. The ship could take on no cargo until this was done because her stern had to be raised high enough above water for the lowest fitting on the sternpost to be driven in. A strong hoist would be needed and all the ballast and anchor stones, and perhaps more weight than that, would have to be shifted towards the bow. He told the agent to make preparations for the work.
After the bronze had been poured into the moulds, they could rest. The smith left the forge briefly and returned carrying two small silver cups and a round-bellied flask with a long-beaked spout. They sipped the rich red wine of Halaba.
“From the land of the Labarna,” said Kanesh, turning the flask carefully in his hands and looking at the graceful painted patterns, “and fine workmanship.” He held up his cup to see more clearly the lines of the prancing deer delicately chased into the bright metal. “And these are yours. The wine, the cups and flask deserve each other.”
The smith’s hands moved: potters and smiths share many mysteries and which of them began the quest no one will ever know though each claims the honour.
They sat in silence for a long time, feeling the warmth of the furnace on their faces and the warmth of the wine inside them.
A gentle wave of the smith’s hand: “The lady?”
“We have found each other but she remains lost to me.” The smith poured more wine and waited.
“There is a boy, no, he is no longer a boy, her son. He sails with us. He watched the smiths on Kallista at their work. I should like him to see finer work being done, the finest, the deeper mysteries.”
After the work for the ship is done, I will show my deepest mystery to both of you, the smith’s hands added, and to none other.
With a lot of hard work ahead of them, the crew had no objection to sitting idly on the bow, going there one by one until the carpenter signalled that the stern had risen high enough above the water, with the hoist on the quay taking up the slack, for him and his mate to do their work. First, they drilled holes through the sides of the sternpost and then pilot holes from the rear end of the post to meet them. The sternpost bronze ring fittings were then driven home through their pilot holes with a mallet. The smith had fashioned a smaller ring at the driven-in end of each fitting and these lined up with the holes the carpenters had drilled first. Bronze rods were driven through the wood and rings, making the fittings so tight as to be immoveable. Compared with this patient, skillful work, fixing the fittings to the rudder was relatively easy and quick and the rudder was lowered into place to the cheers of the watching crew, who trooped off the ship to watch the hoist being loosened and the stern lowered. It only remained to move the ballast and anchors to re-set the ship’s trim. Potyr was curious about the colour of the new bronze but he was anxious for cargo loading to begin and he could ask about that later. The weather should hold good for a dawn sailing the day after next.
With a strip of thick cloth wrapped tightly over his mouth and nose against the smoke, Sharesh had watched in wonder as the silver bead had been teased by fire out of the molten grey metal to lie glistening at the bottom of the crucible. His mind went back to Kallista and Kakelus’s furnace, but this was different, a greater mystery by far, practised by a smith who seemed to be able to make metals do as he wished as effortlessly as a hawker slipped his bird.
“Now come and watch this,” said Kanesh, “and tell no one what you see.”
Outside the forge Sharesh saw something he recognised: a round, blackened furnace about as high as his waist, built of stone and plastered with clay, but this one was different from the one on Kallista. At the bottom on one side was a hole with a pile of ash and black stones piled against it and on the other, two long clay pipes sticking out with a pair of bellows lying at the end of each one. Nearby were piles of red stoney earth, charcoal and dry crumbly clay. The smith was on his knees in front of the furnace, trying to pull something out of the ash-clogged hole with a pair of tongs. Seeing Sharesh, he sat back on his heels, looked up at him, put down the tongs and moved his fingers rapidly.
“He asks you to get it out,” said Kanesh.
“Get what out?”
“Look inside the hole. You will see what it is.”
Sharesh raked away the ash and cinders and peered into the dark opening. There was a tangled lump of something at the bottom that he supposed had to be taken out before what the smith really wanted could be reached. He thrust the tongs inside and tried to pull the lump out, but it was too wide for the hole. He looked up at Kanesh and explained what was wrong.
“Tell the master himself. He hears you.”
The big blackened hands moved again and the dark wrinkled face assumed a puzzled look.
“He asks what is to be done.”
Sharesh thought for a moment, then picked up one of the smith’s hammers and pointed it at the hole.
The smith laughed aloud and slapped Sharesh on the back so hard that his teeth rattled. “He says a bigger hole will not damage the furnace.”
What came out in the tongs was a lump that looked like some of the stones full of holes and shiny bits that he had seen in piles on Korus, except that this was a good deal heavier. He dropped it on the ground and turned back to the furnace. To his surprise, the smith gently took the tongs from him, picked up the lump and walked back into the workshop with it. Sharesh looked questioningly at Kanesh. They heard the ring of a hammer.
“Let us watch the smith reveal the rest of the mystery.”
Inside the forge the smith was holding the lump on his anvil with the tongs and striking it with a hammer, turning it and striking it again and again. It began to flatten into a thick spikey-edged sheet that he bent over and flattened once more with the hammer. The sweat began to run down his face but he kept on with the work, stopping to sweep dust from the anvil from time to time and heat the lump in the furnace and hammer again, until it had turned into a thick bar about as long as his hand. He stopped to wipe his face and Sharesh taking his chance, picked up the tongs and the hammer and swung it. The bar sprang from the anvil and flew into a dark corner of the forge. The smith roared with laughter and rattled Sharesh’s teeth again with a genial thump on the back.
Just what I did myself first time! said the big hands.
Sharesh found the bar and brought it back into the light. It was dark grey with a finely streaky surface and surprisingly heavy for its size. The smith took it from him and began to work it again with the hammer and heating until it lengthened and thinned at the edges and took on first a rounded, then a pointed end. The smith stopped his pounding at last and handed the piece to Sharesh. It was rather warm from all the hammering. The streaks could hardly be seen and it looked just like the beginnings of a blade, perhaps a dagger. Sharesh balanced it in his hand while the two men watched him. Thoughts rushed through his mind. He looked at Kanesh.
“Is this how your sword was made?”
“Ask the master. He made the brand.”
The great hands moved, blackened fingers pointed and the eyes seemed to search for far off places before lowering to stare at the anvil, the hammer and the blade. Sharesh did not need Kanesh to tell him what had been said. The sword blade had been forged with fire and hammer but where the metal came from, no one could know, a thunderbolt, it was said, from beyond the sky, perhaps beyond the stars. That was why it was called a brand.
“What is this metal?” asked Sharesh.
“It is iron,” said Kanesh.
“He is here again.”
The Minister did not reply. He was concentrating on the ship moored at the quayside below the temple cliff.
“He can be taken,” said his deputy.
It was hot on the terrace, despite the canopy of r
ushes. The Minister thought longingly of the cool valleys in the mountains where he had roamed as a boy. Would the evening breeze never come? It looked as if the loading was finished. She would likely sail at dawn.
“He is known to have been with the smith for some days. Both could be taken. They have never paid for their treason.”
“Too many would die. It would be… conspicuous.”
“There is a young man from the ship with them. He is said to be the son of the princess. He could be taken hostage.”
“You are too young to remember how he disposed of the prince, and his retinue when they tried to take him.”
“We know that the smith has divined the mystery of the metal. He can read the smith’s hands and the young man has been seen wielding a hammer at the forge. They cannot be allowed –”
“I thought,” said the Minister wearily, “that one day you would learn this game but I am beginning to doubt it. Do you not see that it is no longer in the Labarna’s interest to have him executed, since without him the enterprise to the Tin Islands would not take place? For the same reason, the smith must be allowed to continue with his work.”
“If the enterprise is successful and the supply of tin is assured, they will enrich themselves and Keftiu will have its bronze and maintain its armaments.”
“Made from a metal lacking, as I understand it, the qualities of the metal of which you say the smith has divined the mystery. Remember, he once worked his forge in our land and could be, shall we say, persuaded, to renew his activities there, and, it goes without saying, pass on the skill to assistants, whom we will provide. Let Keftiu have its tin and its bronze. We can wait for the new metal.”
The sun slid silently below the horizon, leaving the sky above glowing the colour of apricots. Black arrowheads of seabirds skeined landward, seeking their nesting ledges. Fishing boats set out for their grounds, lamps swaying on their poles. The mysterious sound of bronze gongs floated down from the temple on the cliff. In the harbour, the quay was deserted and only the creaking of mooring lines and the low murmur of dice players disturbed the drowsy quiet.
In the town, seamen and townsfolk alike made their way towards the centre, for the buying, the haggling, the eating, the drinking and the simple pleasure of sauntering and gossiping with old friends, or the urge to find new ones for the night. As they jostled their way into the square where the fountain played, Sharesh and Namun breathed in the smells of roasting meat, smoked fish, herb-rich lentil stew, spilled beer and the all-pervasive warm and pungent scent of crowds. Women crouched at the side of the street slapping balls of dough into flat cakes which they baked on hot stones, folded and filled with spiced beans, sesame and crushed garlic and sold to passers-by. Others dipped ladles into cauldrons simmering on charcoal-fired braziers and filled bowls with the rich steaming fish stew that was a delicacy of Gubal. For the sweet tooth there were barley and sesame cakes soaked in honey, dried figs and almond paste filled with green nuts. Sharesh began to feel hungry again. They had to be back on board by midnight, so better find a bite to eat now. Namun would know where. But Namun was no longer there.
“There, by the fountain, the tall one.”
“The other one from the ship who was with him, where is he?”
“That has been arranged.”
“Are you sure of this? The Minister –”
“All you need to know is that there are powerful people who consider that the Minister’s advice does not always best serve the Labarna’s interests. Now listen: he must pass through here on his way to the harbour. Have the hood ready, and the cords.”
Sharesh licked the savoury grease from his fingers and stood up. The water in the fountain’s basin was cool to the hands. It was time to go back to the ship. Namun could find his own way.
“ In a time long ago,” said Kanesh, “there was a lake near the edge of this city with temples on its shore. All was destroyed after a long siege but the place has a life and the city was built again, with stouter walls on the landward side. They will be needed again, one day, no doubt. It is said that the bronze once smelted here used tin and copper washed from the mountains and carried by the rivers near this city and that it was prized in the Black Land. There is a full moon tonight. From the ramparts we will be able to see the mountains inland and where the roads lead in from Halaba, Ebla, Damas and beyond, across the desert. I have travelled them and one day, who knows, you may do the same. There is enough time for us to look before we go back to the ship.”
“In here,” said the woman. “No, wait while I light the lamp. That’s better. Here, I’ve seen you before. What did you say your name was?”
“Typhis,” said Namun. “Can we start? I haven’t much time.”
The Minister stood on his terrace at first light, watching the pilot boat gingerly leading the ship past a small reef and on towards the harbour mouth.
“You say they had no wounds?”
“Not a mark on them, Minister, but a look of terror on their faces.”
“That is disturbing,” said the Minister. “Very well, you will have to act as my deputy for the time being. Make a note that Halaba vines are being shipped to Kallista. They will not thrive: the place is far too windy and the ground is sour.”
The smith put down his hammer and tongs, spread his arms wide and arched his back to ease the aching muscles. He had worked at the forge all through the night, pushing the metal bar into the glowing charcoal and using the blast from the bellows to bring it to red, almost white, heat, before hammering it flat on his anvil until it dulled. Letting it cool by itself, so that he could pick it up to test its weight and whip took too long, so he had plunged it into a cauldron of hissing water before it went back into the fire to make it ready for more hammering. Now the firing and the hammering and the cooling was done and a long pointed blade lay on the anvil. It was heavy and it was hard: he knew that because its point scored marks in the other rough blade the youngster had helped to make. Was it the hammering or the firing that gave it strength, or something else? Not prayers or magic sayings: he had no use for them. No matter, he would know that mystery one day. As for now, where was that whetstone? This blade should take a better edge than bronze.
HIKSHASUS
Potyr decided against returning to Keftiu by the sea lane they had followed to Gubal. Pirate attacks could be avoided or overcome, as they had now shown, but the risk of more sudden coastal squalls like the one that had almost capsized the ship was something to be avoided. In any case, the return route he proposed would be shorter, saving them perhaps two days, all being well.
“Five or more days out of sight of land, all told,” said Typhis, dubiously. “It’s asking a lot.”
“With the ten extra men we took on at Gubal, we shall have three watches, two at the oars and one resting, so the ship will keep its speed.”
“I know our crew but I’m less certain of the ones we picked up in Gubal.”
“They were a long time in Gubal without pay and jumped at the chance to get back to Keftiu. They will work hard.”
“I’ll make sure of that. And, of course, we have a few others who can bend their backs if we need them to,” said Typhis, looking in the direction of the archers and the quarryman and turning back to grin at Kanesh.
Kanesh watched Potyr as he looked first down at the surface of the sea, then lifted his eyes to take in the sky, sniffing the air and holding up his hands to feel the wind.
“Trim the sail and take her out, helmsman. I want the sun fine on the larboard bow when it goes down.”
He hasn’t told us that he also wants to test her on the open ocean, said Kanesh to himself. Typhis swung the tiller and the bow turned on a graceful arc until the ship seemed to be racing the sun towards the horizon. When it rose behind them on the following day, the peaks of Alasiya’s mountains lay dead ahead on that same distant blue line.
Their landfall was a small island lying a little way off a rocky headland that Potyr knew to be the only island on this coast o
f Alasiya. He waited until the ship was close enough for him to see birds rising from the beach and then signed to Typhis who swung the tiller hard to starboard, bringing the ship round onto a course that followed the coast. Kanesh climbed onto the bow deck where Sharesh stood lookout.
“In those mountains lie the mines where the copper stone is dug out. Some is burnt there but most is taken by men and donkey train to furnaces near the coast that free the copper from the stones and cast it into ingots like those we carry in the hold.”
Sharesh looked inland, past foothills furrowed with deep valleys to majestic mountains covered with forest and higher still until his eyes came to rest on peaks still bearing the snows of winter.
“You know this land, Alasiya?”
“To my cost, yes, I know this Alasiya.”
“Why to your cost?”
Kanesh chose not to answer this, saying instead that beyond the next point the coast curved into a wide bay where there was plenty of fish, so the stern lines should be cast. When Namun came to the bow to stand his watch, Sharesh climbed down into the hold, found the lines and took them to the stern. After Leptos and Leptos’s instructions he was now well practised in tying the lure of white feathers that covered the hook and drew the fish as it fluttered underwater when the ship had worked up speed. He had just dropped the lines overboard when there was an excited shout from the bow. Namun was pointing out to sea where flying fish leaped from the waves to glide almost the length of the ship before folding their wings and skittering along the surface where porpoises hunting them swooped up to take their prey. Sharesh wondered why Namun kept pointing and making such a fuss until he saw the reason. Two great turtles were gliding along through the clear water, sweeping their arms as slowly and gracefully as herons in flight. Turtles were good eating but Potyr refused the calls for a hunt. It would be late enough when they reached the anchorage he had in mind.
