by David Bell
The bare white slabs of rock that formed the very tip of Pelos cape came closer and closer on the starboard bow. The land looked brown and barren. There was no sign of houses or fields, only the long spine of a ridge covered with coarse grass and scrub rising inland towards distant hazy blue mountains.
“Bad place, that,” said one of the riggers to Sharesh. “Some as calls it the end of the world. Come to think of it, that’s where we’re going anyway, the end of the world.”
“Bring her to starboard,” said Potyr to Typhis, as the cape slipped aft. Shortly afterwards they passed into its lee and the sea was smooth again. Steep-sided hills dropped directly into the sea, with no obvious anchorage in sight. The light began to fade. “Have the Taphians go to the bow,” said Potyr. “They will pilot us to the harbour. And let our two new men take their place and show us how they can handle an oar,” he added as if as an afterthought. At Typhis’s shout two oarsmen shipped oars, left their thwarts and climbed up to the bow deck. They were tall, wiry men with hair shaved close to their skulls. Sharesh and Namun picked up the heavy oars.
“One of them is brother to Dissias, the bull-leaper,” said Kanesh. “He has a sharp eye.”
“As do all Taphians,” replied Potyr. “They say they are like cats: they can see in the dark.”
“Certainly Dissias was as agile as a cat. How well do they know this coast?”
“Taphian ships frequent these waters, all the way from their own island to Kestera and Keftiu. Some cross the sea to Sikelia. These men have done so. That is why they were chosen for the crew. We are in their hands now. I do not know these seas.”
“And I thought it was for the music,” smiled Kanesh. “One of them plays the pipes.”
“They’ll need their cat’s eyes if we don’t find a place to drop anchor soon,” grunted Typhis. “Are you trying to harpoon fish with that thing?” he yelled at Namun, who had dug his oar in rather too deeply and been almost jerked out of his seat.
The ship passed two small bays but the Taphians ignored them. The hills began to darken against a sky that was turning red now that the sun had sunk behind the mountains. The sail had been lowered in the absence of any helping wind and not a man among the rowers was not praying for the order to easy oars and let the ship drift to her mooring. They rounded a blunt high headland with a cove as narrow as if an axe had cloven the rock and before them opened a broad deep bay with curving sandy beaches smeared between sharp rocky points, jutting out to sea. The Taphian lookouts swung round to face the stern deck and jabbed their hands towards the shore.
“Hard a starboard,” said Potyr. “Follow their signs.”
The ship moved slowly along the rock-strewn shoreline of the headland towards the nearest beach. The Taphians swung their arms sharply to starboard and Typhis responded with the tiller. There, before them, was another, smaller and deeper inlet with cliffs along each side and a stretch of smooth white sand at the end. Beyond the sand was a scattering of trees and shrubs and a huddle of small huts with white specks that might be sheep, or goats, moving about them There was no need for the linesman to do his work: the Taphians knew exactly where to give the signal to back oars and drop anchor. The Davina was soon swinging at her mooring, two ship lengths from the beach, in water shallow enough for Namun and Sharesh to wade ashore waist deep, and start the search for firewood along the strand line. Before they had the fires going, Leptos and Leptos had caught enough fish to feed half the crew. The Captain of Archers and his men went with the two Taphians to see if anyone could be found in the huts. They returned saying that the men and boys were away hunting in the hills and only an old couple had been left behind to tend the sheep, one of which could be bought for a jar of wine and a length of cloth. There was a spring not far from the huts where the ship’s water jars could be filled. The girls and young women had been sent to the village further up the valley, so there shouldn’t be any trouble, they added.
“Give them the cloth and a jug of wine now and say that a full jar will be on the beach tomorrow morning for when the men return from the hunt,” said Kanesh. He sniffed the air. “I can smell rosemary: it should go well with the meat.”
Sharesh sat with some of the crew by one of the fires, poking a stick into its depths and watching the sparks dance upwards. One of the riggers was talking.
“Don’t know why, but I fancied some olives at the end of that row; not water, olives.”
“Salt,” said Kerma. “You needed salt after sweating all day. You ought to know that.”
That started an argument about where the best olives came from. One rigger said Keftiu, Kydona best of all, and the other spoke up for Alasya. The older of the two Taphians jerked his head towards the sea and said that the people who lived at the head of the gulf out there, the one they had to cross tomorrow, steeped their olives in oil mixed with a bit of sour wine. He thought they were the best, purple and soft and meaty. Even better with some garlic, put in the other Taphian.
“I think…” began Kerma.
“You’ve no right to think,” said the first rigger with a grin. “They don’t grow olives where you come from.”
“Just because I haven’t met a woman before doesn’t mean I don’t know what she’ll taste like. Now, take you sister.”
Everyone laughed. “Now then, fishermen,” said Kerma, looking at the Leptos brothers, “what do you think?”
Leptos looked at Leptos. They hardly ever spoke because they hardly ever had any need to do so. Each knew what the other was thinking. They both looked at Kerma.
“Mitoia,” they said.
“And where might that be?”
“Kallista, the far side of the Lagoon. Their mother lives there. She has a tree she says is the oldest on Kallista.” Namun had come across from the other fire, juggling two hot pieces of roast meat in his hands. He tossed one towards Sharesh but Kerma stuck out a huge black hand and caught in its flight.
“I need that more than you,” he laughed, sinking his big teeth into the sizzling mutton.
“Keftiu, the grove in the Commander’s mansion,” blurted out Sharesh and then stopped in embarrassment when all the others stared at him. “They’re good, special,” he stammered on, “different from, well, anything, olives, I’ve ever, well, had, tasted, I mean.”
“Well, I expect they would be, coming from the Commander’s very own grove, wouldn’t they? Not that any of us would have the same chance as you, of course,” said Kerma, looking round at the others with an even wider grin on his face. The grin suddenly disappeared. “What was that? Did you hear that?” Everyone’s head had gone up and they were silent, listening.
“Now that cannot have been the storm god,” said Kanesh to Potyr.
“He strikes more than a single blow.”
“And no flash of fire in the sky. A fall of snow or rock in the high mountains?”
“I think not. A single sound, soon gone, like a great long held breath bursting free.”
“And now the night is still again, thank the Lady Mother.”
“Thanks may be due if we are shown the cause of that unusual sound.”
“Push them hard, Captain,” said Kanesh as the oarsmen thrust out their oars at first light the following day. “Take their minds off that noise and while you do that I shall tell them about the wine and the friendly Taphian girls waiting for them in Alefisia.”
“Some of them built an altar to the Lady Mother on the beach and burned the bones of the sheep on it. That should help, too. Helmsman, raise anchors and get us under way before the village men come back and blame us for that sound last night.”
“That was a god speaking,” said the rigger after the sail had been raised. He was nervously fingering the amulet of a sharp-nosed goddess with arms crossed over her breast that hung from his neck. “Only a god has a voice as loud as that.”
“Well, what was he saying, then?”
“I don’t know. Telling us we shouldn’t be here, likely enough.”
“Why not
tell us that before we started off?”
“No, no,” said the older Taphian, talking over his shoulder. “It was rocks, rocks banging together. It happens somewhere near Sikelia.”
“They weren’t banging together for us, then.”
“Listen. Rocks don’t sound like that when they bang together,” said Kerma. “I should know. It was a god, all right. I should know that as well: plenty of gods where I come from.”
“Was he angry?” asked the younger Taphian.
“Don’t know. You never can tell with gods. Hey, you, Taphian, Skipper wants you. Off you go. Stop dreaming about what you did in that olive grove and take his oar, young man.”
“Three islands offshore from the far cape, Captain,” said the older Taphian in reply to Potyr’s question. “Nearest one is Cabrera and the one farthest off is Ammos. I don’t know the name of the little one in between. They look like bits broken off the cape itself. Plenty of wild goats on the big one; if you have the time to catch them. There’s a narrow passage between them and the point and it is quicker that way but you get a funny current sometimes without any warning and then you’re in trouble. When you get closer you’ll see there have been shipwrecks in that channel.”
“What would you do?”
“Well, sir,” said the man, flustered but flattered that the Master should ask his opinion, “if I were you, not that I could be you, sir, you being the captain, I would stand well out to sea until the cape was safe astern and then I’d turn hard a starboard and follow the star all the way to Alefisia.”
“What is your name?” asked Potyr.
“Tessias, Captain, son of Lotera.”
The man put his fist to his brow and turned to go. “I watched your brother win the Victor’s chaplet at the Games,” said Kanesh.
“I know, my Lord,” said Tessias. “I was there.”
“I believe he had plans to return home to Taphos in triumph,” said Kanesh. “Perhaps he is already there.”
The sun had fallen half way to the horizon when Potyr judged the time right to alter course to starboard and head into the gulf that led to Alefisia and Akynthera and Taphis beyond, though he had no intention of going as far as either of those islands. The wind had freshened and set the Davina’s bow pitching as she headed into it. He gave orders to lower the sail and have Tessias brought to the stern.
“Night will fall before we are halfway to Alefisia, Captain,” said the Taphian, “and it is wiser to stand out from this coast. The wind falls from the mountains and I have known it breed squalls savage enough to blow a ship far out to sea. A ship from my birthplace was seized by the wind and wrecked on the shore of Starpia.” He shuddered at the thought and made the gesture of reverence for the dead. “May we have a clear night sky and the star to guide us on our way to Alefisia.”
“Starpia, you say? I have heard of the place. You seemed disturbed when you said the name.” Tessias pointed into the distance, fine on the larboard bow. “Out there, islands too low to see from here. A dangerous place, Captain, with flocks of great diving seabirds that shriek in fury and land on boats they think may have taken their fish. No one can live with them. Those that survived the wreck left their bones on the shore.”
“To be sure that we are not driven there, you and your countryman will take turns at lookout on the bow with the young men. You know the signs. I want enough of a warning from you to bring her bow into the wind before any squall strikes.”
“That man’s father was at Gaiduros,” said Kanesh as he watched the two Taphians climb up to the bow deck. “Lotera, I recall the name.”
“He was one of those lost at Gaiduros,” said Potyr quietly.
To larboard, the sun’s last rays were splashing the sea with gold as the Davina drew level with a small bay scooped out of the coast, with a low-lying wooded island all but blocking the entrance. Thin drifts of smoke were being blown slowly out to sea by the offshore breeze and Sharesh could just discern the white spots of houses near the shore of the narrow channel leading into the bay.
“Perfect harbour,” said the younger Taphian whose name, Sharesh had discovered, was Mirtias, “but not for us this time. Best sheltered harbour on this stretch of coast. It’s bigger than you can see in this light. Ships sail out of there for Keftiu, and farther than that, even as far as Lazpas where the Great King sends his merchants. I once nearly joined a ship there bound for Gubal. Lucky I didn’t. She was taken by a pirate off Karakya.”
“What stopped you from going?”
“The lady persuaded me to stay”
“The Lady Mother?”
Mirtias gave a great laugh. “No, the wife of the harbour master. She was very persuasive. Purple olives, strong wine and strong ladies: it’s a good place to be, though I can’t go back there, not for a while, anyway. Feel that? Cold breath on your cheek? That’s the wind rolling down off the mountains. Call the skipper! There’s a squall coming!”
The ship was already rolling heavily by the time Typhis got the order to turn hard a starboard and bring her bow into the wind. There was no rain in it but its cold force made the lookouts lash themselves to the rings in the stem post, and cup their hands round their slitted eyes as the pitching bow reared them up and plunged them down. The oarsmen strained hard to hold the ship in place, desperately hoping their strength would last out the gale that strove to drive them out into the ocean, and who could say onto what distant shore? Kerma joined Typhis at the tiller to hold a rudder that seemed to be in the jaws of some sea monster trying to tear it from their grasp. Sharesh saw the Taphian’s mouth working but the wind was a screaming demon that snatched the words away. He shook his head and the man thrust his mouth into Sharesh’s ear.
“Get aft to Tessias. He’ll know what to tell the skipper!”
Sharesh undid the lashing and was instantly flung to the deck and over its edge to land among the oarsmen. He crawled aft until he found Tessias, straining and gasping at his oar. He pushed his face close to the Taphian’s mouth.
“Tell the skipper… hold her… best he can… never mind… she slips astern… a bit… won’t last much… longer… go!”
Sharesh floundered to the ladder and was almost lifted up it by the wind and dumped on the stern deck. Potyr looked down at him enquiringly. Sharesh yelled what he had been told.
Potyr nodded and signed to him to stay where he was, then calmly turned his eyes back to the bow.
Tessias was right. The squall left them as quickly as it had struck. The screeching wind grew silent and the Davina rode the waves, bobbing on the swell like a seabird resting after flight. Some men shouted in relief while others slumped, heads down, too tired even to be surprised they were still alive.
“Great Potheidan!” bellowed Typhis, “his horse rode that one well.”
“I’m beginning to think,” replied Kerma, “that Someone doesn’t want us here.”
“Bring her about, helmsman,” said Potyr, “and give me more sea room. I want to stand well clear of that island up the coast when we get back on course.”
“Does anything ever ruffle the skipper?” muttered Kerma to Typhis.
“Nothing I’ve ever seen. I can handle this now. Somebody’s broken an oar down there and cut his arm; five thwarts along. Better go and see what you can do.”
There was the Sailor’s Star, said Potyr to himself, high and dead ahead. It never failed. The Lady Mother never forgot to light its lamp even if sometimes she hid it with her clouds and she must have reason for doing that. Dawn would find them in sight of Alefisia, he was sure, as sure as he had been that they would survive that squall’s blast.
A clear sky, a warm evening and all is well, Kanesh was thinking, and an instant later comes a gale of wind that tries to wreck the ship and drown you all. One can never be sure of anything except that you can never be sure of anything.
The ship stole on through the quiet night across the waters of a great bay set glittering by bright moonlight. Potyr knew the movements of the moon through the sky well
enough for him to judge when rests could be called for several oarsmen at a time, with water and oil-soaked barley cakes to refresh those who wanted them brought by Namun or Sharesh, whichever was not on watch. While Sharesh peered into the darkness ahead, Mirtias sat with his back against the stem post, put his pipes to his lips and began to blow softly across the reeds. The sweet whispering notes floated on the night air, catching the rhythm of the oar strokes. Most sailors’ songs are sad, thought Sharesh, about things they have known and lost, or left behind and never to see again. One man began to sing and before long others joined in,
Leave that fair woman to weep on the shore
Follow the star, boys, follow the star
Farewell your mother, and father and home
Follow the star, boys, follow the star
Set sail, and turn her away from them all
Follow the star, boys, follow the star
The arms of the ocean are open for you
