by David Bell
After the water had been found, Luzar seemed to be looking for something else. He walked slowly up the narrow, twisting valley, treading carefully and stopping from time to time to pick up a stone or kneel down and look at the ground. Sharesh asked him more than once what he was doing but got no reply. They came to a grassy platform above the stream’s course on one side of the valley where the valley wall was steeper and stood farther back. In the centre of the platform were some small round buildings made of stones piled up for walls about shoulder high. Untrimmed tree trunks formed a doorway. A few branches stretched between the walls held what had once been a thick covering of dry reeds and turf, but was now holed and hanging in shreds. Luzar stood for a while, looking at the huts, one after another, decided on one and went inside. Stooping low in the doorway, Sharesh followed him in.
Moonlight shone through the holes in the roof but, as far as Sharesh could judge, there was nothing to see except a flat stone in the middle of the grassy floor and a large pile of stones near the wall. He turned to go out.
“Wait,” said Luzar. He made some sign with his hands over the stones that Sharesh had never seen before and got down on his knees. The stones at the top of the pile were flat. He carefully lifted them aside and put his hand inside the pile, which Sharesh could now see was hollow, like a rough box made of stones. Luzar drew something from the box and handed it to Sharesh. It was a beaker, a drinking mug like those he had drunk from in Pherethan, rounded at the base, waisted, then widening to the rim. Luzar took out more beakers and then some leather bags. He motioned Sharesh to kneel down beside him and opened the bags for him to see what was inside. One held tanged arrowheads finely fashioned in flint. Luzar emptied a second on the floor and the moonlight glinted dully on pieces of metal: bronze arrowheads shaped like the leaves of the poplar. In a third bag were a pair of bronze daggers with wedge-shaped blades. The last thing lifted out was the head of a shepherd’s crook made from ram’s horn. The huts may have been simple and rough, but the things inside the stone box were handsomely crafted and well cared for, save for a few chips in the brim of some of the beakers.
“When the people left this place why did they leave such good things behind? Were they fleeing from raiders?”
“Not raiders. They leave them here because they come back, every year. Make the roof again. Build their fire on the hearth. They need tools to work, arrows for hunting, pots for drink.”
“Why do they come? To hunt, or fish, but why here?”
“Look: shepherd’s crook. They come with their flocks. They stay here and the flocks eat on the hills above. Every year. Then they leave and lead flocks to another place. Put all things back under the stones. Come.”
The valley side was so steep that Sharesh had to pull himself up by tree roots. The top was level and clear of trees. Dry grassland stretched away in all directions, except towards the river whose great mouth opened wide into sand-clogged lakes and swamps etched with reed-filled backwaters. Looking inland, Sharesh could see its waters glinting where the moonlight struck as it wound its way across a plain that faded into far off darkness.
The stone marked the place and pointed the ways: the way along the high ground above the marshy edges of the river as far as the foothills of snow-capped mountains; the way across the sun-scorched upland towards the low hills where the coolness of spring coaxed sweet green pasture from the thin red soil; and the way along the cliffs, over the fords in the river valleys and up again onto the heights above the sea, as far as the next moss-covered stone. Sharesh traced the outline of the shepherd’s crook, almost worn away now by the touch of many hands, and the dagger below, and for a moment felt the hands of the people who knew the stone was sacred because it had always been there, pointing the way for them to follow.
“Hold her, helmsman, hold her.”
Potyr’s words were blown away in the screaming offshore wind. Typhis needed no telling but, despite all his and Kerma’s efforts, the ship was gradually being pressed farther and farther out to sea. Soon they would lose sight of the coast. Landmarks would be missed. The cape that marked the vital change of course towards the Strait would never be seen. Down sail and bring her head into the wind? That risked broaching and besides, the crew might not have the strength to ride out the gale. Half sail and run before the wind? Potyr knew she could do that, but how far must he run? The Endless Ocean lay waiting to embrace his ship. He would run and defy it.
“Starboard rudder, helmsman. Square the yard when she comes round. Let her run and show us what she can do.”
She ran for the rest of the day and through most of the night, more scudding across than through the waves. With no means of gauging her speed, Potyr had little idea of where daylight would find her. All he knew was that the star held steady on his larboard quarter. At first light the wind began to back astern and slacken. When the sun came up there was no land to be seen.
“We’re bloody lost,” said the rigger.
“No we’re not, shipmate,” said Kerma who had been relieved during the night. “I know where we are.”
“And where’s that, then?”
“On this bloody ship. You’re there and I’m here. So we can’t be lost.”
Potyr felt the wind playing gently on his face and watched as the vague horizon grew into a hard line. The Endless Ocean was astern. He told Typhis to steer for the rising sun. The marker cape was never seen again and Kanesh never saw the river where the water ran red, but as the sun was sinking astern on the second day after Potyr changed course, Namun sighted land, distant, but dead ahead. Before the sun set again, the Davina’s anchor had been dropped in the shallow waters of the bay behind the sandbank that had sheltered her on her first night after passing through the Strait.
“Look,” said Sharesh. “This tells you how many days it is since we sailed out of Keftiu. Remember what the marks mean?”
Namun stared at the scratches on the side of the pitcher, biting his lower lip in concentration: a ring and two lines, one this way and one that way. His mind was blank; no, not quite. He vaguely remembered seeing lines like that, but what did the ring mean?
“No need to swear,” said Sharesh. “Look: this means ten and that means one and that means ten tens.”
“I know the lines,” said Namun testily. It’s when I put them together I get lost. They turn into worms in my head and wriggle away. I remember lots of words, though,” he said quickly. “Well, quite a lot. I’m better with the words. Pictures stay in my head. I know wheel and jug and ship and oar. I can write wheel if you like.”
“All right. Here you are.” Sharesh handed him the stylus.
Namun looked at it suspiciously. “What’s this? It’s not the thing you use on the tablets.”
“It’s the stone Kanesh gave me in Crakluz. This pot is too hard for the other stylus to mark.” Namun dropped the straw-yellow blade of stone as if it burnt his fingers.
“I don’t want that in my hand,” he hissed. “There’s a devil in it.”
“If there is, he hasn’t done me any harm.”
“Biding his time, he is. You wait.”
“What about that wheel, said Sharesh?”
“I’ll show you,” said Namun. “It’s like this.” With his finger he drew a circle in the air and crossed it with double lines. “There you are,” he announced proudly.
Sharesh scratched Namun’s marks on the pot. He added a tiny hole at the centre. “You forgot that,” he said. “Here, this is what our names look like. Yours has three signs and mine has four.”
Namun peered at the marks and looked thoughtful. “Mine’s got loops and curves,” he said. “Yours is all straight lines.”
“You have curly hair and mine is straight.”
“Is that why… you sod! You’re having me on!” The pot flew past Sharesh’s head and shattered against a stanchion.
“Hey! Below, there,” came a voice from on deck. “Hold your noise. Some of us trying to sleep up here.”
Namun searched car
efully among the shards of pot. “It’s broken across the numbers,” he whispered. “How many days was it?”
“Hundred and eleven.”
“You sure?”
“Hundred and twelve tomorrow. A ring, a line across and two lines straight up. Why is the skipper waiting here so long? The Strait is less than a day away.”
“Wind, stupid; he’s waiting for the right wind. Ship’s squared away and ready. You might know all about numbers but you still don’t know about –”
“Shut up below or get your balls nailed to the mast!”
Namun beamed at Sharesh. “How do you write balls?”
“And douse that light!”
On the following evening as the sun was about to disappear below the horizon, the mast top pennant stirred, fell still and stirred again.
“Wind off shore, my friend,” said Kanesh. “Will it hold?”
The pennant stirred again, lifted and fluttered.
Potyr looked up and around. The sky was clear. He must seize the chance. Lady Mother of the Seas, hold the wind steady for us.
“Up anchors and pull away, helmsman. We will take this wind. Full sail when she’s running.”
“Course, Captain?”
“On a heading with the star astern.”
“Captain?”
“We shall not stand along this coast like last time, helmsman. The current is against us. We need the stream on the other shore to carry us through. Hold this course until we have mid channel on our beam.”
During the night the wind continued to back and by daybreak was blowing briskly on the starboard quarter. The morning mist was thin and soon cleared as the sun rose. When Namun called that the strait was coming into view off the larboard bow, the crew cheered again and again until Typhis told them to save their wind for rowing. He kept glancing at Potyr, impatient for the order to change course.
“Steady as you go, helmsman. The wind is still backing.”
“Now, my friend,” said Kanesh to the Captain of Archers. “You are about to range the Libun shore, not merely savour its perfume from a distance.”
THE LIBUN SHORE, NAMUN’S STORY
I’m only telling you this so that somebody remembers what happened to us. Maybe it’ll help anybody else who’s mad enough to head that way. You never know, do you? Now, about the Strait…
They all cheered when I made the sighting, even the archers. I never heard them cheer about anything before. They wouldn’t have cheered if they’d known what was coming later, oh no. The skipper said we were going to range the Libun shore, that being a quicker way home. No more deep-sea five day spells, only a day and a half crossing back to Keftiu. That’s what he said and that’s what he meant. The skipper always told things straight. Trouble is, when you put to sea, you never know for sure what’s coming, not even the skipper; not even the lord and he knows most things.
You would have thought we had dolphins towing us, the rate we came through that Strait. I could see the mountain I climbed with Sharesh when we were waiting to go through the other way: not a cloud on it with the wind coming off the Endless Ocean. Endless Ocean! I was glad to see the end of it. Luzar looked a bit glum, though. I can’t think why. He was heading back to his soft job in Keftiu and that very fancy lady, after all. I remember her in the Palace when Sharesh got himself in a fix. Lovely eyes she had. The way she looked at you. She had Typhis squirming after her like a puppy. What? Oh yes, the Libun shore. Well, it wasn’t the first landfall we made after the Strait. That wind sent us skipping across the water like a flying fish. I was told to keep a sharp lookout for sea monsters like we saw four days out from Crakluz, or was it three, I forget. Granddad said he saw one in the strait going the same way as us and we didn’t want to cross his bows. Skipper must have decided to run with the wind as long as he could because he made no move to close on that Libun shore even if it was in sight to starboard long enough. Same thing next day, wind astern but now we were out of sight of land. Until late afternoon, that is, and by then there was some grumbling going on about being so long at sea again. You could hardly call it land, it was so small. When I first spotted it I thought it was a sea monster on the surface. Good job I didn’t make that call. Typhis would never have let me hear the last of it. Closer to, I saw it was an island, so flat you could have sworn its top had been sawn off and what was left wasn’t much higher than the Davina’s masthead. The wind was dropping so the skipper had Typhis steer round to leeward to see if there was anywhere to anchor. There was a little cove we could hardly fit into and no beach, only cliffs. The skipper wasn’t happy but needs must so we dropped the stones. Mind you, he kept half the crew at their oars ready to pull her away if the anchor dragged. Some of us climbed the cliff and had a look around. There were plenty of seabirds flying about but no eggs: wrong time of year. We saw some turtles and dolphins not far off shore but nobody fancied trying to catch one. The skipper doesn’t allow anybody to touch dolphins, anyway. No, I can’t remember anything else about the place, except one of the archers said he could stand at one end and shoot an arrow into the sea off the other, but I didn’t see him try it. We sailed at dawn next day, glad to leave.
Not for long. Clouds piled up and the wind rose and shifted round until it was coming straight at us. I knew what that meant: same wind that put the cloud banner on the mountain at the other side of the Strait, but now we had it against us and it looked like lasting. There was nothing for it but to beat for the shore, the Libun shore, if we weren’t going to end up back in the Endless Ocean. Well, it was where we’d been told we wanted to be, so shut up and dig in hard. Not much change there. We nearly got driven aground but the skipper somehow brought us into the lee of a little cape just as the light was getting too dim to see. On a sunny day it would have been a nice place, lots of trees all over and a sandy beach, but by the time we got ashore it was raining and we had to set up a sailcloth shelter over the fire to keep it going long enough for the stew to cook.
There’s not a lot to tell about the next few days. The skipper’s not one to hang around waiting for the wind to drop. He said we ought to know by now how to work along a coast and keep a sharp eye open for reefs and sandbanks and such. True enough: when you think about it, nobody’s sailed as far and seen so many different places as we had. The lord told us all to remember that. Nobody had ever passed through that Strait before and we did it twice. We could tell our grandchildren that. We’d be famous, he said. If we ever got home again, I thought but daren’t say it. At last it stopped raining and enough had been caught to fill the jars. That was Sharesh’s job but he didn’t always remember. We ranged that coast for twelve days and nights. I know that because Sharesh marked the tablet and showed me the signs when he put them together. Two up and one across, that’s twelve. It was all right. The wind blew for half the time but there was no more rain and we found a decent place to moor every night. It was easy to net birds. We had partridges most nights and one morning the archers shot a deer that came to drink at a stream where they’d waited all night. There’s enough water on that coast, even in the summer. People? Only once. I was with Kerma and Myrtias, setting a few snares and looking for birds’ nests. We heard some voices. When we came out of the trees we saw some women sitting on rocks by a pool, washing clothes, I think. There were some babies splashing about in the water, I remember. They snatched the babies up and ran off when they saw us. We wouldn’t have done them any harm. We had our orders from the lord about that and you don’t cross him or you’re for it. Kerma would have stopped Myrtias if he’d tried anything and, after all, there weren’t any widows among them. Yes, he said that. Still, I’m sorry we frightened them off. I like talking to women. They were nice-looking; could have been from the Black Land from the colour of their skin and their long hair. That’s what Kerma said and I reckon he was right. No, they had dresses on that came right up to their necks. One had a yellow band round her forehead. She was the one who spotted us. Maybe she was on guard.
Yes, twelve days and n
ights and the next day the lord said we had to keep a lookout for where the coast would turn seawards and end in a barren, rocky cape. Another bloody cape to round, I thought, how many more? That would be the landfall to set us on course for home. He was cheered for that. Then he lifted his hand for silence, like he does, and said that would be after we had found and left Sikelia. That brought some groans because we all remembered that mountain on fire and all the black smoke and dust, but he only grinned at us. How he knew all this I don’t know. Somebody said the lord had been on this coast before, though I don’t remember him saying anything about it. No, come to think, I did hear him telling the captain, Captain of Archers I mean, that if he sniffed, he could smell the Libun shore, so how would he know that if he hadn’t been there? That was when we were off Sapanim, on our way towards the Strait.
Well, we found his cape all right but the wind found us again and this time it was much worse. No, not the same wind; this one came off the sea from the direction we needed to sail, but it wouldn’t let us. We must have done something the Lord Potheidan didn’t like, or the Lady Mother was looking the other way. No good saying like the rigger did, that the wind didn’t blow this way at this time of year. It was blowing then and it pushed us away from where we wanted to head, and sent us farther and farther down a coast we could hardly see, it was so low and flat. At night we had the star astern and the sun at midday dead ahead. Sharesh marked it all down.
I think we were four days being blown along that coast. The current wasn’t much help either. It was running the same way as the wind. Then an island hove into view. I saw it first, not bad really, because the days were getting very hot and hazy and it was very flat. The skipper brought us down the leeward side and it wasn’t long before you could see it wasn’t a real island because the sea was so shallow you could just about walk to it from the main shoreline.
It was too shallow for the Davina to make the passage, what with the cargo she was carrying, but we managed to coax her through a narrow gut, with her smelling the ground a bit, and drop anchor in a lagoon. We knew straightaway there must be people living there because we saw some boats pulled up on the sand. The sun was hot but there were plenty of trees for shade near the shoreline. I was sent with the party going ashore because I could shin up trees that don’t have branches. I learned how to do it in the Black Land before I escaped and stowed away on the skipper’s ship. They used to send me up to dust the flowers to make the fruit grow, as well as cut of the bunches of dates when the harvest had to be gathered. You tie some rope or a band of cloth round the tree and stand on the part nearest you, like this. Then you lift the other side of the loop up the tree a bit, like that, pull it tight and jump up bringing your side of the rope up with your feet, see? I can still do it. Then you do it again and again, all the way up the tree. I could go up a palm tree quick as a monkey. Sharesh never got the hang of it, though he could climb a mast. As soon as we got ashore the lord sent me up the biggest palm to take a look. It was full of dates that got in my way near the top, so I climbed out along a branch. They look as if they’d snap but they’re very strong. Away from the shore there weren’t so many trees, only shrubs and thorn bushes growing in the sand. I couldn’t see very far in the haze but I thought I smelled smoke. There wasn’t any sign of water, which was a bit worrying. I hacked off one of the big clusters of dates and threw it down. It’s not easy with only a dagger, you know: the stalk’s very thick. I love dates. I don’t know anybody that doesn’t like dates.
