Mariners of Gor (23 page)

I saw two or three men emerge onto the darkening deck. I thought little of it at the time.

Chapter Nine

The Mutiny

I awakened to the screaming of tarns and the beating of the ship’s great alarm bar, over and over, incessantly, deafeningly.

“Deck, deck, deck!” I heard.

Outside our crew area, one of several, I could hear feet running in the corridor, others climbing the stairs in the nearest companionway.

“Beware,” called Philoctetes. “There is swordplay.”

We could hear the ringing of steel.

It was past the twentieth Ahn.

“Lamps have been shattered!” I heard. “Put out the fires.”

We tumbled from our quarters, casting our furs about us. Most of us had been disarmed, a concomitance of the weeks of short days and cold, the length of our seizure by the ice, the reduction in rations, the deterioration of morale, the growing fear, the gradually increasing sense of desperation and hopelessness, the surliness of many, but there are always hidden weapons.

“We are under attack!” I heard.

“No, no!” I heard.

“What is going on?” called a fellow.

“Lamps have been shattered!” I heard.

In our quarters we looked wildly to one another. Muchly did we fear fire.

“No!” I heard. “No! To the weapon room!”

The Pani were still armed, and officers, and various guardsmen.

Philoctetes opened the door to the corridor, cautiously, and peered out. It was apparently then empty. We followed him into the corridor. Some tharlarion oil from a lamp, like spread grease, was burning on the flooring. The lamp itself was still on its chains. It was not difficult to smother the flames, with furs, or stamp them out. The most serious fires on a ship are likely to originate in the kitchens. It did not seem likely anyone was trying to fire the ship. Most likely the lamp, in the low-ceilinged passageway, had been jostled in the passage of armed, rushing men. We encountered no shattered lamps, nor any indications of arson.

We could hear, above us, however, the sound of steel, the cries of men.

There must be fighting in corridors, or elsewhere.

We also heard the grating of the large tarn hatch, amidships, being rolled back. This is done with a double windlass. It takes several men to move the hatch.

When the ship had debouched from the Alexandra, and entered Thassa, I had been told there were something like two hundred tarns aboard. They were housed in three large areas, each occupying a substantial portion of its own deck. The highest area was on the first deck below the open deck. The other two areas, by ramps, led to the highest area, it alone having the sky accessible, once the great hatch was rolled back. As the tarn is a large, dangerous, aggressive bird, and territorial in the wild, many of the ship tarns had separate stalls, or cages; others were chained apart, by the left foot; some others, crowded together, literally had their wings bound, their beaks strapped shut, save for feeding.

Restless, and many long unflighted, it was unusually dangerous to be amongst them. Few but tarnsmen or tarnkeepers would approach them, and then with great caution.

“Let us to the weapon room,” said a fellow.

There, one supposed, arms might be issued to us, were they deemed in order. As it turned out, however, the weapon room had been stormed earlier by a number of disaffected crew members, in effect, mutineers, who were intent on freeing tarns, and risking a flight which might lead to land, a flight presumably to the east, where lay Torvaldsland.

I knew little of tarns, the control of such monsters, their dispositions and habits, their ranges of flight, and such, but it seemed improbable, given our conjectured position, so far west of even the farther islands, that one might reach land, say, Torvaldsland, before the tarn might, even with the might of its legendary stamina, fall to the ice, in the dimness or darkness, unable to continue on, to die of cold and exhaustion, or, starving, turn on its rider. If landfall were practical from our current position surely our outriders and scouts would have discovered this, returned, reported it, brought back much needed supplies, and such. But it was true some deserters had, in the past weeks, now and then, flighted a tarn away, over the ice, into the gray sky, and had not returned. Who knew that some of them might not have reached land. Twice, riderless tarns had returned to the ship, their harnessing torn apart or missing, their beaks red with frozen blood. They flew at those who would have led them below. They were killed.

In our small quarters there were some forty fellows, mostly of Cos, Tyros, or the smaller islands. We did not mix well with the fellows from the continent.

I would conjecture there were some five hundred of the unusual men, the Pani, on board, divided amongst the commands of Lords Nishida and Okimoto, some two hundred and fifty each. And of others, mariners, soldiers, artisans, and such, perhaps two thousand, these recruited variously, many, particularly the mercenaries, in Brundisium, often fugitives from the restoration in Ar. I was not clear on the purpose of the voyage, but it doubtless had to do with war, for our ship, despite what might be the views of its shipwright, Tersites, was serving essentially as a transport, one undertaking an unprecedented voyage, whose intended destination seemed likely to be known only to the Pani. The male Pani, for example, were uniformly warriors. This I found significant. There were a handful of Pani females aboard, but I saw little of them. They were spoken of as contract women. I did not understand their status. It did not seem they were slaves. The other men aboard, other than the Pani, or at least the overwhelming majority of us, as were the Pani, were men accustomed to weaponry and the arbitrations of force. The ship, then, as noted, was essentially a transport, conveying a small army to foreign fields. The slaves on board, perhaps some two hundred in number, would have their various purposes, serving in various ways. Too, of course, such women are a form of wealth, as they may be sold, traded, bartered, given as gifts, and such. I did not doubt but what such goods would figure in the plans of the Pani. Of tarns, I had been told, as mentioned, that there had been something in the neighborhood of two hundred on board when the ship of Tersites had entered Thassa from the Alexandra. A tarn cavalry was clearly intended, which was, I suspected, intended to be a decisive arm in some projected campaign. I gathered that tarns might be unknown at the World’s End; else why would they be aboard? The Pani seemed to have no shortage of resources, given their financing of the ship of Tersites, the hiring of hundreds of mercenaries, the purchasing of slaves, and such. Thus, if tarns were common at the World’s End it would be more expeditious to obtain them there. If they were not known at the World’s End, then their judicious application in battle, reconnaissance, raids, and such, might indeed prove formidable. Even their appearance might inspire awe, even terror. To be sure, there were no longer some two hundred tarns on board. Some had been flighted, and had not returned; some had died; two had been killed. There was secrecy with respect to the figures involved, as would be expected, as with the number of catapults, and such, but rumors suggested a current count of something like one hundred and seventy healthy tarns on board. We knew of three weapon rooms, but suspected there were others. One aspect, at least, of the naval power of the ship of Tersites was clear. She nested six galleys. The tarnsman, Tarl Cabot, was apparently the commander of the tarn cavalry. Several times, in better weather, he had had it aloft, in training exercises. It is impressive to see such mighty beasts in flight, the stroke of the wings to the beating of the tarn drum, the wheelings and maneuvers, in unison, to the signals of banners and trumpets.

“Follow me,” said Philoctetes, who was first in our small company. We followed him up the companionway to the next deck, and then to the next. Unarmed, I was uneasy. We could hear the ringing of steel here and there. Who greets a larl without a spear in one’s grasp? Of the three weapon rooms we knew about, two were forward, and one amidships. Ours was amidships. It was on the deck now above us. The tarn areas were also amidships, consuming most of three decks. As noted, the highest area was on the first deck below the open deck, the lower two areas having access to it by ramps. As noted, only the highest area would open to the sky, once the great hatch was rolled back. We were now, on the companionway, moving past the highest of the two lower tarn areas. Most of the cries, the noise, the screaming of tarns, came from above, the first tarn area, that which might be opened to the sky.

I heard the snap of a bowstring above, and a fellow, on the flooring above, dark, briefly outlined in the light of a tharlarion-oil lamp, turned about, slowly, and then tumbled part way down the companionway, toward us, some five stairs. Philoctetes pulled him aside, and looked up. He then thrust the body down, past us. The arrow had been broken in the fellow’s fall, against the stairs.

“It is a Pani arrow,” said a fellow.

The Pani arrow is long, rather like that of the peasant bow, but the Pani bow is unlike the peasant bow, as it is longer, and lighter. Both bows are different from the short, stout Tuchuk bow, or saddle bow, which, I had learned, had been introduced by the tarnsman, Tarl Cabot, into the weaponry of the tarn cavalry. In the corridor above, the Pani bow must have been used diagonally, given the low ceiling of the corridor. The ideal weapon in closed spaces would be the crossbow, not only because of its size and maneuverability, but, even more, because the bolt or quarrel may wait patiently in the guide, the cable back, ready to spring forth instantly, at the press of a finger on the trigger. It takes a moment, of course, to draw a bow, and it requires strength to keep the bow drawn. The Pani bow, the peasant bow, and the saddle bow, of course, and such bows, have a rapidity of fire which far exceeds that of even the stirruped crossbow.

At the foot of the companionway two men, in the dim light, turned the body.

“I do not know him,” said a fellow.

“He has a blade,” said a man, gratefully.

One of our men, finger by finger, pried loose the blade from the clenched hand.

“Now we have one sword,” said a man.

“Leave it,” said Philoctetes. “Armed, you may be mistaken for a mutineer.”

“You would have us defenseless?” asked a man.

“Wait,” said Philoctetes, “until all are armed.”

“Not I,” said a man, Aristodemus of Tyros.

“Give it to him,” said a fellow. The blade was surrendered to him. We took him to be first sword amongst us.

“Conceal it,” advised Philoctetes.

Aristodemus placed the blade within his furs.

Standing on the stairs, Philoctetes called out, “Friend! Friend!”

“Beware!” I called to him.

He then, cautiously, ascended two or three more steps. “Friend!” he called, again, not showing himself. “Friend!”

He then, from the stairs, peered into the corridor. Then he turned back to us. “I see no one,” he said.

“There are doors,” I said, “corners, where the passageways intersect.”

The arrow had been sped from somewhere.

“Stay back,” said Philoctetes, and he ascended to the corridor, his hands held over his head.

I would have given much for even a buckler.

Philoctetes lowered his hands, and turned to his left.

The archer, it seemed, had gone.

In a moment we had followed him, and crowded behind him. We saw that the weapon room had been broken into. Most of the weaponry, spears, swords, crossbows, longbows, javelins, glaves, maces, axes, Anango darts, gauntlet hatchets, edged battle weights, bladed chains, and such, was gone. Some of the bows and spears, ax hafts, and such, had been broken, or splintered. I suspected that much of what had not been seized, might have been carried to the open deck, and cast overboard, that it not be available to others. At that time we did not know the numbers of the mutineers. Their attacks, however, seemed to have been organized, and coordinated. I wondered if Tyrtaios or Seremides was involved. It seemed unlikely, for both men were astute. There would be little point in seizing the ship, given her present straits, and, if their hope was an escape, however improbable of success such an effort might be, they would presumably be content to seize one or two tarns and flee, following in the wake of earlier deserters. Three men were dead in the corridor; one was of the Pani, probably the room guard, posted outside the door, and two others, who may have fallen to his swift, small sword, each, apparently, by a single stroke. He of the Pani, in any event, whether offered terms or not, had obviously refused to surrender the weapons in his charge, preferring rather to die in their defense. I would later learn that this standing at one’s post, this adherence to duty, was typical of the Pani.

“We are unarmed,” said a fellow. “There is nothing we can do, one way or the other. Let us return to our quarters and abide the outcome.”

“We might side with the winning party,” said a fellow.

“There is no winning party,” said another. “This is not about the ship. This is about flight.”

“There is no escape from the ice, unless it be by tarn,” said a man.

“Perhaps we can secure a tarn!” cried a fellow. “There is fighting, confusion!”