Mariners of Gor (53 page)

Some of our casualties, of course, had not taken place in the defile, or on the beach, but in the water, presumably at the side of the boats, or in an attempt to swim to the ship from shore. I had witnessed at least one attack, what I could see of it, of a marine predator, most likely a shark, within a few yards of the beach. One anomaly might be mentioned. Aeson, an excellent oarsman, was found in the water, at the side of the great ship, amongst the small boats, his throat pierced frontally, not laterally cut, a straightforward, cleanly inflicted wound. Obviously he could not have so swum from shore, and would not have been transported in such a condition. Moreover, interestingly, two of the fellows who had shared his boat, insisted that he had been whole at his oar, and that he had been the first to seize a rope, and climb toward the rail, far above. An accident, presumably, had somehow taken place in the darkness, somewhere above, perhaps at the rail itself, the stray movement of a weapon, a running against an anchored blade, or such. Perhaps he had been mistaken for an unwelcome boarder. Tereus, his fellow, who had found the body, drawing it from the water, in the half light of dawn, had howled with rage and demanded the apprehension and searching of the wretched cripple, Rutilius of Ar. This was soon accomplished. He was discovered on a lower deck. He was unarmed. The matter remained unresolved. I had seen such a stroke more than once, twice in the early morning, in a park in Ar, once shortly after dawn on the Plaza of Tarns. The next day Tereus, violent and distraught, had twice sought out Rutilius of Ar, or Seremides, as I better knew him, goading him, jeering him, apparently tempting him to seize up a weapon, or die. Finally the deck watch, disgusted at this bullying, this attempt to intimidate and threaten a substantially helpless man, castigated Tereus roundly and ordered him away, that he might desist in such unmanly, unseemly behavior, wanton abuse, inflicted upon an unfortunate who could not be expected to defend himself. When Tereus withdrew, storming away, in compliance with the instructions of the deck watch, it is said the eyes of Rutilius, glistening, followed him, and that he smiled, and then turned about, and hobbled away, poking at the deck with his makeshift crutch.

“I fear you mistake my meaning, commander,” I said.

“I suspect not,” smiled Cabot, “but speak.”

“I am not an officer,” I said.

“Neither are you a slave,” he said. “Speak.”

“Clearly,” I said, “there is danger in this place, ashore, in these islands.”

“True,” said Cabot. “We received some hint of that at the beach.”

“Would we not be outnumbered?” I asked.

“I think,” said Cabot, “easily, muchly so.”

“One gathers,” I said, “the war has gone badly.”

“True,” said Cabot. “That is my understanding. It was apparently only a tiny remnant of a once mighty force, driven about, harried, fought, defeated again and again, some seven or eight hundred men, perhaps a thousand, which, exhausted, bloodied, and starving, on a gray, cold morning, surrounded save for the sea, awaiting an onslaught they could not repel, awaiting death, in the Pani fashion, which reached the continent, in the vicinity of Brundisium, reached it somehow by the will of Priest-Kings, or perhaps others.”

“Others?” I said.

“Not Priest-Kings,” he said.

“And they have dared to return?”

“They are Pani,” said Cabot. “I gather that it is to be expected.”

“I gather it was expected, by the enemy,” I said.

“That seems clear, from the false signals, the matter of the landing,” said Cabot.

“Treachery seems to have taken place,” I said.

“It seems likely that the signals were betrayed,” said Cabot. “Surely they were falsely displayed, to invite the landing.”

“Does one know whom to trust?” I asked.

“No,” said Cabot.

“There may be enemies in the castle of Lord Temmu,” I said.

“It is not impossible,” said Cabot. “I gather from Lords Okimoto and Nishida that their movements in the war, in the fighting, were often anticipated. One fears their plans were often as clear to the enemy as to themselves.”

“I see,” I said.

“To be sure,” said Cabot, “a brilliant strategist, an acute tactician, can often anticipate an opponent’s moves. In the kaissa of steel such an opponent is quite dangerous.”

“Perhaps one such as Lord Yamada?” I said.

“Perhaps,” said Cabot.

“There may be enemies aboard, as well,” I said.

“Quite possibly,” said Cabot.

“Enemies even from the original camp?” I asked.

“Possibly,” he said.

“What is the power here, the forces?” I asked.

“I gather,” said Cabot, “that the forces with whom Lords Okimoto and Nishida are aligned are relatively few, and that little remains to Lord Temmu other than the great holding and, doubtless, some adjacent lands within its purview, which might be defended from the holding, and perhaps, as well, some obscure mountain valleys, or such, terraced, on which the holding may in part depend, valleys perhaps protected as much by the inaccessibility of the terrain as the castle’s armsmen, its
ashigaru
.”

“What hope is there of reversing the tides of war?” I asked.

“Very little,” said Cabot.

“That may do for the Pani,” I said, “but it is not likely to do for others.”

“True,” said Cabot, grimly.

“I would like to speak my mind clearly,” I said. “I assume I may do so.”

“Certainly,” said Cabot.

“Most rational men,” I said, “will be reluctant to commit themselves to a lost cause, to expend themselves in such a cause, particularly if the cause is not their own. Our men, who are mercenaries, and hired as such, save for the Pani, prefer to choose their wars intelligently, to weigh odds, to balance gold carefully against blood, to fight for a presumed victory, with loot and pay in the offing, not for defeat, not for the chains of a slave, not for a likely death in a strange land, amongst an alien folk.”

“These things are clear to me,” said Cabot.

“On the beach,” I said, “they have met the foe, and have some sense of his prowess and numbers.”

“True,” said Cabot.

“Muchly then,” I said, “have the odds shifted.”

“Doubtless,” said Cabot.

“Further,” I said, “the lockers of the men, their kits, their sea bags, from the despoiling of a hundred ships in the Vine Sea, already burst with treasure, with silver, with gold, silk, pearls, and jewels.”

“That is my understanding, at least substantially,” said Cabot.

“Have they not then already been paid, have they not already acquired more loot than war might augur?”

“Particularly,” said Cabot, “if the war seems foolish and dangerous, and the prospects of victory thin, if not hopeless.”

“I do not think the men will fight,” I said.

“They may have to,” said Cabot.

“I do not understand,” I said.

“They may have no choice,” he said.

“I do not understand,” I said.

“I think,” said Cabot, “we can better see the holding of Lord Temmu now.”

“Yes,” I said. It was more toward noon now, and the fog had been largely dispelled.

“We should enter the cove by nightfall,” said Cabot. “Lords Okimoto and Nishida will go ashore, to greet Lord Temmu, to gain intelligence, and prepare for the sheltering of tarns. In the morning, most of the men will follow, including the slaves, suitably coffled. Weapons and supplies will be also disembarked. Little will be left on the ship.”

“The treasure?” I said.

“That is to remain on the ship,” said Cabot, “at least for now.”

“I see,” I said.

Some men will betray a Home Stone before a tarn disk, being more willing to forsake the one than the other. So simple an arrangement can minimize desertion. To be sure, it is one thing to desert in Victoria, in Market of Semris, in Besnit, in Temos, in Ar, and quite another at the World’s End.

“Tonight, under the cover of darkness,” said Cabot, “the tarns will be flown.”

“The treasure remains on board?”

“Yes.”

“Our voyage then is ended?” I said.

“It seems so,” said Cabot.

“Men will soon think in terms of another,” I said.

“Lords Okimoto and Nishida,” said Cabot, “are well aware of that.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

We Have Made Landfall;

We Shall Approach the Castle of Lord Temmu

The stone-set walls were high, on both sides of the steep, winding, cobbled trail, some ten feet in width, better than a pasang in length, leading tortuously upward to the castle of Lord Temmu.

Ashore the men were armed.

Some Pani folk, shuffling, heads down, ill-clad, had threaded their way past us to where lay the wharf, against which, last night, we had moored the great ship. These new Pani, so different from the aloof, proud warriors with which we had become familiar, seemed scarcely to exist. At the wharf, under the direction of higher Pani, in trip after trip, they would gather burdens, hundreds of bundles, bails, and boxes. These were lowered in nets, swung out by booms, to the wharf. These, shouldered, or hung on poles, or sometimes on yokes, they began to transport up the trail. The only paraphernalia we were allowed to carry were weapons and accouterments. The lower Pani, so to speak, were discouraged from touching such things. I had earlier shouldered a box, but one of the ship’s Pani warned me to leave that for others. I gathered we were armsmen, and not the bearers of burdens. Perhaps Lord Temmu wished it to be clear that warriors had landed, and not porters. The Pani world was one of complex arrangements and degrees, and many proprieties, and formalities, at least to me, were mysterious. Whereas all natural societies are characterized by rank, distance, and hierarchy, acknowledged or not, I think there is no Gorean caste, from the highest to the lowest, which does not regard itself as the equal or superior, in one way or another, to that of every other. Where would society be without the Builders, the Merchants, the Metal Workers, the Cloth Workers, the Wood Workers, the Leather Workers, the Peasant, with the great bow, the ox on whom the Home Stone rests?

The trail upward was steep.

I was with the second contingent landed, some two hundred men, making its way down the ropes and rail nets.

Tarl Cabot, commander of the tarn cavalry, and his men, were not with us. Last night, under the cover of darkness, the tarns had been flown, to some undisclosed location.

We had seen no sign of the fleet of Lord Yamada.

I regarded the great ship.

Tersites had insisted, in the cove, that it come about, so that its bow might point toward the sea. This seemed to have met with general approval, certainly amongst the men. Treasure in hand, from the Vine Sea, what more was to be gained on a dangerous shore, at the World’s End?

The orientation of the great ship, bow to sea, would allow it, should the fleet of Lord Yamada be sighted, to slip its moorings and escape the cove, to the security of the open sea. The orientation also, of course, would facilitate an expeditious departure at any time, independent of some emergency, perhaps one conducted at night, in haste, by stealth.

Did not the great ship, in its way, seductive and beckoning, constitute a temptation?

I lingered on the wharf, past the fourth and fifth contingents.

Interestingly, nothing was permitted to leave the ship through the galley nests, which, if opened, might have provided a convenient access to the wharf. The nests remained closed, almost invisible in the hull, and, I had little doubt, were fastened shut, and guarded, from the inside, by Pani. Opened, they would provide a breach into the ship, quickly and easily exploited. Aside from Tersites and Aëtius, who refused to come ashore, some officers, and a handful of mariners, only Pani were allowed on board, and their role, one supposed, was to prevent a general return to the ship, if not now, later.

I feared for the ship.

And, I suspect, I was not the only one. I saw Tersites at the high starboard rail, that of the stem castle, looking over the side. Then he had turned back, and I could see him no longer.

I feared for the ship.

Had it not served its purpose? Had it not traversed Thassa? Had it not vindicated the madness, the bizarre faith, the superstition and conviction, of its malformed master, half-blind Tersites, a jest amongst the islands, a joke in a hundred ports, who had sent it eyeless upon the open sea? I had long thought this omission, that he would not give the ship eyes, to the uneasiness of many, was cast down as a challenge to Thassa, that it was in its way a defiance, a boast that so mighty a structure had nothing to fear from mother Thassa, from whose womb the land was born, from her moods, her violence, her turbulence, and wind. But now it struck me, and eerily, that this seemingly fearful omission, the denial of eyes, was not so much a bold repudiation of common marine practice and lore as a concession to it deeper than was easily understood. She had been denied eyes that she might not understand how daunting were the long sea roads stretched before her, the perils into which she would be introduced. So, too, might a kaiila be hooded before being raced through the flames of a burning forest, in which arrested, it and its rider would perish.