Aiko shook her head and held out to Alos another chewing stick.
“But my gums are sore from all this rubbing of teeth,” wailed the oldster, fumbling with the tail of his shirt.
“They’ll be even more painful if it is I who scrub at them again,” she growled.
Reluctantly, Alos took the stick and gnawed on the end. “If I had a drink, this would be much easier.”
Aiko cocked an eyebrow.
“All right, all right,” mumbled the oldster, and he looked at the well-chewed end of the stick and, satisfied that it now was soft enough, he began brushing away at his brownish-green teeth.
* * *
For the next several days did the Gyllen Flyndre fare westerly, and under Aiko’s watchful eye, Alos continued to scrub at his teeth and keep his clothes and body clean. Yet the oldster took every chance he got to ask any and all of the sailors if there was aught to drink aboard. The answer from the crewmen was “Aye. The cap’n’s got a keg or two o’ brandy, but he keeps it locked up tight.” Alos soon discovered that Captain Holdar’s quarters were always locked as well. And some dastard had instructed the captain to withhold all liquors from the old man. Alos figured that he knew which one of his companions had done such a deed, yet he only glared at Aiko when her back was turned. And so, Alos, frustrated, spent the time moaning to himself and scratching his seemingly itching skin, and sniffing his apparently running nose—why he was being afflicted with such, he did not know. All he knew was that his whole body yearned and nought he did seemed to assuage the craving. Too, monstrous Trolls and Mages burning with witchfire stalked across his dreams and, like Egil, he woke up nightly screaming in terror, and but half awake, Alos blundered about his cabin, searching, though he could find no drink to soothe his tortured soul.
* * *
On the seventh day out, the Gyllen Flyndre swung southerly, still following along the coast, now sliding past two or three miles to the east.
And in early morn of the eighth day, the lookout atop the main mast called down, “Gronfangs, ho! Dragons’ Roost ahead!”
On this day, Arin, Egil, and Aiko all stood on the upper deck larboard, near the stern, and Alos sat on a hatch cover nearby, his head in his hands.
Captain Holdar on the poop deck shaded his eyes, peering southerly. After a moment—“Ulf,” he barked, “quarter to the steerboard. Agli, pipe the sails about.”
The bo’s’n trilled his pipe and called out orders, and the crew set to, haling the yards ’round and trimming the sails as Ulf spun the helm, and the ship angled out to sea.
Egil pointed toward the south, and low on the horizon Arin and Aiko could see what appeared to be great white talons clutching at the sky, marching out of the east and south and down to the water.
“’Tis the Gronfangs.” Egil’s voice was grim. “They reach down into the sea, passing from sight, plunging into the cold depths. Have you heard of them?”
Arin nodded but Aiko shook her head.
From behind, Alos looked up and said, “Some say the mountains stride ’neath the ocean on to the west, with islands standing where their peaks jut out of the water.”
“Aye,” answered Egil, turning to the oldster. “I’ve heard that, too. And the Seabanes fall where the mountains would be if they were to continue marching westward across the floor of the abyss. Tall stone crags, they are, and nothing lives thereon.”
Aiko looked southward at the snowcapped peaks. “Why do we veer out to sea?”
“’Tis the Seabanes we avoid,” Captain Holdar called down from the poop. “Dangerous waters, cold and deadly they be, ‘specially ‘tween the Fang and the Banes, for there swirls the Great Maelstrom, a monstrous sucking hole in the ocean haunted by dreadful Krakens lurking within that twisting churn—” Captain Holdar broke off what he was saying and glanced up at the aft pennon. “The wind, she be shifting, Agli. Trim her up again. Hold our course to west-sou’west, Ulf.”
Aiko turned to Egil. “What are these things he named Krakens?”
Egil took a deep breath. “I’ve never seen one myself, but they say Krakens are hideous monsters, with great ropy arms and clutching suckers, glaring eyes, and a terrible claw beak. They are supposed to be huge, big as a Dragon, it’s told, with the strength to match.”
“Dragons’ mates, they say,” added Alos from behind.
Egil called over his shoulder, “Dragons’ mates, aye, Alos, that is the legend. ’Tis told among my folk that down through the ages, at rare times, Dragons gather on yon headland there.” Egil stretched out his arm and pointed at a distant mount, just now discernible on the horizon. “There lies Dragons’ Roost, last of the Gronfangs. Did not the Mages at Black Mountain speak of that place?”
Arin shook her head, but said, “Nevertheless, I have heard of it.”
Aiko glanced at Arin. “What have you heard, Dara?”
“Rumors, in the main,” replied Arin, taking Egil’s hand. “But these are Egil’s waters. Let him say what he knows, and if I have aught to add, I will do so.”
Egil grinned and squeezed Arin’s hand. “My knowledge is mostly sailors’ yarns, too, but I’ll tell you what they say.” Egil looked at the distant headland. “Although it doesn’t look it from here, Dragons’ Roost is a mighty mountain, reaching up above the clouds, and its peak is forever covered with ice and snow, even in the heart of summer. Jagged it is, though near its base, its sides are sheer and fall plumb into the icy waters, a thousand feet or more. But above that fall and all the way to the ice-clad crest it is said that Dragons’ lairs riddle the steeps—temporary dens when they forgather for the time of the mating. And on those cragged slopes there are many ledges where lie the lovelorn Wyrms, awaiting the call of their lovers from the sea. It is also said that from that aerie you can peer down into the Maelstrom itself, though no one I know has ever claimed that he stood there and looked. And anyone would be a fool to do so when the Drakes are about, for legends say that Dragons can somehow sense when strangers step into their domains.
“Be that as it may, the Drakes forgather, waiting, now and again raising their great brazen voices to bellow at the sky. And once in a great while, it seems, they do combat, one with another, though it is said that for the most part they know who is strongest and yield the higher places to them, the most powerful on the topmost ledge, and so on down to the least of them.”
Arin nodded. “That agrees with what Arilla said when she told us the tale of the Dragons coming to Black Mountain.”
Egil leaned forward against the top rail. “Aye, and at that time Black Kalgalath must have sat atop the highest perch.”
“Indeed,” agreed Arin, “though Daagor disputed his right to that place.”
Captain Holdar, who had been listening, called down, “Ebonskaith, Skail, Redclaw, Sleeth, Silverscale: I would think they would all contest the topmost perch.” Holdar’s eyes widened. “’Tis a good thing they themselves know who should sit above whom, else the whole w’rld would shake if they ever fought it out. But, ach, who knows the ways of Dragons? Not I.”
They fell to silence, the quiet broken only by the hull shsshing through the brine and the canvas and ropes creaking in the wind. Aiko peered long at the headland, and at last said, “Is that the whole of the tale?”
Egil put an arm about Arin. “There’s not much more to the legends. The Drakes perch there night after night and bellow from dusk to dawn. And after many nights of this thunderous din, in the darktide, driven by the urge to mate or by lust or love—who knows?—one by one, Krakens come to the call, the greatest first, the least last, each burning with the green glowing daemonfire of the deeps, spinning in the vast roaring churn of the dreadful Maelstrom.”
At the naming of daemonfire, Alos groaned and put his face in his hands, but neither Egil nor Arin nor Aiko noticed, for they were facing the opposite way.
Egil’s voice dropped to a whisper. “And one by one the Drakes plunge into that fearsome spin, to be clutched in the grasping embrace of those hideous te
ntacles, each Dragon drawn under by a monstrous mate, lover and lover sucked into the whirling black abyss below, to spawn beyond the light of all knowledge.
“And later, somehow the Drakes return, bursting through the dark surface, struggling to wing up into the night air, and only the strongest survive.”
Egil fell silent, but Captain Holdar added, “They say that the offspring of this mating be Sea Serpents, the long-wyrms of the ocean: those be the children of that vile spawning. I believe it, too! For I have seen a Sea-Drake, myself, not more than a day’s sailing from here.”
Arin looked up at the captain, her eyes wide. “Aye,” he continued, “a long beastie ‘twas, with a rippling crest all down its considerable length, snaking through the water. We ran, we did, and I’m not ‘shamed to admit it.”
“But then, Captain”—Aiko looked puzzled—“if nought but the serpents of the sea are the get of that breeding, whence come the Dragons themselves, or the Krakens, for that matter?”
Holdar shrugged and said, “All I know is it be said that Drakes and Krakes both come from the sea.” He held out a hand to Egil in a silent appeal, but Egil merely shrugged as well.
Aiko looked at Arin, and the Dylvana sighed. “Those who have spoken with the Children of the Sea say that—”
“Pardon, Dara,” interjected Aiko, holding up a hand. “Children of the Sea?”
“Aye,” replied Arin. “Children of the Sea: they are the Hidden Ones who live in the depths of the oceans of the world.”
“Mermaids, y’ mean?” asked Alos. “Mermaids and Mermen? People with fish tails ‘stead of legs?”
Arin shrugged. “I think not, Alos, though I have never seen one.”
“But I—” began Alos in protest, yet Aiko silenced him by holding a chewing stick out to the oldster. A look of dismay swept over the old man’s features, but he reached out and took it.
As Alos began gnawing on the tip of the stub, Aiko turned to Arin. “I interrupted, Dara.”
Arin smiled. “The Children of the Sea tell that after ages of swimming and feeding, the great serpents take themselves unto the unlit depths of a vast chasm located somewhere in the waters of the wide Sindhu Sea. There, three full leagues below the surface, in a lost abyss they settle upon dark ledges lining the chasm walls, where they exude an adherent and enwrap themselves into tight spheres. The adherent hardens and they are enshelled in a crystalline glaze to begin an extraordinary metamorphosis. After a time, when the change has occurred, the crystal shell is finally shattered, and just as some caterpillars emerge from their chrysalises as butterflies whilst others emerge as moths, well then too some serpents—the males, I would guess—come forth Dragons while others—the females—come forth Krakens….
“Or so say the Children of the Sea.”
“Well now,” said Holdar, “be this tale true or false, fact or fable, rumor, speculation, or just plain opinion, I think something of the like must be. List: none has ever seen a small young Drake: all seem full grown from the first. And I don’t think there has ever been found a clutch of Dragon eggs aland: they seem to lay them not. And as far as I know, none has ever seen a female Dragon: they all be males.
“And as to the Krakens, well, I cannot say as to what they may be—male or female—but the sages tell that they be the Dragons’ mates, and who be I to argue?”
Again a quietness fell upon them all as they stared over water at the far headland, dim in the distance. After a long while, Holdar broke the silence: “Ah me. Dragon, Kraken, Sea Serpent, I know not the which of it, but I do know that many a ship has been lost to something in those waters, be it Maelstrom or monster. Of those who have sailed in there, none has ever lived to tell of it.”
Egil shook his head. “Captain, I think if a ship sailed ‘tween Dragons’ Roost and the Seabanes, ‘twould be the Maelstrom that would drag her under, drowning all aboard, for none has ever escaped the suck of that hideous swirl.”
Arin shuddered, and for some reason this talk of the Maelstrom brought to mind the whirling chaos of her vision, a maelstrom of its own, with dire events all spiraling about the jadelike green stone. Will we all be dragged under by its hideous swirl?
* * *
Driven by a following wind, the Gyllen Flyndre cut through the icy water, the white-capped Gronfang Mountains ashore sliding up over the horizon, soon followed by the craggy Seabane Islands asea, slipping leftward in the distance to be lost at last over the rim astern.
West now she fared for days, past the long shore of the Angle of Gron, a vile, baneful land, for therein dwell Foul Folk: Rutcha, Drôkha, Ogrus, Vulgs, Guula and Hèlsteeds, and other creatures dire, thralls of a Black Mage, or so it was said.
Past this dread realm shsshed the Gyllen Flyndre, laden with sailors and a cargo of furs and bearing four passengers as well.
On they sailed across the waters of the Boreal Sea and the fickle weather thereupon, through sunny skies and moonlit nights, through rain and squalls and calms. At times the ship fell into irons, and rowers would debark in dinghies and tow the ship across glassy water in an attempt to find the wind. At other times the crew would need reef the Flyndre’s sails, as fierce wind and torrential rain unmercifully lashed the craft. Yet at other times, no matter its state, Captain Holdar pronounced the weather “bonnie” as long as the winds were favorable.
Up across the horizon came the headland where now the Rigga Mountains plunged into the Boreal Sea, where Gron ended and Rian began. Past Rian they sailed, then past the Jillian Tors, a far-flung set of craggy highlands wherein fierce clansmen dwell, noted for their endless feuds. On westerly sailed Captain Holdar and his crew, to fare along the shores of Thol.
Here, day after day Alos stood adeck and peered at forested land as it slid by, for Thol was once his home realm, but no more, indeed, no more.
They followed the long arc of the Tholian coast, gradually curving ’round from west to south, and somewhere along this route they crossed the uncertain boundary between the Northern and Boreal Seas. Now they fared toward the wide waters of the channel lying between Gelen to the west and Jute to the east.
* * *
Altogether it took twenty-eight days for the carrack to fare from Mørkfjord to the point in the channel where Arin and her companions would transfer from the Gyllen Flyndre to the Brise and set sail in the sloop on their own.
And when the Flyndre had come as close to Jute as she would, Captain Holdar ordered the ship to heave to, and he luffed up in the wind. Haling on the tow ropes, crewmen drew the sloop alongside, and Arin and Aiko climbed down the larboard ladderway and into the small craft.
Alos stood by, watching, the old man intending on staying with the Flyndre and sailing on to the walled port of Chamer. Yet he seemed agitated, as if reluctant to part with those who had cared for him—Arin with her gentle ways, Egil with his friendship, even Aiko, though she was rough, making him bathe and all. However, he was sober for the first time in thirty-three years, and he did not like that at all, what with his dreams being filled with a witchfire Mage and bloody monstrous Trolls.
Before clambering over the side, Egil turned to the oldster and appealed one last time, “My friend, I would that you choose to go with us, for I need an experienced helmsman to aid me in sailing the Brise, and none else here among these sailors can go but you.”
Alos turned away and stalked toward his cabin aft, and Egil, shaking his head and sighing, clambered down the ladderway to the waiting sloop below. He reached the deck and made his way aft to the tiller, then called up, “Prepare to cast off bow and stern.”
Captain Holdar repeated the order to his crew up on the carrack.
“Cast off the stern,” called Egil.
“Wait!” came a cry. Then Alos appeared above, his meager belongings bound in a bedroll. The old man peered down over the railing and declared, “I’ll sail with you on your mad quest as far as Jutland, but no more, you hear me, no more.”
* * *
Three days later on the evening tid
e the Brise sailed into the crowded Jutlander port of Königinstadt; ships rode at anchor throughout the bay and were tied up at dockside as well, a forest of masts jutting into the air like a barren thicket of trees. Among these ships wended the sloop, heading for the pier where flew the flag of the harbormaster, Alos at the helm, Egil and Arin handling the sheets, Aiko on the bow ready to cast a mooring rope to the hands lounging dockside.
And in the distance on a lofty hill beyond the sprawling city and above the bay, they could see a massive citadel, bright lanterns on the fortress walls, the windows of the castle within glowing yellow in the lavender twilight.
“There it is, love,” said Egil to Arin, “the lair of the Queen of Jute, where we will find the mad monarch’s rutting peacock…or so I sincerely hope.”
CHAPTER 37
They paid the harbormaster a small docking fee and moved the Brise to the designated slip, where they packed a few of their goods and battened down the ship. Debarking, they trudged along a main thoroughfare up from the docks and into the city, passing among warehouses and fish markets and shops of crafters, many closed, though here and there workers yet toiled at tasks. They finally came in among taverns and stores and other businesses, all with dwellings above, and here the streets were awash with people, revelers and hawkers, with shops alit.
As they moved among the crowds, Aiko frowned. “Why do some wear iron collars?”
“They are thralls,” replied Egil.
“Slaves?” asked Aiko.
Egil nodded. “Thralls, serfs, slaves: they go by many names. Their ancestors likely were defeated in battle and taken in bondage long past.”
Arin shook her head. “Yet the defeat echoes down through the generations, for their children and children’s children are slaves as well.”
“There are serfs in Ryodo,” said Aiko. “Yet they wear no iron about their necks.”
Egil shrugged. “Most are born to the collar and will wear it throughout their life.”
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