by J P Nelson
Again there was quiet.
“You are not to try persuasion of my mind to alter course?”
With a warm smile, Jha’Ley replied, “By no means. Your service is invaluable, but I would not to disrespect your intent. You are no child. You have given service for … thirty-five years?”
Returning the smile, “Aye; my wife, children, grandchildren,” he held up three fingers, “and great-grandchildren await me.”
“Then it is time for you to retire, go and enjoy your family.”
They ticked glasses and finished their drinks, then the sailing master made his leave and retired to his quarters.
Around the gulf and into the northeastern corner of the Meinkutt Sea the ships made journey, carefully charting and documenting every rod of the way. Notes were made for return and continued exploration. At various locations were rocky outcroppings from the ice, four of which were points of interest where small craft could land.
One landing yielded the raise of eyebrows. After climbing a plateau, a vast flat was discovered. Travelling inward for one day’s journey, six pools of crude oil were found, intermittently bubbling from the surface as if the ground below was burping it upward. The one pool was something over two acres across the surface.
It was late into the nighttime hours when Jha’Ley was awakened with a knock at the door. Sleep was hard to come by, as the all-night sun was not compatible with the commodore.
“Yes?!” This had better be good. No one was to disturb him when he was in quarters and flag hung on his door. Jha’Ley thought, ‘I did hang that shiking flag, did I not?’
A crewman’s voice rang out, “It is Mister Dalton, commodore, he thinks you should see this, shim-shai.
Shim-shai was naval lingo for very quickly, but not necessarily life or death. Jha’Ley was out of hammock, into clothes, and pulling on boots as he called out, “Compliance! Sailor, get me some tea …”
Dalton was at bow with Rufus, both taking turns with the glass directly forward. The course held tight with the coast, as they wanted the most accurate study possible.
The lieutenant handed the tool to Jha’Ley and pointed, “Sir, had we been scope distance out, we may not have seen …”
The commodore had glass to eye as he scanned. Dalton gave him a moment to register the sight, “… the sunlight makes it clear, there is obvious passage between the mass to left and mainland to right …”
Rufus took up the discourse, “Commodore, from our position, I think it could be an inlet, or at least a cove. Sir, those maps of yours are precise, but there is no indication of this.”
He hesitated, “It could be nothing, but …”
Jha’Ley widened his eyes a coupled of times and wiped his face. A crewman stepped up beside him with a mug of tea.
The crewman said, “Laden with honey and cream, sir.”
“Thank you.”
To Rufus and Dalton he said, “Well done, well done.”
Taking a sip of the tea, he saw S’Getti making way to the Ubank’s bow. Jha’Ley yelled into the wind, “We may have found something!” Could he hear? Yes, he did. The captain waved a hand of understanding. Sleep be damned, Jha’Ley was not returning to the hammock at this point.
Glancing to the crewman he said, “This is good, a pot if you will?”
As they got closer, it became obvious there was distance between what Toagun believed to be a massive iceberg, and the mouth of a large inlet, perhaps even another gulf or sea. The distance between the two was between a quarter and half mile. If they had been further out, the edges would have blended together and appeared to be part of the same coastline, the waterway behind easily undetected.
Jha’Ley said, “Rufus, let us chart the mass to our port, see what of it as we observe what lay starboard.”
“Aye sir.”
The mass to port was charted as an iceberg, forty-three miles long and about twelve miles at its widest. From the inner shape, it was concluded it had definitely broken off from the waterway within.
Jha’Ley was not the only one excited. Both ships came together and meeting was held with all officers.
S’Getti was speaking, “Let us please to recapture the information in its most base form … the mouth of this inlet is some thirty-eight miles wide, the western horizon is surf for as far as scope can see, there is no indication of water course merging the Meinkutt on the old map, there should be at least two months of good sail before this part of the sea is frozen, and you are leaving us to vote whether to venture in?”
“That is the skinny of it, yes captain, a unanimous vote at that.”
“May we discuss it out of your presence?”
Jha’Ley rolled his tongue under his bottom lip, then nodded, “Yes. I can accommodate you, captain.”
Lieutenant Mantel of the Ubank quietly breathed and widened his eyes as Jha’Ley collected his mug and left his cabin.
Toagun left with the commodore, “I’m not an officer, and my vote doesn’t count anyway. Damn man, you just left a possible history making decision in the hands of subordinates.”
Slowly, Jha’Ley nodded, “I need unwavering support. We are, and must, remain a team.”
Toagun chuckled and shook his head, “I don’t think I would do it that way. I’d just say, ‘Here it is, let’s do it,’ but that’s why you’re the commodore. I like you, Jha’Ley.”
Grinning, Jha’Ley replied, “I like you too.”
Toagun added, “You know, nobody in there is going to want to be the one to hold you back.”
“This is a team effort …”
“Naw … you’re the man. There isn’t a man-jack in there who doesn’t want to be you.”
Jha’Ley gave him a sideways under-the-eyebrow sarcastic look.
The door opened and Telroy called out, “Commodore, we have reached a decision.”
___________________________
Into the mouth of the uncharted waterway they sailed. Rufus and Telroy were at the wheel making discussion when Jha’Ley sidled up to the younger man.
“Do you remember coming aboard with me that first time?”
With a smile, Telroy said, “Yes sir. You gave me a piece of hard sugar candy.”
“Yes, and we have had some times, have we not?”
“Yes sir, definitely sir.”
Rufus was watching and listening carefully. G’Tabb had done a wonderful job with this lad, and he had taken pride in grooming him further. Telroy was far and away his prized student.
“Do you think you can take us straight and true to the west, and let us see where this little stream begins?”
Telroy breathed in deep and replied, “Yes SIR!”
Jha’Ley glanced to Rufus, who was standing proud, “Then mark your heading and straight at ‘em Mister Telroy; brandy is a’waiting.”
For days they sailed, usually under good wind, with no sign of land anywhere. At about the four hundred mile mark, Jha’Ley was leaned over the Kelshinua Maps making discussion with Rufus, Toagun and Yeau, “Gentlemen, I believe we are here,” he was tapping his finger on a lake outline in the middle of the gargantuan Belmond Glacier.
“The scale indicates about three hundred miles long, and fifty to sixty miles wide throughout. We should be pretty much in the middle of it. The map shows no name, but …”
Looking from man to man he said, “Liam’s Ledger says Greybeard called this Uordak Lake … it is an Elvish Word, I do not know what it means …” he held magnifying lens just to the west of the lake, “and see here, this thin line, connecting it with this much larger body of water, almost three hundred miles farther west, it could be a river or road. I think it to be a river.
“We are obviously at sea level, and this other body is marked at sixty-three hundred feet. Old Uncle said Greybeard believed this to be a freshwater sea, fed by underground hot springs, maybe even a volcano. He referred to it as the Sea of Diustahn.”
Toagun said, “Diustahn, that’s supposed to be the name of the father of all elves. Fl
agan said he was part bird, or something.”
Rufus pointed and made comment, “If this is true, then this waterway, this breaks theory Belmond Glacier reaches from Aeshea to Meinkutt, and it is all part of the same landmass.”
“Yes, Mister Rufus.” Jha’Ley agreed, “That would be correct.”
Toagun added, “If this sea, over here, the Sea of Diustahn, is warm, it stands to reason if this is a river leading from it … it could explain why the ice has melted, making this waterway, and causing the iceberg to finally break away.”
“Ssuh? Cou’d the icepuhg not be gateway he wass look-ing foh, closse but not know-ing?”
They all looked to the quarter-master.
Jha’Ley replied, “Now there is a thought. Well said, Mister Yeau.”
The door to the captain’s quarters was open as they heard Telroy yell, “Hard to starboard, spill all sails!”
The Clarise suddenly began to lee sharply to port-side, as the men broke meeting to see what was going on. Drums were rolling steady and the bell sounding for alarm and immediate stop.
When the ship settled and came to a full halt, Chako reported, “We were sounding for depth, sir, when the line was seized or snagged and held fast. Bourevund was doling the line, when just before the forty fathom mark she was made solid.”
Everyone could see the line was still anchored to whatever. Chako nodded to Telroy, “My first thought was it had been taken by some kind of life, and we have not to touch bottom with one hundred fathoms of line since entering this water.”
“You did right.” Jha’Ley scrunched his sight forward, as if it would allow him to see beneath the waves. Biting the side of his lip, he asked, “And you cannot shake it loose? Forgo that … just under forty fathoms? Mister Sealer? Are you up for a foray?”
Seedle came up and asked, “Commodore? What mind you that I join him this time?”
“Very well. Mister Chako, make ready the Clyde. Mister Telroy, bring us up closer, but not directly above. Mister Bourevund? Let us see what fish you have caught. Reel her in.”
Jha’Ley sat the barge with Lebracio, Caroll, and Dessi … waiting for Toagun and Seedle to come back up. Only a few feet away floated a second team from the Ubank, ready to go at a moment’s notice.
Thirty rods off sat the Clarise, still tied to whatever was below. Suddenly, the line went slack. Toagun was first to surface, then Seedle only a few seconds after. Toagun spit water and slung his head, then wiped water from his eyes and said, “Commodore … you just aren’t going to believe what’s down there.”
They were helping the men in as Seedle said, “We were hung on what looks like a tremendous spire on---”
“On a circular building of metal and glass. It’s gotta be---”
“More than one hundred rods in diameter.”
“And it has legs.”
Toagun looked to Seedle, chuckled, and asked, “Are we going to keep---”
“Interrupting each other? Probably,” Seedle laughed.
To Jha’Ley, Toagun added, “The water is warmer toward the bottom.”
Jha’Ley turned to Lebracio and Caroll, “Get these men to ship and in heavy blankets.” Then looking to the other barge he asked, “Sergeant Corad, Corporal Rahno?”
They looked at him and together said, “Aye sir.”
“If I am not back in ten, come get me.”
Dessi blurted out, “Not alo---”
Jha’Ley was over the side and heading down.
As always, when in the water he couldn’t resist embracing the feel of the sea. Spinning like a porpoise, he just wanted to play. But this was not the time. Moving quickly, because he didn’t want to stay down over long, he didn’t want the men to worry, he propelled himself with his underwater flying-like swim ability quickly below.
On what must be a knoll below the surface, sure enough there was a large structure sitting below. His mind went back to the things Lushandri showed him in the Bai’Yeuntite Crater. This structure did not fit their world, their technology. Could it be related to the concrete house high up on Wessox Mountain? After a quick swim around, he decided not.
The construction was all of some kind of metal and glass and it was in many levels. Those legs favored a folding jack-like apparatus, but what could power it, he could not discern. Jha’Ley figured the dimensions of the circular structure to be one hundred and twenty-five rods in diameter, by twenty rods high. The widest point was at top and graduated in four tiers to the bottom.
With a quick survey, he saw doors and hatches of many sizes and in odd locations. He saw something he swore looked like a boat dock on the sea floor, but what could that be? On the top and off to one side was a rectangular shaped structure with windows all around, and was that a catwalk with rails?
Behind the rectangle, and positioned vertically to the rest of the configuration, was another rectangular structure. Across the top were four rows of twelve tube-shaped openings. It reminded him of a container his pop used, exactly like this, but of course much smaller, in which he stored scrolls and important documents.
Jha’Ley thought, ‘But what would you fit into a tube this big?’
Sitting on the sea floor, right next to the circular structure, sat something which favored a large manta ray about thirty feet long, but it was made of metal with what appeared to be a hatch-like door where the tail should be. He searched for a means to open the door, but found nothing. Likewise, on a half dozen apparent doorways he could find no way to open. Some of the windows, however, were a different story. But upon peering in, he could identify nothing.
Baffled by this new mystery, Jha’Ley rose to the surface and the waiting blankets and soup aboard the Clarise. There was nothing here they could do, except make notes. But who would believe this?
Onward to the west they sailed another two hundred miles, until finally reaching what may be the end of the water way. This was either a gulf or small sea, but the view they beheld was majestic. A series of waterfalls stretched for over a mile until finally dropping into what they were now calling the Uordak Gulf.
Having given carful study to the site as they sailed upon it, Rufus believed the series fell more than seven hundred and fifty feet over a course of five drops. The second fall from the top, he estimated to be less than two hundred feet tall, perhaps fifteen hundred wide, and shaped like a huge crescent. Rufus could not be sure, but it appeared to absorb two or three rivers.
Before them was the final fall, which must be two hundred and seventy feet high and one thousand feet wide. It dropped into a beautiful basin surrounded by coniferous trees, shrubs, and flowers.
In awe he remarked, “Commodore, it is beautiful.”
“Yes, it is.”
A quick jaunt by monomoy discovered the water was fresh, and though cold, not freezing.
Jha’Ley said to Toagun, “We are a full hundred miles further in than the map said.”
“You thinkin’ this has grown since the mapping was made?”
“I am.”
Jha’Ley called to Seedle, “Let’s get an away-team assembled, one from each ship. I want to go in for a couple days, look around.”
“Aye sir, right on it.”
It was then the man in the crow’s nest yelled down to whoever would hear, “Hey, look at that,” as he pointed into the sky.
The sun was finally starting to cycle down to allow a bit of darkness, as the heavens were transitioning to daylong darkness of this arctic land, and it was actually late at night. The sky wasn’t dark, but the green light that suddenly made its appearance was almost ghostly.
For a few moments all eyes were on this new visage in the sky, when a rumbling began all about them. Ice and rock began to fall from the hills close to the shore. Violently the ground began to quake. Hail the size of sling stones began to fall and a hill split in half before them.
Jha’Ley was yelling, but his voice could not be heard. The hail was bigger and bigger as it fell and several men were injured. Chako reached out to grab t
he now suspended monomoy and secure it. But the line broke, just as he was smacked solid in the head by a piece of hail larger than a man’s fist. Falling over the side, his head was caught in the line and his neck broke instantly.
From beneath the shoreline, projectiles of rock shot up all around the vessels. A monomoy from the Ubank was in the water only sixty feet from the ladder, but shattered into pieces when an eruption beneath it knocked the craft twenty feet into the air. Corad was first to dive in to rescue the men as they hit the water.
Another eruption hit the Clarise from the side, a groaning crack sounded from within and water began to spray inside. A piece of wood from the split impaled a man who was down below.
Then, as suddenly as it began, it was over.
Crew members were rushing into the hold of the Clarise, Jha’Ley running all about the ship checking on his men, and assessing the ship’s damage. Five men dead, “Damn!” Off to the side, Chako, who he had stood beside as a youth and received an honor from the queen, was dangling by a rope beside the monomoy, “Damn-DAMN-damn!”
The Clarise was damaged, but fixable. Many thanks to Redding for the hull’s resilient design. They could sail as she was being repaired, then they could do it better in Sterine.
Two of S’Getti’s crew were dead from the monomoy incident, another had a shattered arm but he would live, and two more were dead from the hail. Several more were injured.
The captain reported, “Jann Raul, I have heard the northern hail could be so big, but this it is my first to see.”
After a brief discussion, both men were clearly of the same mind. Back on the Clarise, Jha’Ley said, “Mister Rufus, get us back to the Meinkutt, all speed!”
At maximum sail they returned to the opening before the iceberg, the opening that should have been there. Long before arriving at the mouth of the inlet, they saw a massive field of ice miles deep and hundreds of feet high.
The Clarise and Ubank were trapped in an arctic land, with winter coming on … and nobody knew where they were.