The Wind Whales of Ishmael

by Philip José Farmer

  At this, the entire enemy group ran forward, screaming war cries. Another volley of arrows downed those in front and then those immediately behind, and the others tripped on the bodies. Ishmael scooted under the wall with Namalee, carrying Zoomashmarta in a bag, behind him. A man carrying lesser gods followed her and close on his heels was a man carrying Kashmangai. Others followed them, rolling under the rising wall swiftly.

  The enemy began to hack at the body to cut it apart and so let the wall continue to complete its revolution. Then they would unlock it again with their torches.

  Two of Ishmael's archers shot through shafts, and though the arrows went at an upward angle, they struck two men. But an enemy archer got down on his side and sent an arrow underneath the wall. A man fell with an arrow in his ankle, and the god he was carrying crashed on the stone floor.

  Before the wounded man could get up again, a spear shoved under the wall drove into his neck, and he died.

  Ishmael shouted at his men to retreat. There was nothing to be gained by staying by the wall and much to lose. The hubbub outside was increasing. It was obvious that the whole temple and, for all he knew, the whole city, was alarmed by now. Even if his band wasn't followed through this wall, it might find itself cut off when it reached the boats. The Booragangahns would not take long to realize that the invaders had to have entered from the underside of the ledge. They would send boats and ships around under to cut them off. And they would also send ships out to look for the mother ship and her supporting war vessels.

  Ishmael's only hope was to get away in the boats before the forces on the topside of the ledge were notified of what was going on.

  He led the way down the steps with a torch in one hand. Namalee fell, slipped halfway down with the god and, screaming, slid down toward the stone beast. The monster had somehow managed to turn over onto its feet. It was now climbing again with its lower hind feet braced on the fifth step up from the floor. On seeing Namalee fall, it shot its neck out and its jaws opened. The god in the bag, Zoomashmarta, bounced ahead of Namalee, rose into the air, and was snapped into the mouth of the stone beast.

  Ishmael jumped down after Namalee, who had stopped sliding, and pulled her back up from a step just out of reach of the head. She was skinned bloodily on her knees and hands and her forehead, but otherwise she did not seem harmed.

  The beast had closed its jaws on the idol of Zoomashmarta, but now it opened them again. The statue was jammed tight inside the neck where it opened into the mouth.

  "We have to get the great god back!" Namalee wailed.

  Ishmael did not curse. The situation was too perilous -- and at the same time touched with absurdity -- for him to express himself in mere cursing.

  "I don't think that your god wants to leave," he said. "If he does, he is certainly acting peculiarly."

  Up over the top of the steps, the priests were shouting and swearing. They were cutting away the body so the wall could descend and then be raised again.

  Behind him were the silent survivors of his band.

  Ahead was a stone beast that had swallowed divinity but showed no sign of any transubstantiation or of any desire for communion other than with the flesh of the invaders.

  And around him, permeating everything, was the sweet-stinking and drunk-making perfume.

  If the influence increased, he would soon be seeing two stone beasts. And one was almost more than he could bear.

  Karkri's body, he suddenly noticed, was gone. There was nothing left to show that he had existed except for streaks of drying blood on the steps. The beast had swallowed him without trouble.

  Ishmael gave an order and staggered down the steps, stumbling once and almost falling. The great head with the unblinking dead eyes swung toward him, and the neck retracted as if getting ready to shoot out at him. Nevertheless, it did not attack him, and he passed it safely.

  "I am not another Tyr to put my hand into the monster's mouth and lose it!" Ishmael said. But the reference was, of course, lost on her.

  "If we go ahead, we lose your god, that is true!" he shouted at her. "But if we stay and try to pry him loose, the Booragangahns will soon be with us! And then we die! So which is better? Die with your god or live without him?"

  "Why couldn't it have been Kashmangai?" she wailed, weeping.

  One of the men in the rear called, "The beast has swallowed Zoomashmarta! He is in the body of the beast now!"

  Ishmael turned. All but three men had passed the monster. The last three were still on the steps, halted because the jaws were wide open and the extended neck was swinging back and forth.

  There was little chance that all could get by the beast. The first to try it would be the sacrifice for the others.

  Ishmael said, "Wait!" and he grabbed the bag containing Kashmangai from a man and threw it over the beast to the first man.

  "Toss that into his mouth and then run by him!" he called.

  "No!" Namalee cried. "We can't lose him, too!"

  "Throw it!" Ishmael said. "We have no time to lose!"

  The man, Poonkraji, swung the bag by its neck, and the bag and god were taken in by the great jaws. The three men scrambled by the beast. This time, as if catching a thought that had been traveling for a long time in the granite brain, the beast moved sidewise on its massive legs. Its shell caught the last man and crushed him against the wall.

  "We can come back some other time and kill the beast and extract the two gods," Ishmael said. "The Booragangahns won't know that they are inside their guardian."

  "But we have been defeated!" Namalee said. "This has all been for nothing!"

  "Frustrated, not defeated," Ishmael replied. "But we will know something that the enemy does not, and we will return secretly and profit by it."

  He did not believe that, since it was unlikely that the air shafts would be left open or unguarded from now on. But there was more than one way to enter a city.

  They passed swiftly into the chamber of the things which hung from the ceiling by suction pads. They held their free hands by their necks as they dashed across the floor, the darkness burned away before them by the torches but reborn behind them. Pamkamshi and the two things had either been hauled up and eaten or else the path led them away from the bodies. They saw no sign of them during their flight.

  Halfway across the room, they were attacked. Tentacles fell around them and others fell outside the group.

  Ishmael rammed his torch against the one that looped around his neck and hand, and the tentacle withdrew.

  Namalee cut at the tentacle encircling her with a knife. Four savage slashes half-severed the tough skin and muscles, and that tentacle coiled upward into the darkness.

  There was the odor of burned flesh as other torches seared the tentacles.

  The attack lasted less than a minute. Then they were free without losing a man.

  Just as they started to run again, they heard a shout behind them. Ishmael whirled and saw torches flaring in the entrance far behind them. The Booragangahns had gotten through.

  "Keep on running!" Ishmael shouted, and he turned and sped away.

  When they reached the opposite door, over which a web was spun, they stopped. The torches of their enemies showed them struggling against the tentacles. Ishmael ordered the archers to shoot, and four of the pursuers, who were massed together while battling the tentacles, fell. Another volley downed four more, and the enemy broke and ran back to the entrance. But there they turned and fled yelling toward Ishmael's group again. A torch lit up the gray stone beast briefly as it rammed itself through the narrow opening with a scraping of stone against stone. Apparently it had swallowed the second god all the way and now was looking for mere humans as tidbits.

  The band went at the same swift pace through the room housing the round creatures with the six legs. These swung down, one after the other, at thirty-second intervals, at the ends of their web-strands. But they did no injury to any except themselves. Torches struck them; knives slashed their legs or their
strands from their backs. And soon the party was at the air shaft up which they had entered this unpleasant place.

  While three archers stood guard -- with only three arrows left apiece -- the others went down the shaft. This took a long time because a boat had to be filled one by one and then pulled away with the crew lying on their backs. Then another boat had to be pushed under the shaft and this one filled. And the crew of this had to push another boat under.

  Ishmael, as captain, waited until all were loaded aboard before he descended. He had expected the pursuers to show up long before the first boat was filled. Something had happened to stop them. He neither saw nor heard them, and he could only speculate that they had paused to fight the stone beast and so had given the tentacled things a chance to get at them.

  As soon as his boat dropped away, the gas hissing as it discharged from the bladders, he dropped a signal overboard. Its fuse trailed a slight arc as it fell and then it blew up with a bright white glare that lasted for several seconds. A minute later, something equally white burned in the air several miles to the east. The first mate of the Roolanga had seen the flare go off under the ledge. He had attached one with a burning fuse to a small bladder. This soared up for a thousand feet before its compressed gas and explosive powder from a ground plant were set off.

  Now the Roolanga should be rising to meet them, and the great ships above the city should be dropping swiftly.

  The boats emerged from under the shadow of the ledge. Above them they saw lights dancing around the lip of the ledge. A row of lights slid out into their sight as a vessel moved out.

  The alarm having been given, small boats would be setting out to curve around and under the projecting mass of rock.

  A small wind suddenly pushed the boat. The loss of gas was stopped, and the masts were unfolded and set up. Then the arms were revolved and secured and the sails were unfurled. There was no moon, and the Roolanga was showing no lights. But the agreement was that the boats would meet them at a stated altitude and area after the first signal was released. The Roolanga, slowly rising, would also be moving northeast, close-hauled, for a while. Then it would turn and hope that this northwest course would bring it within visual distance of the boats. The big ship did not have much room for maneuvering after that. It would have to turn and sail close-hauled once more.

  Ishmael watched the lights of the first vessel to leave the immense shadow that was the surface of the city of Booragangah. If it kept on its present course, it might run into the Roolanga. He looked upward but, of course, could not see the fleet of the Zalarapamtrans as yet. They would not be visible unless the moon appeared before they got close to the city. The moon was due to come over the horizon in about twenty minutes, if the sandglass clock could be trusted.

  Ten minutes passed. Ishmael peered into the darkness and occasionally looked back and up. Three more lines of light had appeared. Four vessels were put cruising around, looking for the stealers of their gods. There would be others waiting in the docks, ready to shove out as soon as they saw the signal that they were needed.

  Five more minutes went by.

  "Where is she?" Ishmael muttered, and then he saw the vast dim shape. It was going northwest as they sailed southeast, and they were on a collision courses Ishmael rattled out orders. A sailor opened a shutter in one side of a lantern-cage enclosing fireflies. The glow was not intense, but they were close enough. A minute later an eye of dull fire winked at them. Thereafter, signals were exchanged, and then the two began maneuvering so the boats could be taken overboard.

  Ishmael, looking back, saw the lights of four other vessels putting out from the slots on the edge of the great shelf. And then he saw a dark object coming down swiftly above the city, a tiny object visible only because the moon was up. That should be the giant fire-ship, the Woobarangu. It should be deserted by all except a few on the bridge, who were steering the ship to a spot above the center of the city. A minute or more, and the men on the bridge would climb aboard a boat and drift away. Shortly thereafter, fuses at various places in the giant vessel would burn down to the stores of flammable oil and low-energy explosives derived from the earth plants.

  And then...

  There it was!

  The flame spread out and out, burning so fiercely that even at this distance Ishmael could see the vessel quite clearly. It fell more swiftly as the skins of the bladders were burned away and the gases escaped. The flames illuminated the city below, which was to Ishmael a mass without detail. But he knew that it consisted of a broad area about three miles square of flimsy houses and walks and stores and two levels, all supported by thousands of gas bladders. Here the majority of the population lived and worked, their houses anchored to the earth but almost entirely free of the constant trembling of the earth. The immense cigar shape was falling onto the center of the city, and the light skin and wooden structures would catch fire, and the fire would spread quickly.

  The vessel struck. Flaming fragments flew far out as the mass tore through the houses and walks of the two levels and smashed into the rock of the ledge. The fire spread out even faster than he had envisioned. Within a few minutes, a large part of the center was burning.

  From where he was, the fire was beautiful. But he could imagine the screaming and the running of the women and children and men caught in the flames and of those not yet caught. The images made him sick. But he reminded himself that these were the people who had lured the kahamwoodoo to destroy their enemies. And these were the people who would return to hunt down the last Zalarapamtran if they learned that they had failed the first time to kill every one. Nevertheless, it was impossible for him to be indifferent to what was happening in that distant and beautiful flame or to be happy, as the Zalarapamtrans were.

  By the light he could see five more ships sliding out of the slots in the lip of the shelf. The enemy was attempting to get every vessel out before they all burned. Doubtless the air was swarming with small boats also trying to escape.

  At that moment the other Zalarapamtran ships were illumined by the increasing flames. They were coming down swiftly, and they were being steered toward the outer parts of the city. A few minutes passed and then new fires broke ouf on their trail. They had dropped firebombs on the periphery.

  Suddenly one of the Booragangahn ships leaving the dock began to burn. A Zalarapamtran had sailed above it and dropped a firebomb on it. The ship continued on out from the city, as the flaming vessel dropped and then broke in two and the two parts fell together down the face of the mountain.

  Namalee suddenly gripped Ishmael's arm and pointed to starboard. Ishmael looked and saw ten tiny objects in the moonlight.

  "They must be Booragangahn whaling ships or warships returning," she said.

  "Time to cut and run," he said. "We've done what damage we can to the city." He spoke to the first mate, who transmitted his order. In a short time, a small bladder to which was attached a signal-bomb was released from the Roolanga. Presently the white glow spread out a thousand feet above them. And the vessels above the city turned toward the Roolanga. The Roolanga continued on its course toward the approaching enemy ships. The moonlight was strong enough for Ishmael to see the two dozen warboats released from the ships. These were swift, streamlined vessels, each holding about eight men. They would attempt to intercept and board the Roolanga while the mother ships would attempt to lightly ram her. The business of ramming was a delicate and precarious one, because too heavy an impact would break up both vessels and too light an impact would result in some damage to both but also in the escape of the intended victim. And if the enemy did not succeed in its ramming, the boarders would be at the mercy of the boarded.

  Meanwhile, the boats had launched the other harpoons, and these boats were swung inward against the sides of the ship, and the crew cut holes in the skins and climbed through.

  The mother ship had dropped also as its antagonist dropped, but it did not fall swiftly enough, and it sailed just above the Roolanga, the bottom of its h
ull missing the top of the Roolanga's. Its huge rudder did strike against the Roolanga near the bridge and tear out a huge hole in the hull. But at the same time its own rudder was severely damaged.

  The Roolanga continued on her course and sailed between two enemy ships which almost collided after missing her. More boats attached themselves to the Roolanga, but the archers aboard shot the boarders, and the survivors scrambled back to their boats. There was no sense in their continuing to fight if the mother ships could not ram the Roolanga.

  The enemy vessels turned to sail close-hauled while the Roolanga continued to beat to the wind. Presently, as time and the moon smiled down upon the Zalarapamtrans, the Roolanga turned and ran free. The others of the fleet were strung out behind the flagship for a mile. The enemy ships that had left the city turned again and quartered, but they had little chance of catching the Zalarapamtrans for a long time. The approaching fleet, having signaled the others with their firefly lanterns, changed course to intercept the enemy.

  Even though the invaders were more heavily laden, bearing a cargo of firebombs which they had not had a chance to drop, they had a head start. Whether or not they could keep it was up to the fortunes of war and the wind. Ishmael did not give the order to unload the bombs and so enable them to run faster. He thought that the bombs might be used, and he was studying their possibilities.

  The night wore on. The moon sank over the western horizon and blackness returned, relieved only by the running lights on the two fleets. Ishmael slept three times. The moon shone on the pursued and the pursuers six times. The sullenly red sun rose, and still the distance between the two, though narrowed, was wide enough so that Ishmael did not worry.

  By then the damages to the hull had been repaired. And the ships had sailed three times through red-brit clouds and scooped up great quantities to increase the galley's stores and to feed the bladder-animals. The additional gas enabled the Zalarapamtran fleet to rise to a height of about twelve miles. The Booragangahns followed suit and then, as they slowly decreased the distance between them and the invaders with agonizing slowness, they also increased their altitude. At the end of the second day, they were about six thousand feet higher than the pursued.