Helliconia Summer h-2

by Brian Aldiss

  “Can we do that?”

  “If I say so.”

  “Remember our near disaster on the Persecution Bay expedition?”

  “You thought I was crazy then.”

  “I think you’re crazy now.”

  They both laughed, and he clutched her hand.

  The Admiral summoned the bo’sun. Slaves were set to work. The longboat was launched. Odi Jeseratabhar and SartoriIrvrash climbed aboard. They were rowed two miles across to the island, over a sea of glass. With them went a dozen armed soldiers, delighted at this chance to leave the hated confines of the ship.

  Gleeat Island measured five miles across. The ship’s boat beached on a steep sandy shelf at the southeast corner. A guard was set on it, while the rest of the expedition moved forward.

  Iguanas basked on the rocks. They showed no fear of humans, and several were speared to be taken back to the ship as welcome addition to the diet. They were puny beside the giant black iguanas of Hespagorat. These rarely attained more than five feet in length. Their colour was a mottled brown. Even the crabs that lived commensally with them were small and had only eight legs.

  As SartoriIrvrash and Odi Jeseratabhar were searching the rocks for iguana eggs, the party came under attack.

  Four phagors rushed from cover, spears in hand, and fell on them. They were ragged beasts, their coats in tatters, their ribs showing.

  With surprise on their side, the phagors managed to kill two of the soldiers, bearing the men down into the water with the force of their charge. But the other soldiers fought back. Iguanas scattered, gulls rose screaming, there was a brief pursuit over the rocks, and the scrimmage was finished. The phagors were dead—except for a gillot whose life Odi Jeseratabhar spared.

  The gillot was larger than her companions and covered in a dense black coat. With her arms bound firmly behind her, she was made captive and taken back in the boat to the Golden Friendship.

  Odi and Sartori embraced each other in private, congratulating themselves on confirming the truth of the old legend of the land bridge. And on surviving.

  A day later, the monsoon winds blew, and the fleet was on its way eastwards again. The coast of Randonan was now passing in all its wild splendour on the port side; but SartoriIrvrash spent most of his time below decks, studying their captive, whom he called Gleeat.

  Gleeat spoke only Native Ancipital, and that in a dialect. Knowing no Native, or even Hurdhu, SartoriIrvrash had to work through an interpreter. Odi came down into the cramped dark hold to see what he was doing, and laughed.

  “How can you bother with this smelly creature? We have proved our point, that Radado and Throssa were once connected. God the Azoiaxic was on our side. The small colony of iguanas isolated on Gleeat Island are an inferior strain, isolated from the main body of iguanas on the southern continent. This creature, living among white phagors, probably represents some kind of survival of the Hespagorat-Pegovin black strain. Doubtless they’re dying out on such a small island.”

  He shook his head. While admiring her quick brain, he perceived that she reached conclusions too hastily.

  “She claims that her party were on a ship which was wrecked on Gleeat in an earlier monsoon.”

  “That’s clearly a lie. Phagors do not sail. They hate water.”

  “They were slaves on a Throssan galley, she says.”

  Odi patted his-shoulder. “Listen, Sartori, it’s my belief that we could have proved that the two continents were once linked just by looking at the old charts in the chartroom. There’s Purporian on the Radado shore and a port called Popevin on the Throssa shore. ‘Poop’ means ‘bridge’ in Pure Olonets, and ‘Pup’ or ‘Pu’ the same in Local Olonets. The past is locked up in language, if one knows how to look.”

  Although she laughed, he was vexed by her superior Sibornalese style. “If the smell is overcoming you, dear, you had better go back on deck.”

  “We shall soon be approaching Keevasien. A coastal town. As you know, ‘ass’ or ‘as’ is Pure Olonets for ‘sea’—the equivalent of ‘ash’ in Pontpian.” With that burst of knowledge, smiling, she retired, climbing the ladder to the quarterdeck in practical fashion.

  He was surprised next day to find that Gleeat was wounded. There was a golden pool of blood on the deck where she lay. He questioned her through the interpreter. Although he watched her closely, he could detect nothing resembling emotion when she answered.

  “No, she is not wounded. She says she is coming on oestrus. She has just undergone her menstrual period.” The interpreter looked his distaste but made no personal comment, being of inferior rank.

  Such was his hatred for phagors—but it was gone now, like much else from his past life, he realized—that SartoriIrvrash had always neglected their history, just as he had refused to learn their language. Such matters he had left to JandolAnganol—JandolAnganol with his perverse trust in the creatures. However, the sexual habits of phagors had been a target for prurient jest to the very urchins in the Matrassyl streets; he recalled that the female ancipital, neither human nor beast, delivered something like a one-day menstrual flow from the uterus as prelude to the oestral cycle when she came on heat. It might be memories of those old whispers which caused him to imagine that his captive emitted a more pungent odour on this occasion.

  SartoriIrvrash scratched his cheek. “What was that word used for catamenia? Her word in Native?”

  “She calls oestrus ‘tennhrr’ in her language. Shall I have her hosed down?”

  “Ask her how frequently she comes into oestrus.”

  The gillot, who remained tied, had to be prodded before she gave answer. Her long pink milt flicked up one of her nostrils. She finally admitted to having ten periods in a small year. SartoriIrvrash nodded and went on deck for some fresh air. Poor creature, he thought; a pity we can’t all live in peace. The human-ancipital dilemma would have to be resolved one day, one way or another. When he was dead and gone.

  They drove before the monsoon all that night, the next day, and the night following. The rains were frequently so thick that those aboard the Golden Friendship could not make out their sister ships. The Straits of Cadmer were left behind. All about them was the grey Narmosset, its waves streaked with long spittles of white. The world was a liquid one.

  During the fifth night, they encountered a storm, and the carrack almost stood on its beam ends. The hollies and orange trees growing along the waist were all lost overboard, and many feared that the ship would founder. The seamen, always superstitious, approached their captain and begged that the captive phagor be cast overboard, since it was well known that ancipitals aboard ship brought bad luck. The captain agreed. He had tried almost everything else.

  SartoriIrvrash was awake, despite the late hour. It was impossible to sleep in the storm. He protested against the captain’s decision. No one was in any mood to listen to his arguments; he was a foreigner, and in danger of being thrown overboard himself. He went and hid while Gleeat was dragged from her foul hold and thrown into the raging waters.

  Within an hour, the worst of the wind died. By the time of false light, when Poorich was just visible ahead, nothing more than a fresh breeze prevailed. By dawn, the other three vessels were disclosed, miraculously unharmed and not too far distant—God the Azoiaxic was good. Soon, the mouth of the Kacol, where Keevasien lay, could be discerned through purplish coastal mists.

  An unnatural gloom hovered about the hinges of the horizon. The sea all round the Sibornalese fleet was alive with dolphins, darting just below the surface. Flocks of sea and land birds numbering many hundreds circled overhead. They uttered no cry, but the beat of their myriad wings sounded like a downpour in which no rain fell. The flocks did not swerve as the call ‘Good Tidings’ rolled out from ship to coast.

  As the wind died, the cordage slackened and slapped against the masts. The four ships closed as they approached the shore.

  Dienu set a spyglass to her eye and stared at where a strip of island lay among the breaking waves.
She saw men standing on the strip, and counted a dozen. One was coming forward. During the days of the monsoon, they had skirted the coasts of Randonan; here Borlien commenced—enemy territory. It was important that news of the fleet’s coming was not flashed ahead to Ottassol; surprise counted for much, in this as in most warlike enterprises.

  The light improved, minute by minute. The Golden Friendship exchanged signals with the Union, the Good Hope, and the white caravel, the Vajabhar Prayer, alerting them to danger.

  A man in a wide-brimmed hat was wading out into the foam. Behind him, at the mouth of the river, a boat could be seen, hull half-hidden. There was always the possibility that they were moving into an ambush and, getting too far in, would lose the wind and be trapped. Dienu stood tense at the rail of the quarterdeck; for a moment, she wished that her faithless Io were with her; he was always quick to make up his mind.

  The man in the surf unfurled a flag. The stripes of Borlien were revealed.

  Dienu summoned artillerymen to line the landward rail.

  The distance between ship and shore diminished. The man in the surf had halted, up to his thighs in water. He was waving the flag in an assured manner. The mad Borlienese…

  Dienu instructed the artillery captain. He saluted, went down the companion ladder to give orders to his men. The men worked in pairs, one operating the wheel lock, the other supporting the muzzle.

  “Fire!” shouted the artillery captain. A pause, and then a volley of shots.

  So began the battle of Keevasien sandbar.

  The Golden Friendship was close enough for Hanra TolramKetinet to make out the faces of the soldiery along its rail. He saw the artillerymen taking aim at him. By now, the insignia on the sails had revealed that these were Sibornalese vessels, surprisingly far from home. He wondered if his opportunist king had concluded a treaty to bring Sibornal into the Western Wars on Borlien’s side. He had no reason to believe them hostile—until the weapons were raised.

  The Friendship swung almost side on to him, to present the artillerymen with the best line of fire. He estimated that its draught would allow it to come no farther in. The Union was ahead of its flagship, curving round to TolramKetinet’s left, getting uncomfortably close to the east end of Keevasien Island. He heard shouted orders coming across the water, as the Union’s main and mizzen sails were taken in.

  The two smaller ships, which had sailed closer to the Randonanese shore, were cutting in to his right. The Good Hope was still battling against the broad brown flood from the western arm of the Kacol, the white Vajabhar Prayer was past—could indeed be said to be almost behind him, though still some distance away. On all these ships except the Good Hope, he could see the glint of gun barrels, pointing towards him.

  He heard the artillery captain’s order to fire. TolramKetinet dropped his flag, turned about, plunged into the water, and commenced swimming strongly back to the sand pit.

  GortorLanstatet was already providing him with covering fire. He got his men down behind a shale ridge and directed half of his fire power at the flagship, half at the white caravel, the Vajabhar Prayer. The latter was still coming in fast, heading towards their position. The lieutenant had with him a good crossbowman; he directed him, and another man to prepare a pitch fire-thrower.

  Lead balls smacked in the water round the general. He swam underwater, coming up for air as infrequently as he could. He was aware of dolphins milling about close by, but they made no attempt to interfere with him.

  Suddenly the firing stopped. He surfaced and looked back. The white caravel which bore the hierogram of the Great Wheel upon its sails had unwisely cut between him and the Golden Friendship. The Shiveninki soldiery, crowding on the topmost deck, were preparing to fire on the defenders of the spit.

  Waves burst over him. The shore was unexpectedly steep. TolramKetinet grasped hold of a root and hauled himself among bushes, working forward a few feet into cover and then collapsing. He lay breathing heavily, his face against the brown sand. He was unhurt.

  Before his inward view rose a memory of the lovely face of Queen MyrdemInggala. She was speaking seriously. He remembered how her lips moved. He was a survivor. He would win for her sake.

  Yes, he was not clever. He should not have been made general. He did not possess the natural ability to command men which Lanstatet had. But.

  Since he had received the queen of queen’s message in Ordelay—the first time she had ever addressed him on a personal level, even at secondhand—he had thought of the king’s intention to divorce her. TolramKetinet feared the king. His allegiance to the crown was divided. Although he understood the dynastic necessity for JandolAnganol’s action, that royal decision had altered TolramKetinet’s feelings. He told himself that the attraction he felt for the queen was treasonable. But the queen in exile was a different matter; treason no longer entered the question. Nor did loyalty to a king who had sent him off out of jealousy to die in a Randonanese jungle. He got to his feet again, and ran for GortorLanstatet’s besieged strip.

  His Borlienese troops gave him a cheer as TolramKetinet threw himself down among them. He embraced them as he peered out to seaward over the shingle ridge.

  In a minute, the scene had changed in certain dramatic respects. The Golden Friendship had taken in its sails and lowered fore and aft anchors. It lay about two hundred yards offshore. A lucky fire bolt from the crossbow had set part of its bow and the artemon mast alight. As sailors fought the blaze, two longboats full of soldiers were pulling away from the ship; one of the boats—though the information would have been lost on TolramKetinet—was led by Admiral Odi Jeseratabhar, who stood rigid in the stern; SartoriIrvrash had insisted on accompanying her and sat rather ignominiously at her feet.

  The Union had almost beached itself away to the left of the small island, and was embarking troops into the shallows; they waded doggedly ashore. Rather nearer was the Vajabhar Prayer, stuck in the shallows with sails hanging limp, and a boat full of soldiery making inexpertly for the shore. This boat was the nearest target, and matchlock fire was causing some damage to it.

  Only the Good Hope had not changed position. Caught in the flow of the outpouring Kacol, it remained with all sail hoist, bowsprit pointing towards Keevasien Island, contributing nothing to the struggle.

  “They must believe they are facing the entire Keevasien garrison,” GortorLanstatet said.

  “We certainly need that garrison, poor devils. If we stay here we’ll be slaughtered.”

  There was no way in which thirteen men, poorly armed, could defend themselves against four boatloads of troops armed with wheel locks.

  It was then that the sea rose, opened, and rained assatassi.

  From one end of the Sea of Eagles to the other, assatassi flew like darts from sea to shore. Fisherfolk who understood the sea kept this day and the following one for celebration and feasting. It was a festivity which occurred only once early every summer during the Great Summer, at the time of high tide. In Lordryardry, nets were ready. In Ottassol, tarpaulins were spread. In Gravabagalinien, the queen’s familiars had warned her to stay away from the deadly shore. What was a feast of plenty for the knowledgeable became a rain of death for the ignorant.

  Swimming in from far mid-ocean, shoals of assatassi headed for land. Their migrations during the Great Summer spanned the globe. Their feeding grounds were in the distant reaches of the Ardent Sea, where no man had visited. On reaching maturity, the shoals started their long swim eastwards, against the flow of ocean currents. Through the Climent Sea they went, and on through the narrow gates of the Straits of Cadmer.

  This narrowing brought the shoals into greater proximity. The enforced closeness, together with the onset of monsoon weather in the Narmosset Sea, brought a changed behaviour pattern. What had been a long leisurely swim, without apparent aim, became a race—a race which was destined to end in the death-flight.

  But for that actual flight, that desired death along thousands of miles of coast, another factor was necessary.
The tide had to be right.

  Throughout the centuries of winter, Helliconia’s seas were all but tideless. After apastron and the darkest years, Freyr again began to make its influence felt. As its gigantic mass beckoned the chill planet back towards the light, so too it stirred the seas. Its pull on the ocean mass was now, only 118 Earth years from periastron, considerable. The time in the small year had arrived when the combined mass of Batalix and Freyr worked together. The result was a sixty percent increase in tidal strength over the winter situation.

  The narrow seas between Hespagorat and Campannlat, the strong flow of the current to the west, conspired to make the higher tides mount and break suddenly with dramatic force. On that phenomenal flow of water shoreward, the shoals of assatassi launched themselves.

  The ships of the Sibornalese fleet found themselves first with no water under their draught, and then battered by a tidal wave rising precipitously and without warning from the sea. Before the crews could realize what had hit them, the assatassi were there. The death-flight was on.

  The assatassi is a necrogenetic fish, or more properly fish-lizard. It reaches a length of eighteen inches at maturity; it has two large multifaceted eyes; but what chiefly distinguishes it is its straight bill of bone, supported by a boney cranium. On its death-flight the assatassi reaches speeds high enough for this bill to penetrate a man to the heart.

  Off Keevasien, the assatassi broke from the surface a hundred yards further out than the Golden Friendship. So full did the air become with them that those which flew low enough to skim the water and those who gained heights of fifty feet alike formed part of a solid body of fast-moving fish-lizard. They gleamed like a myriad of sword blades. The air became a sword blade.

  The flagship was raked by assatassi from stem to stem. Anyone standing on deck was struck. The seaward side of the ship was covered with creatures, hanging skewered by their bills. So with the three other ships. But it was the boats, already waterlogged by the tide, which suffered most. All their company was wounded, and many were killed outright. The boards were stove in. All four boats began to sink.