A Triumph of Souls

by Alan Dean Foster

  Nor were the impatient, agitated organs always precise in their deployment. Stumbling along the paths and past the village, the departing crew saw men and women with ears where their eyes ought to have been, noses taking the places reserved for mouths, and individual eyes occupying the high points of faces where nostrils ought to reside. All of which contributed to the general chaos and allowed the sailors to escape unchallenged.

  Commandeering several fishing boats, they rowed their way back to the waiting Grömsketter. Ignoring the danger inherent in attempting to pass through close-set islands at night, the Captain ordered all sail put on. Not one of the grateful crew challenged her decision. Had she so ordered it, they would have jumped into the water in a body and pushed and kicked the heavy craft with their own hands, so frantic were they to flee that gentle, kindhearted, accursed land.

  It was only when they were safely clear of the Tilo Isles and their bizarre inhabitants that the mariners took the time to note that not everything had been put back the way it had formerly been. There was some question as to which eye belonged to whom, and what lips ought rightly to reside above certain chins. This posttraumatic confusion was understandable and was soon sorted out. Personal disappointments aside, it was understood that everyone had recovered his or her rightful features, and that if anyone held any second thoughts on the matter, they were best kept to oneself, since nothing could be done in any event to further alter the current state of affairs.

  What lingering discontent existed was quickly swallowed in the wave of euphoria that followed the last peak of the Tilos falling behind the horizon astern. Everyone realized they should be grateful for having had the proper complement of features returned to them. After all, everyone knows it is better to have the wrong nose than no nose at all.

  There was one attempt made to honor and praise the black litah for effecting their freedom and the restoration of their countenances, but the big cat forcefully demurred. Such frivolities were time-wasting activities fit for humans, it avowed curtly, and not for nobler species like himself. Besides, it went on to explain, it was by nature already lionized, and had no need of gyrating, genuflecting humans to remind it of that fact.

  But despite the cat’s insistence, a few brave sailors did manage to slip in a stroke or two when it was not looking, before dashing quickly back to their posts. After a while the litah gave up trying to frighten them off, even going so far as to tolerate their accolades and attention. Once when it was being the recipient of such attention, the lankier of its human companions caught it purring thunderously to itself. Confronted with this embarrassing contradiction, the litah promptly retired below, and thereafter showed itself as little as possible except at mealtimes and when taking the occasional feline constitutional around the deck.

  VII

  After the remarkable occurrences of the past week it was a relief to passengers and mariners alike to find themselves navigating a calm sea devoid of preternatural spectacles. Except for the flock of web-footed pink and white sea dragonets that glided gracefully past one morning, nothing out of the ordinary presented itself for their perusal. Life aboard ship resumed a normalcy it had not known since the Grömsketter had first cleared the mouth of the now distant Eynharrowk delta.

  They were still in waters foreign to Stanager Rose and her crew, but sailing on the right course to make landfall somewhere north of the trading town of Doroune. The sometimes gruff Captain seemed pleased with their progress, and voiced aloud the hope that they would encounter no more unaccountable interruptions.

  It was a false hope.

  Contrary to what landsmen think, there are many kinds of fog. These are as familiar to mariners as the many varieties of wind and rain are to a farmer. There is the fog that sneaks up on a ship, scudding along the surface of the sea until it begins to cling in bits and pieces to its hull, gradually building up until it is heavy enough to creep over the bow and obscure a skipper’s vision. There is fog that arrives in thick clumps like gray cotton pulled from some giant’s mattress. Some fog drifts down from the sky, settling over ship and crew like a moist towel, while another fog rolls over the ocean in the proverbial bank that is more like a dark gray wall than a line of mist. There are almost as many species of fog as dog and, like dogs, each has its own peculiarities and unique identifying characteristics and habits.

  There was nothing striking about the fog that began to assemble itself around the Grömsketter. At first. It announced itself as a single patch drifting out of the west, neither especially dense nor dark. Gray and damp, it floated toward the bowsprit and sailed past on the starboard side. Few of the crew paid it any heed. All of them had seen fog before, sailed through it, and come out safely on the other side.

  When additional patches showed themselves later in the morning, it occasioned some comment among those on duty. The lookout in particular was concerned, and announced that they appeared to be entering a region of fairly contiguous mist. Stanager Rose directed Terious to make the usual preparations for running through cloud. These consisted of placing additional lookouts in the rigging and reefing some of the canvas. Better to go a little more slowly and be sure of what lay ahead than to charge blindly onward at full speed.

  Sensing the ship slowing, her passengers came out on deck, to find themselves greeted by the congealing grayness.

  Ehomba commented on the unhurried activity aloft. “You are taking in sail.”

  “Ayesh.” They were standing on the helm deck. Stanager’s attention was focused on her crew, not on curious passengers. “When general visibility’s cut, a wise seaman doesn’t take chances with what can’t be seen. Don’t want to run into anything.” She smiled tersely. “Don’t worry. Either this will lift or we’ll plow right through it. That’s the nature of sea fog.”

  “Run into what?” Standing at the railing, Simna was peering into the thickening gloom, struggling to penetrate the damp haze. “Another ship?”

  “Possible, but most unlikely,” she told him. “A floating log could do real damage, but I am more concerned with drifting ice.” She squinted skyward, sighting along the mast. “As far north as the liberated winds blew us, we run the risk of encountering one of the great floating mountains of ice that sailors sometimes pass. Run hard into one and we could easily be hulled. I’ve no wish to be cast adrift, marooned on an island that’s steadily melting beneath me.”

  “I’d melt beneath you.”

  “What’s that?” Her gaze swung sharply from sky to passenger.

  Turning and leaning back against the railing, Simna smiled virtuously. “I said that I felt you entreating your crew.”

  “Oh.” Eyes narrowing, she looked away from him and back toward the main deck. “Certainly is thick. I’d hate to wander into another group of islands like the Tilos. No way to navigate unknown straits in this. We’d have to drop anchor and wait for it to lift.”

  No islands presented themselves, but neither did the fog slide away. Instead, it continued to thicken, to the point where sailors could only see but a little ways in front of them, and had to do a certain amount of work by feel. It was not the density but the darkness that began to concern Stanager.

  Standing by the wheel, she surveyed the brooding layer that had engulfed her ship. “Never seen fog this dark. This thick, ayesh, but never so black. And it seems to be growing worse. But that’s not possible. Fog, even the heaviest fog, is gray and not black.”

  Simna’s eyes widened as he remembered another boat crossing. “Eromakadi!”

  “What’s that?” She blinked at him.

  Ehomba interrupted before his companion had a chance to explain. The silent herdsman had been studying the fog for some time now. “No, Simna. It is not what you fear. Bad enough, but not what you fear.” Reaching out, he swirled one long-fingered hand through the dank atmosphere. “Not thick enough to cut, but not eromakadi, either. See how I stir it?” He waved his hand back and forth. “Being a live thing, eromakadi would react. This is truly an ocean fog, and of a ki
nd I have seen before, that rolls in off the ocean as easily as it clings to it.” He looked over at Stanager, partially obscured by the black fog even though she stood only a few feet away.

  “But on land, it does not linger. And a man carrying a lamp through his village does not have to worry about running into floating logs or drifting mountains of ice.” He smiled encouragingly. “Only into sleeping dogs and laughing children.”

  “This is no game.” Her expression was grim. “If it gets any thicker or darker, my people won’t be able to see well enough to perform their duties.” Without being able to see him, she shouted to her first mate, knowing that he was somewhere below on the main deck. “Mr. Kamarkh! Light and set all lamps! And be careful! A burning ship will cut through this fog, but that’s not the kind of light I want to see!”

  “Ayesh, Captain!” came the mate’s stalwart reply.

  Moments later, pinpoints of light began to appear throughout the ship: in the rigging, at the ends of spars, atop both masts and along her sides. But so dense and dark had the mist become that they barely shone bright enough to illuminate their immediate surroundings, much less the water through which the Grömsketter was cutting.

  “This won’t do,” Stanager muttered. “Lookouts can’t see a thing. Even if they did, it’d be too close to avoid. We’re going to have to furl all sail and put out the sea anchor until this thins or lifts.”

  “That will cost us time.” Ehomba did not phrase it as a question.

  “Ayesh. But I’ve no choice.” She stared at him through the gloom. “I won’t risk my ship.”

  “How long do you think before it clears enough to continue?” Simna asked.

  Her response was not encouraging. “Impossible to say. Something this intense, it might be days. Or weeks.”

  “We do not have weeks,” Ehomba observed quietly.

  “I know. I hope you gentlemen like fish, because if we’re forced to remain here for very long, we’re going to be eating a lot of it.” She turned away from them to give the necessary orders.

  “Wait.”

  Her gaze swung back to the tall passenger. “Wait for what, herdsman? I respect you for what you’ve done, but don’t try to tell me my business.”

  “I would not think of it. It is only that I would like to try something.” He glanced in his friend’s direction. “Simna, would you bring me the sky-metal sword?”

  “Would I like to be locked in the Pasha of Har-Houseen’s harem for a week?” Elated, the swordsman dashed to the nearest hatch and vanished within as swiftly as a meerkat diving into its burrow.

  Stanager eyed her enigmatic passenger warily. “More wind? Should I alert the crew to be ready for some sorceral gale?”

  Ehomba sighed heavily. “As I have had to tell my friends repeatedly, there is no sorcery involved. I am only making use of what the wise people of my village have been kind enough to provide me.”

  “I’m only interested in the consequences, Etjole. Not the source.”

  “There will be no wind.” He smiled to himself. “Simna is a good man and a fine fellow, but sometimes his enthusiasm gets the better of his thinking. The sword of sky metal is not for calling up a casual breeze when one is too hot, or a gust of wind to fill a sail. When loosed to do all that it can, it is an extremely difficult blade to control.” He nodded skyward. “It might as easily sink this ship as blow it free. But there are all kinds of winds. Eminent sailor that you are, you know that there are winds within the sea as well as above.”

  “Winds within the sea?” She frowned. “Are you speaking of controlling the currents?”

  “I am not mariner enough to chance such a thing, and the effects of the sword are not so precisely controlled. But I think there is one path I might explore.” His smile widened even as his tone grew increasingly speculative. “It is a good thing that I have lived all my life close to the water. One does not have to spend time on a boat to know what wonders lie beneath the waves. Simply walking a beach can also be highly instructive.”

  He was interrupted by Simna’s return. The swordsman held the sky-metal sword carefully in a double-handed grip. Having seen what it could do, he had no wish to find out what might happen if it was accidentally dropped.

  “Here you are, bruther!” He passed the sword to its owner. “Now, by Geulrashk, call us up some wind and disperse this muck! Clear the air, Etjole!” Eyes shining, he stepped back.

  “I cannot,” Ehomba told him. “Too dangerous. A ship is a fragile thing. We already have enough wind. What we need is a way to see clear to making use of it.”

  “Gojom help me, I don’t understand, bruther.” It was a sentence Simna ibn Sind had come to use frequently in the presence of his enigmatic friend.

  Grasping the hilt of the sword firmly in both hands, Ehomba slowly raised it skyward in front of him, the blade held vertically and as straight as one of the Grömsketter’s masts. An intense blue glow began to emerge from the metal, pale at first but intensifying rapidly to azure and then indigo. It pushed back the fog instantly—but only for a few yards on either side of the radiant sword.

  Expecting something grander, Simna was openly disappointed. As for Stanager, she was quietly grateful for the modest improvement in the clarity of her immediate surroundings. At least the men and women on deck and up in the rigging would be able to see her without straining. Down by the mainmast, a seated Hunkapa Aub saw the blue luminescence and delightedly clapped two massive hands together.

  “Pretty light!” he exclaimed in the tone of a delighted child. “Pretty, pretty blueness!”

  “It’s pleasing to look upon, all right.” Simna grunted. “But it’s no beacon sufficient to guide this ship.”

  “No, it is not. Nor is it intended to be. But perhaps like will follow like.” Holding the resplendent sword as carefully as if it were a cauldron of boiling oil, Ehomba turned and slowly made his way to the side of the ship, trailing the gently pulsating blue aurora around him.

  One of the several emergency boarding ladders that always hung over the side scraped wetly against the stern. Still holding the blade vertically, Ehomba transferred his grip to one hand. With the other, he grasped the uppermost rung of the rope-and-slat ladder and started over the side. It was a delicate balancing act that did not allow the herdsman to relax for a second.

  “Hoy, Etjole, what do you think you’re doing?” Seeing his friend disappear over the side, Simna rushed to the railing. Leaning over, he watched as Ehomba, carefully balancing the length of refulgent metal in a single-handed grip, made his way down the ladder toward the dark sea below. Only the circle of blue light from the blade made it possible for the swordsman to follow his friend’s progress. Without it, the frightful thickness of the mist would have quickly swallowed him up.

  “What’s going on?” Though intensely curious as to what the tall passenger was about, Stanager would not abandon her position by the helm.

  “I don’t know.” Tensely, the swordsman watched his friend continue his descent. “But I can tell you this much—he’s not out for an afternoon’s swim.”

  The bottom of the ladder trailed backward in the dark water. Ehomba reached a rung where his feet were occasionally submerged and stopped there. Still firmly grasping the tough, sea-cured rope with one hand, he abruptly let gravity take hold of the mass of the weapon and swing the point downward. Keeping the fine edge facing forward, he was able to maintain his grip as the blade cut through the water. The deep blue radiance was clearly visible beneath the surface.

  Even though the edge sliced easily through the gentle swells, the ocean still tugged and pulled on the sword. Gritting his teeth, Ehomba held on, the hilt locked in his long-fingered grip, the blue glow penetrating deeply into the waters that tried to steal it away from him. Above, Simna and Hunkapa Aub watched from the rail. The swordsman could see that the strain of holding on to the ladder with one hand and the submerged blade with the other was tiring his friend.

  “Want me to spell you awhile, bruther?”
he called out.

  The herdsman’s face turned upward. Somehow, he managed to grin. He’ll grin when he’s on his deathbed, Simna mused. It’ll be the last expression he wears.

  “Thank you, friend Simna, but all is well.”

  “Well as what?” the swordsman retorted. “What is it you hope to do?”

  “Light a way through this confusion.” With the effort of looking upward putting additional stress on his body, Ehomba lowered his head.

  Hunkapa dropped a massive, shaggy arm over the side. “Look, look! More prettinesses!”

  Simna squinted. Something was rising from the depths of the ocean. It was not large—no longer than one of the Grömsketter’s small boats—but it was lined with lights that flashed bright yellow and pale red. As it loomed nearer the surface he saw that it was a fish—but a fish unlike any finned denizen of the deep he had ever seen before, either in kitchen or in art.

  Its body was more than nine feet long and silvery black, but it was no thicker around than a ribbon. A single long fin ran the length of the spine, and two tiny pectoral fins fluttered just beneath and back of glaring eyes the size of dinner plates. Above the head three long spines bobbed and weaved, and each was tipped with a bright yellow light. Prominent in the narrow, gaping mouth were fangs like shards of broken glass.

  It was soon apparent that it was not alone.

  Drawn by the light of the sword, all manner of wondrous deepwater creatures were rising to the surface. They swam and drifted and hovered about the cerulean halo of the sky-metal sword like moths romancing a candle on a summer’s eve. As the abyssal ascension gave rise to this luminescent benthic epiphany, more and more of the crew crowded to the port side to gape. Though somewhat muted by the persistent fog, their reactions were a mixture of awe, wonder, and sheer childlike delight in an exotic and beautiful phenomenon the likes of which none of them had ever encountered before.