The Tides of Nemesis (The Windows of Heaven Book 4)

by K. G. Powderly Jr.

  She considered his words for an eternal moment, and then nodded.

  A’Nu-Ahki punched the button. “Anybody near the forward con, I repeat, anybody near the forward con, hurry and release the tether! I repeat, drop the tether now, quickly!”

  He crouched to the deck-grate, above the aft capstan, and opened it.

  By now, the wave’s roar devoured its way up what remained of Akh’Uzan’s valley. Sutara refused to take her eyes off her father-in-law, but she began to tremble violently.

  A’Nu-Ahki reached below the deck planks, and disengaged the tether clamp. He looked back up to his son’s wife, as he rose to his feet. He spoke quickly, “Sutara, the only way you can prove to me that you no longer believe is to go ahead and jump. I really don’t want you to, but that’s your choice. Either way, I’m coming over there to close the window, and afterward I’m putting locks on the shutters. So you must choose now.”

  Fresh out of bed, Na’Amiha heard her husband’s hail from the galley, even as the capstan gears began to zip, unwinding chain in a mad screech. She knew his tone—they were in terrible danger!

  ‘Miha raced up the ladder, and scrambled up into the prow. Pushing through the conning shack door, she dove behind the console for the grate panel. The racket beneath the deck vibrated her insides. She tugged at the bronze screen, as the roar of waters became as loud as the speeding chain.

  ‘Miha screamed as she felt the ocean draw them away from the mountains. She tugged at the panel to get at the tether clamps.

  The grate would not pull loose.

  Iyapeti’s wife sat straddled between death and life. She seemed too afraid to look behind her, and just as afraid to dismount the windowsill.

  A’Nu-Ahki stepped towards her.

  Sutara tensed her muscles to push off.

  The wave top disappeared into the overcast clouds behind her, and began to roll the vapors forward in its near-vertical wall of water. A’Nu-Ahki realized that if the ship did not start moving toward it any faster, they would not make it over before it crested.

  Na’Amiha gave the grate one last desperate yank. The panel flew up, and she somehow flung it across the room. Jamming her arm through the hole, she disengaged the release clamps just as the last few rungs of chain flew off the capstan. The whiplash of speeding metal bounced up against the planks, and crushed her hand before she could pull it out.

  ‘Miha’s cry of pain went unheard over the engulfing roar outside.

  Up at what remained of Floodhaven, Tarbet and Tsulia opened the big outer doors of the ziggurat, and beheld the hazy silence. The strange gray sky had brightened, and the winds subsided. Tendrils of mist shrouded the lower slopes, though visibility stretched beyond to the watery horizon.

  “It’s over.” Tarbet said. “It’s finally over!”

  Avarnon-Set instantly dampened the elation. “I’ll say it’s over!”

  Tsulia scowled at the giant, and then hid behind Tarbet.

  The Archon continued to gaze dreamily at the western horizon, as if lost in the visions of New-world he had shared with her last night after they made love behind the rag drapes, with everyone listening.

  Tsulia scanned the crest, and saw that most of Floodhaven had fallen into the chasm during the forty days of earthquake, rain, and erosion—only the central ziggurat on a crumbling knob of mountain peak remained, buttressed by a few partial structures. The washed-out slopes fell sheer away from the bedrock, bulging into muddy, gelatinous mounds where the hilly forests used to be. Southward, the smoldering crater of Mount N’Zar foamed at its mouth, like some giant rabid beast in a temporary daze.

  Tsulia hung on her Archon’s arm. “How long until it all turns back into trees and meadows again, my husband?”

  “I don’t know,” Tarbet mumbled. His face grew drawn and yellow, bloodless in the new light.

  She swung around, and leaned on his chest. “How do we get down?”

  Tarbet glared at her. She feared he would push her away again—she always hated herself when that happened. Tsulia realized in an odd moment of clarity that she had sunk past all the descending thresholds into madness. Any world they built together in that gray mire below would be one in which she fought forever to forget what she had become.

  How can I despise the man I most love and revere? Contradictions tore her insides apart. To think on it for more than a moment brought down more guilt than Tsuli could endure. There can’t be any evil in what we did, because of who he is—only the illusion of evil! How can I distrust the Archon, who led us through World-end to the dawn of New-world? Is he not the successor of divinely appointed Seti?

  She looked up into Tarbet’s haggard eyes again, searching for some scrap of anything there to hang a hope on, as her thoughts gibbered on inside her skull as monkey noise. Everything he does has a good reason—even those awful things he made me do in front of everybody, when I begged him not to—even the horrible names he called me, and how he punished me when I lost control… Tsulia knew she could never eat again without remembering.

  Nestrigati joined them outside, and pointed out at the water on the horizon. “Look, it’s A’Nu-Ahki’s ship! We’re not the only survivors!”

  Tsuli looked to where he pointed, if only to silence her thoughts before she told herself again how she must deserve whatever Tarbet did to her.

  Far off in the deceptively placid bay, a tiny vessel drifted out with the retreating tide. She turned her eyes back into the Archon’s mantle.

  “Good old Nu!” Nestrigati bubbled. “I knew we’d meet again!”

  Then Floodhaven’s builder went silent.

  Tarbet’s New-world hopes fell. Tsulia sensed them drop as she pressed against his chest—like the massive public shame that her glorious new husband had dropped onto the small of her back. She clutched him with greater fervor because of it—he was all she had now—until he tried to pull away from her smothering arms. For a moment, Tsuli did not know whether to release him, or incarcerate him further with her scissored legs—he could go from giving her such deep security and warmth, to intense rejection and disgrace, so rapidly that she never knew quite how to behave.

  Then she turned her face from his chest again and saw why.

  Tsulia learned in a few brief seconds of personality-shredding glee that it was possible to feel both extreme relief and violent terror all at the same time. It came in a harrowing plunge—like the perverse captivation she found in a man she both loved and hated—who at once gave her towering pleasure and prestige, with equally crushing depths of shame; stretching the dichotomy of her personhood to its ripping point, and beyond.

  The mountain of water on the horizon lost its summit in the roiling gray heavens. They all watched helplessly while A’Nu-Ahki’s toy-like ship flew up the monster wave, and disappeared into the overcast sky—whether to be crushed in the crest above the clouds or to find safety in the back swell, Tsuli would never know.

  Avarnon-Set roared something horrible about faces in the foam, and bolted back inside the ziggurat, slamming the oaken doors behind him.

  Tsulia began to laugh hysterically in sheer panic, as she squeezed Tarbet’s chest as a vice. The roar tumbled in, consuming the mud flats below in churning gravy maelstroms. She gazed up into the sky, and screamed with a wild tickle in her gut that wrung her from the inside, like a sponge. A curling vault of water fell slowly at her, the devouring blue arch of Leviathan’s mouth.

  The wave slammed in to crush Tsuli and Tarbet, and washed their boulder-blasted bodies away in pieces. The N’Zar mountain chain dissolved with them, planarized by bottom-hugging jets of water-driven gravel.

  The sudden shift of gravity turned the mezzanine loft behind A’Nu-Ahki into a yawning shaft.

  Barque of Aeons slid up the giant wall of water as a helpless pine needle pulled toward the invisible roar of the forming wave crest. Sutara flew into Nu, from her perch on the windowsill, and both tumbled backward through the conning shack door, down the steps, and into the void. The fall seem
ed bottomless, destined to end in certain death against the hull pool bulkhead. Then A’Nu-Ahki’s heel snagged under one of the secondary drogue winches, which broke his descent with a loud snap.

  Before the pain hit, he grabbed one of Sutara’s flailing feet, as she almost dropped past him.

  “Stop kicking!” he yelled.

  They hung with heads down against the deck, over an open pit.

  A thunderous slap of water pounded the stern, as the ship, weighted by its aft drogue stones, plunged through an arching barrier of ocean tens of cubits thick. A deluge siphoned through the aft window and hatch, into the loft, past where Nu and Sutara hung from the winch, a mere cable’s breadth from blasting them to their deaths in its howling stream.

  Barque of Aeons breached through the ocean’s surface like a massive wooden whale, and fell over, spinning into the wave’s back swell. The decks strained to resume horizontal attitude with crashes and bangings from every portion of the ship. Nu heard shouts from below, and a terrified din of beasts. Then the pain in his ankle hit, and he screamed.

  Releasing Sutara’s foot, he tried to dislodge his own from between the supports of the winch’s roller drum. It would not budge, and the throbbing grew too intense to force it.

  “My foot’s broken,” he called to Sutara. “Will you help me?”

  She gave him a dull stare, then scurried down the aft ladder to the livestock bays without a word.

  Nu had to yell down to the others for aid.

  T’Qinna arrived almost a half-hour later, first to hear him. She bled from a nasty gash through the dark “paw-print” mark on her forehead.

  “What happened?” she asked.

  “Behemoth of all waves,” he gasped, teeth gritted, as he tried to move his swollen ankle. “Broke my foot trying to hold on to your sister-in-law, and keep us both from tumbling down the loft! I found Sutara at the window, ready to jump, just like in your dream. It’ll be all right now—no more mountains left to swim for, if I marked the size of that wave.”

  T’Qinna’s face clouded. “Where is she? How could she leave you?”

  “She went below. Let her be. She’s been given much to think about.”

  “But Leviathan is twisting her mind!”

  “I know, child. It has to run its course. I’ve known Sutara most her life. E’Yahavah’s love will eventually strengthen her to see Leviathan’s manipulation of her grief. That love will fight for her. What’s our status?”

  T’Qinna answered, “Everybody’s accounted for except Tiva and your wife. One or both of them must have released the forward tether. ‘Peti, Khumi, and U’Sumi are sealing off the lower forward supply compartments to lay pumps. I came aft to find you. We haven’t had time to check the forward con, nor a full damage assessment or casualty count of the animals. We’ve taken on quite a bit of water through the vent slots—fortunately, we had most of them closed. We’re listing mildly by the bow, but that seems to be settling. No animals small enough to need moving are in the flooded compartments. That’s all I know.”

  Nu grimaced. “That’s a good report, my girl. Help me get free, so we can lower the main drogue stone to cruising depth before we get swamped.”

  Tiva huddled between the two frightened cats; their backs propped against the forward stall partition. She saw U’Sumi’s approach from the watertight hatch only distantly. Her terrorized paralysis barred her from calling out. He found her only by poking his head inside the partition.

  “Are you okay?” he asked.

  Tiva found enough control to nod.

  “Tiva, maybe you should come with me back to your quarters.”

  She managed to squeak out a syllable. “No!”

  U’Sumi furrowed his brow. “It’s more comfortable.”

  Tiva tried to avoid his gaze, as speech returned to her. “Please, just let me stay here. I want to be alone. I promise I’ll do all my chores.”

  “I don’t care about the chores. I just want to be sure you’re okay.”

  “Thanks. Tell everyone not to worry. I just need to be alone awhile.”

  He nodded, and turned to go.

  “Alone,” Tiva echoed softly once he left, “Just let me be alone forever…”

  ‘Miha regained consciousness with two faces hovering over her. She had banged her head in her fall, and her crushed hand throbbed.

  “You saved the ship, Mahm,” a face said. It focused into U’Sumi.

  “Can you move?” asked the other, a lighter spot that became Iyapeti.

  “I think so.” Na’Amiha tried to rise, but her head spun and she grew nauseated.

  U’Sumi said, “Don’t push yourself. We’ll get you to your cabin.”

  “I must have hit my head. Tether chain crushed my hand.”

  U’Sumi examined her more closely. “It looks nasty—broken bones and bruises—but not a lot of blood. Are you sure you just didn’t want to get out of cooking?” He smiled at her and winked.

  They all chuckled.

  She asked, “Is everybody else all right?”

  U’Sumi said, “I just left Tiva with the cats. She’s shaken, but okay.”

  ‘Peti hung his head. “Sutara was at the stern window, ready to swim for the mountains.”

  Miha’s heart skipped a beat. “She didn’t…?”

  “No, Pahp got to her in time—just barely. T’Qinna says they were both dangling over the mezzanine. Pahp caught his foot in one of the winches—broke it bad—but he managed to grab hold of Suta. She’s disappeared into the lower decks to sulk. She can evade us for days—even weeks—if she wants. Pahp says to just let her be.”

  U’Sumi added, “At least she won’t try to jump ship again—the mountains are gone. I’ll bet we’re traveling over them right now.”

  “We are,” said a grim voice from the mezzanine hatch.

  Khumi stood over them, gazing at the compass. “The depth’s at least fifteen cubits higher than N’Zar—maybe more, with the water we’ve taken.”

  “How do you know?” ‘Miha asked.

  Khumi leaned on the rotating chair. “Ship’s draft is fifteen cubits. The wave washed from west to east. Not only didn’t our keel scrape, but when ‘Qinna and Pahp lowered the drogue stone to cruising depth, it didn’t catch on anything. No rocks are visible from any watch point.” He stepped over them to the window, slid it open and then shut. “Not even here.”

  “No land,” Iyapeti said with glazed eyes.

  Khumi spoke as though they had not grasped the situation. “Not only no land, but no way of knowing our heading.” He nodded at the compass.

  U’Sumi and ‘Peti hoisted Na’Amiha to her feet, and all of them leaned against the console to see the glass-covered plate.

  North had resumed its spin around the dial, only now it traveled faster, and in the other direction.

  “Come on,” Khumi offered, “I’ll help you both get Mother to her cabin.”

  T’Qinna set up the animal sickbay in the main cargo port, aft of the living quarters. She, ‘Miha, and Tiva tended the wounded, though ‘Miha’s one-handedness limited the work flow some.

  The ship’s compartmental design had ensured that no animal could fall through any great space. The open companionways utilized to exercise the larger creatures required human supervision. Hence, wave casualties were mostly superficial, with no dead except for an ox with a broken neck. Fortunately, there were six other males to make up his loss. Bone fractures, and some head trauma cases had necessitated a watch, however.

  “I wish Sutara would reappear from the dead,” T’Qinna said.

  “Has anybody seen her?” ‘Miha asked, trying to work the cork out of a bottle of ointment with her teeth.

  “Not since the big wave. It’s like she really went out the window!”

  “That’s not funny,” Na’Amiha said, spitting out the cork.

  “Who’s joking? I’m scared for her! The ship just doesn’t feel safe.”

  Tiva, who had maintained a conspicuous silence lately, asked, “Wh
at do you mean, ‘doesn’t feel safe?’”

  T’Qinna whispered, as though the dark bay had ears. “It’s like something’s watching us now—like a loose gryndel, hidden in the shadows.”

  “You mean Sutara might be listening from somewhere?” Tiva said, as she tied a bandage over a pliant young bear’s paw.

  “No; not Sutara—she’s just the first victim it’s devoured.”

  Na’Amiha perked up from rubbing salve over some abraded scales on one of the behemoth calves. “That’s enough of such talk. Nobody’s been devoured! Sutara may be tempted, toyed with, even tormented by her anger and grief, but not devoured! Not on this ship!”

  U’Sumi’s wife hung her head. “Forgive me, Mother. I just meant that things don’t feel right.”

  ‘Miha’s voice softened. “Well, I suppose that’s true enough. Let’s just try not to frighten each other, okay?”

  Both the younger women nodded.

  The men—supervised by an increasingly cantankerous A’Nu-Ahki (who could now do little else)—continued to pump out the lower forward compartments, and inventoried the damage.

  They all had quickly developed sea legs. The drogue stone system worked well; the flat weight suspended diagonally from the hull pool on a three hundred-cubit cable, trailing astern. The wind and surface water currents pushed Barque of Aeons ever forward of its drag, keeping the bow shack window mostly leeward of the winds. The dorsal fin supplemented the effect, stabilizing the deck from minor divergences between wind and water current brought on by strange tidal forces.

  The large waves now had unlimited fetch—that is, no land caused them to rear up and break—so that swells maintained a reasonably constant height that changed only with the wind. A’Nu-Ahki had ordered the hull pool re-opened to clear the ventilation system. Soon the freshest air they had ever breathed permeated every nook and cranny of the ship, driven relentlessly by the powerful engine of the waves.