by David Bell
Follow the star, boys, follow the star
Follow the star
The voices fell silent as the sound of the pipes faded to a last throaty sigh. Every man was left to his own thoughts as he listened to the swish of the bow wave and the splash of the oar blades singing their own song of leaving things behind.
“Can I see them?” asked Sharesh. Mirtias handed him the pipes. In the moonlight Sharesh saw they were made from seven pieces of hollow cane, open at one end and each longer that the last, all tied tightly together with thin cord. He blew, producing some hissing and honking sounds.
“Blow across them, not into them,” said Mirtias, “like this.” He took the pipes and blew gently, up and down giving a soft, slightly hoarse, lilting sound. “I made these,” he said, “but if you want some, wait till we get to Alefisia. You might get some from one of the Water People there.”
“Water People?”
“They live in the mountains, where the river rises. Nobody knows where they come from. They speak the old language. Tessias can understand some of what they say. One of their old gods made the first pipes, they reckon. I went up river once to catch fish and saw a statue of him.” Mirtias started to laugh. “Disgraceful! Grin on his face, horns on his head and standing proud on his hairy legs with his dick sticking up and ready for anything! Why are you looking like that?”
Sharesh said nothing. He was remembering the pool and what Pasipha had said about her very old disgraceful woodland god.
“All right, we’d best shut up and let you do your job, lookout.”
In the strange dim light the sun sends ahead of its rising, Sharesh began to see the coastline emerge on the starboard beam like the first line a painter’s brush draws across the plaster. The line turned pale, merging into darker shadows above: a narrow strip of beach with wooded slopes inland. Higher still and farther away soared black mountains, their peaks tipped yellow as they caught the first rays of the still hidden sun. Streaks of gold and red slanted up from the horizon astern, melting into the deep blue of the sky above and flecking the sea below with red gold. He could see the shore clearly now, curving ahead into the vague distance. The slanting lines in the sky began to race ahead of the ship and level out and he knew the sun was about to leap clear. Moments later, the subtle warm kiss on his back told him it had done so. The ship closed on the shore and he saw lagoons and marshland behind the beach with clumps of low trees and reeds patching the still waters. A river snaked between two of the lagoons and opened its mouth into the sea. He felt the ship change course slightly to larboard and knew that Typhis must have been steering for the river mouth as a landmark. A thin line of smoke was rising straight up into the still air from someone’s morning fire he could not see, although he could now make out the short dark lines that were fishing boats drawn up on the beach.
“That’s the river I told you about,” said Mirtias, “and over there, that’s Alefisia.”
He was pointing straight ahead over the stem post. Sharesh peered through the faint haze now drifting up from the sea. The shoreline to starboard curved round until it lay across their line and then curved almost back on itself like an arm crooked in a protective embrace.
“Let the skipper know,” said Mirtias. Sharesh swung round and shouted towards the stern deck.
“Land ho! Dead ahead! Ships and harbour in sight!”
The Davina came to a stop and stood a few ship lengths off shore, held steady by her oars, while Potyr scanned the place. It was hardly a harbour, more a small bay sheltered from the open sea by a curving headland covered with trees. Several ships rode at anchor and others were hauled up on the sandy beach. Most of the town buildings huddled in the lee of the headland. In a cleared space on the top was the stone tower of a beacon. There was a strong smell of fish and smoke. Sea birds fluttered and cried round every ship and the sounds of hammering and occasional shouts echoed across the calm water from the ships and the shore. A boat paddled by a man standing at the stern came towards them and bumped gently against the side. The boat’s passenger was a tall, strong-looking man with greying hair wearing a brown tunic that looked as if it was not his best. Round his waist was a belt of pale-coloured leather and in his hand he held a short staff carved at one end in the shape of a boar’s head. He looked up at Potyr and Kanesh standing on the stern deck.
“The Lady Mother has seen fit to bring us safe to your harbour. My crew is tired after many days at sea. We seek shelter, food and water for which we can pay, and your leave to rest for a while and look to our ship,” said Potyr.
“You have archers with you,” replied the man, pointing towards the bow where the Captain of Archers stood with his men.
“These are difficult times,” said Potyr. “Perhaps you have heard of ships being attacked?”
“I have heard of a ship that was attacked by one that had archers. It was lost with all the crew. You have archers. Your ship is not like any cargo ship I have seen before. I will speak to the other captains.”
He signed to his oarsman to pull away. Kanesh spoke to him in a tongue that Potyr had heard before but did not know the meaning. The man stopped his boat and turned back to look uneasily at Kanesh.
Kanesh smiled thinly back at him and without taking his eyes from his face, said quietly to Potyr that perhaps Tessias should be called.
Tessias came aft and, when he saw the man in the boat, a smile spread over his face. They knew each other; in fact it appeared that the man’s wife was also Taphian. He explained that he was headman since the last moon, voted to the title by all the other ship owners of Alefisia. The boar’s head staff was his headman’s token. He apologised for his suspicion and churlish manner. The news of the ship that had been attacked by archers had caused alarm. Now it was known what had really happened, everyone would be glad. The tension eased and the headman was rowed back to shore after promising that whatever could be done for this fine ship would gladly be done. He did cast one furtive look back in Kanesh’s direction before he reached the shore.
“You spoke to him in the old tongue.”
“He wore the pigskin belt of the River People.”
“What did you say that brought him back?”
“There are certain things one can say in the old tongue that usually persuade people to think again.”
“We need grain, oil, olives and the water jars refilled. Their wine is not good, or so says the Taphian. We may do better on Sikelia, if we can find the place where Merida is known. He said there was wine there.”
“Strange that they do not speak of him here.”
“He finds nothing of interest in these parts. Besides, the thought of losing a vessel to pirates fills him with dread. Gubal and the Black Land have all his attention. And the Tin Islands now, of course. ”
Potyr, Kanesh and the Captain of Archers went ashore in a small boat put at their service by the headman, to negotiate the supplies and seek advice and information on the sea routes to Sikelia. Typhis was left to oversee the work of cleaning ship and performing all the other tasks necessary after a long sea voyage, the worst of which was baling out the bilge. As they expected, Namun and Sharesh were given this job. It was hot, dirty work in the depths of the hold and by the time it was done it was mid afternoon. They finally emerged to find the ship gently rocking, still and quiet under the hot sun and the rest of the crew sleeping or idly playing dice wherever they could find some shade. Leptos and Leptos lay by the stern anchor rope, each with his eyes closed and a big toe inside a loop at the end of the baited line he had dropped over the side.
“If I smell as bad as you do,” said Namun, “you can throw me overboard.”
“You smell too bad to touch. Come on!”
They both dived over the side, swam around between the boats for a while to cool down, and as there was no voice of Typhis bellowing at them to get back on board, struck out for the shore. They waded out of the water at a place where the sandy beach ended against the timbers of a jetty built in the most sheltered s
pot at the end of the bay. Nets lay spread out to dry on the planks. There was no one to be seen. The warehouse doors were closed and the windows of the houses were shuttered against the heat of the afternoon. An untidy-looking dog lying in the dust lifted its head as they approached, then let it sink again, tongue lolling out, too hot to be interested. They found a pathway leading up the tree-covered slope towards the top of the headland and decided to climb up to see if they might find a cooling breeze. The path led them to the beacon tower Sharesh had first spotted from the ship out at sea. It was no cooler higher up but they found some shade on one side of the tower and sat down to look around. They pointed out to each other the different things they had passed early in the morning: the coastal lagoons, the marshes and the river and beyond those, the sea they had crossed during the night. Looking in the other direction they could see the shore of another bay curving away into the hazy blue distance to end by pointing across a strait at mountains rising from plains that sloped towards them, down to the sea. They sat silent for a while, trying to imagine what lay beyond those distant mountains and across that wide blue sea. They had slept little during the night and worked hard into the afternoon. The air was very warm and very still. Even the bees seemed to fly heavily and slowly. It was an effort for Sharesh to lift his head and find the blurred shapes of the mountains in the sea.
“Namun, do you wonder about the Endless Ocean, and if we will find it?”
“No use wondering. It won’t make any difference.”
“Do you ever think of going back home?”
“I’ve got no home to go back to.”
Sharesh could think of nothing to say to that so he leaned back against the wall of the tower and let his thoughts drift away, slowly, mistily, into… nothing.
Sutekh, great god of the Deshret, was glaring at him with his hard jackal eyes. Namun woke with a start. Sitting with his legs folded under him, an arm’s length away, was the oldest man, if it was a man, that Namun had ever seen. Piercing black eyes stared through long grey tendrils of matted hair that hung from his knobbly skull. His body was a skeleton coated in wrinkled skin so thin it seemed painted on him. The gnarled hands that rested on his knees were too big for his arms. Namun had seen shorter tusks on a boar than the nails on this creature’s toes and fingers. He wore nothing but a loincloth of pale leather. Namun stared back with eyes as wide open as his mouth. Could this ancient thing staring at him be Sutekh himself? He had a strange feeling inside his head, as if something was feeling for his thoughts. He slowly moved a trembling hand until it found Sharesh and pulled at his shoulder until he woke up. The eyes flicked across and fixed on Sharesh.
“I am the Keeper of the Beacon. I see everything, now and after. You will sail the ocean you call Endless. It is not endless. I see beyond it.”
The voice was as soft as the sound made by a snake squirming across sand. The words were strange to them but they understood what was said. They waited to see if there was more.
“You will sail past the boiling pools of Akynthera and the pools where the black blood rises. Beware the weather coast where dead ships lie drowned.”
The voice fell silent once more. Sharesh felt his skin chill as it had in the cave where he had waited through the night before his ceremony. The voice came again, distant and hollow, as if coming from deep within a cave.
“Fill your water jars from the sacred river. The water of the river will lead you to your landfall. Make your offering to the horned god you know. Do this and you will know why the great noise came.”
“How can these things be known? Why are we chosen to know?” said Sharesh.
“I am the father of the Water People. I see everything, before, now and after. You have doubts. You have questions. You are a singer of songs. Close your eyes and listen to my song.”
Everything left the minds of Namun and Sharesh except the words of a song they did not understand. When the song ended and they opened their eyes, there was no sign of the ancient man – or was he an ancient god – except for a set of reed pipes lying where he had sat.
Back on the ship, Sharesh showed the pipes to Mirtias who stared at them for a long time, but made no move to take them from Sharesh’s hand.
“Here, play them. I want to hear how they sound. Then I want you to teach me.”
“Where did you get these?” said Mirtias quietly.
“From, well, like you said, from one of the Water People.”
“Did you now? Look there, near the thong at the end of the longest reed. Have you ever seen that before?”
Sharesh looked. It was roughly carved, but unmistakeable: the big head with the horns and the grinning mouth, the bent-over body and the hooves. The slightly eerie feeling, a memory preferably kept secret crept over him but he was determined not to let Mirtias suspect anything. “Oh, yes,” he said, his voice sounding in his own ears like the one that spoke to him at the beacon tower, “more than once. There’s one in a garden on Keftiu.”
“Only certain people are given pipes like these to play.”
Again the voice whispered inside Sharesh’s head. “Singers of songs?”
Mirtias stared at him in a new way, part wary, part respectful. “Yes,” he said slowly, “singers of songs, and not all of them.”
“Will you teach me?”
“I will play mine and you will then play yours. That is what must be. I cannot touch those pipes; only you may and before you know it, those pipes will sound as if they’re playing themselves. Now, watch and listen.”
“A boat is heading for the river at dawn tomorrow,” said Potyr. “You will go with Mirtias, Tessias and Luzar to fill our water jars. There will be some baskets of dried meat to collect. Two of the archers will go with you, as a precaution. You should have it all done and be back here before dusk. We shall sail at dawn the day after tomorrow.”
It was a long row but they had the cool part of the day for it and, with everyone taking his turn at the oars, they reached the mouth of the river by mid morning. The river had no proper banks but spread out in many channels near the shore into swampy lagoons and reed-choked marshes sealed off from the sea by a long, low ridge of sand and shingle. One stream only was deep and fast flowing enough for them to fill the heavy jars they had floated from the moored boat to the nearest sandbank with the cool sweet water, something to revel in after a long sea voyage when the water on board ship grew fouler and scarcer as the days went by. All the jars were filled, sealed with goatskin and loaded into the boat before the sun had reached his highest point in the cloudless sky.
“What do we do now?” said Sharesh to one of the rowers from Alefisia.
“We wait.”
“Wait? Who are we waiting for?”
“The Water People.”
“The Water People are coming here?”
“They are watching us now.”
Sharesh looked at Namun. He could see that Namun had the same picture in his mind as he had: hard black eyes glaring through strands of grey hair. How many others were hidden by the reeds and trailing vines, watching them? Luzar stood up. He picked up the wicker basket filled with olives, sweetened cakes and bronze bracelets and an instant later was lost among the trees.
The air grew sultry as the hot sun sucked a cloying dampness from the waters of the swamps. The heat and the long waiting in a silence broken only by the harsh echoing cries of marsh birds and the dry rustle of reeds stirred by a swimming rat or water snake set everyone’s nerves on edge. The Alefisia men began to look restless. The two archers, Sharesh noticed, had quietly strung their bows. Namun looked at Sharesh and shifted his glance to the pipes that hung from his belt.
“Play.”
The soft notes floated over the marshes and echoed through the trees like the sound of doves murmuring to their mates. A whisper in his mind urged Sharesh to send the call a second time, pause a while, and then a third. After a long silence, very faintly and from deep in the woods, came the reply.
“You must go,” said Tessi
as.
“No,” he said to the archers who were getting to their feet, “the call is only for him. He will be safe with the other who is one of their kind. Take only the pipes. You will return with much more. Stay close by the river.”
It was cooler among the trees where the water ran smooth and deep. Sharesh kept close to the river bank, following its curves and loops, screwing up his eyes against the sudden glare of the sun when clearings opened and the river braided and ran shallow between sandbanks, where solemn long-legged birds stood eyeing the pools with half-closed lids. He lost all idea of how far he had come, perhaps not very far because the sun seemed not to have moved. What did the Taphian mean when he said he would return with much more: surely not just the dried meat? The trees closed round him again, more thickly, dimming the light. It was difficult to see through them. He stopped and listened for the sound of the river so that he would know where to go. There was only silence. He was aware of his hand feeling for the pipes at his waist and lifting them to his lips to sing that he was near. Luzar took him by the other hand and led him through the trees.
There was dappled light ahead and a glimpse of blue sky. They came out of the trees into a wide glade in which the river fed a small lake fringed with reeds and sedges. Butterflies and gnats hovered and flitted in the hazy golden light pouring down from the sun. Near the reed beds stood a large stone, the top tilted over like a man hunching his shoulders to peer down into the water. Luzar pointed and Sharesh walked to the stone and laid the pipes at its foot. Luzar put a small bowl of olives and a pine cone beside them. They went back to the edge of the glade and stood for a moment, looking at the stone.
“Sit,” said Luzar. “Drink. Water People will come.”
He made a slow movement of his hand before Sharesh’s eyes. It was very warm in the sun. It seemed a good idea to lie down and rest for a while.
The woman was wandering across the dry, dusty fields weeping for something, or someone, she had lost. She cared nothing for her dishevelled hair and torn clothes. Other women pitied her and tried to help, while the men lay about too drunk to work or hunt. The springs and fountains were dry. Pigs rooted about in the weed-choked gardens and fouled the houses. She seized every child that passed, looked long into its face, and turned away to search again. There was a pit, deep and stinking, where the women were throwing in dead things, the rotting bodies of pigs, mildewed pine branches full of cones, anything that would decay, and earth from the forest floor. The pit crawled with snakes that slithered and coiled round phalluses of wood and clay the women had thrown in last. She stood on the edge of the pit. The women pulled her away and she sank face down on the earth and beat it with her hands. Night fell and a great moon looked down on the grief and desolation. When the sun rose again, it no longer scorched the land. The streams ran once more, filling the clear pools where the women washed their clothes and bodies, and later strewed sweet herbs on fires burning near a spring only they knew. The scent of the herbs sweetened the soil of the pit and the women dug it out with their hands to fill their baskets. The woman watched as they spread the soil on the fields. Her tears had dried and her face was calm again. The rain fell on her as she watched the first shoots push up from the earth. She took the hand of her child who had come back to her and stood among the growing corn while the women came forward to crown her.