Alan Foster - The Icerigger Trilogy

Somewhere in one of the two cabins slept Hellespont du Kane and his daughter Colette, the objects of the kidnapping. Colette was also the reason for Ethan’s present personal distress. She had proposed marriage to him; recently, bluntly. Despite her gross physical appearance, Ethan was seriously considering the offer. The prospect of marrying one of the wealthiest young women in the Arm was sufficient to overcome such superficialities as a lack of physical beauty. She was supremely competent as an individual, too. Ethan knew she ran the du Kane financial empire during her father’s periodic attacks of senility.

But one had to consider her acid tongue, capable of verbally slicing one into neat little fragments of shrunken ego. And hers was a very high-powered personality, accustomed to manipulating corporation heads and ordering about Commonwealth representatives. Spending one’s life with such an overpowering individual was something to be weighed carefully.

Somewhere below also slept the drugged Elfa Kurdagh-Vlata, daughter of the Landgrave of Sofold, who was Hunnar’s ruler/chief/king. The royal stowaway had snored through much of the dangerous and eventful voyage from Sofold, but when she awoke Ethan would have another problem to deal with.

Despite certain obvious differences in physiology, there were enough similarities between human and Tran for Elfa to have developed a distressing attraction to Ethan, much to his discomfort. It had caused unspoken but obvious pain to Hunnar. Both he and Ethan had managed to lay a veneer of honest friendship over that potentially explosive situation. The problem would crop up again when the royal offspring awoke.

Ethan had made his feelings in the matter known to Elfa. But that hadn’t discouraged her from attempting to change his mind. If she would sleep just a few days longer, he would be off the planet and spared the problem of dealing with her personally. That would be just as well, because despite his declared feelings, there was an unavoidable feline animalness about Elfa that…

Using information relayed from the masthead lookouts and the bowsprit pointer, Ta-hoding skillfully directed the Slanderscree toward an open dock protruding from the harbor shoreline. The dock was simply a wooden road built out onto the ice. Its pilings were necessary to raise it to iceship deck level, not to keep it above the frozen water.

Smaller ice boats were beginning to cluster curiously around the Slanderscree. They complicated the task of maneuvering the colossal ship up to the dock. But Arsudun owned a wide harbor, much wider than the Slanderscree ’s home port of Wannome. Ta-hoding did a masterful job of maneuvering around and through the curious locals.

A few awed sightseers were warned off by the icerigger’s crew. Their stupified amazement was justified, Ethan knew. The Slanderscree was likely twice the size of any ice ship they had ever seen.

No doubt the crowd gathering on the shore included admiring shipwrights and envious merchants. They would be hard to keep off the ship, once it docked. Their natural curiosity would impel them to inspect the strange rigging arrangement, a modification of ancient Terran water clippers adapted by Williams for Tran-ky-ky’s ice oceans. Surely they would clamber all over the five massive duralloy runners on which the icerigger rode. Metal was a scarce commodity on Tran-ky-ky. The other, smaller ice ships Ethan had seen were outfitted with runners of wood and, more rarely, of bone or stone.

Some of the ship’s sailors cursed when the docking crew was slow to help them. The dockworkers too were dazed by the size of the Slanderscree. Mates had to direct their men to jump over the railings and down to the dock to man the cables and braces themselves, but once the process of tying up had begun, the land crew swung into action and began to help.

It was a tricky process. The Slanderscree was nearly three times the length of her dock, and no other docks in view were longer. There was no need for them. Ships the size of the Slanderscree simply did not exist on all of Tran-ky-ky.

Ta-hoding, however, was prepared to cope. As soon as his vessel’s bow was secured he ordered the stern ice anchors released. They locked in place and would keep the huge vessel from swinging tail-first with the steady aft wind.

Wind, wind and cold. Ethan slid the protective face mask back down over his goggles to shield his delicate human flesh. The lee of an island or indoors were the only places you were out of the wind on Tran-ky-ky. It blew here the way the sun shone on paradisical New Riviera or on one of the thranx worlds such as Amropolous or Hivehom. It blew steadily, varying but never wholly ceasing, across the empty places and frozen seas. It blew steadily down the strait against his back now, sucked inward by the rising, slightly warmer air above the island.

A few clouds scudded in puffy formation across a sky of cobalt blue. Ethan turned his gaze as he moved forward. Grizzled and goggled, a seamed face turned to look back and down at him, to smile with teeth white as chips of the harbor around them.

“Upon my word, young feller-me-lad, if we haven’t gone and made it in one piece!” Skua September rubbed one side of a nose as big in proportion to its face as the ship’s bowsprit was to the hull. He turned away to study the town, its winding icepaths forming shiny ribbons between the buildings, the busy Tran walking or chivaning along them. The locals who didn’t stop to gawk at the icerigger held their arms outstretched parallel to the street, the wind filling their membranous dan and scooting them along effortlessly.

Smoke curled skyward from a thousand chimneys. Multistoried gambreled structures swelled haphazardly up the gentle island slope until they crested against the stark gray bulk of a substantial castle.

While Arsudun seemed to contain a population considerably larger than Wannome, Ethan noted with interest the smaller size of the castle. Its diminutive proportions bespoke either the relative impecuniosity of the local government or the becoming modesty of its Landgrave.

Sir Hunnar offered a third possibility. “It looks not more than a dozen years old, Sir Ethan… Ethan. And it appears unusually well built.” Hunnar clambered awkwardly over the railing and down the boarding ladder. He relaxed visibly when he was able to step onto the icepath covering the center portion of the dock. Like all Tran, he was much more at home on the ice than on any unslick solid surface.

Ethan and Skua joined the knight and his two squires, Suaxusdal-Jagger and Budjir. The latter were discussing the town and the assembled crowd in suspicious mutters. They kept their arms tight at their sides, lest a gust of wind catch their dan and send them unexpectedly rocketing forward.

A voice called from the ship to the landing party. Squinting reflexively into the wind, although the suit mask kept his eyes safe, Ethan made out a rotund, survival-suited figure waving down at them from the bow.

“When you get to the port, use the number twenty-two double R if the authorities give you any trouble!” The voice was crisp, insistent, yet feminine for all its controlled power. Colette du Kane paused to murmur something to the wavering figure alongside her, then put an arm around her father to support him.

“That’s our family code. Any processor unit will recognize it instantly, Ethan. From a personal cardmeter to a Church ident. It will give us priority booking on the next shuttle off here and cut through any red tape.”

“Twenty-two double R, okay.” Ethan hesitated when she seemed about to add something else, but then her father bent over suddenly and she had to attend to him. They couldn’t hear anything, but the figure’s movements hinted at wracking, heaving coughs.