Stephen Hunt - Secrets of the Fire Sea

Ortin urs Ortin tactfully overlooked the rattling from Boxiron and instead addressed the young academic, his Jackelian accent so polished he might have been born a squire to its acres. 'You mentioned that you have not been to Jago before, damson, but I am interested to know what your book learning in the college suggests the island's people will be like?'

'Very similar to the Jackelian citizenry,' answered Nandi, balancing a soup spoon between her fingers as if she was penning a dissertation on the subject. 'And with good reason, ambassador, when we look back to what classical history texts have to say on the matter. The two largest tribes settled on the northwest of the continent were the Jackeni and the Jagoli, but when the cold time arrived, the Jagoli fled the advancing glaciers and journeyed to a new island home, whereas the Kingdom's ancestors stayed put. Prior to that, the early Circlist church had converted both tribes, and there were plenty of intermarriages between the two peoples. In many ways, the modern Jagonese are truer to the traditions of our ancestors than we are – as, unlike the Jackelians, their civilization never fell to the Chimecan Empire. When all else was darkness and ice, their island kept the traditions of democracy burning. They kept their freedom when our kingdom was a vassal province of the empire and our people were being farmed for food. Jago kept their science through the age of ice, and they kept their history.'

'The people of Pericur hold the island in some reverence, I believe, good ambassador,' said Jethro.

'The scripture of the Divine Quad,' said Ortin, adjusting his monocle, 'teaches that the island was once a paradise, where the ursine were shaped and breathed into life by the whisper of the world. There we lived on the Island of the Blessed until the two male members of the quad, Reckin urs Reckin and Amaja urs Amaja, fell to bickering between themselves and had to leave the island for the crime of destroying their home. And the whisper of the world became tears of fire at their fall from grace, filling the sea with all its flames.'

'Then you believe Jago is sacred soil and that neither the Jagonese nor your people should be there?'

'That is a conservative view. I am certainly not one of those who believe that, but I do believe there must be some practical truth to the scriptures. That the ursine once lived on Jago before we lived on Pericur.'

Nandi took another mouthful of soup. 'And why would that be?'

'Let me show you,' said Ortin. The ambassador ducked out of the commodore's quarters and returned a minute later having retrieved a leather-bound tome of Pericurian scripture from his cabin. 'In the scriptures, Reckin urs Reckin was unfairly cast out of paradise for the covetousness and lusts of his ravening brother, Amaja urs Amaja.'

The ambassador opened the holy book to a beautifully illuminated page showing the two couples of the Divine Quad. The two deities on the left were clearly ursine, glowing in beatific purity, while the pair to the right – a furless male and female – were almost definitely from the race of man. '"And the fur of Amaja urs Amaja and his wife was singed from their bodies as they waded into the fires of the sea, begging Reckin urs Reckin and his beloved to forgive their brother his foolishness in destroying their home, the selfish Amaja urs Amaja watching his brother and his wife borne away by the Angels of Airdia to new lands." The people of Pericur had followed the scriptures of the Divine Quad for thousands of years before we ever laid eyes on someone from your nation, Damson Tibar-Wellking. It came as quite a surprise when we discovered the same covetous devils painted on the walls of our temples colonizing the territory to our south in Concorzia, not to mention trampling the sacred soil of Jago deep inside the Fire Sea.'

'But the timescales are all wrong, you must see that?' said Nandi, perplexed. 'The Jagonese settled the island long before we first established contact with your people in Pericur. Your race and ours have never lived alongside each other: the Jagonese migrated from the freezing wastes of our continent – they were never native to the island.'

'Aye,' interrupted the commodore, 'and the only time the black blasted rock of Jago looked like a paradise was when sheets of ice covered the rest of the world and the people there had the blessed heat of the Fire Sea to keep their greenhouses warm and their vaults heated from the cold.'

Ortin urs Ortin tapped his book. 'And yet here your people are, and here we are too, just as the scriptures say. I am a reformer, damson and gentlemen. The great liberal houses of the Baronial Council have paid for this u-boat's hold to be filled with the latest transaction engines from the Kingdom's workshops. I would see our archduchess's rule tempered by a properly elected council of her peers; I would see our cities pushing towards the heavens with the sway of pneumatic towers; I would see the best of your Jackelian science and culture being used to improve our nation; but for all that, there are still some things you must take on faith.'

'Don't be so quick to change, lad,' warned the commodore. 'I have visited Pericur, and I say that your cities of oak with their strange blessed wooden minarets wouldn't be much improved by the smogs of our mills and the beating engines of our industry. Your scriptures say that Jago is a dark isle where only those who would be cursed abide. You walk down the streets of Hermetica City after we have docked and tell me that you don't feel cursed just being there, and then ask yourself why their land is locked away behind the Fire Sea.'

Ortin urs Ortin raised his glass in salute towards the commodore. 'May I always be reminded of the scriptures' truth by my Jackelian friends without any gods at all.'

Jethro winced. Without any gods at all. If only the Pericurian ambassador knew the truth of that.

'There are other books than your people's scriptures that must be considered,' said Nandi kindly, her voice coming alive with the passion of her quest. 'Jago is not just the oldest democracy in the world; their transaction-engine archives are the oldest in the world, too. When the rest of the continent was burning encyclopaedias to stay warm, Jagonese traders were preserving what knowledge they could find, keeping the Circlist enlightenment alive during the depths of the long age of ice.'

'Their transaction engines may be ancient, lass,' said the commodore, 'but they're dangerous. They don't run things on steam out there. The Jagonese will poison your lovely head with their knowledge.'

'I am aware of the dangers, but I'll take precautions,' said Nandi. 'New knowledge is never acquired easily. The island has historical records stretching back unbroken for two millennia that have never been properly mined.'

'Aye, and now our boats can bypass the Fire Sea to get to the colonies it's all they have to sell,' spat the commodore. 'That and safe passage to a fat fool like Blacky who's still generous enough to come a-calling to their bleak isle.'

Jethro didn't comment that the commodore seemed only too willing to pass the cost onto his passengers.

'Saint Vine's college must consider your research worth funding, Nandi softbody,' said Boxiron. 'If it wasn't for the college's share of this voyage's cost, I suspect Jethro softbody and I would be heading to Jago via Pericur by way of a colony boat.'

'I won't argue with you on that,' said Nandi. 'But I don't think my research can take all the credit. When my sponsor at the college, Professor Harsh, was my age, she studied under a Doctor George Conquest. He later travelled to Jago with his wife to pursue a similar vein of research to mine, but his boat sank in the Fire Sea as he returned back home to the Kingdom. All his work was lost.'

'And the good professor wants his work finished,' said Jethro.