Robert Silverberg - The Face of the Waters

“Hold it,” Lawler said. “What’s happening over there?”

Delagard and Dag Tharp were yelling at each other, suddenly. Dann Henders was mixed up in it too, red-faced, a vein standing out on his forehead. Tharp was a jittery, excitable man, always quarrelling with somebody about something; but the sight of the usually soft-spoken Henders in a high temper got Lawler’s attention right away.

He went over to them.

“What’s going on?”

Delagard said, “A little insubordination, that’s all. I can take care of it, doc.”

Tharp’s beak of a nose had turned crimson. The baggy flesh of his throat was quivering.

“Henders and I have suggested sailing over to the island and asking the Gillies to give us refuge,” he said to Lawler. “We can anchor nearby and help them build their island. It’ll be a partnership right from the start. But Delagard says no, no, we’re going to go on all the way to Grayvard. Do you know how long it’ll take to get to Grayvard? How many tricksy net-things can crawl up on board before we reach it? Or God knows what else that’s out here? Kinverson says we’ve been tremendously lucky so far, not encountering anything hostile to speak of, but how much longer can we—”

“Grayvard is where we’re going,” said Delagard icily.

“You see? You see?”

Henders said, “We should at least put it to a vote, don’t you think, doc? The longer we remain at sea, the greater the risks are of our running into the Wave, or some of the nasty critters that Gabe’s been telling us about, or some killer storm, or almost anything else. Here’s an island actually under construction. If the Gillies are using divers and what-all else to help them build it, even a platform, why wouldn’t they accept human help besides? And be grateful for it? But he won’t even consider it!”

Delagard gave the engineer a truculent glare. “Since when have Gillies ever wanted our help? You know how it was on Sorve, Henders.”

“This isn’t Sorve.”

“It’s all the same everywhere.”

“How can you be sure of that?” Henders snapped. “Listen, Nid, we’ve got to talk to the other ships, and that’s all there is to it. Dag, you go call Yanez and Sawtelle and the rest, and—”

“Stay right where you are, Dag,” Delagard said.

Tharp looked from Delagard to Henders and back again, and didn’t move. His wattles shook with anger.

Delagard said, “Listen to me! Do you want us to have to live on a miserable little flat island that’s months or years away from being finished? In what? Seaweed huts? Do you see any vaarghs there? Is there any bay that we can bring up useful materials from? And they won’t take us, anyway. They know we were tossed out of Sorve on our asses. Every Gillie on this planet knows that, believe me.”

“If these Gillies don’t want us,” said Tharp, “how can you be so sure the Grayvard Gillies will?”

Delagard’s face crimsoned. For a moment he seemed stung by that. Lawler realized that Delagard hadn’t said anything at all up till now about having cleared their arrival on Grayvard with the real owners of the island. It was only the human settlers on Grayvard that had agreed to provide sanctuary.

But Delagard made a quick recovery. “Dag, you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. Since when do we have to ask permission of Gillies for emigration between islands? Once they let humans onto an island, they don’t give a shit which humans they are. They can hardly tell one batch of us from another as it is. So long as we don’t slop over onto the Gillie part of Grayvard, there won’t be any problem.”

“You’re very sure of yourself,” Henders said. “But why go all the way to Grayvard if we don’t have to? We still don’t know that it’s impossible for us to latch on at some closer island that doesn’t have a human settlement yet. These Gillies here might just be willing to take us in. And yes, maybe they’d be glad to get a little help from us building it, too.”

“Sure,” said Delagard. “They’d especially like to have a radio operator and an engineer. That would be just what they need. Okay: you two want to live on that island? Swim for it, then. Go on! The two of you, over the side, right now!” He grabbed Tharp by the arm and began to tug him toward the rail. Tharp gaped at him, pop-eyed. “Go on! Get going!”

“Hold it,” Lawler said quietly.

Delagard let go of Tharp and leaned forward, rocking on the balls of his feet. “You have an opinion, doc?”

“If they go over the side, I go too.”

Delagard laughed. “Fuck, doc! Nobody’s going over the side! What the hell do you think I am?”

“You really want an answer to that, Nid?”

“Look,” Delagard said, “what this comes down to is one simple thing. These are my ships. I’m the captain of this ship now and I’m also the head of the whole expedition, and nobody’s going to dispute that. Out of the generosity of my spirit and the greatness of my heart I’ve invited everyone who used to live on Sorve to sail with me to our new home on Grayvard Island. That’s where we’re going. A vote on whether we ought to try to settle on this little sliver of a new island here is altogether out of line. If Dag and Dan want to live there, fine, I’ll escort them over to it myself in the water-strider. But there won’t be any votes and there won’t be any change in the basic plan of the voyage. Is that clear? Dann? Dag? Is that clear, doc?”

Delagard’s fists were balled. He was a fighter, all right.

Henders said, “As I remember it, you were the one who got us into this fix in the first place, Nid. Was that out of the generosity of your spirit and the greatness of your heart too?”

“Shut up, Dann,” Lawler said. “Let me think.”

He glanced toward the new island. They were so close to it now that he could make out the yellow glint of Gillie eyes. The Gillies appeared to be going about their business without taking the slightest note of the approaching flotilla of human-occupied ships.

Lawler realized suddenly that Delagard was right and Henders and Tharp were wrong. Glad though he’d be to end the voyage right here and now, Lawler knew that trying to settle here wasn’t an idea worth thinking about. The island was tiny, a mere sliver of wood barely rising above the waves. Even if the Gillies were willing to let them in, there would be no room for them here.

Quietly he said, “All right. For once I’m with you, Nid. It isn’t any place for us, this little island.”

“Good. Good. Very sensible of you. I can always count on you to take a reasonable position, can’t I, doc?” Delagard cupped his hand to his mouth and shouted up to Pilya, in the rigging. “Cut to windward! Let’s get out of here!”

“We should have voted,” Dag Tharp said sullenly, rubbing his arm.

“Forget it,” Lawler told him. “This is Delagard’s party. We’re only his guests.”

The weather began to change in a fundamental way at the beginning of the week that followed. As the ships followed their northwesterly course toward Grayvard they were starting to leave tropical waters behind, and the strong sun and clear blue skies of the perpetual summer that reigned in the middle latitudes. These were temperate seas here. The water was cool, and dank chilling fogs rose from it when warm breezes blew from the equator. By midday the fog was gone; but the broad vault of the sky was often dappled with fleecy patches of cloud much of the time, or even a dull, lingering low overcast. One thing remained the same, though. There was still no rain. There had been none since the little fleet had left Sorve, and that was becoming cause for concern.

The look of the sea itself was different here. Home Sea’s familiar waters were well behind them now. This was the Yellow Sea, set off from the blue waters to the east by a sharp line of demarcation. A thick disagreeable scum of microscopic algae, puke-yellow with long red streaks running through it like dark gouts of blood, covered the surface in every direction as far as the horizon.