Julian May - The Many-Coloured Land

“We have been searching,” Madame said. “Ever since I first heard the tale three years ago and conceived the plan, we looked for the Ship’s Grave as best we could. But understand the terrain, Richard! The Black Forest lies beyond the Rhine to the east. In our day it was a minor range, a picturesque parkland full of hikers and carvers of cuckoo clocks. But now the Schwarzwald mountains are younger and higher. There are portions well above twenty-five hundred meters, rugged and dangerous to cross and a notorious haunt of les Criards, the Howling Ones.”

“And do you know who they are?” inquired the Firvulag, smirking at Richard. “They’re the people like me who don’t like people like you. The snotty ones who won’t let King Yeo-chee or anyone else tell ’em who their enemies are.”

Madame said, “We have, over the past years, done a precarious exploration of the middle portion of the Black Forest range, north of Finiah. Even with the help of friendly Firvulag such as our good friend Fitharn, the project has been fraught with peril. Ten of our people have been killed and three driven mad. Five more vanished without a trace.”

“And we lost some of our lads to the Hunt, too,” Pegleg added. “Guiding humans just isn’t healthy work.”

Madame went on, “Forty or fifty kilometers east of the Black Forest begins the Swabian Alb, a part of the Jura. It is said to be full of caves inhabited by monstrous hyenas. Not even the malign Firvulag care to dwell in this territory, although it is rumored that a handful of grotesque mutants eke out a pathetic livelihood in sheltered valleys. Yet it is in this inhospitable country that the Ship’s Grave is most likely to be found. And with it, not only workable flying machines but perhaps other andent treasures as well.”

“Would there be weapons in the aircraft?” Felice asked.

“Only one,” said the Firvulag Fitharn, staring into the fire. “The Spear. But it would be enough, if you could get your hands on it.”

Scowling, Richard said, “But I thought the Spear belonged to the guy named Lugonn, and he was the winner of the fight!”

“The winner received the privilege of sacrificing himself,” Madame explained. “Lugonn, Shining Hero of the Tanu, raised the visor of his golden glass helmet and accepted the thrust of his own Spear through his eyes. His body was left at the crater, together with the weapon.”

“But what the hell good would this Spear do us?” Richard asked.

Fitharn spoke softly. “It isn’t the kind of weapon you might think. Any more than the Sword of our late hero, Sharn the Atrocious, which the obscene Nodonn has had in his thieving clutches in Goriah for forty years, is any kind of ordinary sword.”

“They are both photoaic weapons,” Madame said. “The only two that the exotics brought from their home galaxy. They were to be used only by the great heroes, to defend the Ship in case of pursuit or, later, in the most exalted forms of ritual fighting.”

“Nowadays,” said Chief Burke, “the Sword only serves as the trophy of the Grand Combat. Nodonn’s had it so long because the Tanu have won the contest for forty years running. Needless to say, there’s little chance we’d ever be able to get our hands on the Sword. But the Spear is another matter.”

“Christ!” Richard spat in disgust “So to make Madame’s plan work, all we have to do is mount a blind search over two-three thousand square kloms crawling with man-eating spooks and giant hyenas and find this antique zapper. Probably clutched in some Tanu skeleton’s hand.”

“And around his neck,” Felice said, “is a golden torc.”

“We will find the Ship’s Grave,” Madame stated. “We will search until we do.”

Old Claude hauled himself to his feet with some difficulty, limped over to the pile of dry wood, and picked up an armful. “I don’t think any more blind hunting will be necessary,” he said, tossing the sticks onto the blaze. A great cloud of sparks soared into the Tree’s black height.

Everybody stared at him.

Chief Burke asked, “Do you know where this crater might be?”

“I know where it has to be. Only one astrobleme in Europe fits the bill. The Ries.”

The stout fighter with the pipe smacked his own forehead and exclaimed, “Das Rieskessel bei Nordlingenl Naturlich! What a bunch of stupid pricks we’ve been! Hansi! Gert! We read about it in kindergarten!”

“Hell, yes,” sang out another man from the crowd. And a third Lowlife added, “But you gotta remember, Uwe, they told us kids a meteorite made the thing.”

“The Ship’s Grave!” one of the women cried out “ It it’s not just a myth, then there’s a chance for us! We really might be able to free humanity from these bastards!” An exultant shout went up from the rest of the crowd.

“Be silent, for the love of God!” Madame implored them.

Her hand were clasped before her breast almost prayerfully as she addressed Claude. “You are certain? You are positive that this, this Ries must be the Ship’s Grave?”

The old paleontologist picked up a branch from the woodpile. Scuffing an area of dust flat, he drew a vertical row of X’s.

“There are the Vosges Mountains. We’re on the western flank, about here.” He poked, then slashed a line parallel to, and east of, the range. “Here’s the Rhine, flowing roughly south to north through a wide rift valley. Finiah is here on the eastern bank.” More X’s were drawn behind the Tanu city. “Here’s the Black Forest range, trending north-south just like the Vosges. Same basic geology. And beyond it, slanting off to the northeast, the Swabian Jura. This line I’m drawing under the Jura is the River Danube. It flows off east into the Pannonian Lagoon in Hungary, someplace over under the woodpile. And right about here …”

The entire company was on its feet, straining to see and holding its collective breath as the old man stabbed his branch down.

“…is the Ries astrobleme. A few kloms north of the Danube, at the site of the future city of Nördlingen, maybe three hundred kloms east of here. And sure as God made little green apples, that’s your Ship’s Grave. It’s a crater more than twenty-five kloms in diameter. The largest in Europe.”

There was an uproar among the Lowlife folk. People crowded in to congratulate Claude and get refills of wine. Someone got out a reed flute and began to play a sprightly tune. Others laughed and danced about. The day that had begun in panicked flight from exotic enemies showed signs of ending as a celebration.

Ignoring the merrymakers, Madame whispered to Chief Burke. She and the Native American beckoned to the remnant of Group Green and withdrew into a deeply shadowed part of the hollow sequoia.

“It may be possible,” Madame said, “just barely possible, to implement the plan yet this year. But we will have to set out at once. You must lead, Peo. And I must also go to detect and repel the Howling Ones. We will require your help to find the crater, Claude and that of Felice to coerce hostile animals same coin as that unjustly used. The loss of your starship, of your livelihood, was not enough and you know it! You must give of yourself, and then you will no longer despise yourself. Help us. Help your friends who need you.

“Damn…” He bunked away the mist that had risen in his eyes.

Save .

His words were barely audible. “All right.” The others were all looking at him, but he could not see their eyes. “I’ll go with you. I’ll fly the aircraft back here if I can. But that’s all I can promise.”

“It is enough,” Madame said.

Back at the central fire, the singing and laughing were more subdued. People drifted away to the smaller hearths to prepare for sleep. A small figure hobbled toward Madame, silhouetted against the dying bonfire.