Stephen Baxter - Bronze Summer

‘Oak,’ Kilushepa said now. ‘These planks are of oak, are they not?’ She picked at the withies that bound the planks, the caulking. ‘And these lengths that bind them?’

‘Yew. And then it’s all caulked with moss, beeswax and animal fat. The hull is sealed to keep out the water.’

‘You know, we Hatti generally don’t have much time for ships. Even though we rely on the fleets that bring us our grain from Egypt. Everything this ship is made of was once alive, wasn’t it? The wood, the wax, the moss, the leather — all these bits of trees and plants and animals, sliced up and stitched together. The living stuff of the land moulded to defy the sea. It’s wonderful when you think about it.’

‘Is it?’

‘Yes! As if the ship is itself alive, a creature bounding across the waves.’

‘Praxo says she has a mind of her own, that’s for sure.’

His only response from Praxo was a scowl.

They were putting out from the land now. Troy diminished to a shabby blur on the eastern horizon, and a breeze was picking up, fresh with salt. Sitting at the prow, Kilushepa turned and looked out to the open sea, breathing deep. She was remarkably composed, Qirum thought, not for the first time, considering her circumstances — considering she had been the booty of her own people’s army so recently, and now here she was alone on the ocean with ten violent, lusty men.

‘So we sail for Northland,’ Kilushepa called back. ‘Will we be out of sight of the land altogether? How remarkable that would be — the world reduced to an abstraction of sea and sky.’

‘Only for brief stretches,’ Qirum replied. ‘We’ll do some island-hopping before we get to the Greek mainland. Basically we’re following the coastline.’ He held up his periplus, a linen scroll. ‘From Gaira, we’ll work our way up the river valleys and overland to get to Northland.’

‘Would you get lost, out of sight of land?’

Praxo hawked and spat over the side, a green gobbet on the grey-black water. ‘ He would. There are clever sorts who have tricks to find their way around on the open water. Such as to see how high the sun rises at noon, and from that you can work out how far north or south you are.’

She frowned. ‘What sort of divination is that? Sounds like the Greeks to me. Always full of tricks, the Greeks, clever-clever, like clever children. What is that scroll, Qirum? A map, is it?’

He unrolled the periplus carefully, passing the fragile fabric from one spindle to the other, holding it up so she could see the writing, the little sketches. ‘This is my periplus. A guide to the coast. It cost me half my fortune when I bought it from an old seaman down on his luck. And he bought it in turn from somebody else, long ago. I’ve been adding to it since. See, the three different writing hands?’

She came back down the boat to see. ‘I can’t read your script. But yes, I see the differences. And this faded writing must be the oldest.’

‘It’s a kind of description of the coast. Of landmarks, dangers like shoals and shallows — and dangers of a human kind. You see, there are little sketches to help you understand. Good ports, safe places to beach, the prevailing winds. Look at this.’ He ravelled the scroll back. ‘Here is an old description of how it was to come upon Troy, before the Greeks burned the place. A sketch that shows how it might have looked from the sea.’

She studied the picture solemnly. ‘You have crossed it through.’

‘I hadn’t the heart to erase it.’

‘This little scroll is shared wisdom. You treasure it, don’t you? A sailor would have to be desperate indeed to sell such a thing. How would you feel if you had to part with it?’

‘I hope I never have to.’

Her gaze was steady. ‘You hope to have a son, don’t you? A family. You don’t want to be doing this all your life, fighting all day, whoring and drinking all night… You want a legacy. A son to have your periplus, when you’re done with the sea.’

Praxo, at his oar, was staring at the two of them.

Qirum felt unaccountably embarrassed. ‘That’s all for the future.’

‘You aren’t wrong to dream,’ she said, her voice like a rustle of linen. ‘I saw that in you when I met you.’

Praxo guffawed. ‘And did you see his father the rapist?’

Qirum threw a water jug at him. He ducked, it hit the man behind him, and Praxo laughed.

By mid-morning they had picked up a breeze blowing offshore. Under Praxo’s brisk instructions the men shipped their oars, fixed the mast to its socket, and unfolded the leather sail. Soon the sail billowed out, and they were driven east with a creak of wood and leather. This was another new experience for Kilushepa. As the rowers stretched and took food and water, she sat in the prow, letting the wind ruffle hair that was growing back after its brutal shaving by the Hatti soldiers.

Praxo came to sit beside Qirum in the stern. They shared a leather flask of wine mixed with water. ‘This is a stupid plan,’ Praxo said. ‘To meet up with Hatti traders and officials in Northland?’

‘She sent letters to arrange it.’

‘But the Hatti threw the woman out, remember! Why will they accept her now?’

Qirum shrugged. ‘She says it will work.’ Hattusa itself was a big place, Kilushepa had said, and the reach of the Hatti kings stretched much further. Traders out on the edge of the world might not even know Kilushepa’s name, let alone know of the intrigues in court that had deposed her. If she simply claimed to be back in power, even if they suspected her, how could they prove her wrong?

‘Get rid of her,’ Praxo said bluntly. ‘I mean it. She’s trouble. She’s getting into your head.’

‘We wouldn’t even be making this voyage if not for her,’ Qirum said. ‘At least she has a plan. Face it — before we met her we were sailing in circles, going nowhere, you and I. She’s given me a direction, Praxo.’

‘She’s given you a hard-on, that’s all. Well, that’s my advice, and you can take it or ignore it, I’m past caring. Now I’m going to get some sleep before the wind dies.’ He handed Qirum the wine flask and slumped down with arms folded over his belly, his old felt cap pulled down over his eyes.

If Kilushepa had heard any of this conversation, she showed no sign of it.

In another boat, crossing another ocean, it was Caxa who was the first to glimpse Kirike’s Land.

‘Smoke!’ she cried.

Tibo, buried in a heap of furs, thought he was dreaming. ‘Hmm? What?’

The Jaguar girl nudged his ribs.

They were side by side in the stern of the boat, like two fat seals in their layers of furs, under a sky that was deep blue but streaked with pink cloud to the east, the sign of the coming dawn. There was the usual morning stink of greasy human flesh, farts, fish guts, and the stale brine of the bilge water. Around them the men were waking, more bundles of fur from which peered human faces, thick with beards and smeared with fat to keep out the night cold. On Caxa’s other side the priest Xivu lay curled up, still asleep. Caxa was the only female in the boat, and these men had been away from home for a long time; Deri had made sure that whenever they slept the girl was walled in by Xivu on one side, Tibo on the other.

Tibo was falling asleep again. She nudged him. ‘Smoke. Smoke!’

He struggled to sit up. ‘No. Not smoke.’ In the course of the long voyage he had been trying to teach her the rudiments of the Etxelur tongue. She was a slow learner, or an incurious one. ‘We didn’t light the boat’s fire last night, remember? It was raining.’ Another night of salted fish, wet furs and cold. ‘There can’t be any smoke. Do you mean “clouds”?’