Hugh Cook - The Walrus and the Warwolf

It was no use. He was surfing toward the hole. He screamed. From the height of a cresting wave he looked down, down, down into the utterness which was-Gone!Snapped out of existence!

The waters rushing toward the hole from all directions crashed together. Drake was flung to the sky. From the heights, he had a brief, synoptic glimpse of clashing seas, swirling ships, chaotic sheets of sea-spittle, bodies, a raised hand, bobbing heads, flying spray-

Then, falling, he twisted his body so he hit the water cleanly, arms cutting the way for him. He dived deep, deep in the cold, burdensome seas of the North Strait, then rose – not too fast, there was no need to hurry – towards the mottled green of the sky.

Breaking the surface, he lay on his back, kicking just enough to keep himself properly afloat. He felt cold already. Exhausted. What were his choices? He would die if he tried swimming for the land, which looked to be at least half a dozen leagues away. Nearby was a ship. Drake swam for it.

As he had lost all his weapons, even if he had been born a hero he would have been unable to prove it.

Collosnon Empire: dominant power in Tameran; capital at Gendormargensis; formed generations previously when northern horse tribes (the Yarglat) defeated Sharla Alliance in Wars of Dominion; ruled by the Red Emperor, the horselord Khmar, a man very much in the mould of his much-feared grandfather Nol Umu (not Nol Umu the Widowmaker, who was only related to the family by marriage, but Nol Umu the Maker of Wastelands, who is said to have died by drowning in his enemies' blood).

In the autumn of the year Khmar 19, Jon Arabin and certain survivors from the wreck of the Warwolf became prisoners of the Collosnon Empire.

They were taken to Chag-jalak, an island commanding a narrow sea-gap between Argan and Tameran. Here the Collosnon had improvised a naval base of sorts, and here the prisoners would be held until they could be shipped further east to the port of Favanosin, there to be tortured at leisure.

'I demand to see the ambassador of the Narba Consortium,' said Jon Arabin to his captors.

He had already planned out his story. The Narba Consortium, drawing on the strength of the armies of Ling, armed with secret war machines left over from the Days of Wrath, supported by a legion of Immortals who had been grown in the gene tanks of the Technic Renaissance, was about to launch a conquest of the world from bases in Narba and the Greater Teeth.

Jon Arabin – or so his story ran – was travelling to Tameran as an ambassador for the Narba Consortium, to ask the Lord Emperor Khmar if he would care to join them in this modest enterprise. If necessary, the Warwolf was prepared to bluff his way right to Gendormargensis and back.

T demand,' he repeated, 'to see the ambassador of the Narba Consortium. Don't you understand? Ambassador!'But his captors spoke no Galish.

Nor did they understand High Churl, City Churl, Field Churl, Ashmarlan, Lorp Talk, Estral, Rovac, Ligin or Ling, which was almost the sum-total of the languages Jon Arabin spoke. Fortunately he had learnt one more argot in his youth, the Geflung tongue spoken near the port of Stranagor at the mouth of the Yolantarath River.

'These are Yolantarath ships or I'm a baked oyster,' said Arabin. 'One of your people must speak some Geflung.'And he addressed all and sundry in a clear loud voice: ' Varamora! Aaa vaa salaa! Yaa stranaamaaV

Several of his captors understood. But none confessed to doing so. For Onosh Gulkan the Witchlord (who had ruled the Empire before Khmar took over) had tried to extirpate the Geflung peoples after a misunderstanding over taxes. While that had been years ago, the Witchlord's Provision for the Permanent Abolition of Riverside Vermin was still in force.

'Listen here,' said Jon Arabin. 'Someone must understand at least some-'

His speech was interrupted by half a dozen Collosnon soldiers, who grabbed him, roughed him up, then threw him into the prison-pit to which the rest of his men had already been driven.

The next day, they were still there.

It was well and truly autumn. Their prison-pit had no proper roof, being covered with an open latticework of bamboo. Through this their meals were lowered: miserable portions of fish and small bowls of a greasy grey broth which always arrived cold.

Drake dreamt of Stokos, remembering the summer, the airless heat and the reek of blood within the temple of Hagon, the hot oppression of crowds in the streets of Cam on market day, air around forges shimmering with intolerable heat, the warmth and taste of a woman . . .

He woke from dreams to the realities of his prison cell, where there was standing room only, no provision for sanitation, no shelter from the drizzling rain which had quenched all hope of sunshine, and no way to warm oneself in the dank cold where his breath came misting from his mouth.

Fortunately, he was well-dressed, for he wore woollens bought in D'Waith, and sealskins over them – indeed, all the pirates had dressed in their warmest and best before abandoning the Warwolf.

Rolf Thelemite, who claimed to know about such things, took it upon himself to care for their feet. Men were hoisted onto Whale Mike's shoulders, one at a time. They would sit there, hair brushing the bamboo above, while Thelemite removed their boots, wrung out their damp socks, and massaged their feet.

'For,' said Thelemite, 'if we're to go anywhere, we're going to need feet to go with.'

'Aye,' said Ika Thole. 'To walk over the water, no doubt.'

'Well,' said Rolf Thelemite, 'we all saw young Drake do just that, once. With the right kind of liquor inside us, we might end up doing it too.'T never saw it,' complained Whale Mike.

'Nor me,' said Jon Arabin, who had been a prisoner of the people of Brennan at the time. 'So you're in good company.''Good company to escape in,' said Rolf Thelemite.

'We'll not be escaping anywhere,' said Ika Thole gloomily. 'Not without proper food. We'll be done to death by the cold and the rain if this goes on much longer.''Body warmth will save us,' said Thelemite staunchly.

Yet the mention of food made Drake's mouth water. He had lost most of his packets of foil-packed food to the sea, but he still had one remaining. If only he had some privacy in which he could eat it!

Drake woke that night. Darkness. Light rain. Whale Mike, snoring with a sound like a ripsaw working wood. Ish Ulpin muttering something in a foreign tongue.

His feet were numb. Absolutely comfortable. A warning sign – Rolf Thelemite had told him so. Drake worked his feet this way and that in his boots till they came alive with red-hot pain. To think! He slept standing up as if he'd done it all his life. But then, packed in tight as they were, he could hardly fall.Food.Now.

He reached into his pocket for the packet. It crinkled. The crunching metal foil made a sound enormous in the night, despite Mike's masking snore.'Drake?'It was Sully Yot.Awake.

Did he hear the foil crinkle? Did he guess what Drake had? Well – rather die than share food with Sully Yot. So thought Drake.

And stood sleepless till dawn, hating Yot for the very fact of his existence.

Next day, Drake's hunger was worse, as was the rain. Again he longed for privacy. Yes. So he could gorge his food-packet entire. But he had no privacy. So .Share the food?Ridiculous!

There were so many people jammed into the pit that sharing would mean less than a tenth of a mouthful apiece.Drake kept his secret.

Noon came. A meal was served. This time, no fish. This time, no broth. Only water. A bowl of water apiece.

'Don't drink it all at once, boys,' said Jon Arabin, trying to make a joke out of it.

Upon which Whale Mike, without warning, began to cry.