Абрахам Меррит - The Ship of Ishtar

"They took Satalu, my little vessel of joy," mourned Gigi. "And for that Klaneth shall also pay when reckoning comes."

"Half the slaves were killed when the bireme crashed against us," went on the Viking. "Oars crushed in ribs, broke backs. Others died later. The black–skin we put in Zachel's place is a man! He fought those who dropped into the pit and slew his share. Only eight oars have we now instead of twice seven. The black–skin sits at one of them—unchained. When we take new slaves he shall be overseer again and honored."

"And I remember now," it was Gigi, dropping back to his first thought, "that when I dragged you up the side of Klaneth's cabin that day you fought his priests, you still bled from the bites of Sharane's girls. Yet with us there had been time and time again for them to have healed, And here you are once more with old wounds fresh. It must be a strange place indeed, that you go to, Wolf, is there no time there?"

"It is your own world," he answered. "The world from whence all of you came."

And as they stared at him, he leaped up from the divan.

"Sail to Emakhtila! At once! Find Sharane! Free her! How soon, Gigi? How soon?"

He felt the wound in his side open, fell back, his spurt of strength exhausted.

"Not till your wounds are healed," said Gigi, and began to unfasten the reddening bandages. "And we must make the ship strong again before we take that journey. We must have new slaves for the oars. Now lie quiet, until you heal. Klaneth will do Sharane no harm as long as there is hope of taking you. I, Gigi, tell you this. So set your heart at ease."

And now began for Kenton a most impatient time of waiting. To be chained here by his wounds when, despite Gigi's assurances, the black priest might be wreaking his ultimate vengeance upon Sharane! It was not to be borne.

Fever set in. His wounds had been more serious than he had known. Gigi nursed him.

The fever passed, and as he grew stronger he told him of that lost world of theirs; what had passed there during the centuries they had sailed on the timeless ship; of its machinery and its wars, its new laws and its customs.

"And none now go viking!" mused Sigurd. "Clearly then I see that there is no place for me there. Best for Sigurd, Trygg's son, to end his days where he is."

The Persian nodded.

"And no place for me," he echoed. "For a man of taste such as I, it seems no world at all to live in, I like not your way of waging wars. nor could I learn to like it—I who seem to be a soldier of an old, old school, indeed."

Even Gigi was doubtful.

"I do not think I would care for it," he said. "The customs seem so different. And I notice, Wolf, that you were willing to risk chains and death to get out of that world—and lose no time getting back to this."

"The new gods seem so stupid," urged Zubran. "They do nothing. By the Nine Hells, the gods of this place are stupid enough—still they do something. Although perhaps it is better to do nothing than to do the same stupid things over and over," he ruminated.

"I will make me a steading on one of these islands," said Sigurd, "after we have carried away Kenton's woman and slain the black priest. I will take me a strong wife and breed many younglings. I will teach them to build ships. Then we shall go viking as I did of old. Skoal! Skoal to the dragons slipping through Ran's bath with the red ravens on their sails and the black ones flying overhead!"

"Say, blood–brother," he turned to Kenton, "when you have your woman back will you make a steading beside mine? With Zubran taking wives and he and Gigi—if he is not too old—breeding young, and with those who will join us—by Odin, but we could all be great Jarls in this world!"

"That is not to my liking," replied the Persian promptly. "For one thing it takes too long to rear strong sons to fight for us. No—after we have finished our business with Klaneth I will go back to Emakhtila where there are plenty of men already made. It will be strange if I find there no discontented ones, men who can be stirred to revolt. If there be not enough of them—well, discontent is the easiest thing in the world to breed; much easier than sons, Sigurd. Also I am a great soldier. Cyrus the King himself told me so. With my army of discontented men I shall take his nest of priests and rule Emakhtila myself! And after that—beware how you raid my ships, Sigurd!"

Thus they talked among themselves, telling Kenton things of their own lives as strange to him as his own tales must have been to them. Steadily, swiftly his wounds healed until they were at last only red welts, and strength flowed back in his veins.

Now for many sleeps, while he grew well, they had lain hidden within a land–locked cove of one of the golden isles. Its rock–jawed mouth had been barely wide enough for them to enter. Safe enough this place seemed from pursuit or prying eyes. Nevertheless they had drawn the ship close against a high bank whose water side dropped straight down to the deep bottom. The oars had been taken in. The branches of the feathery trees drooped over the craft, covered it.

The time came when Kenton, awakening, felt full tide of health. He walked back to the rudder bar where Sigurd, Gigi and the Persian were stretched out talking. He paused for the hundredth time beside the strange compass that was the helmsman's guide in this world, where there was neither sun nor moon nor stars, no east or west, north or south. Set within the top of a wooden standee was a silver bowl covered with a sheet of clear crystal. Around the lip of this bowl were inlaid sixteen symbols, cuneiform, scarlet. Attached to a needle rising vertically from the bowl's bottom were two slender pointers, serpent shaped, blue. The larger, he knew, pointed always toward Emakhtila, that land to which, were Gigi right, Sharane had been carried by the black priest. The smaller pointed toward the nearest land.

As always, he wondered what mysterious currents stirred them in this poleless world; what magnetic flow from the scattered isles pulled the little one; what constant flow from Emakhtila kept the big one steady? Steadier far than compass needles of earth pointed to the north.

And as he looked it seemed to him that the little blue needle spun in its scarlet pool and lay parallel with the greater one—both pointing to the Isle of Sorcerers!

"An omen!" he cried. "Look, Sigurd! Gigi—Zubran—look!"

They bent over the compass, but in the instant between his call and their response the smaller needle had shifted again; again pointed to the isle where they lay moored!

"An omen?" they asked, puzzled. "What omen?"

"Both the needles pointed to Emakhtila!" he told them. "To Sharane! It was an omen—a summons! We must go! Quick, Gigi—Sigurd—cast loose! We sail for Emakhtila!"

They looked at him, doubtfully; down at the compass once more; at each other covertly.

"I saw it, I tell you.'" Kenton repeated. "It was no illusion—I am well! Sharane is in peril! We must go!"

"Sh–h–h!" Gigi held up a warning hand, listened intently, parted the curtains of the leaves and peered out.

"A ship," he whispered, drawing back his head. "Bid the maids get arrows and javelins. Arm—all of you. Quiet now—and speed!"

They could hear the drop of oars; voices; the low tapping of a hammer, beating the stroke for the rowers. The maids of Sharane silently ranged themselves along the port rail near the bow, bows standing, arrows at strings, beside them their stabbing javelins, their swords, too; their shields at feet.

The four men crouched, peeping out through the trees. What was coming? Questing ship of Klaneth that had nosed them out? Hunters searching the sea for them spurred on by the black priest's promises of reward?

Through the narrow entrance to the hidden harbor drifted a galley. Twice the length of the ship of Ishtar, it was single tiered, fifteen oars to the side and double banked—two men to each sweep. There were a dozen or more men standing on the bow deck; how many others not visible there was no knowing. The galley crept in. It nosed along the shore. When less than two hundred feet away from the hidden watchers grapnels were thrown over the side and the boat made fast.