Evadeen Brickwood - The Speaking Stone of Caradoc

“Oh, never mind, you won’t believe me anyway.”

“What?!” Katherine insisted.

“It looked like…a huge crocodile. In the surf and I think there were others underwater, catching birds. You know like the one in Aztlan.”

“Yeah right. You’re trying to scare me. Thanks.”

“I’m not joking!” Chryséis cried.

“Okay, must be a saltwater crocodile then. They can get really big.”

“Still feel like swimming?” Trevor was being sarcastic.

“Okay, I get it. It’s too dangerous to swim in the sea.” Katherine shrugged her shoulders.

“It was enormous – just like the one in Aztlan. Hey!” Chryséis yelled. A big blob of gray slime had spattered onto her head and sleeve.

“Yuck, that’s bird poo, so gross!”

“Oh no,” Katherine began to laugh. ”Ghastly!”

“Oh you!” Chryséis waved her fist at the sky. There were so many birds that it was impossible to tell which one had dropped the bomb.

“At least it’s not me this time,” Trevor gloated and Chryséis glared at him.

“How on earth do I get this stuff off me?”

“A wild guess would be water and elbow grease,” Trevor suggested.

Katherine asked one of the hairy Konk sailors for a bucket of water and a cloth. Then she vigorously wiped the muck out of Chryséis ’ hair. Chryséis just stood there stiff with disgust.

“Oh, it’s so gross. My hair’s all sticky,” she wailed.

“Excuse me, who is cleaning you up here?” Katherine washed her hands again in the bucket water. “You can wash your hair tonight.”

The Konk sailor came and took his bucket and cloth away without a word. He needed them. They knew that Konks didn’t like to speak. The long red hair on the sailor’s arms and under his fleeing chin flattened in the breeze as he waggled his ape-like head. A coarse ponytail peeked out from under his blue cap.

They tried not to stare as the Konk chucked the dirty water overboard and walked away.

“Gee thanks, I only still need it,” Katherine moaned and hurried after him.

Chryséis tied her sticky blonde strands into a ponytail with a disgusted grimace. Trevor had an idea how to distract her.

“You could send Alun in Cydonia a telepathic message.” Alun had been their first prehistoric friend and was Kheton’s younger brother.

“Do you think it’ll work?” Chryséis slowly unscrewed her face.

“Why not? You did it before.”

They had all learned how to use telepathy in Cydonia, but only Chryséis had managed to use it properly.

“I must relax first.” She sat down on the tackle next to Trevor.

Trevor squinted at his sketch. Not bad, not bad at all. The head was still a bit too big, though. He erased the lines and drew the head again.

Katherine reappeared with clean hands, just as Chryséis closed her eyes to visualize Alun’s face.

“What is she doing?” she asked Trevor, but he just shook his head and put a finger on his mouth.

Chryséis concentrated on a message to Alun and the answer came promptly : Enjoy your voyage, friends. Remember to visit the observatory in Kamûk! You must tell me about the raygun. May the Earthmother bless you.

Chryséis told the others excitedly about the thought transfer. “Oh, boys! All he can think about is the ray gun.”

“I wish I could do that,” Trevor said. “This thought transfer .”

“You just have to practice more.”

“If you say so…,” he felt a little jealousy creeping up on him.

“Let’s go to the front,” Katherine said. ”They have proper seats there and we can watch where the ship’s going.”

“Okay, I’m done here anyway.”

Trevor stuffed his drawing pad between the daypacks and followed the girls to the bow of the ship. Kheton stood by the front railing, his long tunic fluttering in the breeze, showing off the handsome young man’s muscular chest.

There was a rumbling and the ship rolled a little.

“What was that? Do you think we rammed something?”

Trevor scanned the water. “I can’t see anything.”

“Ho, Tian! Go see what’s making the noise below,” captain Thëlamôn bellowed from the captain’s cubicle above the stairs. The cubicle contained the steering wheel and all sorts of interesting-looking instruments.

“Aye, aye, captain.” One of the younger sailors sprinted down the stairs below deck to investigate.

“Did you see all those gadgets in the captain’s cubicle?”

“You think they have radar?”

“Not just radar, I wonder how he lifted up the ship earlier.”

A minute later, the sailor called Tian reported back. “Two bales of cloth wrangled free and were knocking against the hull, captain. I fastened the bales.”

“No danger then, just some loose cargo in the hull,” the captain announced to the passengers. Then he continued to survey the ocean ahead.

In Aztlan, the ship had taken fine Alesian silk cloth aboard, destined for the island of Daitya. The cloth would be exchanged for a cargo of Daityan woolens. Daityans were a funny bunch, only interested in wool and raising sheep, forever spinning and knitting all day long.

Katherine let out a deep breath. “Thank goodness!”

They sat down on low canvas chairs and soon Chryséis and Katherine were chatting about this and that, while Trevor took a nap. This morning, they had seen all sorts of weird and wonderful people at Aztlan harbour. Like the ‘fairies’ with their flowing hair and butterfly clothes and a woman with green skin, who had been carried in a sedan chair. The girls debated the likelihood for inheriting green skin for a while. But, there was something else they remembered. Two Gabari giants in dark cloaks near the cooking house where they had eaten seafood.

“Those guys were creepy,” Chryséis said.

“Yes, creepy.”

“I wonder what they were talking about. Always looking around like that, as if they had huge secrets to discuss. Totally dodgy.”

“Maybe undercover agents. James Bond chasing after the prehistoric villains of the ‘Known World’!”

“The name is Bondûr, Jamon Bondûr.” They laughed.

“Then they are not very good at hiding it. What good are agents you can spot a mile away? Nah, there was something else going on.”

“As long as we don’t have to see them again…”

“Now that would be really creepy.”

The girls didn’t realize who it was they had seen. And it wasn’t a joke.

“Wonder what Kheton’s thinking about.”

“Lelani of course.”

Lelani had gone below deck, checking on her dowry, while Kheton enjoyed the warm breeze. He would soon begin his duty as ‘Honourable Junior Delegate from Alesia’ in Algiras. Algiras was the capital of Atala, the Atland archipelago’s main island.

Kheton thought about looking for Lelani, when she came up the stairs and came to stand quietly next to him. He looked at her proudly. Lelani was so beautiful with her auburn hair all wind-blown and her cheeks blushed by the fresh sea air.

The sun dipped lower in the sky and the rippling waters were turning the colour of charcoal glass.

“Steady on! Let’s reach Kamûk, before darkness falls and the monsters of the deep come out to play with ya dawdling seafarers,” captain Thëlamôn bellowed.

“Aye, aye captain!” the crew answered and the ship gained speed.

Captain Thëlamôn wore the customary dark-blue shirt with the captain’s compass rose on the chest. He had sailed the Atlantean Sea on his father’s trading ships from the age of four. The sea was in his blood.

Soon one of the sailors called out. “Terreis – land. Terreis D’ântilla!”

They were thrilled. This had to be a remnant of Atlantis. Would D’ântilla be very different from Alesia? Chryséis checked her watch. It was twenty seven past five. She pointed straight ahead. “That’s so cool.”