Explorers Of Gor

36
Wreckage; Again We Move Upriver

"There," said Ayari, pointing.

We put down the canoe we were carrying past the hurtling cataract.

We saw, shattered on rocks, the stern quarter of a river galley. Jagged planks, dry and hot, thrust up in the sunlight, and, lower, wedged in, pressed between rocks, wet and black, water foaming about it, was the stern itself with its splintered, side-hung rudder.

I waded out to it. There was nothing left in the wreckage.

"It could have been washed downriver for pasangs," said Ayari.

I nodded. Once before, long ago, we had recovered evidence of what had seemed to be another mishap on the river, a chest or crate of trade goods. We had managed to put them to good use. We had not seen wreckage, however. The chest, not lashed down properly, might have been jolted or washed overboard. Too, there might have been a capsizing. We had not seen wreckage, however. Shaba had not, at that time, as far as we knew, lost a galley.

I put my shoulder against the wreckage. I then put my back against it. I freed it, and, twisting, it plunged away, westward, downriver.

I returned to the rocks of the shore. Shaba now had but two galleys.

"It was wise of you to free it," said Kisu. He looked about. "The less evidence there is of strangers on the river the safer we shall all be."

I looked about, too, at the jungles. They seemed quiet, "Yes," I said. "But I would have freed it anyway."

"Why?" asked Kisu.

"It is what is left of a ship," I said. "It should be free."

How could I tell Kisu, who was of the land, of the feeling, of those who had known the waves of Thassa?

"You will not free me, will you, Master?" asked Janice.

"Kneel," I said.

She knelt.

"You are a woman," I said. "You will be kept as a slave." "Yes, Master," she said.

"Now pick up your burden," I said. She picked up her burden and held it on her head, with her two hands. "Straighten your back," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

I then, with Ayari and Kisu, lifted the canoe again, and again we moved upriver.