Mariners of Gor

Chapter Thirty-Five

From the bulwarks of the large, unusual ship men strangely clad threw down ropes to docksmen, who fastened them to mooring cleats.

The sea end of the pier had now been cleared by guardsmen, that the ship might be attended to, but the land end of the pier, and the adjacent waterfront, even to the warehouses, and the streets leading up to the city, were still swarming with people, men, and women, and boys.

Brundisium is one of the world’s largest, busiest ports, with one of the finest harbors on the planet, host to a hundred traffics, headquarters of a hundred Merchant houses, but never, until now, had there been seen such a ship.

“Yes,” had said the stranger. “I have seen that ship! It is, or was, a ship of the shogun, Lord Temmu!”

“Come from the World’s End?” I said.

“Yes!” he said, pressing forward.

“Stop!” said a guardsman. “Go back!”

A lowered spear barred our way, and that of others.

“Wait!” I cautioned the stranger.

We then stood back, in the crowd.

“Make way, make way!” called a herald.

Making their way to the pier were members of the port’s administration. I knew several, from my work in the harbor office, in the registry.

How would one record the arrival of this ship, I wondered. What would be its registry, its port of origin, who would be its master, what would be its business, its cargo?

We waited behind the line of guardsmen, while the port’s delegates approached the ship.

A gate in the bulwarks of the ship swung back, and was fastened open. Through this opening, several men began to thrust forth, foot by foot, a loading plank. They were short, sturdy men. They were barefoot. They wore short, hitched-up robes, with short sleeves.

“They are from Schendi,” said someone near us.

“Too light,” said another.

“See the eyes!” said a man.

“Tuchuks,” said a man. “I saw one once.”

“Yes!” said a fellow.

I looked to the stranger.

“Pani,” he said.

“Do they speak the language?” I asked.

“Yes,” said the stranger.

I recalled that last night the stranger had alluded to this matter. It had had to do with the will of Priest-Kings.

“What is such a ship doing here, in Brundisium?” I asked the stranger.

“I do not know,” he said.

“Should you not, at the first opportunity,” I said, “seek to make contact with the ship?”

“No,” he said.

I recalled the two Assassins, of yesterday evening.

“It is that ship,” said he, “which is, or was, of the much-diminished navy of Lord Temmu, but the war was going badly. The fleet of Lord Yamada was approaching the cove, when the great ship slipped away.”

“You think,” I said, “it may be a prize, taken by the ships of Lord Yamada’s admiral?”

“I think it unlikely,” he said, “quite improbable, but, in any event, caution is advised.”

“Why unlikely, why improbable?” I asked.

“It was not in the cove when the fleet of Lord Yamada made its appearance,” he said.

“It could have been overtaken and seized elsewhere,” I said.

“That is possible,” he said. “But one wonders why Lord Yamada, rich with resources, with many ashigaru, with many ships, with many villages and rice fields, with his war well in hand, on the brink of victory, would send a single ship to Brundisium, or even, say, to Kasra or Telnus.”

“It is then likely,” I said, “that it is still of the forces of Lord Temmu.”

“Almost certainly,” said the stranger. “But let us see how matters unfold.”

“What are you talking about?” asked a fellow.

“Of far and strange things,” said the stranger.

“Pani, I gather,” I said, “have been in Brundisium before.”

“I have gathered so,” said the stranger, “long ago, by the intervention of Priest-Kings.”

“For what reason?” I asked.

“To hire men, to buy women,” he said. “To establish camps, to secure timber, to obtain tarns, to prepare a resistance, to ready themselves to wage a war anew.”

“Why would they come again?” I asked.

“I do not know,” said the stranger.

“Look,” said a fellow pointing. “It is Demetrion!”

“Who is Demetrion?” asked the stranger.

“He is the harbor master,” I said.

Demetrion had taken time to don his formal robes, lengthy and abundant, of white and yellow. He was approaching the lowered gangplank, one end resting on the pier, the other fastened, roped, to the bulwarks, on each side of the opened gate. With Demetrion were his aides, also of the Merchants, and two Scribes, one of which was Phillip, my superior in the registry.

The guardsmen had rather followed Demetrion’s party, for which, I gathered, they had been waiting, and this permitted the stranger and myself, and the crowd, generally, to proceed several yards further down the pier. The guardsmen did, however, maintain an open space about the gangway.

Demetrion paused at the foot of the gangway and lifted his hand in greeting. “Tal,” he said.

“Tal,” said a thin, angular fellow, in an unusual, sashed robe, in which were two curved swords, a larger and a smaller, who stood at the bulwarks, to the right of the gangway, as one would look toward the ship.

“Be welcome, noble friends,” said Demetrion, “to the great port of Brundisium.”

The fellow on the ship bowed, slightly, presumably acknowledging this salutation. His hair was drawn back on his head, and fastened in a knot, behind the back of his head.

“I am Demetrion,” called out Demetrion. “Harbor master in Brundisium.”

Demetrion looked up to the bulwarks, but there was no response. The fellow on the ship did not exchange greetings, identify himself, or the ship, or state his business.

“Permission to come aboard,” called Demetrion.

“No,” said the fellow on the ship.

“No?” said Demetrion.

“No,” said the fellow.

Demetrion had placed one foot on the gangplank, in anticipation of boarding the ship. Two of the Pani, at the height of the gangplank, had instantly removed the longer of their two swords from their sash, and, two hands fixed on the long, tasseled handle, drew back the weapons.

Demetrion stepped back, on the pier.

“The great port of Brundisium is a neutral port, open to all shipping,” said Demetrion. “I trust you come in peace.”

“We seek one Cineas,” said the fellow on the ship, who seemed to be its captain, or, in any event, in a position of some authority.

“I know no Cineas,” said Demetrion.

“I know him,” said the stranger to me. “He is a mariner, who went ashore with me, and others, at Daphna. We arrived in Brundisium, together, oarsmen, some days ago. I soon spent my coin. But he seemed well supplied with silver.”

“Enough,” I asked, “to hire Assassins?”

The stranger looked at me, startled. “Yes,” he said.

Four Pani rapidly descended the gangplank, passed Demetrion and his party, and threaded their way through the crowd.

The stranger pressed back, unwilling, I gathered, to be noted. He did, however, scrutinize the four Pani who, intent on some mission, looking neither to the left nor right, moved quickly past.

“Do you know them?” I asked, when they had passed.

“I know one,” he said, “Tatsu, who was on the voyage west to the World’s End, to the Twelve Islands.”

“Then the ship sails still for Lord Temmu?” I said.

“I think so,” said the stranger.

“What is your business here?” called Demetrion to the fellow by the bulwarks, who seemed in authority.

That individual, however, made no answer.

“I know not your people, your land, your city, your ship, your family, your caste, your clan,” said Demetrion, “but whoever you be, if anyone, there is wharfage due in Brundisium.”

Many were about, and I fear that Demetrion sensed he had been affronted, and that his office, and station, had been too little recognized, let alone respected.

The man above Demetrion, on the deck of the strange ship, near the height of the gangway, the presumed captain or officer, drew forth from his sash a small sack and tossed it to the pier. It stuck the planks of the pier, at Demetrion’s feet, with an unmistakable sound.

This drew a response from the crowd.

“Pick it up,” said Demetrion to one of his aides, unwilling to do so himself. He was a personage of dignity, harbor master in Brundisium, perhaps the most important single person in Brundisium, or, at least, the best-known and most prominent. Brundisium has no Administrator and no Ubar. It is ruled by a Merchant Council, with its day to day affairs managed by an executive committee, chief of which is the harbor master.

Demetrion’s aides were as reluctant as he to stoop to retrieve the small, but weighty sack. The two Scribes, as well, looked away. Little love is lost between the Scribes and Merchants. The Scribes is a high caste and the Merchants is the richest caste. Each therefore regards itself as superior to the other, and each, then, would be reluctant to seem to lower itself before the other. I would have been quite willing to retrieve the sack and deliver it to Demetrion, but Phillip, my superior, was in his party, and there is, of course, the dignity, and the prestige, of the caste to maintain.

To my surprise, the stranger left my side, and slipped, unprevented, between the guardsmen, retrieved the sack, assured himself, it seemed, of its weight, which was apparently impressive, and climbed up the gangplank.

Neither of the Pani warriors at the top of the gangplank lifted their swords.

The crowd began to murmur, in astonishment.

The stranger, at the head of the gangplank, held out the sack of coin to the angular fellow, who had cast it to the feet of Demetrion.

“If this coin is what I think it is, from its weight,” he said to the spare, angular fellow, presumably the captain, or a high officer, “it is too much.”

“Give me the coin!” called Demetrion, from the pier.

Perhaps he then regretted that he had not stooped to pick up the sack himself.

“This sack, I take it,” said the stranger, “contains ten tarn disks, of double weight.”

“Fifteen,” said the angular fellow, “certified with the stamp of Ar.”

The stranger then removed one such disk from the sack, and held it up. “This,” he said, “is far too much.”

“What are such things but pieces of metal,” said the Pani.

The stranger then handed the sack, less the single tarn disk, to the angular warrior, who replaced it in his sash. The stranger then tossed the single coin which had been extracted from the sack to the planks at the feet of Demetrion, who swiftly reached down, and snatched it up.

He and his party then forced their way back through the crowd, some of whom had been close enough to see what the coin had been. “Festival!” called more than one man. “Set the public tables!” called another. “For a week!” cried another. “Free ka-la-na!” called a man. “Free paga!” cried another. “No, no!” cried Demetrion. “Only silver, only a tarsk!” But that single, weighty coin had been yellow, like Tor-tu-Gor.

“I am Nakamura,” said the angular fellow, presumably an officer, certainly a warrior, to the stranger.

The stranger bowed, which gesture of greeting was returned by the officer, Nakamura.

“I do not know you,” said the stranger.

“I am captain of the River Dragon, ship of the navy of Lord Temmu.”

“You have come to Brundisium,” said the stranger.

“I am pleased to see that you are alive,” said the officer.

“You thought I might not be?”

“One did not know.”

“You know me, then,” said the stranger.

“I think so,” said the officer. “I think you are Callias, of Jad, a Cosian, he who prevented the destruction of the great ship, he who plotted its escape, he who set designs in motion, he who engineered its flight.”

“Scarcely by myself,” said the stranger.

“Then you are he,” said the officer.

“I fear so,” said the stranger.

“Lord Okimoto was not pleased,” said the officer.

“I regret his displeasure,” said the stranger.

“For far less,” said the officer, “men have perished most unpleasantly.”

“I am sure of it,” said the stranger.

“I am charged with seeking you out,” said the officer.

“You have been successful,” said the stranger.

“Do you know why I have come?” he asked.

“I would suppose,” he said, “to kill me.”

“Not at all,” said the officer. “Rather, I bring you greetings from Lord Nishida and from Tarl Cabot, tarnsman, commander of the tarn cavalry of Lord Temmu.”