The Flying Sorcerers

The wind pushed the tiny speck of the airship over the mountains and out of sight, and we settled down for a few quiet days of recovery.

Lesta and his weavers continued to make their cloth, the women relaxed into a more leisurely pace of spinning. The airboat was finished now, and there was no longer an urgent need for dipped aircloth. Indeed, Lesta was considering abandoning the dipping steps altogether, except for small amounts of thread and cloth specifically set aside for the weaving of watertight fabrics.

Trone finished the fourth generator and attached the bicycle frames to it. There were forty men on each generator now, but still, those on the bicycle-put-it-together line kept building. No one had told them to stop. Besides, more and more men wanted to join the generator pumping teams, and the only way to do that was to increase the number of bicycles.

The four balloons were filled in just a little more than one full day. They hung tautly in their filling frameworks. With all four generators working it was possible to fill a balloon faster than ever — indeed, they grew and swelled as we watched. The oxygen bubbled furiously from the other end of the trench, and the bubble-heads giggled hysterically.

My assistants were carving nearly three sets of loom-teeth a day, just to replace the ones that had worn out. Every afternoon was spent carving new chips for Purple and Shoogar.

Damd the Tree Binder was busier than ever. Many of those who had emigrated from other villages were tired of their tents, and wanted to move into proper housetrees. Because of the shortage, Damd had begun binding trees to hold two or three nests whenever possible. In a way it was a lost effort. The trees would be under water before they would be ready for nests.

Ang had commissioned three more giant nets from Lesta, and was working out new ways to increase his catch of fish every day. One set of nets was strung across the river. Another set of nets hung from an overhanging ledge of rock which had not been submerged by the rising seas. The third set was used in the most ingenious way yet. Ang had built a boat, much like the hull of the flying machine. Each day he and three of his apprentices would row out a ways, trailing the net behind them. They had to be careful though — once they caught a submerged housetree.

In short, life had settled down to a regular and steady pace. Neither of the magicians were present to consecrate anything, and Shoogar’s two apprentices were neither skilled enough nor trusted enough to handle even routine consecrations, so I took it upon myself to distribute tokens as necessary.

Of course I levied a small charge for my carving services upon both Purple and Shoogar — it was the least they could do for me. Hence, as monitor of all the carved chips, for every nine I carved for them, I kept two for myself. It was a fair rate.

Of course I had other sources of wealth as well. Lesta and I had renegotiated our contract for the use of the loomteeth. I would provide him with as many loomteeth as he would need, in return for which I received seven percent of his total output, payable either in spell tokens or cloth.

I was beginning to think about the purchase of a third wife. The gods knew I was entitled to it. I had had three wives before, and had never been happy with the demotion to two-wife status. It was not fitting for a Speaker to have only two.

I decided, however, to wait until the airship returned. If this first airship worked well, we might be able to build others. We could perhaps use such ships of the sky for trading expeditions. Yes, that would enrich us considerably. Large bodies of water would no longer be barriers to travel, and we would not be cut off from the mainland every wading season.

Gortik and I and Lesta and the other advisors discussed the idea eagerly. Lesta, who was now the head of the newly enlarged Clothmakers’ Guild (formerly the Weavers’ Caste), was one of the strongest adherents of the idea. Of course he had the most to gain — it was his cloth that they would be trading. But still, there was little opposition from any of the rest of us. Aircloth had enriched all of our lives considerably.

We spent those three days resting — and making exciting plans for the future — and speculating about the fate of the airship. We had not been told how long they would be gone. Purple had said only that they would take as long as necessary, until they had determined how best to steer and control the Cathawk — for that was what he had decided to call the boat.

It did not look like a cathawk to me, but it was Purple’s spell, so I did not question it.

Without the magicians the village seemed strangely quiet — and I began to wonder, was this how it would be after Purple was gone? A strange thought that — I had grown so used to Purple’s presence, I could not imagine this village existing without him.

I spent one afternoon helping Trone and his ground crew. They were practicing the mooring of the Cathawk when it returned. One group of men stood on the launching cradle and threw down ropes, pretending to be the returning airship. The ground crew stood below. When we threw down the ropes, they would chase after them and grab them as fast as they could — then they would pull us off the cradle.

It quickly turned into a competition. We would throw down our ropes and try as hard as we could to keep the ground crew from catching them. The ground crew would try as hard as they could to pull us from our perches. As they were some of the burliest men in two villages, they always won.

Afterward, panting, sweating and covered with dirt, I went up to Trone and asked him if he thought all this effort was truly worth it. After all, the Cathawk would only be making this one landing, and then we’d never see it again.

Trone grunted, “Purple is paying me and my men to see that the Cathawk is grounded safely. It is to our own benefit to see that it does. If anything should happen to the airboat, Purple will only want to build another — and that might take another three hands of hands of days. You want to see him gone, don’t you?”

I couldn’t argue with that.

Shortly after that a rumor started that once Purple returned, he would outfit the Cathawk immediately for his journey north, and leave without redeeming any of his spell tokens.

I tried to stop such foolish prattle, but the villagers would not be convinced. They felt that if Purple did not cast spells in return for his coins, they were worthless. I said that this was nonsense. The coins were symbols of the magic and, as such, were magic themselves. They were as good as a real consecration. Just keep the spell token near the object to be consecrated.

They didn’t believe me.

Instead, they argued about the Cathawk. Trone took credit for it by saying that it was his generators that made the gas that put it into the air. The pumping crews said that the generators wouldn’t have done any good at all without their effort. Lesta laughed at them both, saying that it was his cloth that had done the job. Nonsense, said the weavers, it was their effort in weaving the cloth. Yes, agreed my apprentices, but they couldn’t have done it without my loom-teeth. Grimm claimed it was his work in sewing up the airbags, the thread-dippers claimed it was their housetree blood, and even the women murmured about the thread they had spun. But the heights of idiocy were reached when the ballast-stuffers claimed it was their sand that allowed the Cathawk to fly — it flew when Purple threw it out.

It would have been funny; except that they were all taking it so seriously! Ang was making a small fortune selling dried fish — the same kind, he said, that Purple had taken with him on his historic flight.

The speculation went on about the flight itself. I wondered if they had used Shoogar’s sails. Wilville and Orbur believed that Purple’s airpushers didn’t need sails, but —

I was bathing in the ocean, on a hot still day, when a shout rose up. The Cathawk is returning! The airship is coming back!”

I didn’t bother to dry myself, but snatched up my robe and ran for the Crag. Others had the same idea. A great crowd materialized out of nowhere, and streamed up the hill, shouting and cheering. As I rounded the crest I could see it — slender boatframe and great swollen bags bright against the sky.

I wondered why the Cathawk was flying backward.

Then I saw that there were no sails. Purple’s method of airpushing had worked! Wilville and Orbur were right again!