The Search for Zei

CHAPTER XVIII

After they had crossed from raft to raft and from scow to scow, they found that their path led up to the deck of one of the houseboats.

Zei said: "Should we not throw down more of these gangplanks?"

"No. It'd only stop 'em a minute, and would show where we've gone."

"There seem to be but few abroad this night."

"Dinner time," said Barnevelt.

They wound their way from houseboat to houseboat. An adolescent Krishnan brushed by them, giving them hardly a glance, and vanished through the nearest door, whence came the sound of scolding.

They continued on, over decks and across gangplanks and up and down ladders, until they came to a big roofed-over hulk without signs of life aboard. It had once been a merchant-man from the Va'andao Sea, but now looked more like the conventional pictures of Noah's Ark.

They made the circuit of the deck, finding no more ways leading from this ship to any other. It lay in fact at the extreme north end of the Sunqaro settlement, and beyond it the only craft were scattered derelicts not connected with the "city." Barnevelt looked northward and in the fading light thought he could just see the tattered sail of the rendezvous raft on the horizon. Almost in line with it, the nose of a big derelict that was slowly sinking by the stern thrust up through the vine, a darker pyramid against the dark northern sky.

"This seems to be the bottom of the bag," he said. "What sort of ship is this, anyhow?"

The barnlike superstructure that had been built up on deck had no windows, but three doors: a small one on each side and a large one at one end. All three were closed with padlocks.

Barnevelt settled down to work on the door on the northeast side, where he would be out of sight of the settlement. The lock was a stout one, and he had nothing to pick it with even if he had known how to pick locks. The iron straps to which the lock was attached were nailed to the door and the door frame and so could not be unscrewed with his knife blade. With a stout enough instrument he could have pried them loose, but any attempt to do so with knife or sword would, he was sure, merely break a good blade.

As he ran his fingers over the door, however, he became aware of a roughness in the strap that ran from the door frame to the lock. By looking closely and gouging with his thumbnails he made out that the strap was badly rusted— so much so that he could pry flakes of rust off with his bare hands.

The simplest way, then, might be the most effective. He heaved on the strap until it bent outward enough to let him slide the fingers of both hands between it and the door. Then, with a firm grip upon it, he put one foot against the door and heaved. His muscles stood out with the strain.

With a faint crunch the weakened strap gave way. Barnevelt staggered back and would have fallen over the side had not Zei, with a squeak of alarm, caught his arm.

A minute later they were inside. It was pitch-dark save for the triple moonbeams that came through the open door, which was not enough light to tell them what they had gotten into. Barnevelt tripped over something solid and swore under his breath. He should have thought to bring a candle or the equivalent; but one couldn't think of everything…

That gave him an idea. He felt along the wall, sometimes bumping into things, and before long came to a bracket holding a small oil-lamp. After much fumbling with his pocket lighter he got the lamp lit, then quickly closed the door lest the light betray them.

This hulk was used for stores, piled in orderly fashion on the deck: barrels of pitch, nails, and other things; lumber, ropes of various sizes flemished down in neat cylindrical piles, spars, canvas, and oars. A big hatch lay open in the middle of the deck, and by stooping Barnevelt could see that the deck below was also lined with barrels, piles of firewood, bags, and so on.

"Interesting," he said, "but I don't see how it'll help us."

"At least," said Zei, "we have a place to hide."

"I'm not so sure. If Zakkomir gets away they'll comb the whole settlement. Even if he doesn't, they'll know there were two more of us. Matter of fact, some people saw us on our way here. I told Chask to meet us on the edge of the Sunqar…"

"Who's Chask?"

"My boatswain. I hope he got away when the ructions started. But even if he does show up at the rendezvous tomorrow, you couldn't expect him to stick around long once the sun was up."

"You know not if he escaped?"

"No. If there were a small boat we could steal, now . . ."

"I saw none as we came, and 'tis said that to thrust such a craft through the vine were a thing impossible."

Barnevelt grunted. "Maybe so, but you'd be surprised what impossible things people do when they have to. I'll look."

He slipped out the door and made another circuit of the deck, peering off into the moonlight for a sign of a dinghy. None did he see; nothing but houseboats, the weed growing up to their sides. While he was about it, he took a good look at the ship's superstructure to make sure no light showed through from inside. Light did show faintly along the bottom crack of the southwest door.

Back inside, he uncoiled some rope and laid it along the sill of the southwest door, meanwhile telling Zei of his failure.

She said: "Could you not build a raft from these many stuffs and staples?"

"In six ten-nights, with a set of tools, maybe. Say, what were the pirates talking about when that one from Qirib— forget his name—spoke of using you as the key to the wealth of the Zogha?"

"That must have been ere I came in."

"So it was. This fellow seemed to have an alternative proposition he wanted to argue, but Sheafase shut him up, I suppose so as not to spill their plans in front of me."

"That would be the Qiribo arch-pirate, who is (or rather was) one 'Urgan, not long since a respected commercial of Ghulinde. Taking ill the way his goodwife spent his money, as under our statutes she had a right to do, he fled to the Sunqar. The true inwardness of his plan I know not, save that from hints they dropped before me I think 'twas to liave Sheafase place me under his malefic mental suasion, declaring me true ruler of Qirib, seizing the kingdom, and dandling me before the people as a puppet their true rapacious plans to hide. Had not you and Zakkomir intervened, they might indeed have executed such chicane, for many Sunqaruma are from Qirib and so could give their enterprise the feeble surface tint of lawfulness. But how came you and Zakkomir hither?"

Barnevelt brought her up to date on events in Ghulinde, omitting to mention that to persuade him to come the queen had had to threaten his partner with hot pincers. He felt that that detail might take the fine romantic edge off her admiration.

He concluded: "… and so we got in by pretending to be Mejrou Qurardena couriers. My name is now Sn- Goz-zan." Damn, he knew he'd get his aliases mixed up.

"And who's the Earthman whom you sought to fetch forth in the chest? Methought he was but a common pirate, unworthy of such pains."

"Long story. Tell you some day, if we live through this."

"Live or die, 'twill be a famous feat," she said. "Our tame bard shall make an epic of it, in heroic heptameters. A versatile wight you must be, Lord Snyol. From the mountains of Nyamadze you come to the seas, and from the polar snows to this steaming tropic. From skids you take to ships…"

"Ohe!" You've given me an idea."

Barnevelt jumped up and began examining the piles of lumber. After a while he settled on a width and thickness of board as suitable and dragged out several lengths of that size.

"Should be about two meters long," he mused. "They'd better be right the first time, too."

He looked around for a work-bench with tools, but such work was evidently done elsewhere in the settlement. Finally he fell to whittling with his knife.

"What do you?" said Zei. "Make skids wherewith to travel over the terpahla-vine? In sooth, a levin-flash of genius. If, that is, we fall not through a gap in the vine to provide a banquet for the monsters of the sea."

"Let's see your foot. Damn these flimsy sandal effects…"

The hours slipped by as Barnevelt worked. When he again opened the northeast door, the light of the three clustered moons no longer shone in through the portal, for they had ridden across the meridian to the western half of the starlit sky.

Barnevelt planned his next steps with care. First he made the circuit of the deck once more, looking and listening for sights and sounds of pursuit. Finding none, he peered to northward across the moonlit waste of weed. It would be the easiest thing in Krishna to get lost while splashing around on the vines at night without map or compass. He could no longer see the pale speck on the horizon that he had thought to be the sail of the rendezvous raft, but the nose of the up-ended derelict still stood out plainly.

Then he knocked at the door, saying: "Put out the lamp and come."

Zei obeyed him. Together they lugged out the four skis, the two oars he had chosen for balancing poles, and an armful of rope. He belayed one end of a length of heavy rope to a cleat on the deck and let the rest of it hang down into the water.

Then he discarded his vest of chain mail, which would make swimming impossible, and with the lighter rope set about making ski lashings. He had already cut notches in the sides of the skis for the rope, since it would have to pass under the skis. His own skis gave no great trouble. Though he had never made a ski lashing before, he was sophisticated in the ways of ropes from his boating experience on Earth, and his expressman's boots afforded his feet the necessary protection.

Zei's feet, however, were something else. Although he had cut a couple of pieces of sailcloth which he wrapped around her feet to protect them from the rope, he still feared she would be chafed. However, there was no help for it…

"The Sunqaruma are coming!" she said in a loud whisper.

He listened. Over the subdued ground noise of nocturnal Sunqaro activity came a more definite sound of many feet, a clink of steel, and a murmur of voices.

He frantically finished Zei's bindings and hurried to the hulk's side, his boards going clickety-clack on the deck.

"I shall have to go first," he said, and lowered himself over the edge, holding the heavy rope.

He let himself down to the weed and heard the skis strike water. Then he felt the coolth of the sea around his ankles. For an instant he thought the weed would not bear his weight; that if he let go the rope he would go right on in up to his chin.

The noise of the approaching men grew rapidly louder. Barnevelt could now make out different voices, though not the words.

"Make haste!" came the voice of Zei from above. Barnevelt, choking down an impulse to bark at her: what did she think he was doing? lowered himself further. The tension in the rope decreased, and he found himself standing on the weed with the water not yet halfway up his calves. He took a gingerly step, and then another, still holding the rope, and found that the vine afforded more substantial support away from the ship's side. He also learned that if one kept moving, oae kept comparatively dry, whereas to stand in one place meant to sink gradually to one's knees in water as one's weight pushed the terpahla under.

"Hand me down my oar!" he said softly. When Zei had done so, he tried it and found it not a bad ski pole.

He judged from the sound that the approaching searchers were now coming across the gangplank on the other side of the hulk. That fact left them only seconds' leeway.

"All right," he murmured, "hand me down yours and the rest of the light rope… Now climb down."

"Will you not stand under to catch me?"

"Can't. It would put too much weight in one place."

She began to lower herself down as best she could, her skis rapping against the hulk's side. On the far side of the hulk feet sounded on the deck, and Barnevelt caught snatches of speech:

"… the gods know we've searched everywhere else…"

"… if they be not here, they must have flown…"

"… go around the deck in the other direction, you, lest they…"

Zei reached water level, took a staggering step on the vine, fouled the whittled nose of her right ski in the terpahla, and almost took a header.

"Watch out!" hissed Barnevelt frantically. "The terpahla's more solid over here. Here's your oar. Now come quickly."

They started hiking off to northward, their skis swishing over the weedy water. Barnevelt snatched a look back at the hulk. Althouth the hither side of it was now in shadow, there was a hint of movement around the deck-and the sound of a door being opened. Someone called: "They broke in here! Fetch lights!"

Perhaps, thought Barnevelt, the Morya would be too occupied with searching the hulk to notice that their quarry was escaping in plain sight; not expecting to see people walking on the water, they would not even glance out across the weed.

No such luck. A voice said: "What does this rope here? Ohe, there they go!"

"Where?"

"Yonder, across the terpahla!"

" 'Tis a thing impossible!"

"Yet there they…"

"Witchcraft!"

"Bows! Bows! Who bears a bow?"

"No one, sir, for you did command…"

"Never mind what I commanded, fool, but run to fetch…"

"Can you not throw…"

"Keep on," said Barnevelt, lengthening his stride. Behind him the voices merged into a buzzing babel.

"Watch out for that hole," he told Zei.

The distance increased with agonizing slowness. Behind them came the snap as of a twanged rubber band, followed by a short sharp whistle passing close.

"They shoot at us," said Zei, in a voice near tears.

"That's all right. They can't hit us at long range in this light." Barnevelt did not feel as confident as he sounded. He felt even less so when the next whsht came by so close that he could swear he felt the wind of it. What would they do if one were hit?

Whsht! Whsht! That mail-shirt would have felt good despite its weight.

Little by little the distance lengthened, and the invisible missiles ceased to whizz about their ears.

"We're safe now," he said. "Stand still and catch the end of this rope. Tie it around your waist. That's so if one of us falls into a hole, the other can pull him out. Thank the great god Bakh you're not one of these tiny girls! Off we go again, and remember to keep moving."

They plodded towards the bow of the up-ended derelict.

Zei remarked: "An uncommon sight it is to see all the moons full and in conjunction simultaneously. Old Qvansel avers that this event portends some great upheaval in the realm's mundane affairs, though my mother will not have it SO, holding that Varzai governs all and that the old man's talk of astrological whys and wherefores be nought but impious superstition."

" '… and rhymes, and dismal lyrics, prophesying change beyond all reason.' Why does she keep him on the payroll jf she doesn't believe his line?"

"Oh, he's a legacy from my grandmother's reign, and my mother, however harsh she may appear to those who do not know her intimately, cannot bring herself to cast adrift a longtime faithful servant. Besides which, be his star lore true or false, he's still a man of mighty erudit… glub!"

A sudden tug on the safety rope staggered Barnevelt. Zei had fallen into a hole. Talking women! Barnevelt thought savagely as her head appeared above the water with a strand of terpahla draped over one eye.

"Pull yourself out, Mistress Zei!" he snapped, moving his skis to keep a constant tension on the line. "On hands and knees, like that."

She seemed to be hopelessly tangled in her skis, but finally got squared away.

"Now, bring your feet around under you one at a time," he said. "That's it. Now grab your oar and stand up. Next time, keep your mind on where you put your feet!"

"Master Snyol!" came an offended voice. "Though you have rescued me from peril dire, no license does that grant you to address me as if I were some kitchen drab!"

"I'll address you worse than that if you don't obey orders! Come on."

She sank into silence. Barnevelt felt a little contrite over his outburst, but not to the point of apologizing. After all, he told himself, with these Qiribo dames you had to get the bulge on them at the start or, accustomed as they were to commanding, they'd walk all over you.

At that, it was probably the first time in Zei's life that any mere male had addressed her so roughly. It must have been quite a shock, he thought with a trace of malicious relish. He wondered why he felt that way, and presently realized that neither had he ever so spoken to a woman before. His pleasure must come from a subconscious satisfaction at asserting his masculinity against the female sex. He cautioned himself not to take his burgeoning aggressiveness out on poor Zei, who was not responsible for his upbringing.

He cast a look at her as she splashed beside him. With her gauzy tunic soaked and the light of the three moons upon her, she might almost as well have had no clothes on. Metaphors of goddesses rising from the sea crossed his mind…

Off to eastward, perhaps a hundred meters away, the surface suddenly heaved. Something dark and shiny—a head or flipper?—showed in the moonlight and then vanished with a loud splash.

"I think," he said, "we'd better both be careful about falling into holes… Wonder how Zakkomir's making out? I like the young fellow and can't understand why he seems so anxious to get himself killed."

"You came, did you not?"

Barnevelt paused before answering. "Ye-es, but then… Is there an—uh—understanding between you and him?" (He had already asked Zakkomir a similar question, but confirmation would be desirable.)

"Not at all," she replied. "As a loyal subject and familiar of the royal family he's naturally happy to risk his life for the crown."

Well, thought Barnevelt, such feelings no doubt existed among people brought up in a monarchy, even though he, as a native of a planet where the democratic republic had become the standard governmental form, found it hard to imagine.

They continued their plod and presently came to the bow of the up-ended derelict. Holding the rail, they pulled themselves up the steep deck to a hatch to rest.

Barnevelt looked north but was still not sure he could see the sail of the rendezvous raft. However, he had a good idea of its direction, and thought he could find it by frequent back-sighting. The settlement of the Morya Sunqaruma was now a dark irregular outline on the southerly horizon. Barnevelt picked out the storeship, which he could still discern, as a mark to sight on.

"How are your feet?" he asked.

"Though this be no ballroom floor, yet they will abide."

"Okay, let's go."

They took off across the vine again. The clustered moons now hung low, and Barnevelt thought he saw a faint light in the East, reaching up from the horizon in a great wedge. After a while it faded; this must be the poets' "phantom of false morning." He continued to back-sight on the half-sunk hulk and the storeship.

The moons sank lower, and the pallor of the eastern sky this time looked like the real thing. The smaller stars of the unfamiliar constellations went out, and the sail of the rendezvous raft came into plain sight.

As they neared their goal, Barnevelt lengthened his stride in his eagerness to get aboard and take off his footgear. He drew ahead of Zei who, finding herself towed behind him, called: "Not quite so fast, pray!"

Barnevelt turned his head to answer, and at that instant his skis pitched forward. The water came up and closed over his head with a gurgle.

Before he came to the surface, something struck him a sharp blow in the back, and then he was tangled with human limbs. He knew what had happened: Being behind him, instead of to one side of him, Zei had not been able to resist the pull of the rope as he went into the hole but had been towed right in after him.

He finally got his head clear, broke a length of terpahla that had wrapped itself around his neck, and began to climb out. It was harder than he expected, for the skis got fouled in the vine and made normal movements impossible. When he finally got his legs under him and recovered his oar, he sidled away from the hole and helped Zei out by pulling on the rope.

When she had coughed up half the Banjao Sea and recovered her breath, she said: "I trust, my lord, you'll not deem it impertinent if I advocate that you, too, watch where you place your feet?"

He grinned shamefacedly. "Turn abqut's fair play, as we say in Nyamadze. We're nearly there, thank the gods."

As the light waxed he saw why he had fallen in. They were nearing the edge of the solid part of the Sunqar, and there were many gaps in the vine. Ahead, beyond the raft, the ^Wne was not solid at all, but drifting in yellow-brown patches of all sizes.

At last they clattered on to the raft and sank down on its moldering timbers with a simulataneous sigh of exhaustion. Barnevelt untied his ski lashings and turned his attention to those of his companion. She winced at his touch, and when he got.the rope and the canvas wrappings off he saw that her feet had been chafed raw in several places.

"Great Qondyor!" he said. "These must have hurt! Why didn't you tell me?"

"To what end? You could not have borne me across this insubstantial floor of floating weed, and my plaint would only have distracted you from your proper task."

"You've got guts," he said, pulling off his boots and socks and wringing out the latter.

"I thank you." Then she laughed. "Look at your legs!"

In the increasing light he saw his legs were streaked with blue where the dye of the expressman's uniform had run.

A pre-dawn breeze sprang up, making Barnevelt shiver.

"Brr!" said Zei. "And I had but just got dry from the previous ducking! Here, doff that wet apparel and suffer me to wring it out. Otherwise 'twill not dry for hours in this dank."

Suiting the action to the word she slid out of her own flimsy garb and wrung it over the side. Dirk's Chautauqua County past rose up and covered him with a blush as rosy as the dawn, while Zei, with no more self-consciousness than a one-year-old, hung her clothes on the raft's remaining mast stay and said: "What holds my lord from action? Are you maimed in your members?"

Barnevelt mutely obeyed.

As he took off his jacket, Sheafase's letter fell out. He crumpled it and threw it away. It would serve no useful purpose now and might cause trouble if it incited Queen Alvandi's curiosity as to why the Morya Sunqaruma were so interested in her friends from Nyamadze.

He said: "One good dose of sunburn on those sore feet would cripple you for fair. Maybe I could cut down this old sail to cover us—but no, I'd better leave it up for the time being so Chask can find us."

"And if your ship comes not?"

"I've been wondering. Maybe I could sneak back to the settlement at night to steal food and stores for re-rigging this raft or building a new one. Doesn't sound practical, though."

"Oh, so versatile a hero as yourself will overcome all obstacles. Meanwhile, how about sustenance? For I do hunger with a monstrous appetite."

"Now where would I find anything to eat out here?"

"But one of your proven resource and aptitude can surely devise some ingenious expedient…"

"Thanks for the compliments, darling, but even I have limitations. And don't look at me with that famished expression. It reminds me of that beastly custom of your nation."

"Nay, twit me no longer on that subject! The custom was not of my instigation. And fear not that towards you I entertain plans anthropophagous, for like a shomal bred for racing you'd prove all bone and gristle."

He yawned. "We'd better catch some sleep while waiting. You cork off first while I watch."

"But need you not the first repose? Yours has been the heavier…"

"Go to sleep!" roared Barnevelt, feeling very dominant.

"Aye, noble master." She gave him a worshipful look.

He sat down with his back against the mast, his eyes sweeping the horizon. Now and then he pinched or slapped himself to wake himself up. Memories of all the cartoons he had seen, showing a pair of castaways on a raft, paraded through his mind. As the sea water dried upon his hide, it left little itchy flakes of salt. When he scratched his scalp, he became aware that his coarse bronze fuzz was sprouting. He'd better find means of shaving it, or his non-Krishnan origin would soon become obvious.

"O Snyol!" said Zei in piteous tones, "I am too cold to sleep."

"Come on over and let me warm you," he said. Instantly he regretted it. With a swift octopoid motion, Zei slithered sidewise into the crook of his right arm. She was shivering.

"That's better," she said, smiling up at him.

Oh, is it? thought Barnevelt, in whose soul two natures— the cautious, calculating man of affairs and the healthy young animal—were locked in mortal combat. Blood pounded in his temples.

For an instant, the man of affairs ruled. "Excuse me," muttered Barnevelt, disengaging himself and abruptly turning his back on Zei to feel his clothes where they drooped from the stay. They were still damp, as might be expected so close to the surface of the sea. Nevertheless, he donned these dank garments, saying over his shoulder: "They'll never dry on the line at this rate. But if we put them on, our body heat'll dry them in time. Better put your tunic on, too."

"Ugh!" she said, fingering her torn chemise. "But if you say so, my lord." She slipped the gauzy garment over her head. "Now warm me again, sirrah, for my teeth begin to clatter like the castanets of a dancer of Balhib."

Once more they settled down at the base of the mast. The moons neared the horizon; the sun should soon be up. Zei gave a contented sigh and smiled up at Barnevelt. Before he knew what he was doing, he bent down and kissed her.

She neither pulled away nor responded. Instead, her face bore an expression of surprise and perplexity. She asked: "Is this, then, that Earthly custom called 'kissing,' whereof I have heard rumors?"

"Why, yes. Hasn't it spread to Qirib yet?"

'Tis practiced amongst the wilder spirits of the land, I'm told—albeit none of our courtly circle has yet monstrated it to me. Is it true that, amongst the Terrans, 'tis a kind of salute, signifying love and esteem?"

"So they tell me."

"Excellent. It is right and proper, forsooth, that all loyal subjects should love the members of the royal house. So, dear Snyol, have the goodness once more to prove your loyalty to the throne!"

The thought flickered through Barnevelt's mind that "love" had many meanings. He complied. Zei, he found, improved quickly with practice.

Again his blood pounded. Healthy-animal Barnevelt, thrown for the nonce, now rose up and grappled Man-of-affairs Barnevelt. The latter protested: In the name of all the gods, Dirk, use some sense! If you go on like this and she doesn't resist—which she sure hasn't so far—it could cost you your head! Wait till you've gotten your affairs and those of your company straightened out…

Healthy-animal Barnevelt advanced no arguments; he had no need to. By sheer brute strength, he forced Man-of-affairs Barnevelt to the mat. Barnevelt discovered that the partial covering of Zei's hidden glories, far from abating his desires, only stimulated them.

He shifted his position, for his right arm was going to sleep from the pressure of Zei's body. Then a fleck, of brightness ' in the distance brought him up with a start. "What is it, dearest friend?" said Zei.

Barnevelt reluctantly disengaged himself and pointed towards the little whitish triangle, standing up against the lightening sky on the western horizon. "If I'm not mistaken, that's the sail of the Shambor."

He gave her a long, lingering glance. However, Man-dr-affairs Barnevelt was now firmly back at the helm. Grimly, Barnevelt began doing calisthenics. The rotten planking of the ancient raft creaked under his push-ups and knee-bends. "What do you?" asked Zei. "Is that a matutine gesture of obeisance to the grim gods of far Nyamadze?"

"You might put it that way. Nothing like a little exercise to—ah—get the blood circulating. Better try it."

At length he stopped, panting. "It struck me that this may not be our ship after all. So we'd better lie down behind the mast, so as not to show against the sky, just in case."

"What if it be our foes?"

"Then we'll slip into the water and take a chance on the fondaqa."

The sail grew swiftly larger as the dawn breeze drove it closer. When it drew near enough for the ship's hull to be discerned from where they lay, Barnevelt saw that it was indeed the Shambor. He waited, however, until he recognized Chask at the tiller before leaping up to whoop and wave.

Minutes later, the little ship nosed into the weed until her stem bumped the raft. Barnevelt boosted Zei over the rail and climbed aboard himself.

He grumpily told himself that he had had a lucky escape from forming an intimate connection with the princess, with the gods knew what dire results. But, at the same time, the less practical side of his nature—Romantic-dreamer Barnevelt—whispered: Ah, but you do love her, and not as subject and royalty, either! And some day, perhaps, you, and she will be united somehow, somewhere. Some day. Some day…