West of January

WITH SALT STILL DRYING ON MY SKIN, I crept in through the door of Sparkle’s bower and paused to make sure I had not wakened her. Then I started picking my way as quietly as I could over the sprinkle of yellow leaves on the floor. The grove itself helped me, its creakings and rustlings much louder in the rough water near the beach. Below that continuing chorus I could still hear the jabber of the great ones. They had been very excited for some time now, but no one in the tribe could understand their distress. I had just cut short my swim because they had been pestering me so much.

At the far end of the bower, Merry muttered and stirred, crinkling the blanket of bronze leaves that had settled upon him. Then he seemed to go back to sleep, and silence returned. Merry was Merry-son-of-Pebble, because Sparkle claimed that she had been bearing him when I married her. I had accepted that obvious falsehood and so the tribe had also, but Merry had straight hair.

So did Sea Wave’s boy and Wave’s, and Silver’s daughter and many others. Many of their mothers, like Sparkle, were big again. My second crop, a herdman would have said, but I was careful not to use that expression among the seafolk.

I reached my wife and settled down beside her as quietly as I could. I don’t know why I bothered—I doubt that any husband in the history of Vernier ever managed to be quiet enough under those circumstances.

“Who was it this time?” she inquired drowsily.

She had been asleep when I departed. She needed much sleep now, for her time was near.

“Don’t remember.”

With a great heaving, as if a storm had struck the grove, she rolled over to face me. We adjusted position, but it was hard to cuddle her present bulk satisfactorily.

“Not funny.”

“Whoever it was,” I said, “wasn’t pretty like you. Not as lovable. Couldn’t be.”

She frowned and spoke very quietly, in case there might be listeners beyond the wicker walls. “Must not go to wives, Golden.”

How do women know such things? Still, Sparkle was jealous of my other duties, and I loved it. “You know I would make waves only with you if I could, love,” I assured her. “You’re always my favorite.”

She bit her lip, so I tried to kiss it better. She wouldn’t let me.

“Never mind worrying, my dearest Sparkle,” I said. “You concentrate on that baby of yours. She’s going to be my first, remember!”

“He!” she insisted automatically. “And who shouting at?”

I must have been louder than I thought. “Sand. Young weed-brain!” I had caught Sand hunting alone again. I told them and told them… Since Pebble died, though, we’d only lost one man. A shark had bitten off Clamshell’s foot and he had bled to death. Great ones could outrun sharks, but they could not apply tourniquets. We had lost one man, but many others had been just plain lucky. They promised, and they forgot again, and I screamed again…

“And the great ones are getting worse,” I muttered, hearing the constant clicking and booming. Then the old cracked voice of Icegleam rose in triumph from some nearby bower.

“Visitor!” he yelled with sudden comprehension. “Is what have been trying to tell us! Visitor coming!”

Sparkle’s big eyes widened. “Visitor? What sort of visitor?”

I could guess what sort of visitor.

His chariot was brown and streaked with salt; mainsail yellow, foresail white. It approached very slowly in the fitful wind, flanked by a leaping escort of great ones almost to the place where its wheels grounded on shingle. Momentarily it bounced and twisted in the surf, then dozens of willing hands grabbed it and rushed it up to dry land.

The angel stood tall and lean against the sky as he furled his sails, quickly and efficiently. Then he vaulted nimbly over side of his chariot, landing with a crunch of boots on shingle.

His hair was a chestnut plume, hanging thick behind his ears and held by a beaded headband. Sun and wind had burnt his face almost the same umber shade as his fringed buckskins, and its bony planes projected endurance and authority and wry good humor. He was as unlike Violet as anyone could be.

We spent more time on shore now, and I made sure there was a supply of shoes there, but there were not enough for everyone. Thus the tribe had spread itself in a long line along the water’s edge to wait for the angel’s greetings. The women came first, each speaking her name and embracing him with fervor. He responded conscientiously, obviously wise to the amorous ways of seafolk and aware that any response less than ardor would be a slight.

He was flushed and grinning as he embraced the last, who happened to be the youthfully alluring and enthusiastic Surge. She prolonged the encounter, squirming against him erotically. Sand grinned proudly nearby.

The angel broke free from her. He rolled his eyes and took a deep breath, and the men smiled. Then each of them also offered a hug and spoke welcome. When he arrived at me, I was tempted to shake his hand and say “Knobil,” but I embraced him in seafolk fashion and gave my seaman name. Nevertheless, he held my shoulder for a moment, studying me with shrewd gray eyes.

Finally, of course, he had to meet all the children. He knelt on the shingle to hug and kiss, as was expected. Then he rose and glanced around as if counting. His gaze lingered again on me, the fair-haired obvious misfit.

The grove lay close to shore now, more gold than green. We no longer dared light fires, even on the floating hearths, so I had set some of the men to building a bonfire on the beach—a hellish task, with the heat of the flames adding to the sun’s crippling glare. I was worried, although no one else seemed to be.

The creek trickled listlessly through the shingle, its flow a dismal mockery of what it once had been. Offshore the great ones lingered, spouting and watching. They could no longer leap and sport close to the grove, where the water was now almost too shallow for them to approach at all.

There was an awkward pause, as the seafolk shuffled feet and exchanged bashful glances, uncertain who should speak or say what. I hung back, amused. As I would have guessed, it was Sparkle who took charge. She handed Merry to me, having enough trouble balancing without any additional burden. He wrapped his arms around my neck and squealed “Golden!” in my ear. Being Pebble’s son, he did not call me Daddy, and that was one faint rankle that I could never quite suppress.

“Shall all be honored if will feast with us, Angel,” Sparkle said.

He nodded graciously. “Your hospitality will be welcome, lady. But if the feast may be delayed briefly, I would first speak with your elders. My stay with you must be short. My mission is urgent.”

Sparkle called over the senior members of the tribe—Behold and Icegleam and Tusk, the surviving members of the original settlers, and introduced them again. I was surprised to learn that Tusk was Beholds brother. These three were certainly the elders in the literal sense of the word, but they held no special authority in the tribe. No one did, unless it was perhaps Sparkle herself, for she had a natural grace and a most uncommon common sense…and me, of course, but I was more of a younger than an elder.

The elders settled in the ripples and Sparkle sat behind them. I crouched at her side to hear what the angel had to say. I have always had more than my share of stupidity, but I was not stupid enough to be unconcerned. I knew already that the sea-tree copse was ailing and the sea itself retreating. White sand had become shingle, the creek had dwindled, my ancient, half-forgotten driftwood collection now lay far inland, out of sight across the plain. I had seen angels come to warn herdfolk, and I could guess that this new one brought no good tidings.

Some of the other adults clustered around also, but most went off to play languid games with their children, for it was a rarity to have everyone gathered onshore at the same time. The angel remained standing, tucking thumbs in his belt and looking us over for a moment before starting to speak.

“Your home is dying,” he began. “You must know that it will soon be out of the water altogether?”

“Time yet,” Behold said complacently.

“Soon it will lie in the surf zone and be ripped to pieces. You do not have long—it will happen before that babe you carry learns to crawl, lady.” He meant Sparkle.

“Great ones will find us another.”

He shook his head. “It is not the shallow water that is killing the sea trees. There are other groves. I have passed many, and they are all dying.”

No one else spoke, so I said, “Why?”

“Salt. The ocean is shrinking—evaporating—and the water is becoming too salty.”

“The watervines!” I said. “They all—”

The angel flashed me an odd glance and I stopped, puzzled.

Old Tusk cackled. “Was born on land, in much colder place than this. Will show them how to make tents. Is always changing, the sea. Are able to change also.”

There was a mutter of agreement, and some of the audience wandered away. The angel’s eyes scanned the rest of us carefully and fixed themselves on Sparkle. “And what will you drink?”

“He is right,” I told the silence. “The stream is much smaller than—”

Again the angel caught my eye, and this time he plainly shook his head. He wanted me to stay out.

“Rain,” Tusk said, less confidently.

“When did you last see rain?”

He got no answer. I looked at Sparkle, who was frowning. There had been no rain since I had come to the grove.

“Will find another stream. Great ones will know.”

The angel shook his head sadly. “Even if you do find one, it will dry up soon. The sun is coming… Do you know that the sun moves?”

I did, of course, and I had seen the grasslands die, but my seafolk hosts had never cared much for that morbid tale. Now the angel began to tell a terrifyingly similar story. The springs would dry up, the ocean would dry up, the fish would die. When High Summer arrived, the sea itself might boil. The prospect horrified me, but I was even more horrified when I looked around my companions and saw no alarm on their faces. The seafolk were going to be as disbelieving as the herdfolk.

“What must do?” Sparkle asked. More of the other listeners were scrambling up and going off to join in the play.

“You must leave! Load your boats, mount your great ones, and travel the Great River, back to the South Ocean.”

The three elders scowled and muttered, “Cold!”

“You must go soon!” the angel said. “The Great River is flowing very swiftly. Soon it will be too fast for even the great ones, and they will be trapped here. They cannot leave on foot, as people can.”

Already people were leaving on foot—leaving the meeting. Only Sparkle and the three elders remained, in sullen silence. And me. Sparkle blushed and said, “Have many women with child…”

The angel’s bright eyes flickered toward me and then away again. “You must not delay, even for that. Pregnant women can travel in boats.”

The listeners glanced at one another. “Are grateful, sir,” Sparkle said. “Will talk it over soon. Now have feast, and singing?”

The angel smiled. “I shall enjoy that. First I must attend to a few things…in my chariot, then I shall join your feast.”

With sighs of relief, the gathering dispersed. The angel caught my eye again and jerked his head. I handed Merry back to Sparkle and strode off alongside him.

He was a handbreadth taller than me, that lanky angel, and he looked down at me with needle-sharp gray eyes as we paced along the strand toward his chariot.

“Your name was not always Golden.”

“It was Knobil, sir…once.”

“Wetlander?”

“Herdman.”

That surprised him. We reached our destination, but obviously his only purpose had been to take me aside for a private chat. He leaned back against one of the big wheels, folded his arms, and studied the scene on the beach for a few moments.

“What do you think of seafolk?” he asked quietly.

“They are very kind. Very happy people. Very hospitable.”

He nodded, and a small grin crinkled the sun-browned skin around his eyes. “They have obviously been hospitable to you, Knobil—or should I call you Herdmaster?”

I felt my face grow hot. “What can you mean, sir?”

“Very few toddlers, but a great many babies? Many women pregnant? I see a lot of youngsters with straight hair.”

I shrugged. Fortunately there had been no scandalously blond or blue-eyed babies.

“How many are yours?”

“None—according to the tribe.”

“How many according to you?”

I contrived what I hoped was an innocent boyish grin. “Nineteen, sir.”

He shook his head in what might have been admiration. “You have cause to be proud of your manhood.”

I shrugged modestly. “Any herdman can outbreed a seaman.”

“It isn’t only that.” He hesitated and then said, “I don’t question your prowess—you’re obviously a fabulous stud, and they’re very fortunate to have you available—but their trouble is mostly inbreeding.”

“It is?” I was taken aback. The incest taboo?

“How many founders?”

“Sir?”

“How many came from the South Ocean?”

“Six…four women, two men.”

The angel nodded sadly. “And they were probably highly inbred to start with. You can tell just by looking at them, Knobil, right? They all look as alike as a clutch of eggs. When relationships get that close, fertility drops. The women don’t conceive, and when they do, they usually abort. They won’t lose yours, of course. How do they dispose of the freaks?”

Freaks? “I… I don’t know, sir.” I had not even known about miscarriages. No one ever mentioned such things. Freaks? I shuddered.

“And the intelligence goes down,” Brown added. “They’re like kids, aren’t they?” He eyed me thoughtfully.

“I try to be patient with them.”

He nodded. “This is the fourth group I’ve talked with, and they’re all the same. It’s very serious! There isn’t much time.”

I had little understanding of time, but I nodded profoundly.

“The woman—your wife?—said they would talk it over. Will they?”

“Probably not. They prefer to ignore unpleasant things, sir.” They would forget the angel’s bad news as soon as possible.

“But I think you can help me… Herdmaster.”

“I’m a seaman now, sir.”

“But you deserve the title. Very few men of your age have sired so many—and such fine strong babies! I’m really impressed. You won’t mind if I call you Herdmaster while we’re alone?”

“Of course not.”

“And you may be able to save your family and friends, perhaps even many other tribes also. Now, tell me your story.”

“Once I was a pilgrim.” I fumbled at my neck for a leather amulet that Sparkle had made for me long ago, and which I had dug out now in the angel’s honor. It closed very tightly around a small packet, well waterproofed with grease. I opened this and showed my two tokens.

“Two!” The angel whistled. “I’ve never heard of anyone collecting two! And if you will help me, of course I shall give you one of mine. You’ll have three then, Herdmaster! That’s never been done before, I’m sure.”

“Of course I shall help, sir. Not for a token—I am a pilgrim no longer. But in a sense I feel that the tribe—I feel they are all my children.”

“Of course you do,” he said. “But three angel tokens! I’m sure Heaven has never heard of such a feat. Let’s get up in the chariot where we won’t be disturbed. I want to hear this!”

So we clambered up and sat down opposite each other on the two chests near the rear. This chariot was a great deal tidier and smarter-seeming than Violet’s had been.

I told him my history, and all about my escape from the grasslands, and of my former ambition to become an angel. I confessed that I now just wished to remain with my family, and he assured me that he understood. Once or twice some of the seafolk sauntered over. The angel ignored them, and they wandered away again without speaking. He listened carefully, nodding, solemnly attentive.

When I had done, he sighed. “I knew Violet. He taught me how to drive a chariot. A plump stocky man?”

“Knew? He didn’t arrive?”

Sadly the angel shook his head. Of course, Violet was an ancient memory to me now, but I had not forgotten that I owed him my life and that in his way he had cared for me. I had promised to meet him in Heaven. I had often wondered if he even remembered the gawky blond herdbrat, but I had always assumed that he had driven safely home. And yet I had spared no thought for Violet in a long time.

After a moment’s silence. Brown said, “We… I mean Heaven—we lost many, many angels in the grasslands tragedy, Herdmaster. They are being replaced, but it takes so long… We are late in getting the message to the March Ocean—here, to the seafolk. Now, I’ll try to explain properly. Did Violet show you any maps?”

I shook my head blankly.

He shrugged and settled back, although I had thought he was going to open the chest he was sitting on.

“Well, I’ll show you later. The March Ocean was born before you and I were, back when the sun melted the ice—you know, of course, that the Dawn area is all covered with ice? The water is salt, because there is salt left behind when it dries out…”

I had no notion what “ice” was, but I nodded solemnly and did not interrupt as he continued speaking in a very man-to-man sort of way. I paid much more heed to the way he was addressing me than to what he actually said.

Later, when I reached Heaven, I was given the explanation again, and I listened better then. Every cycle is the same. Meltwater fills the basin, eventually overflowing to create the Great River. All the folk of Vernier must travel westward during their lives, but seafolk try also to find northerly bays or small seas, for those are warmer than the main ocean. Behold and her family—and many other families—had fought their way up the salty torrent of the Great River. They had found a paradise of calm, warm water.

Eventually drainage is diverted and the influx from the wetlands ends. As the water level falls, the Great River stops running. The approaching sun begins to evaporate the March Ocean. Partly because of the increased rainfall that this produces elsewhere, partly by accident of geography, the next portion of the cycle is marked by a rise in the South Ocean, which finally floods along the Great River in the opposite direction. So the door was now open again. The seafolk could escape from the trap.

But only if they went soon. The flow was increasing as the relative level of the two oceans changed. Rapids and waterfalls would multiply until even the great ones would not be able to swim against the current. People could still leave overland—if they wanted to and were shown the road—but the great ones would certainly be trapped. Like a true seaman, I was almost more horrified by the danger to them than by the risk for humans. Ultimately input from the Great River would be unable to keep pace with evaporation. The March Ocean would become a desolate salt flat.

The angel stopped talking then and stared along at the seafolk, who were beginning to gather near the bonfire. The feast was almost ready. “They are indeed your children, Knobil. Your tribe. Your herd. They do not know that, but you do. It is your duty to save them.”

“What must—what can I do?”

His steel-bright eyes came back to mine. The bony planes of his face shone with sweat, like mirrors. I sensed again that strange intensity.

“This happens every cycle. Usually there is a disaster. When there is not, it is because the great ones have been told. The records say that the great ones can speak to each other across the whole width of the ocean. You must warn them, and they will round up the seafolk.”

I stared at him in dismay. “I cannot speak to the great ones!”

He was surprised—and skeptical. “But you ride them? How can you hunt with them if you can’t speak their language?”

“Hunting is easy. Oh, I know some signals and a few words. I can understand a little of their song, but anything complicated, like what you want—that needs three people.”

“Why three?”

“To make the harmonies.”

He frowned, as if he should have remembered that. “Well, you could ask two other to help you, surely?”

As a callow youth I had cared nothing when I saw the herdfolk die, and there had been no way I could have helped them anyway; but these were my friends—and my children. I wanted to save the tribe, and I also wanted to please the angel. I watched the seafolk as they laughed and frolicked in the surf, then I turned away. I avoided the angel’s eyes and stared down instead at the bony shins protruding from his boots.

“I don’t think so, sir,” I whispered.

“Why not?”

“I can tell my mount to dive, or turn, or find seals or sunfish—but I don’t know any of the words you want. Not that they really have words—they speak in chords and in rhythm.”

“But can you not then ask three to speak for you?”

“I could ask…”

“So…?”

“I wouldn’t know what they said,” I mumbled, still glumly studying his feet. I could guess what sort of message would be passed—squirt Golden, dunk him, swim him around in circles… If the seafolk did not want to admit the truth of the angel’s warning even to themselves, they would certainly not tell the great ones.

“There must be some you can trust, Knobil? The women?”

I did not reply.

Brown turned again and studied the crowd on the beach. “Widows I can understand—I know their ways. But I see at least six pregnant wives over there. Obviously you’ve talked yourself into enough beds—”

“Not so! They talk me into it! I won’t go to a wife unless her husband asks me outright.”

Brown said nothing until I looked up. Not liking what I saw, I quickly dropped my eyes again.

“You are not exactly brimming over with tact, are you, herdman? You make them beg?”

“Ask! Just ask.”

He grunted. “I expect it feels like begging. Name of Heaven! ‘Please breed my wife because I’m not man enough’!? Couldn’t you have just settled for a hint or two? You don’t leave them much pride, do you? You think they can’t tell straight hair from curls as well as you can? Do you gloat much?”

He did not expect a reply, and I squirmed in silence. Then he sighed. “Well, I shall keep trying. There must be many other tribes, and perhaps I can convince one of them to tell the great ones in time. The records insist that it is the only way.”

I did not know who “the records” were, but obviously he listened to them and thought them wise.

“There is another possibility,” the angel said. “It is a faint chance. The Great River is not far from here—I think you could almost make it in one ride, without a sleep, because the great ones travel much faster than my chariot does. If you were to go upstream as far as the worst rapids, in the mountains, and then come down again… I think your mount might understand. They are very smart, you know. They could taste the better seawater coming in. You might have to do it twice—to show them that the flow was getting faster. It might work.”

“My wife is going to have a child—”

“Your wife is going to die. And all of your children. Or don’t you care about them? Is hot groin all you’re interested in?”

I clenched my teeth till they hurt. Someone shouted my name from the fireside and others called for the angel. I forced myself to look at him again.

“There might be another way.”

He regarded me warily. “Go on.”

“There is no one in the grove at the moment—no one at all.”

“You can’t be certain of that.”

“I am. I counted. I’m always counting. They stray worse than woollies—”

“What are you thinking?”

“If they lost their home right away, while you were still here to lecture them again—then they might listen? I could run down for a swim.” It was so hot that everyone was taking quick dips to cool off. “No one would notice if I slipped out to the grove. I have tinder and flint at my feasting place—”

“Did you ever see grassfires in your youth?”

“Of course!”

He nodded. “And you fought them with backfires? Woollies themselves are fireproof, so I’m told—”

“I could be back here before anyone noticed. Then we could organize a rescue, to save the tools and clothes and things—”

“No!” His voice cracked with the finality of a club hitting a seal’s skull. Again I averted my eyes from the expression on his face.

“Why not, sir?”

“First, it would be violence, so I will not condone it. People must be able to trust angels. In fact, I shall stop you if you try—you know that I have that power?” I remembered Violet slaying the tyrant; I shivered and nodded. Again there were shouts for us from the feast.

“Secondly you’re judging by grassfires, which are relatively harmless. That grove is a dry trelliswork, packed with dead leaves. It would explode in one big roar of flame. You would save nothing. You would leave the tribe not merely homeless but destitute, with no possessions at all. Forget that, Knobil!”

Sparkle was heading toward the chariot, plodding heavily along the shiny shingle.

“My wife is coming to tell us the meal is ready, sir.”

“What will you say to her?”

“That we are coming?”

“And what will you say to her when she comes to tell you that the stream has stopped flowing? Well? Look at me, damn it!”

This time his gray eyes held me as if he had nailed me to the side of the chariot. No water? The children could die of thirst while we searched for another stream. The tribe kept no emergency supply, and of course we ought to be doing that, but the seafolk never would do anything so strenuous, not even after this warning.

His stare was a challenge—to my courage, to my manhood, to every stitch of the self-respect he had just rubbed threadbare.

I licked my lips and surrendered. “I’ll try, sir.”

He smiled in triumph and held out a hand. There was a small triangle of leather lying on his palm: brown, yellow, and white.

“Your third!”

I took it and was committed, and I wanted to weep.

I wiped my mouth and tossed the remains of my blackfish into the surf. The whole tribe was sitting in one long line in the fingertips of the sea, listlessly debating the problem of ferrying the children back to the grove for the singing. A dozen girls flocked around the angel.

“I am going away,” I said.

Sparkle was cracking a crawler leg for Merry. Her head twisted around to me. “No!”

“Just to look at the Great River. A few sleeps, is all.”

“No! Not leave me!”

“It’s very important, dearest. The angel is right. We are all in danger.”

She patted my knee. “Stay till after baby. Then go.”

“That might be too late.”

Alarm flickered in her eyes. “After angel leaves, then.”

“No. Now.” I did not think the angel would go before I did.

Suddenly she looked angry, as if I were being a foolish child.

“Must wait at least for singing!”

I had meant to wait for the singing, and had she reacted differently, I think my resolution would have collapsed altogether. Instead her sharp tone made my own terror flare up in petty rage.

“Dark hell the singing! Now! You can eat at Sand’s place while I’m gone.” I trusted Sparkle to be faithful to me, and she was much too pregnant not to be.

Sparkle glared. “Taking who with you?”

“No one. If I wait for anyone else, I’ll never get away.”

“Stupid to go alone!” she shouted, and she pushed Merry aside as he tried to climb on her lap. Unaccustomed to such rebuffs, he burst into tears. We were attracting attention. “Is your rule—not go alone!”

“I’ve asked them!” I had asked at least a dozen of the seafolk and had heard a dozen different excuses. Even a herdman can take a hint if he’s thumped hard enough.

Suspicion settled over Sparkle’s face. “Did give token?”

I nodded.

“So going to Heaven?” She was starting to shout. “Pilgrim again? Again want to be angel? Visit camps and tribes and meet lots of nice girls? Tired of being father and husband?”

She was hugely pregnant and miserably uncomfortable in the heat. I should have made more allowances, but I was on edge, too, and I was still under the spell of the angel’s flattery.

“No, not that. I told you I’m coming back as soon as I can.”

“Don’t! Stay away!”

“What?!” I howled, as she heaved herself unsteadily to her feet. “Sparkle! You love me. You said so!”

And I truly believed that I loved Sparkle.

“And you? If loved me, would not go! First Pebble, now Golden? Soon have married all the men. Think Whistler is old enough for next?”

I rose also, trying to explain the angel’s plan, but she would not listen. Soon we had a shouting competition going, while the rest of the tribe watched in horror. I could send another in my place, she said. I was a herdman who did not like his possessions talking back to him. If I really loved her, I would not make wave with all those other women. I must not forget to kiss Surge goodbye—how did she know about Surge?

“And big kiss for Salty, also.” She turned her back on me.

I was supposed to put my arms around her at that point.

I didn’t. Of course she was frightened, and seafolk did not know how to handle fear. Now I see that. Then I did not.

I also was afraid and now ashamed, too. I pushed past sobbing children. I strode away into the surf, without a word and without looking back. I should have been more understanding. I should have explained better, but I did nothing that I should have. Like a petulant child, I just walked away. It would have made no difference in the end, but it is another of the great regrets of my life.

—2—

FRITH WAS A FULL-GROWN MALE NOW, almost as large as Gorf. He had a mate, Pfapff, who came with us, and three or four other great ones kept us company for a while. I carried two water bottles, a knife, and a net. I wore a hat and pagne, and my amulet contained three angel tokens. In my throbbing angry head was a muddled account of the geography, given me by that rawboned, steely-eyed angel.

I hated him.

The great ones were still excited, and I am sure that their discussions were booming to and fro across the ocean. Having to stay near the surface, Frith would not have been able to hear properly, but the others listened to the long-range talk and repeated it to him in their local chatter—or so I believe. I may be wrong, for neither saint nor seaman fully understands the great ones.

I was weary and sunbaked when members of another pod came leaping and spouting to meet me and lead me to one of the other tribes that Brown had mentioned. Their grove had long since vanished, and they camped in cheerfully ramshackle tents on steaming sand by a stream that I noted glumly to be even smaller than ours. There would be no refuge here for us if our water failed.

I was given food and a place to rest. I was not told whose home it was, and I slept alone. I awoke screaming. For the first time since my marriage to Sparkle, I had dreamed of Anubyl beating my mother. I had felt my nails cut into my palms and tasted the blood from my bitten lip.

I refused my hosts’ entreaties to tarry longer. Frith had waited, as I had asked him to, and we continued our journey south with Pfapff at our side. Our other escorts had departed. I did not feel the same lonely terror that I had known before. I was a seaman, Frith was with me, and he would take care of me.

The Great River was easy to find. Even I could smell the difference in the water, and the tussocks of vegetation floating in it were not yet yellowed by excess salt. Most rivers are narrow, short-lived, and drinkable. This one was a moving sea, too wide for both banks to be visible at the same time. Frith and Pfapff seemed excited at the chance to explore a new environment, and they plunged eagerly ahead.

Eventually I grew so tired and hungry that I had to call for a halt. The sun was near to being overhead and there were few shadows, but I asked to be put ashore on some high rocks, and I found a shaded ledge. Soon thereafter Frith put up his head, made his chuckling sound, and threw me a fish that would have fed half the tribe. I ate. I slept. This time I dreamed of Loneliness, and I nearly wept with relief when I awoke and saw that Frith was still there. Had he left me, I should have died very quickly on that barren little island.

Two more sleeps brought me to the mountains and to faster currents. By then my skin was peeling in sheets from the continuous salt and sun, yet I had no alternative but to continue, and I was excited by the sight of the huge hills and the vaster hazy-blue giants raked along the horizon behind them.

With no warning, Frith and Pfapff balked. They swam in circles, chattering furiously, and no signal or word from me would persuade them to go farther. Of course, the words I knew were little closer to their true speech than “Whoa!” is to horse talk. I could tell them what I wanted, but in no way could I explain why it was important.

Important or not, my journey seemed to have ended. I even tried dismounting and swimming in the direction I wanted to go. They let me do so, clattering with amusement as the current swept me backward toward the March Ocean. Only when I was exhausted and sinking did Frith stop laughing and retrieve me.

I asked again and was refused again. Then, just as I was ready to admit defeat, a strange thing happened. A tremor of excitement ran through the great muscular back I straddled. At the same instant Pfapff sounded. I knew from the angle of her tail that she was going deep. Frith sank as low in the water as he could without drowning me and then just drifted, listening.

Of course, I remembered how I had learned of Pebble s death, and I was filled with dread that something bad had happened back at the grove. I felt deep booming sounds from Pfapff. Those I knew to be long-distance talk. Some important message was being passed.

Both great ones surfaced simultaneously, spouting and gibbering. They held a long conversation, but if they were trying to tell me the news, they failed utterly. To my astonishment, however, they then set off against the current at high speed, with me hanging grimly to Frith’s fin and Pfapff leaping exuberantly alongside. Showing no further hesitation, they carried me up the Great River and through the mountains.

Of course, I was perplexed beyond measure at their change of heart. It was much, much later that I received a plausible explanation, and it came from Kettle, a former seaman and by then a saint, great scholar, and senior aide to Gabriel himself. My companions’ initial reluctance to go farther, he suggested, had probably been due to the increasing noise of the river. It would have cut them off from the sounds of the ocean and from the chatter of the other great ones. Then, just as I had concluded that I must abandon my mission, they had learned of the impending disaster.

Brown-yellow-white, the angel who had bewitched me into this folly, was one of two who had survived the journey down the Great River to the March Ocean. The two angels had then split up. Brown had gone north. The other, Two-pink-green, had followed the southern shore, and his efforts had met with success. He had been able to convince one tribe of the imminent danger. They informed their great ones, who immediately passed the news to all the others. Then Frith and Pfapff knew what I was trying to do, more or less. Perhaps they were excited at being pathfinders for the great migration. Perhaps they were even ordered by some central great-one leader to go ahead and explore. Who can say?

The canyon through the Andes Mountains is one of the wonders of the world, and traveling up it on Frith’s back was the most awe-inspiring journey I was to know on all my wanderings. In many places it churned and roared, with waves standing like hills and great whirlpool mouths howling at us impudent wayfarers, seeking to suck us down to our destruction. Repeatedly I was swept off, helpless as froth, and rescued by Pfapff, who was keeping close behind Frith to guard me. The two great ones reveled in the tumult, at times leaping like roos up the cataracts, although at other times even they needed to seek out calmer pools and rest. As for me, I could only hope that they would take my screams of terror to be shouts of joy, or that those went unheard in the violence of the waves.

This was the route that Violet had intended to sail. We can never know how far he went after leaving me, but a few angels did return to Heaven at about that time and by that road. Their accomplishment shows how greatly the respective levels of the two oceans had changed while I wandered alone on the sands and then dallied among the seafolk.

Yet there were also wide calm places, where the river wound in chasms through barren hills scoured to sterile rock by the higher floods of the past, or cauterized by the heat of summer. Sometimes the river narrowed, with rocky sides rising sheer until the sky was a ragged slit of light shining far above me, reflected on the black stillness as if it were also far below. At those times I seemed to float in air rather than on water. Plumes of cataracts graced the walls, some dropping from heights so great that only mist reached down to dimple the mirrored surface. For long stretches I traveled on dark glass, leaving a narrow, V-shaped wake behind me.

Earlier—at about the time of my birth—the river had been much higher, but I have been assured by the saints that I saw only a part of the canyon. They estimate that it was still about half-full when I went through; at other times the gorge is that much deeper. I have never had any desire to go back and see.

The only more terrible journey I can imagine would be to descend that hellish torrent in an angel chariot. It had never been done so late in the cycle, but it was the fastest route from Heaven to the March Ocean, and with time running out for the seafolk, the archangel had sent his six best sailors. Brown and Pink survived. The names of the other four are recorded on the Scroll of Honor.

We emerged at last from a rift in the mountains onto calm water stretching out of sight in three directions. I thought it must be another ocean, but it was only an inland sea lying to the east of the Andes. On Heaven’s maps it looks very small.

Here I was greeted by a gentle rain, an experience I had almost forgotten, the first shower I had seen since my childhood. It cleared almost at once, to show a nearby hillside clothed in rich grass and bearing real trees.

I was battered and spent, much too weary to think of food. Frith took me to this idyllic shore. I drank deeply at a stream of crystal water, found a dry spot under a bush, and lay like a dead man.

I awoke stiff, bruised, and famished. By then the surface of the sea was already dotted with fins and spoutings. Even as I watched, more great ones were emerging from the mouth of the canyon. Of course I did not know about Two-pink-green. I did not know that my mission had been completely unnecessary. I assumed that the honor was mine, and I congratulated myself on being a hero. All Brown need do now was watch as the seafolk were rounded up by the great ones and borne away to safety. That was, indeed, what happened. Unlike the tragic dying in the grasslands, there was no disaster on the March Ocean in this cycle. Not everyone made it—many bodies floated back down the Great River—but most did, and Heaven recorded a success.

Battered and naked and starving, though, the self-hailed hero wanted breakfast. In the tumult of the canyon I had lost everything except my knife and my amulet. I mounted a rock at the water’s edge and hopefully sang Frith’s name. The shore sloped steeply. In a miraculously short time he thrust his head up almost at my feet and tossed me a fish, clicking welcome and amusement. I called out my thanks, greatly relieved that he had not deserted me.

Yet raw fish is a dull diet. After I had taken the edge off my hunger, I began collecting dry leaves from below the densest shrubs and soon worked up a sweat twirling a stick, while I pondered my immediate future.

The passage of the canyon had been a torment for even a strong mount and a relatively skilled rider. Towing coracles of terrified children and pregnant women would be a feat I just could not imagine the tribe achieving without my help. There was not a man I would trust to keep his head. My obvious duty was to return to the March Ocean and take charge.

If Frith refused to go through that hell again—and of course my craven heart hoped that he would refuse—then I could camp quite happily on this hospitable shore. Or so I thought. I could wait for the tribe—great ones and people both. So I thought. Even if I was asleep when they passed through the gates of the mountain, Frith and Pfapff would tell them where I was. They would almost certainly head for this stream anyway, the first fresh water. Whether I went back or stayed, we should be reunited. I would ask Frith, and he would decide. I saw no other possibility.

But I was fairly certain that Frith would take me.

By the time I had worked all that out, I had roasted a piece of my fish on the rocks of my hearth. I skewered it on a stick. With my mouth watering, I rose to my feet to find a comfortable spot, away from the heat.

I had earned this feast, I thought, and a rest in this so-serene campsite. I had earned the joy of smelling grass again, and the soothing shade of real trees, the inspiring view of mountains and shore. This was Paradise, and I longed to share it with Sparkle and my friends.

Above me, the smoke from my fire climbed slowly up the azure sky, visible to half the world.

I think of that moment as the end of my innocence.