Morning came to the ocean and with it the breeze from the west. The floats could no longer be seen; the ocean was a blue mirror in all directions, Sklar Hast lowered Blasdel's horn into the water, listened. Nothing could be heard. Barquan Blasdel did the same and agreed that King Kragen was nowhere near.
There were perhaps six hundred coracles in the flotilla, each carrying from four to eight persons, with as much gear, household equipment and tools as possible, together with sacks of food and water.
Late in the afternoon they noted a few medium-sized floats to the north, but made no attempt to land- King Kragen was yet too near at hand.
The late afternoon breeze arose. Rude sails were rigged and the oarsmen rested. At dusk Sklar Hast ordered all the coracles connected by lines to minimize the risk of separation. When the breeze died and seas reflected the dazzling stars, the sails were brought down and alt slept.
The following day was like the first, and also the day after.
On the morning of the fourth day a line of splendid floats appeared ahead, easily as large and as rich of foliage as those they had left. Sklar Hast would have preferred to sail on another week, but the folk among the coracles were fervent in their rejoicing, and he clearly would have encountered nearunanimous opposition. So the flotilla landed upon three closely adjoining floats, drove stakes into the pad surface, tethered the coracles.
Sklar Hast called an informal convocation. "In a year or two," he said, "we can live lives as comfortable as those we left behind us- But this is not enough. We left our homes because of King Kragen. who is now our deadly enemy. We shall never rest secure until we find a means to make ourselves supreme over all the kragen- To this purpose we must live different lives ihan we did in the old days-until King Kragen is killed. How to kill King Kragen? I wish 1 knew.
He is a monster, impregnable to any weapon we now can use against him. So this must be our primary goal: weapons against King Kragen." Sklar Hast paused, looked around the somber group. "This is my personal feeling. I have no authority over any of you, beyond that of the immediate circumstances, which are transient. You have a right to discredit me, to think differently-in which case I will muster those who feel as I do, and sail on to still another float, where we can dedicate ourselves to the killing of King Kragen. If we are all agreed, that our souls are not our own until King Kragen is dead, then we must formalize this feeling. Authority must be given to some person or group of persons.
Responsibilities must be delegated; work must be organized.
As you see I envision a life different to the old. It will be harder in some respects, easier in others. First of all, we need not feed King Kragen…"
A committee of seven members was chosen, to serve as a temporary governing body until the needs of the new community required a more elaborate system. As a matter of course Sklar Hast was named to the committee, as well as Phyral Berwick, who became the first chairman, and also Mem Cagno the Scrivener. The captured Intercessors sat aside in a sullen group and took no part in the proceedings.
The committee met for an hour, and as its first measure, ordained a census, that each man's caste and craft might be noted.
After the meeting Meth Cagno took Sklar Hast aside.
"When you captured Barquan Blasdel, you brought his books."
"True."
"I have been examining these books. They are a set of me Ancient Dicta."
"So I understand."
"This is a source of great satisfaction to me. No one except the Scrivener reads tile Dicta nowadays, though everyone professes familiarity. As the generations proceed, the lives of our ancestors and the fantastic environment from which they came seem more like myth than reality."
"I suppose this is true enough- I am a Hoodwink by trade and only know Hoodwink configurations. The Dicta are written in ancient calligraph, which puzzles me."
"It is difficult to read, that I grant," said Cagno. "However, a patient examination of the Dicta can be profitable.
Each volume represents the knowledge of one of our ancestors, to the extent that he was able to organize it. There is also a great deal of repetition and dullness; our ancestors, whatever their talents, had a few literary skills. Some are vainglorious and devote pages to self-encomium. Others are anxious to explain in voluminous detail the vicissitudes which led to their presence on the Ship of Space. They seem to have been a very mixed group, from various levels of society.
There are hints here and there which I, for one. do not understand. Some describe the Home World as a place of maniacs. Others seem to have held respected places in this society until, as they explain it, the persons in authority turned on them and instituted a savage persecution, ending, as we know. in our ancestors seizing control of the Ship of Space and fleeing to this planet."
"It is all very confusing," said Sklar Hast, "and none of it seems to have much contemporary application. For instance, they do not tell us how they boiled varnish on the Home World, or how they propelled their coracles. Do creatures like the kragen infest the Home World? If so, how do the Home Folk deal with them? Do they kill them or feed them sponges? Our ancestors are silent on these points."
Meth Cagno shrugged. "Evidently they were not overly concerned, or they would have dealt with these matters at length. But I agree that there is much they fail to make clear.
As in our own case, the various castes seemed trained to explicit trades. Especially interesting are the memoirs of James Brunei. His caste, that of Counterfeiter, is now extinct among us. Most of his Dicta are rather conventional exhortations to virtue, but toward the middle of the book he says this."
Here Cagno opened a book and read: *' 'To those who follow us, to our children and grandchil174 Jack Vtince dren, we can leave no tangible objects of value. We brought nothing to the world but ourselves and the wreckage of our lives. We will undoubtedly die here-a fate probably preferable to New Ossining, but by no means the destiny any of us had planned for ourselves. There is no way to escape. Of the entire group I alone have a technical education, most of which i have forgotten. And to what end could 1 turn it? This is a soft world. It consists of ocean and seaweed. There is land nowhere. To escape-even if we had the craft to build a new ship, which we do not-we need metal and metal there is none. Even to broadcast a radio signal we need metal.
None… No clay to make pottery, no silica for glass, no limestone for concrete, no ore from which to smelt metal.
Presumably the ocean carries various salts, but how to extract the metal without electricity? There is iron in our blood: how to extract it? A strange helpless sensation to live on this world where tfie hardest substance is our own bone! We have, during our lives, taken so many things for granted, and now it seems that no one can evoke something from nothing…
This is a problem on which I must think. An ingenious man can work wonders, and I, a successful counterfeiter-or, rather, almost successful-am certainly ingenious.' "
Meth Cagno paused in his reading. "This is the end of the chapter."
"He seems to be a man of no great force," mused Sklar Hast. "It is true mat metal can be found nowhere." He took the bit of metal from his pocket which had once graced the workroom of Barquan Blasdel. "This is obdurate stuff indeed, and perhaps it is what we need to kill King Kragen."
Meth Cagno returned to the book. "He writes his next chapter after a lapse of months:
" 'I have considered the matter at length. But before 1 proceed I must provide as best I can a picture of the way the universe works, for it is clear that none of my colleagues are in any position to do so, excellent fellows though they are.
Please do not suspect me of whimsy: our personalities and social worth undoubtedly vary with the context in which we live.' "
Here Cagno looked up. "I don't completely understand his THE KRAGEfrf 175 meaning here. But I suppose that the matter is unimportant."
He turned the pages. "He now goes into an elaborate set of theorizations regarding the nature of the world, which, I confess, I don't understand. There is small consistency to his beliefs. Either he knows nothing, or is confused, or the world essentially is inconsistent. He claims that all matter is composed of less than a hundred 'elements,' joined together in 'compounds,' The elements are constructed of smaller entities: 'electrons,' 'protons,' 'neutrons,' which are not necessarily matter, but forces, depending on your point of view.
When electrons move the result is an electric current: a substance or condition-he is not clear here-of great energy and many capabilities. Too much electricity is fatal; in smaller quantities we use it to control our bodies. According to Brunei all sorts of remarkable things can be achieved with electricity."
"Let us provide ourselves an electric current then," said Sklar Hast. "This may become our weapon against the kragen."
"The matter is not so simple. In me first place the electricity must be channeled through metal wires,"
"Here is metal," said Sklar Hast, tossing to Meth Cagno the bit of metal he had taken from Blasdel, "though it is hardly likely to be enough."
"The electricity must also be generated," said Cagno,
"which on the Home Planet seems to be a complicated process, requiring a great deal of metal."
"Then how do we get metal?"
"On other planets there seems to be no problem. Ore is refined and shaped into a great variety of tools. Here we have no ore. In other cases, metals are extracted from the sea, once again using electricity."
"Hmph," said Sklar Hast. "To procure metal, one needs electricity. To obtain the electricity, metal is required. It seems a closed circle, into which we are unable to break."
Cagno made a dubious face. "It may well be. Brunei mentions various means to generate electricity. There is me 'voltaic cell'-in which two metals are immersed in acid, and be describes a means to generate the acid, using water, brine, and electricity. Then there is thermo-electricity, photo electricity, chemical electricity, electricity produced by the Rous effect, electricity generated by moving a wire near another wire in which electricity flows. He states that all living creatures produce small quantities of electricity."
"Electricity seems rather a difficult substance to obtain," mused Sklar Hast. "Are there no simple methods to secure metal?"
"Brunei mentions that blood contains a small quantity of iron. He suggests a method for extracting it, by using a high degree of heat. But he also points out that there is at hand no substance capable of serving as a receptacle under such extremes of heat. He states that on the Home World many plants concentrate metallic compounds, and suggests that certain of the sea-plants might do me same. But again either heat or electricity are needed to secure the pure metal."
Sklar Hast ruminated. "Our first and basic problem, as I see it, is self-protection. In short, we need a weapon to kill King Kragen. It might be a device of metal-or it might be a larger and more savage kragen. if such exist…" He considered. "Perhaps you should make production of metal and electricity your goal, and let no other pursuits distract you. I am sure that the council will agree, and put at your disposal such helpers as you may need."
"I would gladly do my best."
"Andi," said Sklar Hast, "I will reflect upon the kragen."
Three days later the first kragen was seen, a beast of not inconsiderable size, perhaps twenty feet in length. It came cruising along the edge of the float, and observing the men, stopped short and for twenty minutes floated placidly, swiriing water back and forth with its vanes. Then slowly it swung about and continued along the line of floats.
By this time a large quantity of stalk and withe had been cut, scraped and racked, as well as a heap of root-wisp, to cure during the rigging of a ropewalk.A week later the new rope was being woven into net.
Two large pads were cut from the side of the float, stripped of rib-trussing, upper and lower membrane, men set adrift.
The space thus opened would become a lagoon. Over the severed stalks sleeves were fitted with one end above water. the sap presently exuding would be removed, boiled and aged for varnish and glue. Meanwhile arbors were constructed, seeded with sponge-floss, and lowered into the lagoon. When the withe had cured, hut frames were constructed, pad membrane stretched over the mesh and daubed inside and out with varnish.
In a month the community had achieved a rude measure of comfort. On four occasions a kragen had passed by, and the fourth occurrence seemed to be a return visit of the first. On this fourth visit the kragen paused, inspected the lagoon with care. It tentatively nudged the net, backed away and presently floated off.
Sklar Hast watched the occurrence, went to inspect the new-cut stalk, which now was sufficiently cured. He laid out a pattern and work began. First a wide base was built near the mouth of the lagoon, with a substructure extending down to the main stem of the float. On this base was erected an A-frame derrick of glued withe, seventy feet tall, with integral braces, the entire structure whipped tightly with strong line and varnished. Another identical derrick was built to overhang the ocean- Before cither of the derricks were completed a smalt kragen broke through the net to feast upon the yet unripe sponges. Sklar Hast laughed grimly at the incident.
"At your next visit, you will not fare so well," he called to the beast. "May the sponges rot in your stomach!"
The kragen swam lazily off down the line of floats, unperturbed by the threat. It returned two days later. This time the derricks were guyed and in place, but not yet fitted with tackle. Again Sklar Hast reviled the beast, which this time ate with greater fastidiousness, plucking only those sponges which like popcorn had overgrown their husks. The men worked far into the night installing the strut which, when the derrick tilted out over the water, thrust high the topping-halyard to provide greater leverageOn the next day the kragen returned, and entered the lagoon with insulting assurance: a beast somewhat smaller than that which Sklar Hast had captured on Tranque Float, but nonetheless a creature of respectable size. Standing on the float, a stalwart old Swindler Hung a noose around the creature's turret, and on the pad a line of fifty men marched away with a heavy rope. The astonished kragen was towed to the outward leaning derrick, swung up and in. The dangling vanes were lashed; it was lowered to the float. As soon as the bulk collapsed the watching folk, crying out in glee, shoved forward, almost dancing into the gnashing mandibles. "Back, fools!" roared Sklar Hast. "Do you want to be cut in half?
Back!" He was largely ignored. A dozen chisels hacked at the horoy hide; clubs battered at the eyes- "Back!" raged Sklar Hast. "Back! What do you achieve by antics such as this? Back!" Daunted, the vengeful folk moved aside. Sklar Hast took chisel and mallet and as he had done on Tranque Float, cut at the membrane joining dome to turret. He was joined by four others; the channel was swiftly cut and a dozen hands ripped away the dome. Again, with pitiless outcry, the crowd surged forward- Sklar Hast's efforts to halt them were fruitless. The nerves and cords of the creature's ganglionic center were torn from the turret, while the kragen jerked and fluttered and made a buzzing sound with its mandibles. The turret was plucked clean of the wet-string fibers as well as other organs, and the kragen lay limp. Sklar Hast moved away in disgust. Another member of the Seven, Nicklas Rile, stepped forward; "Halt now-no more senseless hacking! If the kragen has bones harder than our own, we will want to preserve them for use. Who knows what use can be made of a kragen's cadaver? The hide is tough; the mandibles are harder than the deepest stalk. Let us proceed intelligently!"
Sklar Hast watched from a little distance as the crowd examined the dead beast. He had no further interest in the kragen. A planned experiment had been foiled almost as soon as the hate-driven mob had rushed forward. But there would be more kragen for his derricks; hopefully they could be noosed by the sea-derrick before they broke into the lagoon.
In years to come, strongboats or barges equipped with derricks might even go forth to hunt the kragen… He approached the kragen once again, peered into me empty turret, where now welled a viscous milky blue fluid. James Brunei, in his Dicta, had asserted that the metal iron was a constituent of human blood; conceivably other metals or metallic compounds might be discovered in me blood of a kragen. He found Meth Cagno, who had been watching from a dignified distance, and communicated his hypothesis. Cagno made no dissent. "It may well be the case. Our basic problem, however, remains as before; separating the metal from the dross."
"You have no idea how to proceed?"
Meth Cagno smiled slightly. "I have one or two ideas. In fact, tomorrow, at noon precisely, we will test one of these ideas."
The following day, an hour before noon. Sklar Hast rowed to the isolated pad on which Meth Cagno had established his workshop. Cagno himself was hard at work on an intricate contrivance whose purpose Sklar Hast could not fathom. A rectangular frame of stalk rose ten feet in the air, supporting a six-foot hoop of woven withe in a plane parallel to the surface of the float. To the hoop was glued a rather targe sheet of pad-skin, which had been scraped, nibbed and oiled until it was almost transparent. Below Meth Cagno was arranging a box containing ashes. As Sklar Hast watched, he mixed in a quantity of water and some gum, enough to make a gray dough, which he worked with his fingers and knuckles, to leave a saucer-shaped depression.
The sun neared the zenith; Cagno signaled two of his helpers. One climbed up the staging; the other passed up buckets of water. The first poured these upon the transparent membrane, which sagged under the weight.
Sklar Hast watched silently, giving no voice to his perplexity. The membrane, now brimming, seemed to bulge perilously. Meth Cagno, satisfied with his arrangements, joined Sklar Hast. "You are puzzled by this device; nevertheless it is very simple. You own a telescope?"
"I do. An adequately good instrument, though the gum is clouded."
"The purest and most highly refined gum discolors, and even with the most careful craftsmanship, lenses formed of gum yield distorted images, of poor magnification. On the Home World, according to Brunei, lenses are formed of a material called 'glass.* "
The sun reached the zenith; Sklar Hast's attention was caught by a peculiar occurrence in the box of damp ash. A white-hot spot had appeared; the ash began to hiss and smoke.
He drew near in wonderment. "Glass would seem to be a useful material." Meth Cagno was saying. "Brunei describes it as a mixture of substances occuring in ash together with a compound called 'silica' which is found in ash but also occurs in the husks of sea-ooze: 'plankton,' so Brunei calls it.
Here I have mixed ash and sea-ooze; I have constructed a water-lens to condense sunlight, I am trying to make glass…" He peered into the box, then lifted it a trifle, bringing the image of the sun to its sharpest focus. The ash glowed red, orange, yellow; suddenly it seemed to slump.
With a rod Cagno pushed more ash into the center, until the wooden box gave off smoke, whereupon Cagno pulled it aside, and gazed anxiously at the molten matter in the center.
"Something has happened; exactly what we will determine when the stuff is cool." He turned to his bench, brought forward another box, this half-full of powdered charcoal. In a center depression rested a cake of black-brown paste.
"And what do you have there?" asked Sklar Hast, already marveling at Cagno's ingenuity.
"Dried blood. I and my men have drained ourselves pale.
Brunei reveals that blood contains iron. Now I will try to bum away the various unstable fluids and oozes, to discover what remains. I hope to find unyielding iron." Cagno thrust the box under the lens. The dried blood smoldered and smoked, then burst into a reeking flame which gave off a nauseous odor. Cagno squinted up at the sun. "The lens bums well only when the sun is overhead, so our time is necessarily limited."
"Rather than water, transparent gum might be used, which men would harden, and the sun could be followed across the sky."
"Unfortunately no gum is so clear as water," said Cagno regretfully. "Candle-plant sap is yellow. Bindlebane seep holds a blue fog."
"What if the two were mixed, so that the blue defeated the yellow? And then the two might be filtered and boiled. Or perhaps water can be coagulated with tincture of bone."
Cagno assented. "Possibly feasible, both."
They turned to watch the blood, now a glowing sponge which tumbled into cinders and then, apparently consumed, vanished upon the surface of the blazing charcoal. Cagno snatched the crucible out from under the lens. "Your blood seems not over-rich," Sklar Hast noted critically. "It might be wise to tap Barquan Blasdel and the other Intercessors; they appear a hearty lot."
Cagno clapped a cover upon the box. "We will know better when the charcoal goes black," He went to his bench, brought back another box. In powdered charcoal stood another tablet, this of black paste. "And what substance is this?" inquired Sklar Hast.
"This," said Meth Cagno, "is kragen blood, which we boiled last night. If man's blood carries iron, what will kragen blood yield? Now we discover." He thrust it under me lens. Like the human blood it began to smolder and bum, discharging a smoke even more vile than before. Gradually the tablet flaked and tumbled to the surface of the charcoal; as before Cagno removed it and covered it with a lid. Going to his first box, he prodded among the cinders with a bit of sharp bone, scooped out a congealed puddle of fused material which he laid on the bench. "Glass. Beware- It is yet hot."
Sklar Hast, using two pieces of bone, lifted the object. "So dlis is glass. Hmm. It hardly seems suitable for use as a telescope lens. But it may well prove useful otherwise. It seems dense and hard-indeed, almost metallic."
Cagno shook his head in deprecation. "I had hoped for greater transparency. There are probably numerous impurities in the ash and sea-ooze. Perhaps they can be removed by washing the ash or treating it with acid, or something of the sort."
"But to produce acid, electricity is necessary, or so you tell me."
"1 merely quote Brunei."
"And electricity is impossible?" Cagno pursed his Ups. "That we will see. I have hopes.
One might well think it impossible to generate electricity using only ash. wood, water and sea-stuff-but we shall sec.
Brunei offers a hint or two. But first, as to our iron…"
The yield was small: a nodule of pitted gray metal half the size of a pea. "That bit represents three flasks of blood."
Cagno remarked glumly. "If we bled every vein on the float we might win sufficient iron for a small pot."
"This is not intrinsically an unreasonable proposal," said Sklar Hast. "We can all afford a flask of blood, or two, or even more during the course of months. To think-we have produced metal entirely on our own resources!"
Cagno wryly inspected the iron nodule. "There is no problem to burning me blood under the lens. If every day ten of the folk come to be bled, eventually we will sink the pad under the accumulated weight of iron." He removed the lid from the third box. "But observe here! We have misused our curses! The kragen is by no means a creature to be despised!"
On the charcoal rested a small puddle of reddish-golden metal: three times as large as the iron nodule. "I presume this metal to be copper, or one of its alloys." said Cagno- "Brunet describes copper as a dark red metal, very useful for the purpose of conducting electricity."
Sklar Hast lifted the copper from the coals, tossed it back and forth till it was cool. "Metal everywhere! Nicklas Rile has been hacking apart the kragen for its bones. He is discarding the internal organs, which are black as snuff-flowerPerhaps they should also be burned under the lens."
"Convey them here, I will bum them. And then, after we bum the kragen's liver, or whatever the organ, we might attempt to bum snuff-flowers as well."
The kragen's internal organs yielded further copper. The snuff-flowers produced only a powder of whitish-yellow ash which Mem Cagno conscientiously stored in a tube labeled: ash of snuff-flower.
Four days later the largest of the kragen seen so far reappeared. It came swimming in from the west, paralleling the line of floats. A pair of Swindlers, returning to the float with a catch of gray-fish, were the first to spy the great black cylinder surmounted by its four-eyed turret. They bent to their oars, shouting the news ahead. A well-rehearsed plan now went into effect. A team of four young swindlers ran to a lightweight coracle, shoved off, paddled out to intercept the kragen. Behind the coracle trailed two ropes, each controlled by a gang of men. The kragen, lunging easily through the water, approached, swimming fifty yards off the float. The coracle eased forward, with one named Bade Beach going forward to stand on the gunwhales. The kragen halted the motion of its vanes, to drift and eye the coracle and the derricks with flint-eyed suspicion.
The two swindlers yet at the oars eased the coracle closer.
Bade Beach stood tensely, twitching a noose, while the fourth man controlled the lines to the float. The kragen. contemptuous of attack, issued a few nonplussed clicks of the mandibles, twitched the tips of its vanes, creating four whirlpools.
The coracle eased closer, to within a hundred feet, eighty- sixty feet. Bade Beach bent forward. The kragen decided to punish the men for their provocative actions and thrust sharply forward. When it was but thirty feet distant. Bade Beach tossed a noose toward the turret-and missed. From the float came groans of disappointment; one of the gangs hastily jerked the coracle back. The kragen swerved, turned, made a second furious charge which brought it momentarily to within five feet of the coracle, whereupon Bade Beach dropped the noose over its turret. From the float came a cheer; both gangs hauled on their lines, one snatching the coracle back to safety, the other tightening the noose and pulling the kragen aside, almost as it touched the coracle.
Thrashing and jerking, the kragen was dragged over to the sea-leaning derrick, and hoisted from the water in the same fashion as the first. This was a large beast: the derrick creaked, the float sagged; before the kragen heaved clear from the water sixty-five men were tugging on the end of the lift. The derrick tilted back, the kragen swung in over the float.
The vanes were lashed, the beast lowered. Again the onlookers surged forward, laughing, shouting, but no longer exemplifying the fury with which they had attacked the first kragen. At a distance a group of Intercessors watched with curled lips. They had not reconciled themselves to their new circumstances, and conscious of their status as the lowest of castes worked as little as possible. Chisels and mallets were plied against the kragen turret; the dome was pried loose, the nerve nodes destroyed. Fiber buckets were brought, the body fluids were scooped out and carried off to evaporation trays.
Sklar Hast had watched from the side. This had been a large beast-about the size of King Kragen when first he had approached the Old Hoats, a hundred and fifty years previously. Since they had successfully dealt with this creature, they need have small fear of any other-except King Kragen.
And Sklar Hast was forced to admit that the answer was not yet known. No derrick could hoist King Kragen from the water. No line could restrain the thrust of his vanes. No float could bear his weight. Compared to King Kragen, his dead hulk now being hacked apart was a pygmy… - From behind came a rush of feet; a woman tugged at his elbow, gasping and gulping in the effort to catch her breath.
Sklar Hast, scanning the float in startlement, could see nothing to occasion her distress. Finally she was able to blurt:
"Barquan Blasdel has taken to the sea, Barquan Blasdel is gone!"
"What!" cried Sklar Hast.
The woman told her story. For various reasons, including squeamishness and pregnancy, she had absented herself from the killing of the kragen, and kept to her hut at the far side of the float. Seated at her loom she observed a man loading bags into a coracle, but preoccupied with her own concerns she paid him little heed, and presently arose to the preparation of the evening meal. As she kneaded the pulp from which the breadstuff known as pangolay was baked, it came to her that the man's actions had been noticeably furtive. Why had he not participated in the killing of the kragen? The man she had seen was Barquan Blasdel! The implications of the situation stunned her for a moment. Wiping her hands, she went to the hut where Blasdel and his spouse were quartered, to find no one at home. It was still possible that she was mistaken;
Biasdel might even now be watching the killing of the kragen.
So she hurried across the float to investigate. But on the way the conviction hardened: the man indeed had been Barquan Blasdel, and she had sought out Sklar Hast with the information.
From the first Barquan Blasdel had made no pretense of satisfaction with his altered circumstances. His former rank counted nothing, in fact aroused antagonism among his floatfellows. Barquan Blasdel grudgingly adapted himself to his new life, building sponge arbors and scraping withe. His spouse, who on Apprise Float had commanded a corps of four maidens and three garden-men, at first rebelled when Blasdel required her to bake pangolay and core sponges "like any low-caste slut," as she put it, but finally she surrendered to the protests of her empty stomach. Her daughters adopted themselves with better grace, and indeed the four youngest participated with great glee at the slaughter of the kragen.
The remaining two stayed in the background, eyebrows raised disdainfully at the vulgar fervor of their sisters.
Barquan Blasdel, his spouse, his two older daughters and their lovers were missing, as was a sturdy six-man coracle together with considerable stores. Sklar Hast dispatched four coracles in pursuit, but evening had brought the west wind, and there was no way of determining whether Blasdel had paddled directly east. or had taken refuge in the jungle of floats at the eastern edge of the chain, where he could hide indefinitely.
The coracles returned to report no sign of the fugitives.
The Council of Seven gathered to consider the situation.
"Our mistake was leniency," complained Robin Magi-am, a gnarled and weather-beaten old Swindler. "These Intercessors- Barquan Blasdel and all the rest-are our enemies. We should have made a complete job of it, and strangled them. Our qualms have cost us our security."
"Perhaps." said Sklar Hast. "But I for one cannot bring myself to commit murder-even if such murder is in our best interest."
"These other Intercessors now-" Margram jerked his thumb to a group of huts near the central pinion "-what of them? Each wishes us evil. Each is now planning the same despicable act as that undertaken by Barquan Blasdel and his spouse. I feel that they should be killed at once-quietly, without malice, but with finality."
His proposal met no great enthusiasm- Arrel Sincere, a Bezzler of complete conviction and perhaps the most casteconscious man on the float, said glumly, "What good do we achieve? If Barquan Btasdel returns to the Old Floats, our refuge is known and we must expect inimical actions."
"Not necessarily," contended Meth Cagno. "The folk of the Old Boats gain nothing by attacking us."
Sklar Hast made a pessimistic dissent. "We have escaped King Kragen, we acknowledge no overlord. Misery brings Jealousy and resentment. The Intercessors can whip them to a sullen fury." He pitched his voice in a nasal falsetto. '* 'Those insolent fugitives' How dare they scamp their responsibility to noble King Kragen? How dare they perform such bestial outrages against the lesser kragen? Everyone aboard the coracles! We go to punish the iconoclasts!* "
"Possibly correct," said Meth Cagno. "But the Intercessors are by no means the most influential folk of the Floats.
The Arbiters will hardly agree to any such schemes."
"In essence," said Phyral Berwick, "we have no information. We speculate in a void. In fact Barquan Blasdel may lose himself on the ocean and never return to the Old Floats.
He may be greeted with apathy or with excitement. We talk without knowledge. It seems to me that we should take steps to inform ourselves as to the true state of affairs: in short, that we send spies to derive this information for us.''
Phyral Berwick's proposal ultimately became the decision of the Seven. They also ordained that the remaining Intercessors be guarded more carefully, until it was definitely learned whether or not Barquan Blasdel had returned to the Old Floats. If such were the case the location of the New Floats was no longer a secret, and the concensus was that the remaining Intercessors should likewise be allowed to return, should they choose to do so. Nicklas Rile considered the decision soft-headed. "Do you think they would warrant us like treatment in a similar situation? Remember, they planned that King Kragen should waylay us!"
"True enough," said Arrel Sincere wearily, "but what of that? We can either kill them, hold them under guard, or let them go their ways, the last option being the least taxing and the most honorable."
Nicklas Rile made no further protest, and the council then concerned itself with the details of the projected spy operation. None of the coracles at hand were considered suitable, and it was decided to build a coracle of special design-long, light, low to the water, with two sails of fine weave to catch every whisper of wind. Three men were named to the operation, all originally of Almack Float, a small community far to the east, in fact next to Seonia. the end of the chain. None of the three men had acquaintance on Apprise and so stood minimal chances of being recognized.
The coracle was built at once. A light keel of laminated and glued withe was shaped around pegs; ribs were bent and lashed into place; diagonal ribs were attached to these, then me whole frame was covered with four layers of varnished pad-skin.
At midmoming of the fourth day after Barquan Blasdel's flight, the coracle, which was almost a canoe, departed to the east, riding easily and swiftly over the sunny blue water. For three hours it slid along the line of floats, each an islet bedecked in blue, green and purple verdure, surmounted by the arching fronds of prime plant, each surrounded by its constellation of smaller pads. The coracle reached the final float of the group and struck out east across the water. Water swirled and sparkled behind the long oars; the men in their short-sleeved white smocks working easily. Afternoon waned; the rain clouds formed and came scudding with black brooms hanging below. After the rain came sunset, making a glorious display among the broken clouds- The breeze began to blow from the west; the three men crouched and rowed with only sufficient force to maintain headway. Then came the mauve dusk with the constellations appearing and then night with the stars blazing down on the glossy black water. The men took turns sleeping, and the night passed. Before dawn the favoring wind rose; the sails were set, the coracle bubbled ahead, with a chuckling of bow-wave and wake. The second day was like the first. Just before dawn of the third day the men lowered the horn into the water and listened.
Silence.
The men stood erect, looked into the west. Allowing for the increased speed of their passage, Tranque Float should be near at hand. But nothing could be seen but the blank horizons.
The dawn wind came; the sails were set, the coracle surged west. At noon the men, increasingly dubious, ceased paddling, and once more searched the horizons carefully. As before there was nothing visible save the line dividing dark blue from bright blue. The floats by now should be well within sight- Had they veered too far north or too far south?
The men deliberated, and decided that while their own course had generally been true west, the original direction of flight might have been something south of east: hence the floats in all probability lay behind the northern horizon. They agreed to paddle four hours to the north, then if nothing were seen, to return to the south.
Toward the waning of afternoon, with the rain-clouds piling up, far smudges showed themselves. Now they halted, lowered the hom, to hear crunch crunch crunch, with startling loudness. The men twisted the tube, to detect the direction of the sound. It issued from the north. Crouching low they listened, ready to paddle hastily away if the sound grew louder. But it seemed to lessen and the direction veered to the east. Presently it died to near inaudibility, and the men proceeded.
The floats took on substance, extending both east and west; soon the characteristic profiles could be discerned, and then the hoodwink towers- Dead ahead was Aumergc, with Apprise Float yet to the westSo they paddled up the chain, the floats with familiar and beloved names drifting past, floats where their ancestors had lived and died: Aumerge, Quincunx, Fay, Hastings, Quatrcfoil, with its curious cloverleaf configuration, and then the little outer group, the Bandings, and beyond, after a gap of a mile. Apprise Float.
The sun set, the hoodwink towers began to flicker, but me configurations could not be read. The men paddled the coracle toward Apprise. Verdure bulked up into the sky; the sounds and odors of the Old Floats wafted across the water, inflicting nostalgic pangs upon each of me men. They landed in a secluded little cove which had been described to them by Phyral Berwick, covered the coracle with leaves and rubbish.
According to the plan, two remained by the coracle, while the third, one Henry Bastaff, moved across the float toward the central common and Apprise Market.
Hundreds of people were abroad on this pleasant evening, but Henry Bastaff thought their mood to be weary and even a trifle grim. He went to the ancient Apprise Inn, which claimed to be the oldest building of the floats: a long shed beamed with twisted oldstalks, reputedly cut at the astounding depth of three hundred feet. Within was a long bar of laminated strips, golden-brown with wax and use; shelves behind displayed jars and tubes of arrack, beer, and spirits of life, while buffets to each end offered various delicacies and sweetmeats. To the front wide eaves thatched with garwort frond and lit by yellow and red lanterns protected several dozen tables and benches where travelers rested and lovers kept rendezvous. Henry Bastaff seated himself where he could watch both the Apprise hoodwink tower and that of Quatrefoil to the east. The serving maid approached; he ordered beer and nut-wafers. As he drank and ate he listened to conversations at nearby tables and read the messages which flickered up and down die line of floats.
The conversations were uninformative; the hoodwink messages were the usual compendium of announcements, messages, banter. Then suddenly in midmessage came a blaze, all eighteen lights together, to signal news of great importance. Henry Bastaff sat up straight on the bench.
"Important… information! This… afternoon… Apprise… Intercessor,,. Barquan Blasdel… kidnaped … by… the… rebels… returned… to… the... Floats… with… his… spouse… and… several … dependents. They… have… a… harrowing… tale… to… tell. The… rebels… are… established … on… a… float… to… the… east… where … they… kill… fcragen,.. with… merciless… glee… and… plan… a… war… of… extermination… upon… the… folk… of… the … old… floats. Barquan Btasdel… escaped… and … after… on… unnerving… voyage… across… the… uncharted… ocean… late today… landed … on… Green Lamp Float. He… has… called… for… an… immediate… convocation… fo… consider… what… measures… to… take… against… the… rebels… who… daily… wax… in… arrogance."