The Icerigger Trilogy: Icerigger, Mission to Moulokin, and The Deluge Drivers

  “Oh, I don’t know. This western slope doesn’t look so bad.”

  “Perhaps not for you, sir. But I have heard you are built differently from us and that climbing uphill without wind aid does not give you as much difficulty.”

  That was probably true, Ethan reflected.

  He was examining the huge windmills that powered lathes and grindstones and brought air to the forges when he felt Colette’s hand on his arm.

  “Oh look. There’s professor Williams.” She’d taken to calling him “professor” Williams now, though they didn’t know exactly what level of upper school he taught. He’d not volunteered the information. Sometime Ethan would have to ask.

  The schoolmaster was seated at a table along with the ever-attending Eer-Meesach. Both were so engrossed in a pile of diagrams that they didn’t notice the arrivals until Ethan and Colette had stood behind them for several minutes.

  “I’ll leave you, noble sir and lady, to the company of the wizards. I have much work to do. Tis sure no one knows how to put a decent edge on a sword these days.” Mulvakken gave them a bloodthirsty grin and bowed politely.

  In other words, Ethan reflected wryly, I’ve wasted enough time showing you alien V.I.P.s around and it’s time I got back to some serious work. He waddled off in the direction of smoke, heat, and ringing noises.

  “Well, Milliken. Eer-Meesach.”

  “Greetings, sir and madame,” the wizard said with sprightly enthusiasm. His eyes were shining. “Your friend has been showing me many things. Great things. I haven’t been so excited since I was a famulus!”

  “What have you been up to, Milliken?”

  “Malmeevyn has been helping me with mechanical equivalents and local terminology. I’m not much of a fighter and thought I might be able to help some other way.”

  “Nor am I,” said Ethan sincerely.

  “Oh, but we all saw the way you handled Sir Hunnar that night.” He couldn’t keep the admiration out of his voice. “Even Mr. du Kane is a better fighter than I … But I did think I might be able to aid in other ways. I’ve read quite extensively, you know. I’ve been trying to help out the Wannomian armorers with an idea or two gleaned from terran and centaurian history. My first idea involved catapults, but both sides already understand and utilize the principle. Very powerful devices they have, too.”

  “They’d have to be,” Ethan commented, “to do much in this wind.”

  “Yes. Also swords, pikes, axes, lances, halberds—all kinds of things for cutting and stabbing. Spears and bows for throwing. But I’ve been working closely with Malmeevyn and the metal workers and I believe we’ve managed to come up with a couple of beneficial developments.”

  He reached under the table and brought out an object the like of which Ethan had never seen.

  It had a long, straight body of wood, with a short bow set on one end. There was also an obvious trigger and some sort of pulley and crank mechanism at the other end.

  “Very interesting,” said Ethan, conscious of his historical cretinism. “What is it?”

  “An ancient terran weapon. It’s called an arbalest, or crossbow.”

  “A marvelous invention!” shouted the wizard, unable to contain himself. “I showed it to Leuva Sukonin’s son, a knight of archers. When I outdistanced his best bowman he fell on the icepath and nearly slid all the way into town!” The wizard chuckled at the memory.

  “It can throw twenty to forty zuvits further than the finest archer,” Williams said, “and it’s more accurate and powerful besides. It cannot be loaded as fast, it’s true. But it will penetrate the thickest of leather-bronze shields at close range. I made the bows extremely tough. I think this version is more powerful than anything ever used on old Terra. These tran have truly awesome arm and shoulder muscles … from holding their dan against the wind, I suspect.”

  Ethan hefted the weapon uncertainly. He tried the crank but could hardly budge it. “It’s impressive, all right. I don’t suppose you’ve succeeded in coming up with maybe a pocket laser or a nice portable thermonuclear device, hmmm? It would make things a lot simpler.”

  “I’m afraid not” Williams smiled slightly. “But we are still working on other developments. I hope one or two will be ready in time to do some good.”

  “That’s right” muttered Ethan, “—time.”

  “No one’s said anything to me about time either,” protested Colette. “When is this Horde or monster or whatever due to arrive?”

  “No one knows, Colette. It could be several malets yet. Or they might be sighted tomorrow morning. Hunnar says they might even decide to pass Sofold completely for another year. I can’t tell whether that possibility pleases or disappoints him. Now let’s have another look at that chap who does the interesting marketable scrollwork on the sword-hilts …”

  In the weeks that followed Ethan got to know the people of Wannome as well as those of New Paris, Drallar, or Samstead. Preparations for battle continued apace, but the flow of commerce in the harbor never slackened. There was still no word of the Horde.

  One evening he wondered if the whole story of the Horde mightn’t be a gigantic fraud—a cleverly concocted story designed to keep these useful and interesting strangers from the sky in Sofold. He quickly discarded that as a thought not only unworthy of people like Hunnar and Balavere and Malmeevyn, but also illogical. Although he wouldn’t put it past the Landgrave.

  No, there’d been too much obvious passion displayed that night when the inhabitants of Sofold had determined to fight their tormentors instead of groveling to them—too spontaneous, too genuine, even in its alien setting, to be a mere dumb show created for such ignoble purpose.

  He, Hunnar, and September were seated at a table in the general castle dining hall, down near the scullery. This was where most of the castle folk took their meals. Hunnar then suggested a walk along the sky balcony and the two humans agreed.

  The sky balcony was the highest open pathway in Wannome Castle, excepting only the High Tower. From its wind-lashed parapet one could stare down a sheer drop to solid ice below, and far out across the great frozen sea to the south.

  Their sojourn was interrupted by the breathless arrival of one of the apprentice-squires. He scraped to a halt, gulping freezing air, and almost forgot to bow to Hunnar. His face was wild.

  “N … noble s … sirs …!”

  “Take it easy, cub,” Hunnar admonished him, “and catch your breath. Your words ride the wind too far ahead of you.”

  “Not thirty or forty kijat to the southwest, noble sirs—the thunder-eater comes!”

  “How many?” asked Hunnar sharply.

  “On … only one, sir. A Great Old One! A caravan … three ships … blundered into it, hoping to find some shelter in the pika-pedan and then ride the wind-edge in. Only one escaped. Its master sits even now in audience with his Lordship!”

  “Come,” Hunnar said curtly to the two men. He started for the stairs without even bothering to see if they followed.

  “So one of these ‘thunder-eaters’ finally shows up,” said September. “Excellent! I’ve been listing slowly to starboard sitting on my butt here. At least now we’ll have a chance to see one of these things, what?”

  “I don’t know,” Ethan commented carefully. “From Sir Hunnar’s attitude, I don’t think they run out day excursion rafts. And that apprentice did mention something about two ships being lost.”

  “Ah, that could have been from the storm,” countered September. “Say, Hunnar!” They hurried to keep up with the knight. Hunnar was being polite in not making use of the downward ice-paths. If he had, they’d have lost him in seconds. “Will we have a chance to see this thing?”

  For Hunnar, the reply was unusually curt.

  “You must understand that this is not a frivolous matter, my friends. In its own unthinking way, the stavanzer can be as dangerous as the Horde.”

  “Oh, come on now,” September replied in disbelief. “It can’t be that big. No land animal on a Terra-type
planet can. There’s not even any water to buoy it up. A really big animal couldn’t walk.”

  Hunnar halted so abruptly that Ethan bumped into him, bounced off the iron-hard back beneath the furs.

  “You have not seen a thunder-eater, stranger from the sky,” he said quietly. It was the first time since their initial meeting he hadn’t used their names. “Do not judge til then.” He started off again as suddenly as he’d stopped. Ethan followed, surprised. The knight was really worried.

  “A stavanzer,” Hunnar continued as they descended yet another stairwell, “could destroy the great harbor more completely than any Horde and would do so without thought or compassion for life. A barbarian wishes to conserve in order to enrich himself. The thunder-eater has no such thoughts.”

  “I see,” said September, abashed. “Look, I apologize, Hunnar. I shot off my big mouth without having ammunition. Moratorium until I see the thing, okay?”

  “You do not know so naturally you cannot imagine,” said Hunnar, mollified. “There is no need to apologize for such.” He didn’t say anything about September’s shooting off his mouth. “There will be no chance to ‘look’—only the Hunt.”

  “You mean you’re going to try and kill this thing?” asked Ethan. “After making it sound nothing short of invincible?”

  “I did not say ’twas invincible, friend Ethan. Only very big. But no one kills a stavanzer. Not in recent memory, anyway. We must try to drive it off. Were it a herd I should not worry so much.”

  “Why not? I’d imagine a herd would be a hundred times worse,” Ethan commented.

  “No. A herd would move only for its grazing grounds—the great pika-pedan fields to the south. They migrate on a north-south polar axis, mostly in the empty regions to the west. As a group they have little curiosity. But a lone one, and a Great Old One at that, might investigate Sofold from sheer perversity. It takes something extraordinary to excite a herd. Somehow, we must turn him.”

  “You say you can’t kill it, but you speak of turning it,” said September. “How? With pikes?” There was nothing mocking in his voice.

  “No. There is one way to fight the thunder-eater. If your souls are sound, you may have a chance to try it. Many who do claim it is the supreme moment of their lives. For some ’tis also the last. Yet it must be tried,” he concluded as they topped a rise in the passageway.

  “Just how big is this boojum, anyway,” Ethan finally asked, exasperated.

  “The thunder-eater has been granted but two teeth. Do you know the Landgrave’s throne?”

  “Yes.” Ethan recalled the chair, inlaid with stones and polished metal set into a tower of pseudo-ivory. It would fetch a fine price from a certain decorator on …

  “The back of the throne itself, the white pillar … what did you think it was?”

  “Some kind of stone,” Ethan replied. Then he paused. “You aren’t trying to tell me that …?”

  He held onto the thought as they left the castle, barely aware that other knights and men-at-arms had joined them. They passed the du Kanes. September barely had time to shout, “We’re a-going a-hunting!” to them. Colette yelled something in return but Ethan didn’t hear it.

  Down at the harborfront, kettledrums were droning like fat beetles. A knot of moving, businesslike tran had collected around the Hunnar-nucleus. Ethan caught occasional glimpses of solemn-faced townsfolk.

  As they continued downhill, he couldn’t help noticing that the soldiers and knights carefully avoided the ice-paths out of deference to their crippled visitors.

  He wondered if anyone else would be able to see what was going to take place. The wizard had a telescope in his rooms, but it might not be able to scan the area they were heading for. But Milliken would be there, and maybe also the Landgrave.

  All this fuss over one animal. And it wasn’t even a meat-eater, like the Droom.

  They reached the harbor. The crowd parted to reveal three of the oddest craft he’d seen since their landing.

  Three small rafts with large sails sat ready by the docks. Their sails and bodies were painted pure white. Arrow-narrow and long, they were clearly designed to stay hidden against the ice.

  To the rear of each was tied a second, even stranger craft. Each consisted of a single tree-trunk, averaging about twenty meters in length and one or two in diameter. A single small sail was mounted on each. The front end was cut and shaped down to a needle-sharp point.

  The bottom cross-spar of the sail ended on each side in a tiny wooden ship or large skate, depending on how one chose to view them. Each was equipped with an even smaller runner to its outside, making each into a stubby, one-tran outrigger. The cross-spar was connected to each skate-boat by a single pole.

  There were two wooden runners under the tree itself, a single solid one near the bow, and a third skate-boat at the rear.

  The sails on each of these massive lances—for such they clearly were—were furled. Three wind-powered spears suitable for battling a goliath.

  Ethan had a thousand questions. Hunnar was already on board the first raft, giving directions and inspecting lashings. Ethan followed September on board. Almost immediately the strange little convoy started toward the harbor gate. All other ships gave them respectful clearance and some of their sailors came to the rail to watch quietly.

  A moment later they were through the great gate towers. As they rode out of the lee of Wannome and its sheltering mountains they picked up speed. The sails crackled and the helmsman set course slightly into the wind, to the southwest.

  “We must circle well behind the beast,” Hunnar explained, “to allow the lightnings to build up speed. When they have, the towing raft casts free and moves clear.”

  “Those spears are maneuverable, then?” asked September over the howl of the wind. Sailors fought the rigging.

  “Only a little,” Hunnar replied grimly. “Once set on course, they can be turned only to right or left, and only with the wind. There is no turning about.”

  “What happens,” asked September finally, “when you make contact with the creature?”

  “Here Jaipor, take over!” Another tran hurried over to take a rope from the knight. Satisfied, he led them toward the stern of the fast-moving raft. Ethan could feel the tension building among the crew. They stood behind the helmsman and Hunnar pointed to the following raft.

  “A strong but simple latch ties the lightning to the three skate-boats. Each is a tiny raft in itself, but without sails. See the high, padded back? That is to protect the rider and to catch a little of the wind.”

  “They look like big wooden shoes,” commented Ethan. He recalled Ta-hoding mentioning that wooden skates wouldn’t hold much of an edge on the ice. But then, these weren’t intended for long journeys.

  “Momentum should carry the three steersmen clear of the thunder-eater,” Hunnar continued, “and to safety.” Ethan peered closely at the tiny boats.

  “Once you’ve released from the main lance, how do you steer the things?”

  “With your body weight. The skates are well balanced. The release should take place in plenty of time to give the rider ample opportunity to veer wide of the target.”

  “Of course, the closer you get before giving up control,” said September, “the more accurate the strike.”

  “Of course,” agreed Hunnar.

  “Then if you’ve no objection, I’d like to be one of your sparmen.”

  “I would be honored, Sir September.” They exchanged shoulder clasps.

  “Oh, well,” said Ethan, “I suppose I’ll have to take the other, then.”

  “Now young feller, this is no game, what? If you don’t really want—”

  “Oh, shut up, Skua. I’ll take the opposite spar.” He felt like a fool, but he’d be damned if he’d back away when September had volunteered.

  “Tis settled then.” Hunnar turned and pointed toward their companion rafts skimming alongside. “Sir Stafaed will command the first bolt and Sir Lujnor the second. We will have the l
ast.”

  “Does this thing have a weak spot?” asked September over the roar of the wind.

  “It may. If so, none have found it. There is no hide protecting the eyes and they are nerve-centers if naught else. Tis best to strike there. They are small and set low. If we could blind him, that would be better than turning him from the city.”

  “If he has good vision it means he’ll see us coming,” added September thoughtfully.

  They continued to swing in a wide curve, until Ethan realized all at once that they were now running with the wind. He looked over the sharp prow of the raft. Somewhere far ahead was a wavering green blur, the huge field of pika-pedan. They’d come a long way fast.

  The sailors brought in the sail. Sharpened ice-anchors of dark iron stabbed ice. The three rafts with their trailing death slowly skidded to a halt, shaking and straining in the wind.

  “Now we ride the lightning,” said Hunnar solemnly. He scrambled over the side of the raft.

  According to the surviving merchantman’s report, the stavanzer was moving northeast. They would try to turn him southward again.

  “You take the port side, lad, and I’ll have at the starboard,” September shouted to him.

  “What?”

  “The left side, the left! And don’t let loose your latch-piece til Sir Hunnar gives the sign.”

  “Think I’ll freeze at the wrong moment and let go early?’ Ethan stared up at that buttressed visage. The eyes twinkled.

  “No man can deny the possibility, young feller.”

  “Well … I might,” he replied, almost defiantly. “But it won’t be from fear. It’ll be from this delightful climate.”

  The wind was blowing harder than usual for midday. That meant he had to grab twice at the wooden rail of the raft to keep from being blown away like an empty sack. It was bitterly cold out here, divorced from the castle’s sheltering walls. He was relieved just to scramble into the comparative shelter of the skate-boat.

  The broad wooden back of the skate was thickly padded. It vibrated steadily in the perpetual gale, but the worst winds howled harmlessly past. Leaning forward slightly, he could see just over the central trunk. September waved and he waved back.