A Triumph of Souls Read online

  “Millions.” Much as he liked the taste of crab, Simna found he was not hungry. He remembered all too clearly what Ehomba had told him the night before about the crustaceans’ traditional taste for the flesh of drowned men. “There must be millions of them!”

  “Tens of millions,” the herdsman agreed. Beneath the bowsprit the clacking of claws and scrape of shell on shell was almost deafening.

  “How does this help us?” In her years at sea Stanager Rose had seen many strange things, but nothing to quite match the crustaceal armada presently assembling beneath the bow of her ship. “What do we do?”

  “I know!” Never one to hesitate at venturing expertise in matters where he had none, Simna spoke up enthusiastically. “Etjole’s going to magick them so that they carry us on their backs. As soon as enough have congregated, hoy?”

  Ehomba eyed his friend dolefully. “There is no magic in this, Simna.” Looking past him, he smiled encouragingly at Stanager. “When a hundred million crabs present themselves at the ready, Captain, I think it might be advisable to throw them a line.”

  “Throw them a… ?” For the barest of instants she gazed back uncomprehendingly. Then she turned and barked orders to Terious and the rest of the waiting crew.

  The strongest cord on board was made fast around a fore capstan. When the mate was convinced it could be knotted no better, the unsecured end was heaved over the bow. It landed with a convincing splash just to the right of the line of floating crabs.

  Immediately, those forming the end of the line nearest the ship swarmed over the rope. At any other time and in any other place they might well have tried to eat it, but not this morning. Sharp claws dug deep into the thick hemp, legs burying themselves into the folds of the triple weave.

  “Line going out!” one of the crew monitoring the capstan shouted.

  Stanager glanced briefly at Ehomba. He did not react to the warning and continued to lean over the bow watching the frenzied crustaceans. “Let it go,” she directed the crew tersely.

  The capstan whirred as more and more of the valuable cordage was taken up by the crabs, until at last only the terminal coils securing it to the capstan itself remained. Stretched out beneath the bowsprit, the rest of the line was completely obscured by swarming crabs. As those who managed to crowd into the bow observed, the thick cable was being drawn taut, and tauter still, until the visible portion that was suspended in the air between water and bowsprit twanged from the tension that was being applied to it.

  Very slowly but perceptibly, the Grömsketter began to move.

  “All hands to stations!” Stanager bellowed. Behind her, men and women swarmed into the rigging or to posts on deck. Priget stood like a barrel behind the helm, her eyes aloft as she searched for the first hint of a good stiff breeze.

  When the ship reached the base of the oceanic slope there was a collective intake of breath among her crew. Exhaling in concert and producing a noise like a billion tiny bubbles all bursting at once, the line of crabs continued to pull the ship forward. That and the scrape of millions of carapaces rubbing against one another were the only sounds they made.

  The elegant sailing vessel’s prow rose slowly, slowly. Sailors reached for something to keep themselves from falling backward as the ship began to slide up the slope toward the smooth ridge above. At the halfway point someone erupted in an involuntary cheer, only to be quickly hushed by his superstitious fellow seamen. Who knew what might disturb the crabs at their arduous work? If the line broke, if a few hundred thousand claws and legs lost their grasp, then the ship would surely slide right back down into the peaceful but terminal watery valley—perhaps forever.

  The rim drew near, nearer—and then it was beneath the Grömsketter’s bowsprit. Very gradually the ship ceased ascending and she leveled out. When the stern was once more on an even keel with the bow, several of the most senior mariners could no longer restrain themselves. They began to dance and twirl around one another out of sheer joy. Priget turned the great wheel, adjusting the ship’s heading slightly. Wind began to billow her sails. Not strongly, but it was enough. And it was behind them. Picking up speed, the ship began to move away from the valley under her own power.

  In front of it, the crabs were scattering, abandoning the line and sinking back down into the depths from which they had been commanded. Seeing this, Stanager ordered the heavy line winched in swiftly lest it back up and wrap around the bow, fouling their advance. She would have thanked the hardworking crustaceans who had joined together to drag them clear of the valley, but how did one thank a crab? She put the question to the most unfathomable of her unique quartet of passengers.

  “Do not thank them yet.” While, with the exception of the dozing cat, his companions celebrated along with the crew, the herdsman did not. He remained where he had been standing, hard by the bowsprit and staring at the water forward of the ship. “The crabs helped us because their king commanded them to do so. But I do not think they were alone. I do not see how they could have done such a thing by themselves.”

  “Why not?” Free of the valley and with a fair wind astern, Stanager was in too good a mood to let the solemn-faced traveler mute her high spirits.

  “Certainly they were by themselves in their millions strong enough to drag the ship clear, but any line, however mighty, needs an anchor against which to pull.” He waved diffidently at the gentle swells through which they were cutting. “What was theirs?”

  “Who knows?” She shrugged, much too relieved to be really interested. “The top of an undersea mountain, perhaps, or a shelf of corals.”

  “Corals would not hold up under the strain. They would break off.”

  “Well, the submerged mountaintop, then.” He really was a man to discourage good cheer, she decided. Not naturally grave, but given to an inherent reluctance to let himself go and have a good time. Simna ibn Sind was incorrigible, but at least he knew how to celebrate a success. Deciding to put the proposition to a small test, she reached down and pinched the stoic herdsman on his stolid behind. Startled, he finally took his eyes off the sea.

  “So you are alive after all.” She grinned cheerfully. “I was beginning to wonder.”

  His expression was one of utter confusion, which pleased her perversely. “I—I did not mean to dampen anyone’s spirits. I am as gladdened as everyone else that we are safely out of the valley. You have to excuse me. It is simply that as long as I am afflicted with an unanswered question, it is impossible for me to completely relax. I can manage it a little, yes, but not completely.”

  “I’m surprised that you are able to sleep,” she retorted.

  Now it was his turn to grin. “Sometimes, so am I.”

  “Come and have a grog with me.” She gestured over the bow. “Doroune lies that way, to the southwest. We’ll have you and your friends there soon enough, and from then forward I’ll be denied the pleasure of your company. Prove to me that there is some truth in that statement.”

  His uncertainty returned. “What, that we’ll reach the coast soon?”

  “No, you great elongated booby.” She punched him hard in the thick part of his right arm. “That there’s pleasure to be had in your company.”

  For an instant, inherent hesitation held him back. Then he relaxed into a wide smile. To her surprise, not to mention his own, he put his arm around her. “I do not especially like the taste of seamen’s grog, but under the circumstances, it is the taste I think I should seek.”

  Even those members of the crew assigned to duty high up in the rigging joined in the festivities. Internal lubrication caused a number to sway dangerously at their positions, but by some miracle the deck remained unsplattered. The Grömsketter continued to make headway, albeit more slowly than the efficient Stanager Rose would have liked.

  The celebration continued unchecked until one lookout, his vision blurred but his mind still vigilant, sang out with an utterly unexpected and shocking declamation.

  “Kraken! Kraken off the port bow!”
/>   On the main deck, conversing intimately with one of the female members of the crew, Simna ibn Sind heard the cry and sat up like a man stabbed. He had never seen such a thing as the lookout proclaimed, but he knew full well what it was supposed to look like. Stumbling only slightly, he abandoned his nascent paramour and staggered forward. Ehomba was already there, staring like a second figurehead out to sea.

  “What…?” The swordsman steadied himself as he slammed up against the railing. “What’s happening, bruther? I heard the lookout.…”

  “Hoy,” the herdsman murmured, mimicking a favorite exclamation of his friend. “We had our rescue.” Turning back to the water, he nodded to the southwest. “Now comes the reckoning.”

  It arrived with ten immense arms each weighing a ton or more. Pale pink in color, the benthic colossus had surfaced less than a mile from the ship. Now it moved effortlessly closer, making a mockery of the desperate Priget’s attempt to steer clear of its cylindrical bulk. A few crabs and barnacles clung to its smooth flanks, while scars revealed the history of titanic battles with sperm whales that had taken place in the depths of the ocean.

  In an instant Stanager was beside Ehomba, even as she was beside herself. She could only stare in alarm and astonishment at the abyssal apparition that was making a leisurely approach to her ship. What else could one do when confronted by the sight and reality of the Kraken?

  “That is what was at the other end of the hundred million crabs,” the herdsman informed her quietly. “That is the only creature strong enough to both grip and anchor them.”

  “But—what does it want? The crabs have gone, scattered back to their homes.”

  “They were commanded. This is no crab, and would have to have been asked. I do not know what it wants, but whatever that may be, we had better hope we can supply it. The elders of my village have spoken many times of the Kraken, and I do not recall them commending it for its placid nature.” He tried to inject an optimistic note into the litany. “They are a diverse family. Hopefully this one will be amenable to reason.”

  “Reason? That?” She gaped at him.

  “The Kraken and their smaller cousins are among the most intelligent creatures in the sea. I thought an experienced mariner like yourself would know that.”

  “I am a Captain of people,” she protested. “I do not converse with squid!”

  He turned from her, back to the many-armed monster that was approaching the ship. “Perhaps you should learn.”

  It swam right up to the bow. There was a sharp bump as the Grömsketter, jarred by the contact, shuddered slightly. The Kraken did not try to halt the ship’s progress, though it was clearly more than massive enough to do so if it wished. Instead, it swam lazily alongside, paralleling the vessel’s advance. One of the two major tentacles rose high out of the water, reaching up to probe curiously at the lookout nest that topped the mainmast. The sailor stationed there crouched down, painfully aware of the inadequacy of his pitiful shelter.

  Sidling to the side, Ehomba leaned as far over the railing as he dared and found himself gazing into a luminous, very alert eye. It was quite similar to his own, except that the Kraken’s was nearly three feet in diameter. If he was not careful, a man could lose his mind in that eye, he warned himself.

  The glistening orb twitched slightly and stared right back at him. Its pupil alone was far larger than Ehomba’s eyeball. Behind Ehomba, Stanager and Simna waited breathlessly, knowing that the monster could pluck the herdsman from the deck as effortlessly as they would pinch a bud from a long-stemmed flower.

  Ehomba smiled, for all the good that might do, and as he had done with the king of all the crabs, commenced to twist and wriggle his fingers.

  The Kraken floated alongside, its tentacles weaving lazy patterns through the air and water, and studied the herdsman’s limber gyrations. If so inclined, it was easily large enough to drag the entire ship down into the depths, locked in an unbreakable cephalopodian embrace. Iridescent waves of color, of electric blue and intense yellow, rippled through its skin as it flashed chromatophores at the apprehensive and uncomprehending crew.

  Lowering his hands, Ehomba made a single final, sharp gesture with one pair of fingers—and waited. Eyes that were full of unfathomable intelligence regarded him silently. Then the Kraken lifted half a dozen enormous tentacles from the water. Responding, men and women bolted for cover or tried to make certain of their hold on lines and posts. But the monster was not attacking; it was replying.

  When those six gigantic limbs had risen from beneath the surface, a powerful urge to flee had surged through Simna ibn Sind. Mindful of Stanager’s presence, he had held his position. Besides, there was nowhere to run to. Watching his lanky companion converse with the apparition by means of simple finger movements was akin to observing an infant engaging in casual chat with a mastodon via a confabulation of giggles. Only the possibility that the exchange might turn unpleasant, resulting in the sinking of the ship and the loss of all on board, kept him from smiling at the sight.

  When he could stand it no longer, he let loose with the question that was on the verge of driving him and everyone else on board mad. “For Gojokku’s sake, bruther—what’s it saying? What are you two talking about?” He hesitated only briefly. “You are talking, aren’t you?”

  “What?” As if suddenly remembering that he was not alone aboard the Grömsketter, Ehomba turned to gaze reassuringly at his companions. “Yes, we are talking. In fact, we are having a most pleasant conversation.” Even as he replied to Simna, the herdsman continued to twitch and contort his fingers into patterns that meant nothing to his fellow humans.

  “Hoy, then how about letting us in on a bit of it?”

  “Yes,” agreed an anxious Stanager. “What does it want?”

  “Want? Why, it wants what I told Simna any creature in its position would probably want. Payment. For anchoring the hard-shelled multitude that pulled us out of the valley.”

  Stanager was uneasy. “By all the sea gods and their siblings, what form of ‘payment’ could such a creature require?” Peering over the side, she observed the powerful, parrot-like beak protruding from the center of the mantle—a beak large and sharp enough to bite through the hull of a ship. “If it’s hungry, I’m not sacrificing any of my crew. We have preserved meat aboard, and fresh as well as dry fish. Might it be satisfied with that?”

  Turning back to the eye of the Kraken, Ehomba worked his fingers. Once again, immense tentacles semaphored a reply. Wishing to make certain that there was no miscommunication, the herdsman repeated the query and for a second time made scrupulous note of the response.

  “Coffee.”

  “What?” Simna and Stanager blurted simultaneously.

  “It says it wants coffee. Not too hot, if you please. Tepid will do fine. With sugar. Lots of sugar.”

  It was the Captain who replied. “You’re joking, landsman. I know it must be you because nothing that looks like that is capable of making jokes.”

  “On the contrary, though this is the first Kraken to come to my personal acquaintance, I know from experience in the shallow waters below my village that squid have a very highly developed sense of humor. But it is not joking. It wants coffee. I admit that it is a request that puzzles me as well.”

  “Well, that’s something, anyway, if you’re as bemused as I am.”

  “Yes,” he admitted. “What exactly is ‘coffee’? I gather from the description that it is some kind of food.”

  While Simna slowly and carefully elucidated to his tall friend the nature of coffee, explaining that it was a warm beverage not unlike tea, Stanager conferred with the ship’s cook. They had tea and coffee both. Not being an addict, the Captain had no difficulty with agreeing to sacrifice their store of the darker beverage. Parting with an entire sack of sugar, more than half the ship’s supply, was another matter. The alternative, however, was surely more dispiriting still.

  “Have you a cauldron?” Ehomba asked her. “Perhaps for rendering out
seal blubber?”

  “This is not a fishing boat. Cook will use her largest kettle to prepare the brew.” Stanager peered past him, to where the Kraken continued to hover like a mariner’s worst nightmare hard by the port bow of the Grömsketter. “It will have to be big enough.”

  As matters developed, the iron kettle was more than sufficient to hold the multiple gallons of dark, aromatic liquid. After the sugar was added and stirred in and when it had cooled to a temperature Ehomba thought appropriate, it was presented with some ceremony to the waiting cephalopod.

  A tentacle powerful enough to rip a ship’s mainmast right out of its footing reached over the railing. The prehensile tip hooked beneath the kettle’s sturdy handle. Without spilling a drop, the Kraken lifted the heavy iron over the side. Ehomba’s companions rushed to the railing, expecting to see the contents of the kettle vanish down that clacking beak in a single prodigious swallow. Instead, the monster tipped the kettle ever so slightly forward, and sipped. A vast, invertebrate sigh rose from within, and the Kraken seemed to slip a little lower into the sea. As it drank, other tentacles dipped and waved.

  “What’s it saying, bruther?” An enchanted Simna looked on as his friend strove to communicate with the many-armed visitant.

  “It is wondering why it is drinking alone, and why we do not join it.”

  Stanager replied absently. “It was our entire supply of coffee that went into that kettle.”

  “Tea will do,” Ehomba assured her. “I could do with a cup myself. This has been thirsty work.”

  “Hoy, and I’ll have a cup as well, Captain!” Simna grinned broadly.

  “Just remember that I am the master here,” she growled back at him, “and not some serving wench put aboard for your amusement.” Muttering to herself, she went once again to confer with the cook.

  So it was that Etjole Ehomba and Simna ibn Sind came to sit on the railing near the bow of the graceful sailing vessel, their sandaled feet braced against the rigging, delicately sipping tea while the herdsman conversed on matters of wind and weather, tide and current, the nature and flavor of various seafoods, and the vagaries of men who set forth to travel upon the surface of the sea, with as intimidating and alien a beast as ever plied the deep green waters.