“New world … being reunited with long-dead wives.” Haplo picked up the battered hat, toyed with it.
“It’s possible!” cried the wizard shrilly. “Anything’s possible.” He reached out a tentative hand for the hat. “M—mind you don’t crush the brim.”
“What brim? Listen, old man, how far are we away from this star? How many days of travel to get there?”
“Well, er, I suppose.” Zifnab gulped. “It all depends … on … on how fast we’re traveling! That’s it, how fast we’re traveling.” He warmed to his subject. “Say that we’re moving at the speed of tight… . Impossible, of course, if you believe physicists. Which I don’t, by the way. Physicists don’t believe in wizards—a fact that I, being a wizard, find highly insulting. I have taken my revenge, therefore, by refusing to believe in physicists. What was the question?”
Haplo started over again, trying to be patient. “Do you know what these stars really are?”
“Certainly,” Zifnab replied in lofty tones, staring down his nose at the Patryn.
“What are they?”
“What are what?”
“The stars?”
“You want me to explain them?”
“If you wouldn’t mind.”
“Well, I think the best way to put this”—sweat broke out on the old man’s forehead—“in layman’s terms, to be concise, they’re … er … stars.”
“Uh huh,” said Haplo grimly. “Look, old man, just how close have you actually been to a star?”
Zifnab mopped his forehead with the end of his beard, and thought hard. “I stayed in the same hotel as Clark Gable once,” he offered helpfully, after an immense pause.
Haplo gave a disgusted snort, sent the hat spinning up and out of the hatchway. “All right, keep playing your game, old man.” The Patryn turned back, studying the supplies—a barrel of water, a cask of salted targ, bread and cheese, and bag of tangfruit. Sighing, scowling, Haplo stood staring moodily at the water barrel.
“Mind if I watch?” asked Zifnab politely.
“You know, old man, I could end this real quick. Jettison the ‘cargo’—if you take my meaning. It’s a long way down.”
“Yes, you could,” said Zifnab, easing himself onto the deck, letting his legs dangle over the edge of the hatch. “And you’d do it in a minute, too. Our lives mean nothing to you, do they, Haplo? The only one who has ever mattered to you is you.”
“You’re wrong, old man. For what it’s worth, one person has my allegiance, my loyalty. I’d lay down my life to save his and feel cheated that I couldn’t do more for him.”
“Ah, yes,” Zifnab said softly. “Your lord. The one who sent you here.” Haplo scowled. How the hell did the old fool know that? He must have inferred it from things I’ve let drop. It was careless, very careless. Damn!
Everything’s going wrong! The Patryn gave the water barrel a vicious kick, splitting the staves, sending a deluge of tepid liquid over his feet. I’m used to being in control; all my life, every situation, I’ve been in control. It was how I survived the Labyrinth, how I completed my mission successfully on Arianus. Now I’m doing things I never meant to do, saying things I never meant to say! A bunch of mutants with the intelligence of your average rutabaga nearly destroy me. I’m hauling a group of mensch to a star and putting up with a crazy old man, who’s crazy like a fox.
“Why?” Haplo demanded aloud, shoving aside the dog, who was eagerly lapping up the spill. “Just tell me why?”
“Curiosity,” said the old man complacently. “It’s killed more than a few cats in its day.”
“Is that a threat?” Haplo glanced up from beneath lowered brows.
“No! Heavens, no!” Zifnab said hastily, shaking his head. “Just a warning, dear boy. Some people consider curiosity a very dangerous concept. Asking questions ofttimes leads to the truth. And that can get you into a great deal of trouble.”
“Yeah, well, it depends on what truth you believe in, doesn’t it, old man?” Haplo lifted a piece of wet wood, traced a sigla on it with his finger, and tossed it back into the comer. Instantly, the other pieces of broken barrel leapt to join it. Within the space of a heartbeat, the barrel stood intact. The Patryn drew runes on both the barrel and in the empty air next to it. The barrel replicated itself, and soon numerous barrels, all filled with water, occupied the hold. Haplo traced fiery runes in the air, causing tubs of salted targ meat to join the ranks of water barrels. Wine jars sprang up, clinking together musically. Within a few short moments, the hold was loaded with food. Haplo climbed the ladder leading up out of the hold. Zifnab moved aside to let him past.
“All in what truth you believe in, old man,” the Patryn repeated.
“Yes. Loaves and fishes.” Zifnab winked slyly. “Eh, Savior?” Food and water led, somewhat indirectly, to the crisis that came near solving all of Haplo’s problems for him.
“What is that stench?” demanded Aleatha. “And are you going to do something about it?”
It was about a week into their journey; time being estimated by a mechanical hour flower the elves had brought aboard. Aleatha had wandered up to the bridge, to stand and stare out at the star that was their destination.
“The bilge,” stated Haplo absently, trying to devise some method of measuring the distance between themselves and their destination. “I told you, you’re all going to have to take turns pumping it out.”
The elves of Arianus, who had built and designed the ship, had devised an effective system of waste management, utilizing elven machinery and magic. Water is scarce and extremely valuable on the air world of Arianus. As the basis for monetary exchange, not a drop is wasted. Some of the first magicks created on Arianus dealt with the conversion of waste water back into pure liquid. Human water wizards dealt directly with nature’s elements, obtaining pure water from foul. Elven wizards used machines and alchemy to achieve the same effect, many elves swearing that their chemical wizardry produced better-tasting water than the humans’ elemental magic.
On taking over the ship, Haplo had removed most of the elven machinery, leaving only the bilge pump in case the ship took on rainwater. The Patryns, through their rune magic, have their own methods of dealing with bodily waste, methods that are highly secret and protected—not out of shame, but out of simple survival. An animal will bury its droppings to keep an enemy from tracking it.
Haplo had not, therefore, been overly worried about the problem of sanitation. He’d checked the pump. It worked. The humans and the elves aboard ship could take turns at it. Preoccupied with his mathematical calculations, he thought no more of his conversation with Aleatha, other than making a mental note to set everyone to work.
His figuring was interrupted by a scream, a shout, and the sounds of voices raised in anger. The dog, dozing beside him, leapt to its feet with a growl.
“Now what?” Haplo muttered, leaving the bridge, descending to the crew’s quarters below.
“They’re not your slaves any longer, Lady!”
The Patryn entered the cabin, found Roland—red-faced and shouting—standing in front of a pale, composed, and icily calm Aleatha. The human contingent was backing up their man. The elves were solidly behind Aleatha. Paithan and Rega, looking distraught, stood, hand in hand, in the middle. The old man, of course—when there was trouble—was nowhere to be found.
“You humans were born to be slaves! You know nothing else!” retorted a young elf, the cook’s nephew—a particularly large and strong specimen of elven manhood.
Roland surged forward, fist clenched, other humans behind. The cook’s nephew leaped to the challenge, his brothers and cousins behind him. Paithan jumped in, attempted to keep the elf off Roland, and received a smart rap on the head from a human who had been a slave of the Quindiniar family since he was a child and who had long sought an opportunity to vent his frustrations. Rega, going in to help Paithan, found herself caught in the middle.