Above us, on the upper deck, I could hear the crieds of the seamen, casting off mooring lines, shoving away from the dock with the traditional three long poles. The sails would not be dropped from the yards until the ship was clear of the harbor.
I heard the creak of the great side-rudders and felt the heavy, sweet, living movement of the caulked timbers of the ship.
We were now free of land.
The eyes of the ship, painted on either side of the bow, would now have turned toward the opening of the harbor of Telnus. Ships of Gor, of whatever class or type, always have eyes painted on them, either in a head surmounting the prow, as in tarn ships, or, as in the Rena, as in round ships, on either side of the bow. It is the last thing that is done for the ship before it is first launched. The painting of the eyes reflects the Gorean seaman's belief that the ship is a living thing. She is accordingly given eyes, that she may see her way. "Ready oars!" called the oar-master.
The oars were poised.
"Stroke!" called the oar-master.
The keleustes struck the great copper drum before him with the leather-cushioned mallet.
As one the oars entered the water, dipping and moving within it. My feet thrust against the footbrace and I drew on the oar.
Slowly the ship, like a sweet, fat bird, heavy and stately, began to move toward the opening between the two high, round towers that guard the entrance to the walled harbor of Telnus, capito city of the island of Cos, seat of its Ubar's throne.
We had now been two days at sea.
I and the others, from our pans, were eating one of our four daily rations of bread, onions and peas. We were passing a water skin about among us. The oars were inboard.
We had not rowed as much as normally we would have. We had had a fair wind for two days, which had slacked off yesterday evening.
The Rena of Temos, like most round ships, had two permanent masts, unlike the removable mast of the war galleys. The main mast was a bit forward of amidships, and foremast was some four or five yards abaft of the ship's yoke. Both were lateen rigged, the yard of the foresail being about half the length of the yard of the mailsail. We had made good time for a heavy ship, but then the wind had slacked.
We had rowed fro several Ahn this morning.
It was now something better than an Ahn past noon.
"I understand," said the oar-master, confronting me, "that you were a Captain in Port Kar."
"I am a captain," I said.
"But in Port Kar," he said.
"Yes," I said, "I am a Captain in Port Kar."
"But this is not Port Kar," he said.
I looked at him. "Port Kar," I said, "is wherever her power is."
He looked at me.
"I note," I said, "the wind has slackened."
His face turned white.
"Yes," I said.
At that moment, from far above, from the basket on the main mast, came the cry of the lookout, "Two ships off the port beam!"
"Out and read oars!" cried the oar-master, running to his chair.
I put down my pan of bread, onions and peas, sliding it under the bench. I might want it later.
I slid the oar out of the thole port and readied it.
Above on the deck I could hear running feet, men shouting.
I heard the voice of the Captain, Tenrik, crying to his helmsmen, "Hard to starboard!"
The big ship began to swing to starboard.
But then another cry, wild, drifted down from the basket on the main mast, "Two more ships! Off the starboard bow!"
"Helm ahead!" cried Tenrik. "Full sail! Maximun beat!"
As soon as the Rena had swung to her original course, the oar-master cried "Stroke!" and the mallets of the keleustes began to strike, in great beats, the copper-covered drum.
Two seamen came down from the upper deck and seized whips from racks behind the oar-master.
I smiled.
Beaten or not, the oarsmen could only draw their oars so rapidly. And it would not be rapidly enough.
I heard another cry drifting down from the basket far above. "Two more ships astern!"
The heavy, leather-cushioned mallets of the keleustes struck again and again on the copper-covered drum.
I heard, about a half an Ahn later, Tenrik call up to the lookout.
The man carried a long glass of the builders.
"Can you make out their flag?" he cried.
"It is white," he cried, "with stripes of green. It bears on its fielf the head of a bosk!"
One of the slaves, chained before me, whispered over his shoulder. "What is your name, Captain?"
"Bosk," I told him, pulling on the oar.
"Aiii!" he cried.
"Row!" screamed the oar-master.
The seamen with the whips rushed between the benches, but none, of all those there chained, slacked on the oars.
"They are gaining!" I heard a seaman cry from above.
"Faster!" someone cried from above decks.
But already the keleustes was pounding maximun beat. And doubtless that beat could not be long maintained.
About a quarter of an Ahn later I heard what I had been waiting for. "Two more ships!" cried the lookout.
"Where?" cried Tenrik.
"Dead ahead!" cried the lookout. "Dead ahead!"
"Helm half to starboard!" cried Tenrik.
"Up oars!" cried the oar-master. "Port Oars! Stroke!"
We lifted our oars, and then those of the port side only entered the water and pressed against it. In a few strokes the heavy Rena had swung some eight points, by the Gorean compass, to starboard.
"Full oars!" cried the oar-master. "Stroke!"
"What shall we do?" whispered the slave before me.
"Row," I told him.
"Silence!" cried one of the seamen, and struck us each a stroke with the whip. Then, foolishly, they began to lash away at the sweating backs of the slaves. Two of the men lost the oars, and the free oars fouled those of other men. The oar-master rushed between the benches and tore the whips away from the seamen, ordering them above decks.
He was a good oar-master.
The man then called out, "Up oars! Ready Oars! Stroke!"
Again we found our rhythm, and again the Rena moved through the waters. "Faster!" cried a man down into the rowing hold.
The oar-master judged his men. The beat was, even now, scarcely being made. "Decrease the beat by five points," said the oar-master to the keleustes. "Fool!" I heard.
Anad an officer rushed down the steps into the rowing hold, and struck the oar-master from his chair. "Maximun beat!" he screamed to the keleustes. Again the rhythm was that of the maximun beat.
The officer, with a cry of rage, then turned and ran up the stairs to the main deck.
Maximun beat.
But, in less than an Ehn, one man failed to maintain it, and then two, and the oars began to foul. Relentlessly though the keleustes, under his orders, pounded the great drum.
Then the strokes of the drum were no longer coordinated with the oars. The men, many of them, could no longer maintain the beat of the keleustes, and they had no guide for a stroke they could draw.
The oar-master, his face bloody climbed to his feet. "Up oars!" he cried. Then he spoke to the keleustes, wearily, "Ten from maximum beat."
We took u this beat, and again the Rena moved.
"Faster!" cried the officer from above. "Faster!"
"This is not a tarn ship!" cried the oar-master.
"You will die!" screamed the officer down into the hold. "You will die!" As the keleustes kept his beat, the oar-master, trembling, mouth bloody, walked between the benches. He came toward me. He looked at me.
"I am in command here," I told him.
"I know," he said.
At that moment the officer again came down the steps, entering the rowing hold. His eyes were wild. He had a drawn sword in his hand.
"Which of these," he asked, "is the captain from Port Kar?"
"I am," I told him.
"You are the one they call Bosk?" he said.