“Perhaps that is true.” Whether the Saia genuinely believed this or was merely being polite, Ethan couldn’t say. “If so, it is true only when such peace is not disturbed by the living. That is why we would not venture into the interior even were we able.” He regarded them warningly.
“When they are disturbed, the vengeance of the dead is unimaginable.” He raised his spear, gestured inland. “Go that way, to the land of the unclean dead where spirits dwell in aimless, milling anger. They may focus on you, the living. Or they may not. We will not stop you. We would not if we could. But we will lament your passing as friends.
“They will not,” he concluded significantly, “like being disturbed. Every Tran may choose his or her own death. As for ourselves, the day has light to spend and we have hunting to do. Farewell.” He smiled a Trannish smile at Ethan. “Farewell, furless friend. Our legends lie not.”
Back on the raft, they were surrounded by excited sailors and knights who had been unable to hear the conversation. When Ethan concluded his brief resume of what had transpired, Williams danced about like a man possessed by a vision—which in a sense, he was. “We’ve got to follow them! I must have a look at their village, learn how they’ve adapted to a climate so radically different from the rest of this world. We must record their legends, and interpret—”
“We have to,” September interrupted him in no-nonsense tones, “get inland and find another way off this plateau as fast as we can, Milliken. This isn’t a scientific expedition.”
“But a discovery of this magnitude!…” Williams wailed. Abruptly, he killed the pleading in his voice. “I must formally protest, Skua.” He put his hands on hips, glared defiantly up at the giant.
September weighed more than twice as much as the diminutive schoolteacher. Ignoring the other’s belligerence, a product, no doubt, of a year’s survival on Tran-ky-ky, September replied humorlessly.
“Okay, now that you’ve gotten that out of your system, we’ll be on our way.” When it looked as if the teacher’s rising blood pressure might do him more harm than September ever would, the giant added consolingly, “Milliken, I’m ’bout as curious as you are concernin’ these folks, but we’ve considerable more people to try and help, remember?”
“’Tis true, friend Williams,” Sir Hunnar added. “We should be on our way.” The teacher turned desperately to Ethan, who half-shrugged.
“They’re right, Milliken. You know we—”
“Barbarians. I am surrounded by barbarians. Where’s Eer-Meesach?” He stormed away in search of his only intellectual colleague, mounting to the doorway of a second-story cabin like a hyperactive sloth.
Ethan smiled as he watched the teacher ascend the steep rampway paralleling the wider icepath. When they’d first crashed on this world, the smaller man’s muscles would have strained to mount that ramp at all, let alone propel him upward at such respectable speed. Tran-ky-ky hadn’t done much for their credit balances, but they’d built up other assets.
He had to think thus because the cloying mists, the rich greenery surrounding them here, were all too reminiscent of lands and worlds more receptive to human life. This place was too friendly. Go a few thousand meters or so in any direction, he knew, and the ambient temperature would drop a hundred degrees or more.
“Our friend classes us with you, Hunnar.” September regarded the knight expectantly. “Let’s be on our way, then. Or are you afeared of these spirits and night-creeps the Saia seem so fond of?”
Hunnar looked insulted. “We will deal with what ever we may encounter, friend Skua. Be it Rakossa of Poyolavomaar or the ghosts of my fathers.”
“Those who have traveled into Hell are not easily dissuaded by the tales of heat-softened hunters.” Elfa said with admirable confidence. She lowered her voice then, so that only those immediately around her could hear. “Still, it would be as well not to speak of this to the crew.”
Ethan and the others agreed readily. Though Elfa and Hunnar and a few of the more educated Tran were equipped to combat superstition and rumor, the average sailor was not. Tell them that according to the Saia they were about to enter the lands of the dead and confront the spirit world, and the Slanderscree might find itself moving in the wrong direction. Whether man or Tran, a storm is easier to combat than the fears dwelling in the depths of the mind.
Sails were reset and once again the icerigger commenced rumbling uphill. Two days later the mists started to thin. Once Ethan thought he spied an ellipse formed of neatly crafted wooden houses. They were nothing remarkable, but they were radically different from the familiar heavy-beamed, stone dwellings of all other Tran. He did not mention the sighting or his observations to the still sulking Williams.
The mist did not disperse gradually. They reached a point where it stopped clean, a slightly oscillating wall of steam. From then on they saw no more signs of the Golden Saia. Some day Ethan would return and listen to the long legends of a misplaced people. So he told himself. He was not honest enough to admit that once back in the comfortable hub of Commonwealth civilization, he would likely forget all but memories of Tran-ky-ky.
For now, he forced his attention outward. They had a confederation to expand, a union of ice to cement, and they did not have a lifetime in which to do it.
Grass turned yellowish and scraggly. Trees gave way to bushes, and ferns and flowers vanished behind them. The Slanderscree had emerged on a high, rolling plain. As they lumbered across bare gravel and tormented grasses, the wind began to rise, an old companion back from unwilling vacation. Soon it was blowing at familiar strength. The Tran found it comforting.
None of the crew had been lost in the transit, though Eer-Meesach was still treating the most severe cases of heat-stroke in the central cabin. The temperature fell and the humans had long since redonned their survival suits, the Tran their heavy hessavar fur coats.
They received no visits from the spirits of the dead or otherwise. The most notable spirits aboard, those of the sailors, had risen considerably with the return of a congenial climate. The rolling landscape mounted into steep hills to the north and east. After consultation with Ta-hoding, it was decided to turn southward. They would eventually reach the western edge of the plateau. Then they could begin hunting for a way down.
As the wind increased, so did their speed. Before long they were traveling at a pace short of breathtaking but quite respectable. It didn’t take long for everyone on board to grow accustomed to the domesticated thunder of the twelve huge wheels.
Yellowish grass continued to speckle the plain, fighting to stay rooted in the sparse soil. The raft’s chief cook tried some in a meal one night, and though it was pronounced edible by all who tried it, there was no rush to harvest. It proved tough, tasteless, and hard to digest.
In days of traveling they saw nothing that resembled a tree. The closest approximations were widely scattered, meter-high bushes which looked like umber tumbleweeds. Their tightly intertwined branchlets had the consistency of wire. Ethan wanted to use a beamer to cut a sample and for a change, it was Williams who protested. Eying the isolated, unimpressive clump he said, “Anything that can survive in this desolation deserves to remain unharmed.” And Ethan put his beamer away.
The wind was steady and predictable. That gave the sailors needed time. They learned fast, but handling a ship the size of the Slanderscree on land was a different proposition from doing so on ice.
Ethan spent much time watching the parade of distant hills and thought of the Golden Saia. Taken theoretically, he supposed it was possible for the spirits of the departed to linger in some outrageously incomprehensible mode—that they would congregate like so many conventioneers seemed impossible. And if they were so inclined, why choose a region as unattractive as this? True, the Saia had remarked on their desire for privacy, and this vast plateau would certainly provide that, but—