They would only need seconds to pick up wind and start southward. There was no question of running into the wind now. Against it they could outrun the Horde, but not the herd. They might get out of their path. They had to get out of their path.
Utter confusion extended invisible claws, gripped the barbarian ranks as the word was passed. Spears and axes and torches were dropped as the remaining nomads spread their dan and chivaned for their lives. A few of the barbarian rafts were struggling with reduced crews to pull out their ice-anchors and get under sail as well. It was impossible to tell at that distance, but Ethan supposed many of those anchors were being cut free.
The majority of the nomads seemed determined to gain the distance to the rafts, the only homes they’d ever known. A few, less concerned, scattered in all directions, though it was hard going against the wind, or north, or south. A few milled about aimlessly. Others were trampled under chiv by their hysterical fellows.
Hunnar was growling low in his throat, glancing from the sails to the straining captain, then astern.
“Get her nose around, Ta! Get her nose around!”
Now the herd was close enough for Ethan to discern individuals. Close enough to see the long, gargantuan tusks curved partway back into the cavernous mouths. Even battling wind-noise, their thunder dominated as they inhaled cubic liters of air, forced it out of the fleshy jets near their rear.
The tran of the Slanderscree fought like demons to put on every centimeter of sail. There was a crackling and snapping. The still shattered bowsprit turned with agonizing patience to the south. Nearly free now of the attentions of the Horde, she began to move.
She passed the half-putrid corpse with nail-biting slowness—the corpse whose rotting stink had drawn the furious, bellowing herd from feeding grounds far over the horizon to gather and mourn over one of their dead.
Just as Eer-Meesach had said it would.
Ethan found himself pounding the rail with a fist.
“Move, ship, move! Please move!” Rippling wave-thunder drowned out all sounds now, hammered relentlessly against his eardrums. Prayers went unheard.
A few, a very few, of the barbarian rafts had put on sail. The rest were trying.
The herd moved in slow motion upon the rafts. With them. Among them.
Through them.
There were no more rafts.
The Slanderscree was pulling away as her sails ate wind. The bad runner held for a minute, then a second, and another, until it was forgotten in other concerns. Ethan stood frozen to the rail as the herd approached at an incredible pace. They were moving at least 100 kph—into the wind!
What remained of the once omnipotent Horde of the Scourge vanished beneath several million kilos of gray flesh, became a red-brown smear on the shining ice.
The herd drew closer. For a second time Ethan gazed down the throat of Leviathan.
It paused, froze in space.
Began to recede.
“They’re stopping at the body,” murmured Hunnar finally, long after they were safely away southward. He had to clear his throat once before the words came out. “Thank all the Gods!”
“It didn’t look like many of them managed to escape,” said Ethan.
“No,” agreed Hunnar, curiously unemotional. “Not many.”
“Cubs, too,” continued Ethan, his voice dropping to a barely audible mutter.
September showed no such concern. He was rubbing both hands together and chatting with sailors and soldiers, as happy as if a freshly baked cake had exited the oven without falling. Hunnar was leaning over the stern, straining to pick out shapes among the rapidly receding forms.
“I didn’t see Sagyanak’s raft in those final seconds. Could the devil-bitch have escaped again?”
“Sorry to kill all the bad dreams you half-hoped to have, friend Hunnar,” said September. He grabbed at his hood as a sudden gust of wind threatened to tear it off. “I did.”
“What do they do with the dead young one, the stavanzers? Now that they’ve found it?” asked Ethan.
“If the wizard’s information is accurate, and it has been thus far,” the knight replied, “then the thunder-eaters will remain with the dead for several days. I have never seen such a thing myself. Supposedly they prod the body with their tusks, nudge it every so often in the apparent hope that they may stir it to life once again… Eventually, some inner desire satisfied, they will move off, never to return to that spot again. Or perhaps they merely grow hungry. None know for certain. Among my people, at least, the observation of the thunder-eater’s habits from close range ’tis not over-popular. And thunder-eaters do not die often.”
“I don’t wonder at your caution.” Ethan noticed that Ta-hoding was only a short breath from total collapse, now that the Slanderscree was out of danger. A sweaty heap of fur and flesh, the captain had sunk to the deck next to the big wheel. He stared into nothingness. All his efforts seemed directed to following each breath with another.
“Noble animals,” Ethan mumbled.
“What?” September came over. “Those supra-nourished grotesque herbivores? Get a hold on your self, lad!”
Ethan sighed. “Skua, sometimes I think you have no poetry in your soul.”
“Now as to that, young feller-me-lad, firstly you’d have to establish the existence of the latter. And you’re one to talk!” He sniffed with exaggerated force. The resultant supercilious pose was so comical that Ethan couldn’t keep from laughing. “You kindly explain to me, lad, the poetry in volume buying or discount pricing.”
Ethan started to do just that, but had to pause in the middle of the first sentence.
Why did someone have to keep reminding him of where he wasn’t?
XIII
THERE WAS LITTLE NEW to look at as the raft continued to devour the kilometers. The journey rapidly became a dull cycle of rising, pacing the too-familiar deck, talking, eating, and returning to sleep. The humans, in one respect, were fortunate. They had the added extra task of fighting to stay that one step ahead of frostbite.
They’d entered a new region, filled with innumerable small islands. Many rose nearly perpendicular from the ice—dark, black stone, the stumps and cores of long-eroded volcanos. They served to break the monotony of flat horizon, but just barely, since the next was much like its predecessor.
A few of the islands were inhabited. Tiny villages clung precariously to the cliffs.
Occasionally a small raft or party of wandering hunters would parallel the Slanderscree for a few dozen meters. The dialect here differed from that of Sofold. Ta-hoding, a good merchant, was able to converse with them like a neighbor. After the first few encounters, even Ethan and the other humans could make themselves understood, though they lacked the captain’s fluency.
The Trannish language had a universal planetary base, then. Local variations did not preclude adequate communication between widely scattered groups. Another plus as far as trade and commerce were concerned.
No matter how skilled or strong, the locals rapidly dropped behind, unable to match the big raft’s speed.
Things grew so dull that Ethan found himself wishing for another storm—but not a Rifs. That bored he wasn’t.
He got it.
After the third consecutive day of freezing wind and even a little razor-sharp sleet, he was damning himself for a romantic idiot and praying for a return to the clear sameness of days before. Anything for a reprise of calm weather!