On the Oceans of Eternity

The Marines set to efficiently; bicycles resting in a row, clearing the long grass-the green undergrowth was unlikely to burn but you didn't want to take chances-cutting circles of sod to make space for campfires, pitching tents, both their own eight-person squad models and smaller types for the officers. A stamping, bayonet-prodding inspection of the undergrowth produced a yelling, dodging chaos when a six-foot Montpelier snake rose and fanged the forestock of a rifle only inches from a Marine's left hand, then thrashed about hissing and striking in warning before it whipped off downhill; that set the little group of tailless Barbary apes in the trees shrieking and bolting as well.

Marian's katana had leaped into her hand without the intervention of her conscious mind. She ran it back into the scabbard behind her left shoulder with a hiss of steel on leather greased with neatsfoot oil.

"Damn, but I hate snakes," she muttered. "Especially poisonous ones you can't see in the grass." Her partner snorted, and Alston went on: " 'Dapa, do I mention you and spiders?"

They led their horses to the little stream at the base of the hill, watered and unsaddled and rubbed them down, checking their feet and hobbling them before setting them to graze. That would keep them happier than being tethered with a feedbag, and they wouldn't go far from the campfires with the predators about. While she tended the horses the black woman watched the Marines at work, saw Swindapa doing the same.

The officer and her noncoms paced the area around the camp carefully; she saw Ritter take a sight on a bush twenty yards off, walk a few paces, do the same, note it to the sergeant and corporals and repeat the process all around. The black woman nodded; it was a trick the Marines had gotten from the Fiernan Spear Chosen, through her-a way to identify what should and shouldn't be there. After it got dark, a creeping enemy could look far too much like a bush. They put equal care into picking a good spot for the Gatling, and a detail was already at work digging a sanitary slit trench off behind a tree. An ax rang counterpoint to the shunk of spade and pick, breaking fallen wood into convenient sizes.

"Squads to wash in rotation," Ritter said, when the basic work was done and deadwood fires crackled in the fire pits. "Clarkson, what do you say? Can we get some 'variety tonight?"

"Piece of cake, or duck, ma'am," the young Marine answered, gri

The accent was Fiernan, Marion thought-from the west-coast area. At her slightly lifted brows Ritter went on: "You might want to see this. Commodore. He's from the Level Fens, south of Westhaven."

Swindapa nodded, then smiled and shook her head silently at Marian's inquiring look. Clarkson's section of the platoon trooped down to the river. They all stripped-soap and towels were along-but the brown-haired young man with the Immigration Office name also quickly plaited himself a headdress of grasses and reeds before slipping into the water. Even looking at him Marian had trouble following his passage down the darkened surface of the river. A minute later came a sharp gooselike squak- abruptly cut off. Another followed it, a minute of silence, then two more, and a thunder of wings in the darkness. Geese went by overhead, dandy-dog close, like whizzing projectiles with thrashing wings and outstretched panic-taut necks, honking in alarm. Clarkson came wading back holding four of the big birds high; Alston realized he must have swum close enough u

"Impressive," she said. And possibly useful, the filing system in her mind noted.

"Now, let me take a look at that bullet wound," Swindapa said.

Her own bruises and nicks had faded, but there was still a red healing weal where the slug had gouged Marian's flank. This platoon of Marines hadn't been involved in the boarding fight; in fact, most of its members hadn't seen combat yet- Ritter and the sergeant and one of the corporals being the exceptions.

In fact, Sergeant Daudrax has more scars than I do, Alston thought, looking over at him.

Although mine show more. Scar tissue came in dusty-white, standing out against the black of her skin. She looked down; spearthrust in the shoulder, boarding pike along the ribs, sword scar on the left forearm, and this would be the second bullet mark, after the one that took off most of the lobe of her left ear. Nothing too disfiguring yet; in fact, the Marines were casting occasional awed glances as the two senior officers soaped up and rinsed off.

And they all hurt like hell, infants. It mystified her sometimes why you got prestige from evidence of failure, and if letting someone cut you wasn't failing, what was?

By the time the squad had finished washing in the river- with much whooping and horseplay among the troops; at times like this you remembered that many of them would be considered kids up in the twentieth-the geese had been plucked, gutted, washed, rubbed with salt and some of the unit's precious, hoarded joint ration of Nantucket Secret Spice, and slapped on green-stick grills over the fires. By the time the other squads had taken their turn with the soap, the goose was about ready, enough to give everyone a mouthful or two of the flavorful fat-rich meat. Water was boiling for sassafras tea; that had the added advantage that you didn't have to add the purification powder with its unpleasant metallic tang.

Two big kettles were simmering with Jesus Stew-cubes of bouillon for stock, dried beans and peas, parched barley, chopped-up lengths of desiccated sausage and similarly "desecrated" vegetables, garlic powder, and sage, that service legend claimed not only proved the doctrine of the Resurrection, but was the Life. Together with bread baked that morning at the base camp and hard crumbly Alban cheese it made a pleasant enough di

Despite the day's work a flute came out; the song that set them swaying and clapping was half-new, a mutation of something dug out of a book during the dark, hungry winter of the Year 1, and crossbred since with things native to this era:

"I'll sing the base and you sing the solo-

Hob y derri dando!

All about the clipper ship the Marco Polo-

Ga