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THAT they might be able to manufacture duplicate eggs hadn't changed Bevy's and Vanas minds.
Second only to getting their eggs back was their desire to return to their tribes. They pla
Sloosh guessed this. "You owe it to your people to find a way out. You also owe it to all people, all sapients. You can give them salvation and continuity."
The two could understand saving their own tribes. But why should they bother with their enemies?
"If you could get to another world but you took only your own people, you would be guaranteeing their degeneration. They are too few for healthy breeding. In time the inbreeding would destroy them."
"What about you?" Deyv asked. "Do you intend to get your people through?"
"Of course. Really, I don't understand myself. Why should I be trying to talk you into getting humans through when they would probably do their best to destroy us Archkerri? But I am an optimist, however irrational that state is."
Vana said that it was perilous but possible to return to their tribes. It seemed impossible to overcome
The Shemibob. So why not be realistic?
"You make your own reality," Sloosh said. "Within certain limits. What are the limits in this situation?
We won't know until we get to The Wasteland."
When nobody else was around, Vana and Deyv discussed the possibilities.
"It's too risky," she said.
"I agree. We've taken too many risks as it is. What we encountered was bad, but at least we know what we'll face on the way back. But there—?"
"We don't have a chance, anyway. How could we do what many thousands for how many thousands of thousands of sleep-times have tried to do and failed?"
"Right."
The wind slowed down and then curved in a different direction. It was pushing them southward of The
Wasteland, according to the witch. Deyv and Vana took this as an omen warning them not to tackle The
Shemibob. Sloosh asked -them to explain just how they'd concluded this. They couldn't do so, but they still kept their conviction.
In another sleep-time, the wind had weakened to the point where it would soon be safe to leak off the lifting gas.
"That is," Sloosh said, "if there isn't a change in the wind's force."
By then the band of light on the horizon had become even broader. Once they had landed, though, The
Dark Beast would overtake them. They would have to endure at least six sleep-times of more darkness.
It seemed a small price, no matter how much they longed for a bright sky.
The wind continued to fade. At last, Sloosh took a sword and punched away at a cell. He was just about to make two more tiny holes in other cells when Kiyt came ru
"Mother says the wind is increasing!"
"May I borrow some of your expletives, Deyv?" the Archkerri said. "My language doesn't have any."
They went back up on deck. Not only was the tharakorm moving faster, the horizon behind them had become black.
"Do you have anything with which to repair the puncture?" Sloosh asked Feersh. Hoozisst translated.
She spread her hands out and rolled her eyes upward.
"I suppose that means no. Well, I've calculated the rate of leakage. We will be on the ground shortly after the next sleep-time. So, since the wind will be much stronger then, we must take our chances now."
Without consulting anybody about his intentions, he went below and punched many holes. Returning to the deck, he said, "If that gas is inflammable, we mustn't have any fires. Also, we must stay up here. The gas will fill the rooms belowdecks."
"I know," Feersh said after the Yawtl had relayed the message. She went to the railing and looked down with blind eyes. '
Sloosh gave a buzz of exasperation, then said, "Deyv and Vana, warn the others. The witch doesn't care if we and the slaves strangle. Her children are aware of the dangers, of course."
When they got back, the Archkerri said, "The wind has swung around toward The Wasteland. Too late to do us much good, though. We'll be on the treetops in about as fast as you could run two miles. Lef s hope we're as fortunate as we were the last time."
A short while later, they saw water ahead. It extended beyond the horizon, even at their altitude.
Feersh and her children tied ropes to themselves and secured the ends to a mast. The slaves hurried to do the same. The Yawtl, braving the gas, went below many times, returning with his arms full of the witch's devices.
"We're going to land on the water," Sloosh told him. "It'll pour through the holes in the bottom and the sides, and the tharakorm will sink. Maybe it'll first float awhile because of the gas left in the cells. But you won't be able to swim to shore with a single one of those things. You'll be lucky if you don't have to shed your weapons."
Hoozisst snarled, and he said, "We'll see about that!" "You can't see much from the bottom of the lake.
Do as you will."
Deyv and Vana had strapped the cube onto the Archkerri's back. He'd contemplated unfolding it but had decided not to. The wind would blow it across the water to the farther shore—if, that is, it was a lake.
This might be the ocean for all he knew. It didn't seem likely that they had been pushed to the lower shore of the land mass. Still, his eyeball calculations could have been incorrect. There was no use taking a chance.
As they angled down, thev saw some tiny white spots on the water about a mile from the beach. When they were closer, they recognized these as very large two-masted sailing ships. Deyv was impressed by their size. He'd never seen water-going craft so huge. At the same time, he felt any little optimism he'd had evaporate. The people on those ships would kill them or capture them.
The witch's two sons were weeping and sobbing and shouting that they could never swim that far to the shore. Jowanarr looked pale, but she didn't seem to be scared. Feersh, who couldn't see what was coming but had had it described to her, stood with her back to the mast. She had doffed her robe, since its heaviness would drag her down. Deyv thought that she would soon be in the same situation she was in when her mother had chased her naked and weaponless into the jungle. The difference was that she was old now. And blind. Would her children help her swim or would they abandon her? She'd given them no reason to love her.
Perhaps she was thinking the same things. If so, she wasn't letting them show on that grim face.
The Yawtl left his tall pile of treasures and swaggered up to Feersh.
"Well, hag, where are your witchery, your evil schemes, and your arrogance now? Hoozisst tricked you good, didn't he? You'll soon be sinking to the mud, and your flesh will be eaten by the fish, though it may make them sick."
Hoozisst's laugh was stopped by a hard slap from Jowanarr's palm. He staggered back, holding his cheek, his eyes slit. Then he flashed out his sword and raised it to cut the daughter down. She stared at him, her arms folded.
Hoozisst stopped. "Sure, you'd like me to kill you now so you'd be spared the agony of drowning. You're not tricking me, hag daughter of a hag. But if you should make it to the shore, you won't live long. I promise you that."
"Haven't you seen those ships?" Jowanarr asked. "Their crews will take the stuff you stole from us away from you. If you don't drown first under their weight, greedyguts."
Hoozisst whirled around, and his narrowed eyes grew large. He began swearing and stomping around while the others laughed at him. Presently, though, as the water and the vessels came closer, all on the tharakorm fell silent.