Voyage of the Fox Rider (36 page)

“Patefac Farricem,”
she repeated, gazing into the ebon mirror of the darkling water.

Though she did not expect to, Jinnarin could see no change in the surface; even so, a sense of disappointment crept into her heart.

A third time did Aylis call,
“Patefac Farricem.”
At last she looked up and shook her head,
No
.

Jinnarin’s shoulders slumped, but before she could say aught, “Come, Pysk,” muttered Alamar. “Back on watch. There’s yet some aurora left, and we would not miss a plume…though we may have missed one already.”

Dawn came and onward they sailed, beyond the town of Kairn, the City of Bells, eastward over the horizon from the course where they fared. Onward they went, the low chill Sun arcing its track across the cold winter sky, the Elvenship moving at a good clip through the
grey waves, driven by a stiff winter wind. Darkness fell, yet on they ran, and just ere the mid of the moonless night they came at last into the waters one hundred miles northwest of Rwn.

With a winter wind blowing, the crew stood upon the decks, sailors and warriors alike dressed in quilted, down-filled parkas and pants, the clothing proof against the brumal blow, the warriors armed and armored as well, for none knew what they might find. At the stern stood Jinnarin and Aylis and Alamar, father and daughter dressed like the crew in parkas and pants. To a lesser extent was Aravan affected by the chill and so the clothing he wore, though warm, was lighter. But Jinnarin was dressed in her usual garb, the Pysk seemingly untouched by the winter blast, as if being Feyan was somehow proof against the cold.

All eyes scanned the dark, night sea…finding nothing.

“Wot’r we looking for, Cap’n?” asked Tink, the lad jittering about in the wintry wind.

“I don’t know, Tink—something untoward…large or small I cannot say.”

Tink’s eyes scanned the horizon. “Lor, no matter if it’s as big as a house, in all this vastness it’ll be like searching for a needle in a haycock.”

Bokar growled, “Or a cork bobbing about on the sea.”

“I see nothing here,” said Jatu. “Where now, Captain?”

Aravan glanced overhead at the stars. “We will sail the line drawn on the map. Guide on the third star up in the Serpent’s Tail.”

“Aye, Captain. —Reydeau, pipe the sails. Boder, follow that star.”

Sailing this course they ran for an hour and then another, faring along the uncertain boundary between the icy waters of the Northern Sea and the milder Weston Ocean.

Still nothing did they find.

In the third hour on this track, overhead the glimmerings of the northern lights began. And Jinnarin and Aylis and Alamar remained on deck to watch for plumes.

“Captain,” said Jatu, “by my reckoning we are now
over forty leagues from Rwn, one hundred twenty miles.”

Aravan glanced at the stars again. “Aye, Jatu, thou art fair exact. Bring her about. We will run the line opposite, but tack larboard and starboard a league or so each way.” Aravan turned and pointed to a constellation southeasterly. “Guide on the Shepherd’s Crook.”

Alamar harrumphed. “I say, Aravan, what if we are zigging when we should have zagged?”

“Then, Alamar, we shall have missed whatever there is to miss. E’en so, we saw nought when we ran a straight course, and so if something lies a league left or rightward, then if Fortune smiles upon us, we will come across it; otherwise we will not.”

Reydeau piped the sails about, reversing the
Eroean
’s course, the ship now tacking back along the southeasterly line.

Another hour passed, the night deepening, and of a sudden Jinnarin shrieked, “There’s another one! Another plume!”

Both Alamar and Aylis muttered
Visus
, and looked to where Jinnarin pointed. A great long stream detached itself from the aurora and flowed down toward the eastern horizon, disappearing beyond.

“Line it up,” barked Alamar. “Pick out a star where the plume disappeared.”

“The red one on the horizon,” said Aylis.

“I agree,” responded Alamar. “Axtaris, it’s called.”

By this time Aravan had reached their side. “In line with Axtaris, Aravan,” said Alamar, “that’s where it went down.”

“Due east, Jatu,” called Aravan. “Due east we sail, Reydeau.”

As the ship was heeled over to sail easterly, Aravan turned to Alamar. “Hast thou any estimate as to how far?”

“Less than two hundred miles, I would say. Perhaps no more than a hundred fifty.”

Alamar turned to Aylis. She shrugged. “Beyond the horizon, Father, that is all I can say.”

Jinnarin nodded in agreement.

And with a stiff winter wind off the starboard stern quarter, eastward ran the
Eroean
.

The Sun had not set late in the day when they came to the waters off the northern coast of Rwn. The lookouts aloft had seen nothing unusual as the Elvenship cruised easterly, the Men relieving one another often because of the cold, cold air out upon the open sea. Another shift was just changing when Aravan came to the wheelhouse, where the officer of the deck and the steersman now stood out of the blow.

“Anything at all, Frizian?”

“Nay, Captain.”

Boder at the wheel spoke up. “Where to next, Cap’n? I mean, what be the course?”

“East, Boder, east. We’ll run at least until dark.”

“Then what, Cap’n?”

“Then we’ll see, Boder. More I cannot say.”

Aravan held an officers’ meeting just after sunset, the
Eroean
yet running east.

Gathered ‘round the map table were Jatu, Bokar, Frizian, Reydeau, Rico, and Fager. There as well were Jinnarin, Aylis, and Alamar. Aravan spread a chart upon the board. Two places were marked thereon: one where Alamar had judged the first plume had fallen, the other at his less-certain placement of the second.

Aravan looked up from the map. “Though we have seen two plumes and have followed them to their landings, we have found nought but waves in the water.”

Bokar growled, “Aye, Captain Aravan, nothing but waves. But that is not all, for we pursue something that I cannot even see—another ‘nothing’ to my way of thinking. Kruk! I feel as if we are chasing an invisible will-o’-the-wisp!”

Alamar bristled. “Well
I
can see it, Dwarf. And I tell you that it is a
something
and not a
nothing
we pursue.”

“Father,” said Aylis, “Bokar is not doubting our word. It’s just that it is difficult for a warrior to grapple with something he cannot see.”

Bokar nodded vigorously. “You have the right of it, Lady Aylis. Give me a foe I can see and I will soon put him down. But invisible will-o’-the-wisps are not at all to my taste.”

Jinnarin sat down on the map, pondering. “What we
need is a way of being at the place where a plume comes down at the time it comes down.”

Jatu slammed a fist into palm. “Exactly so, Lady Jinnarin. In pursuit, perhaps we will never find out what is happening. But let one come to us, and, well, mayhap things will change.”

Aravan smiled. “My thoughts exactly.”

Frizian looked back at the map. “What do you propose, Captain.”

Aravan drew a line between the two marks, then extended it on eastward another hundred and fifty miles, and there he put a third X. “I say we sail on another fifty leagues to this point and wait. Should a plume come down after we arrive, then surely it will strike nearby.”

Jatu grunted. “That assumes, Captain Aravan, that the next one—the third plume—will be eastward by the same distance that the second one was from the first.”

“Aye,” replied Aravan. “Same distance, same direction.”

Alamar cleared his throat. “
Hem!
But, Aravan, I am not at all certain that the second one was fifty leagues away from the first.”

Frizian looked at the Mage. “But, Mage Alamar, you were dead certain about the location of the first, e’en though that was more than two hundred miles away.”

“Right!” exclaimed Alamar. “But I was sighting out across Rwn. And gauging the likely size of the plume, and given the scale of the island, I could better judge where it landed. This time, though, we were on open water, and”—Alamar’s jaw jutted out defiantly—“I’d like to see you try to size something up when you’ve got no reference. Fifty leagues, sixty, seventy—I doubt you’d come even that close!”

Aravan turned up his palms. “Nevertheless, Alamar, thine is the best estimate we have. Hence, I suggest we sail easterly to this mark.” Aravan’s finger stabbed down on the third X.

Jinnarin looked up at the others ‘round the table. “Seems as good a chance as any.”

“By damn, third time, she be charm, Miss Jinnarin,” said Rico with a grin.

Aravan also looked about at the others. “Any additions, amendments, alternatives?” Silence answered him.
“Then set sail, Rico, all she will bear. Run due east another fifty leagues and hope that we are in position before the next plume falls.”

“Aye, Kapitan,” replied the bo’s’n, and he turned on his heel and left.

Aravan turned to the second officer. “Frizian, run her hard and true, for I would catch this will-o’-the-wisp.”

Frizian saluted. “Aye, Captain. Be there more?”

Aravan shook his head negatively, and the officers returned to their duties or to rest, each frowning, as if secretly fearing that the chase would be long and hard.

When they were gone, Jinnarin sat alone in the center of the table, her head down in reflection. Aravan reached for the map, clearing his throat, for the Pysk sat in its center. When Jinnarin looked up, Aravan said, “Thou art troubled, Lady?”

“Oh, Aravan, I was just thinking of something that Rico said.”

“And that was…?”

“Well, he said, third time’s the charm.”

Aravan raised an eyebrow.

Jinnarin added, “I am reminded that the fourth time’s the harm.”

They had sailed some thirty-five leagues—mid of night drawing nigh, the boreal lights writhing above—when in the remote distance ahead another plume streamed down from above and toward the ocean beyond the horizon afar.

“Where away, Alamar?”

“Close, Aravan. No more than fifty or sixty miles ahead.”

“Twenty leagues.” Aravan turned and called aft, “Rico, what be our speed?”

“Fourteen knots, Kapitan” came the reply.