Waking Olympus (The Singers of the Dark Book 1) (3 page)

“Sure,” Mikel said. Though his voice was very uncertain.

“Good, you will leave in a week. Before that you will be fully briefed. You will be given money, some standard supplies and a choice of additional items. Remember you can’t take everything you want, you will be on foot. Pack light. That is all for now. Master Samuel will take on your preparation. Please make regular reports via our Trade Mission in Bethor if you can. Goodbye.”

A deep raspy voice spoke in his ear. “Follow me, son.” The guard.

The preparations for his mission took up Mikel’s entire time for the next week.
 

He selected a set of instruments. A mini-sextant, oiled leather wraps to protect things from rain. Compass, abacus, string, rope, a measured piece of string with a small weight (used for precise timing and length), a sling, a small sword. He had practiced with the sword but knew that although he still had some skill with it he had forgotten too much. Various cloths, chemicals, a few herbs, and medicinals, which with his understanding of their use would serve him well as a healer. A well made pair of boots and a protective set of clothing. A small code book; a one-time pad. A small telescope which he had made a couple of years before. A bedroll, basic cooking items, his fire-starting kit, a piece of waterproof canvas that could shelter him and fold to become his backpack, tent or bundle on his staff if easier. Some dried food. Finally, a small journal with ink and pen for recording his journey. Mai had offered him one of her bows but he was a lousy shot with them, he preferred his sling, which he was — against all expectations — quite good at. Also, carrying a bow on his back, even unstrung, was not being inconspicuous.

The pack and outfit felt comfortable but after a day’s walk he might think otherwise. He knew he was likely forgetting some important things and taking unnecessary items.

He had gone over the list of items several times. There were so many things he could add, but he could only carry so much and most of what he wanted was not necessary.
 
Master Samuel cast his eye over the pack, gave him a stern look and removed some things and suggested others.

Mikel's greatest concern was that he was so out of practice with a weapon that he would be fair game. He had thought this several times. To that end he had arranged some practice with some of the weapons masters and on their advice he had added a small shield to his collection.

Master Samuel sent him off to the armorer. He was fitted out with a set of light leather armor, with hidden thin stiff inserts of some material, they looked like cuttlebones. To prevent being easily stabbed in the back he was told, he didn't ask about the
easily
qualification, he knew that protection could limit damage but not necessarily prevent it, the hope being that it would limit any damage to the merely
uncomfortable
. It looked great when the armorer's young assistant put it on though he knew he wouldn't look as good as her; she was familiar with it and confident. When he tried it on the reddish brown leather squeaked and it felt awkward and unnatural. The squeaks when he moved made him sound like a mouse. They oiled it, which helped, but the impression lingered.

"Wear some loose clothing over it." Suggested the balding armorer, speaking earnestly, his words seemed to be strengthened from a permanent ruddy glow in his face looking as if he had just come from the forge and would pound him with a hammer if his time was wasted.

"Remember, deception is a strength," the assistant added.

Hardly necessary, Wizards learned many magic tricks both to dazzle the ignorant and to train in manipulating human perception, after all they weren't warriors.

By week’s end he thought he was ready — it wasn't true of course.

Looking back on his preparations made Mikel feel cold and alone. He came back to the present with a start and saw that night was starting to fall. The sea was much calmer and the wind had eased. A member of the crew was making his way around the deck lighting some strategically placed lamps. The stars were starting to come out. He examined the familiar constellations and the bearing of the ship and realized that the wind must have returned to its normal westerly direction. It was a smooth run downwind, with a good sea. He brushed his chin with his left hand unconsciously and discovered a layer of salt and the beginnings of a beard. Being on the sea was like surfing but without the feeling of being preternaturally clean or being in control. No golden, seaborne glow here. He couldn’t wait until they got to port and he could wash.

The Captain approached him again. He had been taking some measurements with a sextant. Not an easy thing while the deck still pitched from the trailing end of the rough sea.

“We are pretty much on course, about a day out of Bethor by my estimate. I will know more accurately when it is plotted.” He said.

“Can you determine our longitude easily using Thaytan?” Mikel asked.

Thaytan, the Constant Star, was only a magnitude three star but maintained the same position in the sky always; it was hard to single it out for the untrained eye so it was essential to have a good knowledge of the night sky to see the star that didn't belong among the constellations. Stellar magnitudes follow a logarithmic scale, which meant that magnitude three stars were about 2.5 times dimmer in real terms than magnitude two, with the brightest being magnitude one. That meant that the Constant Star was two magnitudes, which meant 2.5 times 2.5, or 6.25 times dimmer than the bright magnitude one stars, roughly, and just as well human eyes were logarithmic so they could see but not be overwhelmed. Though it was probably the case that human logarithmic eyes were responsible for the logarithmic magnitude scale.

Astronomers determined the length of the year using the star, easier than using the sun, or the planets. Using a modified sextant to measure the position of Thaytan and one or more other stars it was straightforward to determine the latitude and longitude of any place on the Western Sea. It was said, many Captains could just look at the sky and tell you precisely how long it would take to make landfall and the true heading.

“Easy to determine the longitude and latitude, but there are winds and currents. But still not hard.”

“What if Thaytan didn’t exist? Or, for example, if Lind was on the other side of Neti?” Mikel was genuinely curious. He wondered if other cultures were stymied by their inability to determine longitude.
 

“Well lad, it is speculative of course. I would say it would be almost impossible to measure longitude without Thaytan. How would you tell? You could use the phases and movements of the moon, but it would be fiendishly complicated. The moon isn’t always visible even on clear nights. We should be thankful that Thaytan is in a geostationary orbit.” Mikel nodded and had to agree, he pitied anyone on the far side of Neti.

The Captain touched his beret, to be polite, and then bid Mikel a good night as he retreated to his cabin to record the values from the 'chip log'.

The morning was bright and clear. The wind behind them was warmer today, perhaps a sign that winter was truly gone. With luck there would be no more cold snaps. It was one week into the month of Regin, mid-Spring, the month of Greening was already gone. It should be warmer by now. Many in Lind said the weather had been changing over the years but he hadn’t seen any change over his lifetime. He was nineteen, maybe it was too short a time to notice, or to fool yourself. The clouds to the east that morning heralded the approach of land, then came the comforting but soon annoying sound of seagulls wanting a feed. Later the low, dim outline of a mountain range could be seen. White tops, a green base. There were white seagulls poised in mid-air as if free from the world of sea and land never having known the touch of gravity; dolphins raced ahead like a marine honor guard, and a white-green horizon. It was beautiful.

Some time after they passed the heads of the bay he could see in the distance the slowly emerging shapes of ships, masts, squat buildings, temples, and a few spires. Bethor was the trading hub of the known world, which meant the western part of the continent of Arva. No one knew if there were people in the east beyond the Great Desert. The other known continent of Werrin to the south had been visited by Center ships but was found to be either barren or semi-arid, and uninhabited. Lind now concentrated on setting up trading posts in the southern coasts of Arva. But everything still seemed to end up going through Bethor.

Bethor had riches and knowledge and Mikel was eager to see the fabled Library and the Museum.

The city straddled a river called the Inda, which emptied into the Bay of Pennit. The Inda formed a delta on the eastern side of the bay with several tributaries through the delta. Sometimes, Wizards wryly referred to Bethor as the Blind Spot, a comment on the resemblance of the bay and river to an anatomist's view of a human eye with Bethor sitting on the optic nerve. Beyond the city was an imposing mountain range running north-south, snow capped: the Cantas.

The ship had already started maneuvering to head to the northern port so he still couldn’t see much of the city. He popped out his collapsible spyglass but it couldn’t resolve anything very well. Too far away; the scope was small and the optics were probably not the best. The port itself was some distance to the north of the delta area, near the northeast part of the bay. The bay was about 8 to 10 kilometers in diameter and circular, but eroded and missing a western arc that opened into the Western Sea. The shape was called a ‘crater’ by the locals, though none knew why. The delta area of the city, called only ‘The Delta’, wasn’t very big, about half a kilometer wide by a kilometer long, but it had become the center of the commercial district.

When the ship docked at the northern port he wasn't sure of his next step. He approached the Captain who was starting to relax now that the heavy cargo was on shore. His first mate a woman of loud voice and quick wit was organizing the loading onto wagons below on the dock, her black hair just poking out under her cap.

"My first mate, Dana, will be taking the cargo via the wagons. She is very capable, I'm surprised she hasn't applied for her own command by now. Be that as it may. We won't be following her, we will be taking a small boat over to the Delta."

"So is it just passengers to the Delta port then?"

"Transport to the Delta port is much more expensive and it would require extra handling for the cargo. So, more complicated and more expensive, and probably slower to take the cargo with us."

"Then why are there two ports?"

"This one, the Northern Port, is deep water, but as you can see there isn't a lot of hinterland to develop a sizable town, it'd be squeezed right up against the cliffs of the Rim. The Delta has a lot of flat ground with rich soils, suitable for a city and farms, but the river is very shallow, with shifting sand banks, nasty to navigate."

Mikel and the Captain crossed over to a smaller boat with a single sail. Dana waved at them and yelled, "See you later, Dad." The Captain waved back and gave Mikel an almost tender look.

Just beyond the port, to the North, there were hills making up the crater Rim, about fifty to a hundred meters high; compared to the imposing snowy Cantas far to the east they were insignificant, though still an impediment. At the Northern Port there were houses stretching all the way up the Rim with the best ones at the top. He knew there were roads that crossed the northern and southern rim to communities up and down the coast but he couldn't see them. He was originally from the North, somewhere, it gave him a strange tingling feeling.

East, beyond the city of Bethor, there was a large gap in the mountain range, the Bethor Valley, visible from anywhere in the Bay. It was a wide pass that split the Cantas in two and linked Bethor to the inland regions of Arva. North of the Bethor Valley and the Bethor Pass were the Northern Cantas, and to the south the Southern Cantas. Both mountain ranges showing white tipped peaks that towered above the bay. East of the Bethor Pass the countryside opened up into the famous Great Plains. In the center of the Plains was Lake Baikal, and around it the ancient and legendary Cities of the Plains. To the East beyond the Lake, somewhere in the Great Desert, it was told, was the half-mythical Trader city of Tanten.

When he finally arrived in Bethor, Mikel's doubts about this mission just got stronger. Did the Center really know what they were doing? He was stunned by the masses of busy people. Too many to note, analyze and observe. Too many to get to know. Lind, including the Artist’s Enclave, was just too small. He felt like a country hick. The docks were full of life and activity, there were horses and other animals of burden and people working to take goods off some boats and load onto others. There was constant noise, strange smells, and colors that he had not seen or experienced in such profusion before.

He saw a team of men naked to the waist, sweating, carrying things on their back off another vessel to the right as he walked up the gangplank. He could think of ways to save them some effort, he thought about having a talk with them when they stopped for a break. Then he noticed the well dressed man looking at them and the heavy set overseer beside him with a whip at his side. Slave owners and slaves. Ugly memories mixed in with sweet. This was best forgotten, he had a mission; he took a deep breath and moved on.

He walked with Captain Woran through the crowd at the docks. So many people with different clothes and styles, different smells, unknown lives. He felt very plain.

He remembered that the Council and Enclave often recruited promising candidates from Bethor and smaller towns, including himself. They must have intimate knowledge of the mainland cities. He wondered if relatives were passing him on the street without his knowing. This gave him strange uncomfortable feelings, yet there was simply no way to know who his family were, even if they were still alive, which he doubted, or maybe the doubting was just convenient denial. He dismissed the train of thought, it just wasn't helping him.