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had their slings ready, loaded with leaden ball, though under orders not to
cast unless the Mingols started arrow fire. Across the waves a stallion
screamed from its cage.
Thought of the Maelstrom made the Mouser look in his pouch for the golden
queller. He found it, all right, but somehow the charred stub of the
Lokitorch had got wedged inside it. It was really no more than a black cinder.
No wonder Rill had burned herself so badly, he thought, glancing at her
bandaged hand -- when Cif had stayed on deck, the harlots, and Mother Grum,
had insisted on the same privilege and it seemed to cheer the men.
The Mouser started to unwedge the black godbrand, but then the odd thought
occurred to him that Loki, being a god (and in some sense this cinder was
Loki), deserved a golden house, or carapace, so on a whim he wrapped the
length of stout cord attached to it tightly round and round the weighty golden
cube and knotted it, so that the two objects --queller and god-brand -- were
inextricably conjoined.
Cif nudged him. Her gold-flecked green eyes were dancing, as if to say, "Isn't
this exciting!"
He nodded a somewhat temperate agreement. Oh, it was exciting, all right, but
it was also damnably uncertain -- everything had to work out just so, why, he
could still only guess ~~t the directions god Loki had given them in the
speech he had forgotten and none else had heard....
He looked around the deck, surveying faces. It was strange, but everyone's
eyes seemed to flash with the same eager juvend excitement as was in Cif's ...
it was even in Gavs', Trenchik, and Gib's (the Mingols)...even in
Mother Grum's, bright as black beads....
In all eyes, that is, except the wrinkle-netted ones of old Ourph helping Gavs
with the tiller. They seemed to express a sad and patient resignation, as
though contemplating tranquilly from some distance a great and universal woe.
On an impulse the Mouser took him from his task and drew him to the lee rail.
"Old man," he said, "you were at the council hall the night before last when I
spoke to them all and they cheered me. I take it that, like the rest, you
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heard not one word of what I said, or at best only a few -- the directives for
Groniger's party and our sailing today?"
For the space of perhaps two breaths the old Mingol stared at him curiously,
then he slowly shook his bald dome, saying, "No, captain, I heard every last
word you spoke (my eyes begin to fail me a little, but my ears not)
and they greatly saddened me (your words) for they expressed the same
philosophy as seizes upon my steppe-folk at their climacterics (and often
otherwhen), the malign philosophy that caused me to part company with them in
early years and make my life among the heathen."
"What do you mean?" the Mouser demanded. "A favor -- be brief as possible."
"Why, you spoke -- -most winningly indeed (even I was tempted), of the glories
of death and of what a grand thing it was to go down joyfully to destruction
carrying your enemies with you (and as many as possible of your friends also),
how this was the law of life and its crowning beauty and grandeur, its supreme
satisfaction. And as you told them all that they soon must die and how, they
all cheered you as heartily as would have my own
Mingols in their climacteric and with the selfsame gleam in their eyes. I well
know that gleam. And, as I say, it greatly saddened me (to find you so fervent
a death-lover) but since you are my captain, I accepted it."
The Mouser turned his head and looked straight into the astonished eyes of
Cif, who had followed close behind him and heard every word old Ourph had
spoken, and looking into each other's eyes they saw the same identical
understanding.
At that very instant the Mouser felt _Flotsam_ beneath his feet slammed to a
stop, spun sideways to her course. and sent off circling at prodigious speed
just as had happened to _Sprite_ day before yesterday, but with a greater
force proportionate to her larger size. The heavens reeled, the sea went
black. He and Cif were brought up against the taffrail along with a clutter of
thieves, whores, witches (well, one witch), and Mingol sailors. He bid Cif
cling to it for dearest life, then found his footing on the tilted deck, and
raced past the rattling whipping mainsail (and past young Mikkidu embracing
the mainmast with eyes tight shut in ultimate terror or perhaps in rapture) to
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