Chapter 14

It was foggy again in the morning. Piiram fried fish and potatoes again. “We can’t go anywhere until we can see the sun, at least. I haven’t got a clue which is the way towards the shore. It’s so still I can’t even hear the waves hitting the rocks. But anyway, it’s best to wait until the fog clears, or at least gets a bit thinner. We don’t want them to think we’re sneaking up on them.”

Blimey. What a place. No lights in the evening, don’t arrive in the evening, and don’t arrive in fog. Talk about distrust! Maybe they’ve got good reason.

‘Dangerous place if you look like money...’

“What would they do to us if they thought we were sneaking up on them?”

“Who knows? I wouldn’t want to be the one to find out. But if we’re straightforward with them, and they can see we’re being straightforward with them, they’ll be straightforward with us.”

By the time we’d finished breakfast, the sun was a dim circle in the sky, and the coast was vaguely visible as a fuzzy, darker bit of fog.

“If we wait another few minutes before setting off, they’ll be able to see it’s just three chaps in a dinghy before we get too close in. We’ll just have hot water, Piiram, don’t put anything in it.”

The fog lifted as we approached the shore, but I couldn’t see any sign of human habitation. As we got closer, I realized that there were people sitting on some of the rocks, watching us, but I still couldn’t see any buildings. We were heading for a gap in the rocks, maybe seven or eight metres wide.

“They’d have recognized Jalaan by now, but they don’t know us so well. We’ve only been here a few times before. It’s not the easiest place to run to in bad weather. At least they don’t mind if you bring a boat right in if you have to, they even put up leading lights during storms. They’d have been very suspicious if we’d brought it in last night. There’s not enough wind this morning, even if we wanted to.”

Then suddenly I spotted Aila, high up on the rocks, much further away than all the other people. She’d already seen me, and was running, leaping from rock to rock. Then she disappeared behind some rocks, and didn’t reappear.

Piiram had seen her, too. “That was Griima running, wasn’t it? She must have seen you. She’s heading for the quayside, we’ll be there in a minute.”

My heart was pounding in my chest. I felt as if I would burst.

The rocks either side of the inlet towered over us, and the inlet seemed to go on forever. Then suddenly it opened out into the most beautiful natural harbour. Piiram threw the painter to a young man on the quayside, who tied it round a stone bollard. As we clambered out onto the quay, Aila appeared at a run.

She ran straight up to me, flung her arms around me, and buried her face in my chest. I put my arms around her and held her tight. She was breathing hard from running. I could feel the tears running down my face.

Then she was leaning back in my arms, looking up at me with tears in her eyes, too. “What are you doing here? I told you to go and find somebody else! Didn’t you get my letter?”

“Yes, I got it. You didn’t think I’d really do that, did you?”

“Yes! No! I don’t know. You’re a naughty boy, anyway!” She buried her face in my chest again and held me tight. I could feel her breath catching in great sobs.

She looked up at me again. “But what can we do? Where can we go? You shouldn’t have come, it just puts you in danger too. There’s no point getting both of us killed.”

“But we can do something. We’ve got friends. Lots of them.”

“So we get our friends killed, too? Do you know what happened to Jalaan?”

“Nothing’s happened to Jalaan. Mashaar and Piiram talked to him yesterday.”

She was beginning to calm down a little. “Come into the inn. They’ll get you a skiir. I could do with one, too.”

She seemed to see Mashaar and Piiram for the first time, and reached out towards them. “I don’t know how to thank you two. I told you not to tell anyone you’d seen me, but I’m so glad you told Owen. You come and have some skiir, too.”

Somehow I hadn’t expected Troum to have an inn.

The whole village seemed to face in towards the harbour. It reminded me of the village on the Sirimi road, and I wondered for a moment why, then realized. There was no glass in the windows, the buildings were the same rough cut grey limestone, and none of the roofs protruded above the line of the rocks behind. I realized that we had an audience.

Aila led the way up a flight of stone stairs between two houses, onto a narrow alleyway behind them. The inn, which didn’t look any different from the houses, was just the other side of the alleyway.

“Have you three had anything to eat this morning? I’m well in credit here, and Bashaamu’s always got stew on the go.”

We had, but Piiram was willing to fill up again, and Mashaar said he wouldn’t mind a half portion. I really didn’t feel hungry at all. I just wanted to be with Aila. And we needed to talk, too.

“He tried to kill me. Twice, now. And he didn’t care if he killed Jalaan in the process.”

“Who did?” I was fairly sure I already knew.

“Jerem’s man, of course. Or more likely, his father’s, if Jerem’s dead.”

What to say, and what not to say? I really want to tell her in private, but I can’t say that in front of all these people. If I tell her here about Jerem’s legs, then everyone here will know. But so what? They’ve tried to kill her already. It can’t get any worse than it is. And these people are unlikely to talk to anyone else anyway.

“Jerem’s not dead. He’s a gibbering idiot now, and he’ll never walk again. But it wasn’t you who smashed his knees, was it?”

Aila looked thunderstruck. “Smashed his knees? No! Why would I do that? I hit him on the head, and he fell down. I didn’t know if he was alive or dead, but he wasn’t moving. I just ran out of the house and hid until I heard Berraami’s train coming. Surely Berraami told you the story?”

“Yes, that’s exactly the story she told me. But Mashaari went round to your place a few hours after you left...”

“I know. I saw her. That’s when I knew I had to leave.”

“Ah. I did wonder about the coincidence of the timing. Anyway, Mashaari told your Mum and Gran that you’d smashed Jerem’s knees as well. They seem to have just accepted Mashaari’s word for that, but it seemed strange to me. Then when I talked with Birgom, he didn’t believe you’d have done that. Nor did Maamatta...”

“Who’s Maamatta?”

“Borjii Maamatta. The lady of the wealthy family in Griishi...”

“You’ve been to Griishi? And talked with the rich people?”

“I’ve been to Griishi, but I’ve never talked to the rich people there, no – well, apart from the two boys. They gave me a letter from their mother. Here, you read it.” I fished Maamatta’s letter out of my bag.

“Aibram warned me not to trust the boys, though.”

“I don’t know who Aibram is, either, Owen. We’ve got lots to tell each other, I know. But let me read this first.”

People were crowding round us, fascinated. I was pretty sure none of them could read.

Suddenly Aila thrust the letter into my hand. “Here, you read it to me. I can’t see, I’m crying too much.”

She grabbed me round the chest and put her head on my shoulder. I read it to her quietly. I was sure everyone could hear me, anyway. They weren’t making a sound themselves. I carefully changed ‘Aila’ to ‘Griima’ throughout as I read.

my dear owen,

don’t worry that i know who you are and why you’re here, and that my boys do too. i’m writing to warn you to be careful, especially for griima’s sake.

she’s running away because she thinks jerem is angry with her. as far as she knows, he could have recovered completely.

everybody on the circuit knows the story, but i don’t believe it. if i’m right, griima doesn’t know how much danger she is in. i don’t believe she broke jerem’s knees. i don’t doubt that she broke his head, she’s a capable young woman and that was surely the right thing to do. but why break his knees when his head’s already broken? that doesn’t make sense, and i know she’s a sensible girl. gamaara has talked about her many times.

i’m sure it must have been tiiram (that’s jerem’s father) who did that. it is in character. now of course he wants everyone to believe it was griima. he knows griima knows she didn’t break jerem’s knees, and i expect he’s very afraid that when she hears that people are saying that, she’ll deny it, and they’ll find out it was him. so there is a very real risk that he’ll have hired someone to arrange a nasty accident for her. except maybe in the heat of the moment, jerem wouldn’t have wanted her killed, i’m sure, and i think she’d know that. but tiiram probably does want her dead, and she doesn’t know that.

i’m sure that gamaara and others also suspect that it was tiiram, not griima, who broke his knees. but they daren’t believe it, can’t prove it, and aren’t saying anything to anyone – well, not that i’ve heard, anyway.

my boys will do anything they can to help – within reason, don’t forget they’re only boys. and if you can possibly get her back here to our house, we can keep her safe until the truth is public and she’s out of danger. my husband doesn’t know what i think, but if she’s here to tell him about the knees, he’ll believe it. he doesn’t know she was in griishi, either.

i’m only sorry we didn’t know the story until after she’d already left griishi. we’ve not told anyone she was here, and we won’t. i can’t speak for the coach drivers, of course.

good winds and favourable tides,

Borjii Maamatta

“Your reading is fantastic, Owen. You’ve been studying hard, I can tell.”

“We were snowed in in Briggi for four weeks. What else was there to do? Well, really there was lots to do, but I did spend a lot of time studying, yes. I didn’t know anything had happened to you until we got through to Tambuk, where Berraami was stuck.”

“So what should we do now? Should we get Mashaar and Piiram to take us back to Griishi, to Maamatta?”

“No, I don’t think so. Maamatta won’t believe that her boys can’t be trusted, but Aibram is sure they can’t be. He thinks they’d tell anyone anything for a few coins, because they know no-one would dare touch them. Graamon has a friend in Barioha who’ll help us, though. Mashaar and Piiram will take us to where we can get a gig into Barioha. I hope Jerem’s father doesn’t have any friends here listening to us.”

“I’m pretty sure he doesn’t. Oh, I’ve so much to tell you, Owen. But Maamatta has it exactly right, I’m sure. And Tiiram’s man did find me, and he’s tried to kill me twice now, but he won’t try again. But sooner or later another one will come looking for him, and with murder in his head.”

“He won’t try again? He’s dead?”

“I doubt if he’s dead yet. He’s only been there three days. But he won’t last long.”

“Where is he? Are you sure he can’t escape from wherever he is?”

“No, he doesn’t have a boat. And he doesn’t have any fresh water, either – or not more than he was carrying, and he probably wasn’t carrying any. He didn’t expect to be stuck there.”

“Stuck where? Where is he? How did he get stuck?”

Aila started crying again. She’s remembering something that happened. What happened? Patience, Owen. She’ll tell you everything in her own time.

After a little while, she took another sip of skiir, and pulled herself together. “The first thing that happened was sailing over here with Jalaan. We were about halfway across when the rudder broke off. Jalaan spotted it floating a little way astern, and spilled the wind to slow us down, but of course he couldn’t bring the boat round into the wind, so we were just blowing with the wind. The broken rudder was too far away already to retrieve it, we were blowing along much faster than anyone could possibly swim, and we didn’t have a long enough rope to swim for it with a rope to get back with. We thought we were finished, and would get smashed to pieces on the rocks halfway between Troum and the river mouth. But we were lucky, we got caught on a mud bank instead, and it was half tide, going down. Jalaan managed to break a plank out of the cabin roof, and lashed it onto the stump of the rudder. We waited for the tide to float us again, and managed to limp in here. He said the boat was handling like a grumpy goat, but he managed, and here I am. They made a better temporary rudder for him here, but they could see that the original break was deliberate sabotage. They looked the boat over thoroughly, but couldn’t find anything else. You said you’d talked to Jalaan?”

“No, but Mashaar and Piiram have.”

“Yes, he said he had some repairs to do that would take him a few days. He didn’t say anything about sabotage.”

“Oh, and that was ages ago! Surely it wouldn’t take so long to make a new rudder, and repair where he broke the plank out?”

“No, that sounds like two or three days’ work to me. Maybe there was some other bit of sabotage, that they didn’t notice here. Or maybe it was nothing to do with it, just coincidence. We all have to do repairs sometimes.”

“So how did Tiiram’s man end up stuck wherever he is?”

Aila took another sip of skiir. “Nobody expected him to follow me here. We all assumed he’d think he’d done his job, but he obviously watched to see if Jalaan came home. Or he got word from someone. And someone must have leaked where Jalaan had taken me, too – or he made a good guess. Anyway, he came round overland, on horseback. That’s quite a trip, it’s a long way, through uninhabited, trackless, really rough country. At first we’d no idea how he got here, but Biishu found the horse. It’s branded Mezham, so someone there will be getting pretty angry soon, if they’re not already, unless he’s left a big deposit. I was the first to see him. I was out auking on the point. It’s an island. I saw someone coming over in a kayak, but they obviously weren’t very expert with it, so I knew it wasn’t anyone from Troum. So I didn’t let him see that I’d seen him. I carried on auking, but kept an eye on what he was doing. He started to scramble up to the top, and then I knew. I made sure I was secure, and tied the bottom of my rope to a good rock where I was. I’d guessed right. My rope came tumbling down. He was trying to arrange another accident for me, but he’d misjudged. I was down that rope like the wind, and had my kayak and his long before he could get down from the top. He’s stuck on the point without a kayak now, and I’m back here.”

“So what will you do with him now?”

“Everyone here says we should just leave him there. He’ll be dead in a week or two at most. It’s obvious he was trying to kill me.”

“Hmm. Alive, he could be very good evidence against Tiiram. Is there any way we can keep him alive without risking him getting away, or hurting anyone?”

“What use is evidence against Tiiram? He’s rich, it doesn’t matter how good the evidence is.”

“I’m not so sure. Think about Maamatta’s letter. If the rich themselves believe he’s guilty, then he’s on his own. And Graamon has a lot of influence with a lot of rich people.”

“I hope you’re right. It’s our only hope. But whether there’s any way to keep him alive safely, I don’t know.”

Aila looked round at the ring of faces surrounding us, so I did too. Most were looking rather blank, but a few looked thoughtful.

Mashaar was the first to speak. “I don’t think so, not here. And there’s no safe way to move him anywhere he could be kept alive. Leave him to the birds. It means the point’s out of bounds for auking until he’s dead, but that’s not such a big thing. People leave it alone for days at a time anyway, I’m sure. But his horse, and the people he hired it from, are pretty good evidence themselves.”

“The people he hired the horse from don’t know who sent him, as evidence they’re not good as he is.”

“If he hired it anyway. What’s the betting he stole it? He stole the kayak to get out to the point.”

“There’s no risk he could swim back from the point, is there? Or even that he’s done it already?”

“He’s not tried yet, anyway. He’s just sitting there staring at whoever goes to look at him. I think he’s expecting to be rescued eventually. Maybe he can’t swim, or maybe he realizes that if he tries, someone will stick an arrow in him. It’d be a hell of a place to swim across, anyway, with tidal currents and cross seas, and nowhere to climb ashore safely on the mainland side. He’d have to swim all the way round to Troum harbour. I’ve never heard of anyone doing it.”

Mashaar said that if we wanted them to take us to Mormi, it would be good not to waste the wind that he thought was beginning to get up. Not only were we inside the inn, but the inn itself was in a deep hollow amongst the rocks; so how he knew the wind was getting up, I don’t know. But we all went outside, and then you could tell that he was right.

Aila was clinging tight to my side. “I shall miss the people here, Owen. There’s something about Troum. The people here have been incredibly good to me. But I know. We should get to Barioha as quickly as we can, before Tiiram becomes too concerned about where his man’s got to.”

The farewells were tearful on both sides, with lots of hugging. It seemed that the whole village had taken Aila – Griima – to its heart. Even Mashaar, Piiram and I got hugs. Mashaar and Piiram were given heartfelt thanks, and I was told to “Look after her!”

I’d like to come back here. We will, one day. In fact, I think I wouldn’t mind living here, it’s a lovely place full of lovely people. But what about Graamon, and the research institute, and Briggi, and Viina’s lovely room, and Yaana and Yaani and Peyr and Grim in Laanoha? – and Birgom. Got to talk to Aila about all this, but this isn’t the time. Oh, and there’s that question of bringing up children as little savages.

Is there anything really so wrong with bringing up children as little savages anyway?

The dinghy wasn’t big enough for four – it was really only designed for two, but I sat in the stern, and one of the village women brought Aila in a canoe.

The wind was from a little east of south, but the point at Troum was more east than south of the village, so we didn’t need to tack to clear the point. Sailing close hauled, we ran parallel to the coast towards the point.

“You two keep your heads down,” Mashaar said. “It’s probably better if Tiiram’s man doesn’t see you.”

“I don’t see that it matters, he’ll be dead soon,” Aila said, but she snuggled down beside me in the bottom of the cockpit anyway.

“That’s very likely, but just in case he somehow gets away, it’s better if he doesn’t know you’re with us.”

We heard him shouting to us to stop and pick him up as we sailed past, but Mashaar didn’t even let him see that he’d heard.

“That’s one risk, of course, that someone will stop and pick him up. I’m sure the two chaps sitting the other side of the channel watching him will shout to anyone to leave him where he is, but not everyone might take any notice of them. It’s not a big risk, though. Very few boats come here apart from the Troum people themselves. I don’t think any of the fishermen would pick him up if the Troum people said not to, and the chance of anyone else coming here in the next little while is pretty remote.”

I still felt very uncomfortable just leaving the man to die for lack of water. But he tried to kill Aila. Why should I feel sorry for him?

Piiram had another thought. “If it rains, he’ll be able to find some water collected somewhere. At this time of year, it’s likely to rain any time.”

Mashaar laughed. “So he’ll maybe last a few days longer. Lucky man. Don’t worry about him, he’s as good as dead already. Maybe if it rains often enough, he’ll last until he starves instead. I doubt he’s capable of getting at the eggs, even with Griima’s rope dangling there for him. I wonder how long you can survive on raw eggs and rainwater?”

Aila whispered in my ear, “I wish they’d stop talking about him. I don’t want to think about him.”

But she couldn’t help it. “Even if he manages to climb the cliffs, egg time will be over in two or three weeks, unless there’s a bad spell of weather and the birds have to start again. Then he’s got to eat chicks. Even an expert can only catch adult birds when they’re sitting eggs. He could try ekraahi, but you’ve got to cook them well or they’re a sure recipe for the worst bad stomach you can imagine. I wouldn’t like to have to eat them raw!”

Near Laanoha, that’s no doubt true. Here, it might not be. But I won’t say anything.

From the floor of the cockpit, we could see the upper part of the cliffs. I could see birds perched on ledges, and white streaks of droppings below every ledge. I imagined Aila up on the cliffs, clinging on to a rope with one hand, and catching birds or collecting eggs with the other. In my mind’s eye, I could see the picture I’d seen in the attic in Griimi. Just as it matched Aila perfectly, it matched these cliffs perfectly, although I knew it had been painted in Griishi, and its cliffs were the Griishi cliffs.

But Aila isn’t up on those cliffs now, she’s right beside me, with her shoulder under my armpit, and her head resting on my neck. I held her more tightly.

We were leaving the cliffs behind. The wind freshened and veered due south, but Mashaar held his course for a while before turning a little north of east. I guessed that Mashaar knew the coast well, and that there were nasty rocks well out to sea on the line of the cliffs. Maybe he can even see the rocks under the water by the way the waves behave above them.

The sun was shining, the sky was blue with a few white clouds scurrying northwards, and Aila was snuggling against me. I felt almost happy. But I still had nagging doubts about how the Tiiram situation would work out. Are we doing the best thing? Hmm. I don’t see how any other course would be better.

“If you two want to sit up, we’re well out of his sight now. Have been for a while.”

“Let’s. I’d like to see the coast along here. This stretch is famously wild. You want to hear Gran’s tales!”

“That’s better. The trim of the boat’s better with you two up there. We’ll make an extra half knot like this.”

Troum point was already shrinking behind us, and we couldn’t actually see anything else but sea all around.

“It’ll be another hour before you can see Zhaam point, and Troum point will have nearly disappeared by then. We’d have to sail closer in to see the coast, and it’d take longer to get to Mormi. If the wind keeps up, we might make Mormi late tonight, but if it drops overnight like it has the last few nights it could easily be two days before we get there.”

“It might be safer just to stay the night at Zhaam when we get there, brother. I don’t think I fancy a night halfway across the bay.”

“Fair enough. I can’t say the prospect appeals to me much, either.”

So they are brothers – unless they use the word the same way as people do in England. I wonder what’s so terrible about a night halfway across the bay?

I do believe Aila’s gone to sleep. I twisted myself round to hold her more securely. I wonder how much she’s been sleeping recently? I bet she’s not been sleeping well at all.

We’d be better off on the cockpit floor, but I don’t want to wake her up to move her.

Mashaar had noticed, too. “She’s nodded off? Probably a good thing. I bet she’s scarcely slept a wink since Jalaan lost his rudder.”

“I was just thinking the exact same thing.”

“Piiram’s probably right that it’ll be better to spend the night at Zhaam than on the open water, but I hope she won’t feel insecure there again.”

“Hard to know. But it’s pretty unlikely that Tiiram would have sent more than one man, unless he sent them together. And if there’d been two together, the other man wouldn’t have left that horse around for them to find. I’m pretty sure we’re safe, at least until Tiiram starts to wonder what’s happened to his man. And we should be safely in Barioha before then.”

“It’s one thing to know something in your head, it’s quite another what you feel.”

“That’s very true. At least I think she must be feeling reasonably secure just now.”

“Just having you to hold on to must make a huge difference.”

“That’s probably true, even if she can probably look after herself better than I can.”

Mashaar laughed quietly. “What happens, happens. You never know how good you are in a situation you’ve never been in before until you’re in it. I don’t know how many men would have dared float halfway round the world hanging from an oversize paper lantern!”

“You do what you have to when you can’t think of any other option.”

“But you’re right about Griima. She foxed that man perfectly beautifully. He probably thinks she planned it all, and led him out there on purpose.”

“I haven’t actually asked her. Maybe she did.”

“No, I don’t think so. I don’t think she knew he was in the area until she saw him in the kayak. Lucky she saw him.”

I shuddered involuntarily at the idea that she might not have seen him, and that he might have succeeded in making her fall. Aila stirred and mumbled something, but didn’t wake.

We sailed on in silence, apart from the slap, slap, slap of the waves against the hull.

Troum point shrank behind us, and another headland appeared in the distance dead ahead. Mashaar altered course very slightly, heading just inland of the point.

“That’s Zhaam point. We’re making good time. But Piiram’s right, better not to try to get to Mormi in one go. It’s not as though we’re pressed for time now.”

Funny how he seemed so itchy to get away from Troum, but now we’re not pressed for time. He seems very confident of his assessment of situations, and he seems genuinely to have a good grip on reality. I wonder why the change? No sense asking; he’ll tell me if he wants to.

I could see Piiram’s head and shoulders over the top of the cabin. He must have been sitting on the foredeck, leaning back on the cabin, constantly on the lookout ahead. Aila was sound asleep; Mashaar seemed lost in thought, but holding our course beautifully steady.

The wind was cold, but the sun was bright, and warm on my shoulders. I dozed.

The topography here isn’t like England. In England, we have a line of big cliffs with platforms at their feet at about a forty-five metres above sea level. According to Godfrey, it’s an old sea coast that had stayed pretty constant probably for thousands of years, and surely that’s confirmed by all the remains of things the ancients did along that line. Here, they’ve got that at about the same height, but there’s another one pretty much at current sea level. It’s not that sea level here is constant, it’s falling at about the same rate it is in England, which probably means the sea here connects with the sea there eventually – although the connection could be under the ice, which would explain why English sailors are so rare, they’d have had to come overland somewhere as well as probably two long sea crossings. But if sea level’s not been roughly constant at the present level for millennia, why the cliffs and platform at sea level? The only explanation I can think of is that at some time in the distant past, long before even the period of stable sea level we’d already worked out, there must have been an earlier period of stable sea level, at roughly the level we’re at now. But if that’s the case, why isn’t there a similar line on the English coast?

Ah. One possibility is that the connection between the sea here and the sea there isn’t as deep as that, and once sea level drops much below where it is now, the two seas aren’t connected any more. Or maybe at some point the sea froze right down to the sea bed in the connecting channel. Oh, and there’s another possibility – the level of the land itself might change slowly, too. In fact, we can be pretty sure it does, as the weight of ice pushes it down – that’s what all the earthquakes are all about, and why they’re stronger the closer to the ice you get. We ought to try to devise some way of measuring the compressibility of different kinds of rock – although it must involve creep as well as elastic compressibility. Well, we know it does – look at all the bendy strata that must have been laid down horizontal originally. I wish I could talk to Godfrey about that, he knows much more than I do. I wonder how much anyone here knows?

I ought to write all these thoughts in my notebook, but I can’t with Aila sleeping on me like this. I must as soon as I get a chance though, it’s exactly the stuff Graamon wants – oh, and Baam will want it, too, especially information about England.

A sudden thought struck me. Birgom’s not originally an English sailor, is he?

Hmm. If he is, where did he get the name Birgom? Where did he get the name Mezhab? Hmm – where did I get the name Mezhab? And the name Mezhab originally meant ‘from Mezham’, apparently. And if he’s originally an English sailor, how did he get Laanoha papers? Well, how have I got railway papers? Hmm.

Hmm.

Zhaam point was growing slowly; I looked behind, and Troum point had vanished. Apart from Zhaam point, all I could see in all directions was water and sky.

Blue sky, with just a few small white clouds scurrying northwards. Oh, and a couple of gulls, apparently riding a wave of air deep in the lee of the sail. Oh to be able to see the pattern of movement of the air! Can the gulls see it somehow, or do they have an instinct for it, or just years of experience?

And was that a sail, far behind us? Right on the limits of visibility, if it was. I can’t see it at all, now. And I can’t reach my bag, to get Aila’s telescope. When should I give that to her? Privately would be best, best not to get it out anyway.

A sudden realization shocked me awake. I wonder how good Mashaar’s eyesight is? Obvious thing to do is ask him!

“How good’s your eyesight, Mashaar? I thought I saw a sail in the far distance behind us! Too far behind for me to be sure, and I can’t see it at all now.”

Mashaar looked behind. “I can’t see anything now, either. But Piiram’s eyesight is much better than mine. Piiram! Come astern a minute!”

The shout woke Aila, and she sat up as. Piiram got up and came into the cockpit.

“Can you see a sail in the distance, behind us? Owen thought he saw one, but too far away for him to be sure.”

Piiram scanned the horizon astern, then fixed on a point almost dead astern, just where I thought I’d seen it.

“Could be. Dead astern. I can’t be sure, either, but it looks like it.”

Mashaar was a bit worried. “Well, we haven’t passed anyone fishing, so it’s someone else coming this way from Troum. Who, and why? I wouldn’t expect anyone coming out of Troum to head in this direction going fishing, I’d expect them to beat southwards for the best chance of a good run home later. I hope no-one picked that villain up and got persuaded to follow us. Bad luck it’s so soon after we left, if so.”

Piiram had another thought. “Griima, you didn’t get the impression there was anyone in Troum who might think to earn themselves a few coins helping him, did you? That would explain the timing, Mashaar.”

“I really don’t know. They all seemed to be so good with me, and probably most of them were. But how can you tell if there’s the odd one or two biding their time, waiting for an opportunity to take advantage? But everybody in Troum would know about it if anyone picked him up, so they’d have had to persuade the whole village.”

“Or not have thought through the consequences properly, or decided to argue the point later when they’d got the coins, or try to make a new life somewhere else. I wouldn’t bet against it.”

“And I thought we were well on our way to safety.”

“Well, we pretty certainly are. This is a good boat. We won’t stop at Zhaam, and we’ll put on the best speed we can.”

Piiram was already below decks, sorting something out. I wondered what. Mashaar had already altered course to clear Zhaam point.

Then something occurred to me. “Pass me my bag, Aila.” Oops. Did anyone notice? Don’t draw attention to it by correcting yourself.

If they did notice, they never mentioned it. Aila passed me my bag. “I’ve got a present for you, from the Griimi innkeeper’s mother. I was going to wait for a private time to give it to you, but it would be very useful just now.”

I got out the telescope and gave it to Aila. She burst into tears, and I put my arm round her again. “Oh, I could hug her, Owen. What a really, really kind thought! Here, give it to Piiram, he’ll see better than I could.” She handed the telescope back to me, and I called Piiram up out of the cabin and passed it to him.

“Wow! That’s just what we need! That’s Tomaam’s Dad’s telescope, isn’t it, Mashaar?”

“Yes, apparently his Mum gave it to Owen as a present for Griima. She must have thought a lot of you, Griima. Well, we all do.”

“I used to borrow it when I was out on the cliffs at Griimi, to look out for anyone getting on or off coaches.”

Piiram climbed onto the cabin roof. He stood just forward of the mast and held onto the halyard with one hand. He tried to hold the telescope to his eye with the other hand.

“It’s no good, I can’t hold it steady enough. I’ll have to lie flat and use both hands, but I wanted the extra height. If it’s there, it keeps dipping below the horizon.”

He lay flat on the cabin roof. Resting his elbows on the roof and holding the telescope in both hands, he managed to hold it reasonably steady.

“Blimey. Everything doesn’t half jump about when you’re looking through a telescope. And it’s hard to get it pointing in exactly the right direction. Even just holding it on the horizon is hard, so I can’t be sure I’m scanning the whole...ah, yup, there’s definitely a sail! That’s all we need to know, unless it gets any closer. I’m coming down, and I’ll get a trapeze set up. We’ll leave them so far behind they won’t know where we’ve gone. Oh, and we must put a lanyard on this. We don’t want to lose it over the side!”

“Can you two hike as well, do you think? If you can, I’ll jury up some kind of a foresail, too. She wasn’t built for speed, but she’s a good boat and strong enough to make the best of this wind, and their boat won’t be any better.”

Aila didn’t even know what hiking meant, but soon learnt, and took to it like a natural, which didn’t surprise any of us. I’d only ever seen her on the cliffs in my mind’s eye, and a picture of her grandmother, but the other two had seen it in reality. Aila and I were soon hanging out as far as we could, while Piiram rummaged around below to find a piece of sail to tie on the forestay.

“Well, it’s not the best foresail you’ve ever seen, but it’s the best I can manage. We ought to make ourselves a proper one sometime, Mashaar.”

“How often do we go racing, Piiram?”

Piiram laughed. “I never thought we would. If it wasn’t so serious, it could be quite fun.”

“Well, I’ve never seen hikers on a fishing boat before, and you’re not having as much effect as they seem to on a toff’s dinghy, but it’s making a difference. Quite a difference.”

It was. It was also hard work. I could see how a better harness could make it a lot easier, but Piiram had done very well at short notice, and I was impressed. We were making a very good speed for a little round-bottomed fishing boat in only a moderate wind.

Mashaar was having a hard time at the tiller, too. “She’s hard to keep on course like this! We could do with a rib along the bottom of that foresail, she flaps like billy-oh! But I’m sure she’s helping a lot.”

“I’m not putting one on now! I don’t think we’ve got anything that would do the job. The tender oars are too long, and I can’t think of anything else.”

“No, don’t worry. But if we ever make a proper one, we should think about that. But we’ll probably never be in a race again, so why bother? Just a waste of time.”

“Oh, I don’t know. Saving half an hour getting to good fishing grounds would pay the effort back quite quickly, really.”

“Maybe. We’ll think about that later. Could it really save that much time? We’ll see how much difference it really makes – but we’d only have one hiker, not three, and we’ll never know whether it’s the foresail or the hikers that make most of the difference.”

Blimey. I wonder how long I can keep this up? The other two don’t seem to be having any problem. Yet? Or just not showing it. I don’t suppose I’m showing it, either. Courage! That could be the chap who tried to kill Aila following us.

It was actually Aila who buckled first, after about half an hour. I was the rearmost of the three of us, looking back to see if I could catch a glimpse of sails astern; Piiram was in front, doing his best to do lookout duty forward. I suddenly felt Aila slip away from beside me, and turned round quickly. She’d fainted, and was in the water.

Mashaar had seen what had happened, and hove to quickly. Piiram was in the water beside Aila and had made sure her face was out of the water before I’d had time to think beyond thanking goodness we’d put on safety ropes. Then he grabbed the side of the boat with one hand and hauled her up to where Mashaar could grab her and haul her aboard.

She’d recovered consciousness, but was dazed and confused.

Piiram scrambled down into the cabin, shouting to me to get her wet clothes off her while he found something dry. Mashaar was already getting us under way again.

Aila started stripping her clothes off herself. Piiram was back up the companionway with a blanket before she’d finished.

“I’d better tie her clothes to the shrouds and get them dry, pass them here.”

“You don’t have another set, do you, Griima? Clothes on the shrouds will spoil our trim, Piiram.”

“I’ve got a spare set in my rucksack. You’ll look a bit funny in them, sweetheart, they’ll be a bit big on you and a bit mannish, but they’ll keep you warm enough and let us keep going as fast as we can.”

Piiram dived back down into the cabin to change his own wet clothes. “I’ll get back out on the trapeze, anyway. You give Griima your spare clothes, Owen, and then do you think you could come and hike with me again? You stay where you are, Griima. We don’t want you to catch your death.”

I gave Aila my rucksack to find my spare clothes, and then clambered out onto the side of the cabin alongside Piiram. He looked at me. “You’re sure you’re not going to fall in the water too? The only dry clothes we’ve got left are Mashaar’s, and they’d be even sillier on you than yours on Griima!”

“I’ll be all right. I’ll go back in the cockpit before I get that bad.”

“Just make sure you do!”

I managed to support myself a little more comfortably this time, and felt that I’d last quite a long time. Every minute helps.

Aila changed into my second set of clothes. “These are nice, Owen! Where did you get them?”

“Judd took me up to a place just under the Castle. I don’t think he’d ever been inside, just seen it from the outside. The railway paid for them – two sets. I swapped the other set for these so I wouldn’t look too posh in Troum, but if we’re not stopping in Zhaam I don’t suppose it’ll matter after that.”

Mashaar agreed. “No, Mormi’s not like Troum and Zhaam. It’s quite civilized, really – more so than Oushi even, just a gig ride from Barioha.”

He said something I couldn’t hear to Aila, and she climbed down into the cabin. “Whereabouts is it?”

“Oh – isn’t it on the table?”

“No – oh, I see it. It’s fallen on the floor. Got it.”

She came back up with a reel of cord. Mashaar pulled a knife out of a sheath on his belt and handed it to her, handle first. She cut a length of cord, passed the knife back to him, then disappeared into the cabin again. A few minutes later she reappeared, with the telescope dangling round her neck.

“That’s better. We won’t lose it now.”

“How are you feeling now?”

“Absolutely fine. I don’t know what happened to me.”

“Oh, I can guess. Hiking’s not like cliff hopping. Cliffs don’t pitch and roll quite as much as small boats! And you’re tired, and you were probably cold, too. Are you warmed up a bit yet?”

“Not too bad. But I might snuggle up in that blanket again, as well as Owen’s lovely clothes.”

She parked herself in the corner of the cockpit seat, by the top of companionway on the windward side, close to my feet.

Mashaar approved. “That’s the best spot for the trim, short of being out on a trapeze.”

“I’m not as high as Piiram was, on the top of the cabin. I don’t know how far astern I can see.”

“Have a go. See what you can see with the telescope.”

Aila put it to her eye. “Piiram’s right. It’s not as easy as it was on the point.”

Then, after a moment, “I’m managing to hold the horizon all right, so I can scan along it without missing any. Can’t see a sail anywhere from this height. I’ll go up on the cabin roof in a bit.”

But she didn’t; she was soon fast asleep again.

Piiram suddenly called out, “Sails ahead! It’s the Zhaam boats, I reckon, fishing. Do you think we should avoid them, Mashaar? Or should we talk to them?”

“No sense trying to avoid them. If they see us doing that, they could intercept us pretty easily if they wanted to. We can try sailing straight past quite close, and shout to them as we pass, or we can luff a bit and talk even if they don’t seem to care. Probably best to do that – we might even be able to persuade them to delay anyone who’s following us. Owen, do you think you can get the telescope off Griima, and give it to Piiram? Get up on the cabin roof and see if you can see anything astern, Piiram. Once we’re past Zhaam, we won’t know for ages whether it’s just Zhaam boats we’re seeing or someone following us.”

Aila stirred as I took the telescope, but didn’t wake. Piiram put the lanyard round his neck and went up on the roof. It took him a couple of minutes to be sure he’d scanned enough of the horizon to be sure, but he eventually expressed his satisfaction that if they were following us at all, we’d left them well behind.

“Good, good. We’ll get the Zhaam men to tell them we’ve gone into Zhaam. That’ll waste them an hour at least.”

“Hmm. Not so sure. They’ll be sore as hell when they find out they’ve been tricked.”

“Yup. And then what will they do? Take on the whole population of Zhaam? If we can make that man burst a blood vessel, so much the better.”

“I suppose so. It just makes me itchy, that’s all.”

Aila had woken up again by the time we reached the Zhaam fishing fleet. One of the boats came to meet us, and we hove to alongside each other. I climbed down into the cockpit.

Mashaar greeted them in a language I didn’t know, and they talked for a while. Then one of the two men on the other boat clambered across onto our boat, took me by the hand, shook it vigorously, and addressed me in broken Laana. “Good luck, young man.”

He turned to Aila. She extracted her arm from her blanket, and offered him her hand. He looked a little surprised, but took it, and shook it much more gently than he’d shaken mine. “And good luck to you, young lady. For the Ghost’s granddaughter, we’d sink anyone who was causing you trouble, but we don’t want a war with Troum. But don’t worry, any man on that boat who isn’t a Troum fisherman won’t get beyond Zhaam.”

He nodded to Mashaar, said something in the other language again, and returned to his own boat.

The two vessels turned to the east together. Mashaar adjusted the sheets and the sails filled, and we left the Zhaam boat behind. They waved, and Piiram and I waved back.

Piiram had been on the cabin roof the whole while. He put the telescope to his eye again, and scanned the horizon. “Still no sign. I wonder if we’ve been worrying about nothing.”

Mashaar wasn’t sure. “I can’t imagine what it was doing coming this way. It’s possible the Troum men know some reef that’s good for fishing somewhere out this way, but I’ve not heard of it.”

“Well, by the sound of it, we can pretty much rely on the Zhaam lads stopping them, anyway.”

“What was he saying? I couldn’t understand a word when you were talking with him.”

Mashaar laughed. “That was Maara, more or less. Zhaama really, but it’s not a lot different. He said they’d tell anyone following us that we’d gone into Zhaam, then blockade them in and make them hand over anyone who wasn’t a fisherman. I’m not sure what he said they’d do to him, but it didn’t sound gentlemanly, whatever it was. If it was a Troum fishing boat, they’d let it go, with just the Troum men, after a couple of days, under strict instructions to go home and not to follow us. I didn’t know whether they knew the Ghost story here, but I hoped they would, and he did. Worked like a charm.”

Piiram suddenly had doubts. “It’s probably okay. I hope so, but I wouldn’t rely too heavily on them. He could have seen an opportunity to make a few coins, and if he hasn’t seen it already, he might see it before the other boat arrives.”

Mashaar nodded. “I thought of that possibility, too, but I wasn’t going to mention it. I don’t think it’s very likely. If Tiiram’s man’s got any coins on him, they can just take them, he can’t stop them. And if he hasn’t, they’re not going to believe any promises of getting paid later! But we’ll make the best time we can anyway. If it is him following us, he’s managed to persuade someone in Troum, somehow. You two get back on the trapeze. No, not you Aila. You should try and get some sleep.”

After the point, Mashaar altered course somewhat to the north. “The trouble with doing this passage in the dark is that there are no lights along this stretch of the coast, not until you get to Mormi. You don’t want to get too far offshore or you can miss Mormi altogether, but you don’t want to get too close in either, there are rocks. It wouldn’t be too bad in moonlight, but there’s no moon tonight. At least it’s not cloudy. I won’t light the masthead light until we see Mormi lights though, give everybody’s eyes the best chance to see the coast. I don’t think we can keep the foresail after sunset, it makes my steering too wobbly, and it’ll probably be best if you two stop hiking, too. The next couple of hours should get us a good long way, anyway. I just hope the wind holds up after sunset. It’s stronger now than it was earlier, or yesterday, so I’m hopeful.”

My arms and back were aching more than I could ever remember, and my feet were numb, by the time Piiram decided it was time to call it a day. But I’d held out, and I was quietly pleased with myself.

I hope the Zhaam men are as good as their leader’s word. Was he a leader of some sort? He obviously felt he was in a position to speak for them all. If he wasn’t, what then? Well, hopefully we’re a long way ahead. Will we be able to get a gig in the middle of a moonless night? And if not, what will that chap do if he arrives in Mormi before we’ve managed to get away? We might actually be better off getting becalmed and arriving in the morning – anyone following us would be becalmed, too. No point saying anything; what will happen, will happen.

Piiram took down the foresail. The wind weakened somewhat as the light faded behind us, but it didn’t give out altogether. The crash, crash, crash of the waves against the hull gradually diminished to the slap, slap, slap I was more used to.

Piiram made the usual fried fish and potato meal, then came and sat beside me and Aila while we ate.

As it got really dark, I could see what Mashaar meant. I could only just make out the coast as a blacker band along the horizon. The sky was clear enough, with a sprinkling of stars right down to the horizon, and nearby the sea was alight with dancing reflected stars, but further away the sea itself was almost as black as the coast.

Three pairs of eyes peered into the blackness. Aila was fast asleep again, her head now resting on my lap. She’d started to snore gently, a reassuring sound – but I hadn’t heard her snoring in Laanoha. I hope she’s not caught a chill. Maybe it’s just the position she’s lying in.

I couldn’t help it. I went to sleep, too.

I was cold. I opened my eyes, but all was utter blackness. There was no sign of stars, the pitching and rolling of the boat was barely noticeable, and almost the only sound was Aila’s gentle snoring.

My left arm was warm on Aila’s tummy. My right arm was tangled in rough cloth. Eventually I managed to free it, and brought my hand up to my face. There was dew in my beard, and my face was wet. Feeling around with my free hand, I realized that someone – probably Piiram – had tucked an oilskin blanket in around me and Aila, carefully not covering her face, but managing to get it around my upper back where it was above the coaming, and then round in front of me and across my chest, tucked in behind Aila’s head. A very carefully done job. What a hero.

Whether Piiram was sitting the other side of Aila where he had been, I couldn’t tell; nor could I tell whether Mashaar was still sitting in the stern by the tiller. I suspected that they might have been in the cabin, probably with a line to the boom round a wrist, to wake them at the first breath of wind.

Well, I’m cold, but not dangerously so. Aila’s snoring sounds healthy enough. Best not to move more than I have to. At least this means we’ll probably arrive in Mormi at a better time, and anyone chasing us must be just as becalmed as we are.

I tried get my right arm into the blanket again. It was difficult without the help of my left arm, but I didn’t want to disturb Aila. I managed after a fashion eventually – not as good as it had been before I moved, but better than nothing. I tried to get back to sleep again, but didn’t succeed for a while.

I really must get my thoughts written down. When am I going to get a chance?

There’s all that stuff about the ancients’ railways that Godfrey was telling me about, too. Did the ancients have railways in this area? Are there remains of ancient railways here? Are they even more decayed and buried and difficult to recognize than they are in England? Were any of them high enough up to escape the water during the high sea level period? Or at least high enough to have been flooded only for a relatively short time, and so not be too badly affected? Does anyone here know about them, if there are any?

Are there any accursed sites anywhere here? What were they really? I don’t believe in that ancient curse nonsense – but people really do get sick and die if they try to investigate the sites, so I’m not going to. But are there any here, and does anyone here know more about them than they know in England?

Interesting – I’m thinking of the English as they, now. Not just interesting – good, really.

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