Hewako arrived late at the oars, cursing, his legs red with a slight burn, and swearing vengeance on the soup-spillers when they got to the Games. He found his bunk-mates at their positions and the man he was to relieve angry because of the delay. He grabbed the oar handle, then swore and sputtered, but the gong of the coxswain sounded the first stroke, and he could do nothing but stay at his post.
Taro was Hewako’s oarmate, and Taro had complained that though the joke would be on Hewako, they would all suffer.
“The air for a mile around is going to be bad for everybody. Hewako won’t be the only one gagging.”
“Yes, but only Hewako will have his hands in it,” Hadon had said.
Hewako kept his indignation and fury down to a mild roar, but after two minutes he decided that he had had enough. He bellowed out for a replacement. The gong master yelled back at him to keep quiet, that he had had his chance at sick call. Hewako shouted back an insult. The gong master screamed that if there was another word from him, he’d have him up before the captain for a lashing.
Since the youths had been told that they would have to accept oarsmen’s discipline when on duty, Hewako became silent. At least, he said nothing to the gong master, but he threatened Hadon under his breath. Then he pleaded with Taro to trade places. Taro said he’d sooner drown. After a while Hewako had no breath for anything but his labor.
All might have gone as planned if the first mate had not walked by Hewako. He stopped, wrinkled his nose, and said, “Whew! What’s that?”
Nobody answered. He sniffed around until he located the source of offense. He stood for a moment, leaning over and looking down at Hewako, before he roared for the gong master. The master turned over his gong to his subordinate and hurried down the deck. When he ascertained what the trouble was, he requested that the captain be summoned. The captain passed from irritation because his breakfast was interrupted to anger when he saw—and smelled—the cause of commotion. By then Hadon had quit grinning. He hadn’t thought that anybody but he and Hewako would be involved, except for the breathers in the immediate area, of course.
The captain sputtered and then shouted, “You future heroes can horse around among yourselves all you want to, as long as it doesn’t interfere with the operation of my ship! But this does it! A rower can’t be efficient if he has to handle a slippery oar, nor can those around him be efficient if they are sickened! You all report to me at the end of the shift! Gong master, douse this man with water until the dung’s all gone! And you, Hewako, make sure all traces are gone before you report!”
The result was that Hadon had to confess. The captain had promised to have every one of the youths lashed if the culprit did not declare himself. Hadon, at high noon, had his hands tied above him to the mast. A burly oarsman struck Hadon’s back five times with a hippopotamus-hide whip. Hadon had thought that the humiliation would be worse than the pain. But it wasn’t. The whip cut to the muscle, and blood ran down between his legs. He clamped his teeth, refusing to cry out, and he slept on his face for many nights thereafter.
It was some, though not much, consolation when Hewako got three lashes. The captain did not ask Hadon why he had played the trick, since Hadon would have had to refuse to answer and he would have received more lashes. He investigated and found a watchman who had seen Hewako in the pig sty and had also seen Hadon washing himself off. Hewako confessed and shortly afterward had a bloody back. Later, in the privacy of the cabin, Hewako said that he was going to get the captain someday. Hadon replied that he didn’t exactly love the captain, but he did respect him. If he had failed to do his duty because the culprit might someday be in a position to execute him, he had no business being the captain.
“I’ll get you during the Games,” Hewako said.
“You’ll only be trying to do what everybody else will,” Hadon said. “But, in the meantime, why don’t we lay off each other? If we keep this up, we’ll wear each other ragged. And a ragged man has no chance in the Games.”
Hewako did not reply. However, thereafter he spoke to Hadon only in the line of duty. Though their backs were on fire, they returned the next day to the oars. The priestess rubbed a soothing ointment on the wounds, though it was not soothing enough. She advised them to wash their backs every two hours with water and soap and watch carefully for infection. Fortunately, there weren’t any flies at sea, but the cockroaches would nibble at the wounds at night unless they also smeared on a repellent
“And stay out of the pig sty,” she said, and slapped them playfully on the back. Caught by surprise, they screamed, and the priestess laughed uproariously.
“Boys will be boys,” she said, “but you’re men now. By Kho, if I weren’t married to the captain, I’d see just how manly you two are!”
Hadon was glad of that. He didn’t care for fifty-year-old fat women, and he would not have dared refuse her invitation.
3
The high rugged cliffs continued to rise from the sea. The galleys kept away from them by two miles, since there were reefs close to them. Many a ship had been driven against them by storms and all hands perished without a trace. Then the strait itself appeared, a narrow break in the cliffs, and the fleet put into a port that had been built at great expense of money and life. Two stone breakwaters curved out from cliffs, against which a floating great raft was moored, and on this raft were the headquarters of the Kethnan strait fleet. The Khokarsan fleet was obliged to put in here and to submit to another search. The captains of the merchant and naval vessels fumed, but they could do nothing.
“Fifteen years ago, Piqabes destroyed this place with a great storm,” the captain said. “Would that she’d do it again! Though not while we’re here!”
At dawn the next day the fleet put out, its path curving outward so that it could enter the strait head-on. The strait was a gloomy chasm created by some enormous riving of the mountains in the distance past, perhaps at the creation of the world by Kho. It was the only water connection between the two seas, the northern Kemu and the southern Kemuwopar. It was unknown to the civilized world until the hero Keth led two galleys through its awesome darkness, and they burst out into a great bright sea. That was one thousand and ninety-nine years ago. A few other explorers had followed, but there was no active colonization until two hundred and thirteen years later, when Kethna founded the city named after him. Fourteen years later, the priestess-heroine Lupoeth discovered diamond-bearing clay and gold at the site of Opar, and the southern sea became worthwhile considering by the rulers of Khokarsa.
So narrow was the strait that at a distance of a mile its entrance looked merely like a darker vein of stone in a dark cliff. Then, as the first of the naval vessels, a bireme, plunged into it, it seemed to gape like the foaming mouth of a stone monster. Hadon’s vessel was the third to enter. One moment they were tossing on the choppy waters in the bright sun, and the next they had been swallowed up. The waters rushed through, carrying them between sheer walls so high that the sky was only a thin ribbon. The dusk rapidly settled about them, so thick as to seem palpable. There was no turning back now, because there just was no room to maneuver. They must either go ahead or go down under the waters; there was no other choice. A signalman stood on the prow, above the bronze ram, and called back to the first mate, who relayed instructions to the gong master. Torches guttered on the prow and along the side of the vessel; the oars lifted and dipped, their blades only a few feet from the black hard walls. The chunk of oars, the dripping of water as they lifted, the voice of the signalman and the mate, and the clang of the gong were the only sounds. The orders were for everybody else to be silent, but that was not necessary. Nobody felt like talking, and even those who had made the passage many times felt what Keth and his men must have felt the first time they dared it. Truly, it seemed to be a gateway to a world of the dead, of the queendom where dread Sisisken ruled over her phantoms, pale citizens of the greatest empire of all. No wonder that Keth had had to put down a mutiny before he could lead his men through
this twilit passage.
The strait did not go as a measuring stick, but curved back and forth. Several times the walls moved in closer, and it was necessary to ship the oars while one side of the vessel touched stone. Though the contact was not hard, it would have crushed the fragile hull if bumpers of mahogany had not been put up before the vessel entered the strait.
Hadon and his companions stood before the fore deckhouse and watched. They had been relieved of their duties during the traverse, since the captain wanted only professionals at the oars. Hadon and Hewako were happy about this, because their lash wounds were far from healed. But their happiness was tempered with apprehension. They kept looking upward and muttering prayers. There were said to be ogres who lived in caves along the cliffs, and if they heard a ship coming, they would stretch down their long arms and snatch up a mariner and eat him. And sometimes the wild Klemqaba would hurl large rocks at the vessels.
Presently clouds shut off the blue line far above, and they seemed to be crawling through the night. The captain ordered more torches lit, but these were soon sputtering in a heavy rain. The wind, which had been only a soft fingertip on their necks, suddenly became a heavy cold hand. The contestants went into the deckhouse and put on caps and ponchos of animal skin and then came back out on the deck. They did not want to be trapped in the house if the vessel should be pushed hard against a cliff. Not that much could be done if the ship did sink. They would be crushed between hull and cliff if the following vessel tried to pull them out of the water. Still, it was better to die in the open.
The strait twisted for fifty miles, and it took two days and nights to get through. The rain stopped, the clouds moved off, in the middle of the noon of the second day the walls suddenly fell away, and they moved onto a broad sea in golden light. Simari sacrificed the finest of the boars and poured the best of wine into the blue waters, and the rowers chanted a thanksgiving song. Everybody smiled, and those not working capered. Hadon felt so good that he drank two cups of wine. The steward, a dour little man, noted the cups down in his records. The city of Opar was paying for the expenses of Hadon’s trip, since he was too poor to bear the cost himself.
The captain consulted the lodestone compass card to check that the lead naval vessel was on the proper bearing, and the bireme turned north by north-northwest toward the island of Khokarsa. The last lap, the longest, lay ahead of them.
Days and nights passed. The broad blue-green Kemu was the only thing they saw except for birds and an occasional ship.
Several days out of Khokarsa, they sighted fishing fleets. These consisted of small ten-man sailing ships and a mother ship which prepared the fish and salted them. Clouds of birds, fish-eagles, sea vultures, and white birds with hooked beaks, the datoekem, swirled around the boats.
And then came the day when a long dark line lifted on the horizon. Sea-girt, cliff-girt Khokarsa was rising to meet them.
The fleet rowed into the broad bay of Asema, passed its red-and-black walls and white towers and domes on their port, and by nightfall were in the long arm of the sea, the Gulf of Lupoeth, that cuts the island almost in half. The traffic became thick with naval vessels putting out for years-long patrols; merchant vessels, some of them gigantic triremes; fishing-boats; and the trade boats carrying cargo between the cities of Khokarsa or river boats ferrying the products of the inland plain cities to the coastal cities, where they would be transferred to the seagoing merchant vessels.
It took three days until the sea arm began to narrow, but before that they saw the peak of the great volcano, Khowot, the Voice of Kho, which lies just east of the capital city. Then they saw the top of the Great Tower of Kho and Resu, two-thirds completed, centuries in the building, its construction often abandoned during times of tribulation.
The captain had by then run up the great linen flag bearing the red ant, the sign that this ship carried contestants from the treasure city of Opar. The flag ship of the fleet saluted the merchant ships, and the naval vessels veered toward the port on the naval-base island of Poehy. The merchants continued, bearing east of Poehy and proceeding slowly through the thick traffic. Presently they were docked, while an army band played, and the contestants filed off the gangplank to be greeted by the officials who would take charge of them.
Hadon was very excited, though he hoped that it was not noticeable. He was dressed in his finest hippo-hide sandals, a kilt of leopard skin, a bronze cuirass bearing a relief of the great red ant, his bronze helmet with its plume of hawk feathers, and a broad leather belt supporting a bronze scabbard in which was the long, square-ended, slightly curving broadsword, the tenu. There seemed to be thousands waiting along the docks, and in the narrow streets beyond, more thousands hoping to catch a glimpse of the Great Gamesters. They waved and shouted and cheered, except for some rowdy drunks who booed. Doubtless, these were partisans of contestants from other cities.
Things went swiftly after that. The officials took over the youths from the priestess Simari, and then, the clangorous band leading, they were marched through the city. Hadon had hoped that they would be presented to the king and his daughter. No such thing. They passed near the high black granite walls of the Inner City, but after a while it was evident that they were to go straight to their quarters near the coliseum of the Great Games. Their progress was slow because of the crowds, which threw petals on them and tried to touch them. Their route led through the commercial and residential area of the east, lined by two to four-story-high buildings of adobe brick with a thick covering of white plaster. Many were tenement buildings. Though the city of Khokarsa was the richest in the world, it also held the most poor people. Evidently many of them neglected their daily ritual bath, because the stench from them in the hot narrow streets was strong. Added to that was the odor of rotting garbage on the pavements and barrels of excrement waiting to be shipped out to the rural areas for fertilizer.
After a mile, the street began climbing, and suddenly they were going by the residences of the well-to-do and the wealthy.
These were large two-story buildings set behind high walls and guarded even in daytime by men with spears and swords. Here the crowd thinned out, consisting mostly of wives of the wealthy and their sons and daughters and the servants and slaves. Hadon saw one beautiful girl who made his pulse beat faster. She wore only a kilt, but it was of the finest linen, embroidered with red and blue flower patterns, and a necklace of diamonds fell between her breasts. A large scarlet flower adorned her long blond hair. If there were more girls like her, he thought, he might enjoy his free time. If he had any. He had no idea what restrictions he faced during the training period.
The street kept winding up and up, and soon they were so high that he could look down on the Inner City. He could see the moated and walled citadel in the northeast corner, the rocky hill on top of which were the palaces, the temples, and the main government buildings. Beyond was the great tower, a ziggurat now five hundred feet tall, its base covering half a mile. Dust hung around it, dust stirred up by thousands of men and oxen laboring there.
The street began to descend again, and they were crossing the Road of Kho, the wide stone-block-paved highway that meandered from the wall of the Inner City up the steep side of the volcano. Above them, glittering white, was the tomb of the hero Gahete, the first man to land on this island, almost eighteen hundred years ago. Up beyond it was the plateau on which was the great temple of Kho and the sacred oak grove. But he could not see them.
They passed through another wealthy residential area, crossed a bridge over a canal, and then, coming onto a broad field, saw the coliseum. Hadon’s heart beat even faster than when he had seen the beautiful blond girl. Inside the high circular granite walls his fate waited for him. But he would not see its inside today. He was marched into the barracks reserved for the youths and assigned a bed and a closet. He was glad to remove the hot bronze armor and to take a shower.
4
A month passed before the contestants were received by the king and his
daughter, the high priestess. In the meantime, the youths spent the daylight hours training and the evenings talking or shooting dice. Everyone trained by himself; there were no practice matches among them; but they carefully watched each other, making evaluations. Hadon had been mildly shocked to discover that there were three youths taller than he, two of whom were much more thickly muscled. The third, Wiqa of Qaarquth, was the man who might beat him in the 440-yard dash and the two-mile run. He wouldn’t know until the day the races came, of course. But Wiqa was fast, very fast. He also seemed to be a swift swimmer, though Taro thought that he could beat him. Hadon didn’t believe this, but he did not say so. Taro, who had always been so jolly in Opar and on the voyage, had become glum. It was evident that he regretted now having entered, and it was too late to back out. There was no law forbidding him, but he would be thought a coward if he did, and he could never return to the city of Opar.
Hadon had his own moments of doubt and gloom. It was one thing to be the tallest and the swiftest in Opar, but here he was, a rube actually, up against the pick of the mighty empire. He could not quit, though he could manage to disqualify himself during the field and track events. If a man did not pick up enough points from these, before the dangerous events, he would be eliminated. And doubtless others before him, losing heart, had done just that. He hoped that Taro would do this. He could not. When he was in a contest, he had to do everything he could to win. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself if he deliberately lost. And suicide, unless committed under honorable circumstances, assured one the most miserable of existences in the empire of dread Sisisken. Whereas if he died fighting bravely during the Games, he would be buried as a hero, and his pylon would rise along the Road of Kho.