The Jewels of Aptor Part 11

_Can't ... find_, Snake said. _But ... alive ... I ... know._

"One other question," Geo raised the jewel from where it hung against his chest. "How do you work this silly thing?"

_Think ... through ... it_, said Snake.

Geo frowned. "What do you mean? Can you tell me how it works?"

_You ... have ... no ... words_, Snake said. _Radio ... electricity ...

diode ..._

"Radio, electricity, diode?" repeated Geo, the sounds coming unfamiliarly to his tongue. "What are they?"

Snake shrugged.

Geo got a chance to report his findings to Urson that evening and the big man was puzzled.

"Can you add anything?" Geo asked.

"All I've had a chance to do is work," grumbled Urson. They were standing by the edge of the rail beyond which the mist steeped thickly, making sky and water indistinguishable and grave. "Hey, Four-arms,"

Urson suddenly asked. "What are you looking at?"

Snake stared at the water but said nothing.

"Maybe he's listening to something," suggested Geo.

"You'd think there were better things to eavesdrop on than fishes," said Urson. "I guess Argo's given special orders that you two get no work.

Some people! Let's go eat." As they started toward the convergence of sailors at the entrance of the mess hall, Urson said, "Oh, guess what?"

He turned to Geo and picked up the jewel from the boy's chest. "All you people are going around with such finery, I took my coins to the smithy and had him put chains on them. Now I'll strut with the best of you." He laughed, and then went through the narrow way, crowding with the other sailors into the wide hall.

For two weeks, nights without dreams left them early, and the boat rolled from beneath the fog. Dawn was gray, but clear; then, by one breakfast time the ragged slip of Aptor's beach hemmed the horizon.

On the wheel deck the sailors cl.u.s.tered to the rail, and before them rocks struck like broken teeth from the water. Urson, in his new, triple neckchain, joined Snake and Geo at the rail. "Whew," he said. "Getting through them is going to be fun."

Suddenly heads turned. Behind them now, Argo's dark veils, bloated with the breeze, filled about her as she mounted the steps to the wheel deck. The sailors moved away from her. Then, one hand on a stay rope, she stared across the gray water to the dark tongue of land.

From the wheel the captain spoke, "Jordde, disperse the men and take over the wheel."

"Aye, sir," said the mate. "You, you, and you to the tops." He pointed among the men. "You also, and you. Hey, didn't you hear me?"

"Me, sir?" Geo turned around.

"Yes, you, up to the top spar there."

"You can't send him up," Urson called out. "He's never been topside at all before. It's too choppy for any lad's first time up. He doesn't even know ..."

"And who asked you?" demanded the mate.

"n.o.body asked me, sir," said Urson, "but--"

"Then you get below before I have you brigged for insubordination and fine you your three gold baubles. Don't you think I recognize dead man's gold?"

"Now look here," Urson roared.

Geo glanced from Argo to the captain. The bewilderment that flooded the face of the Priestess shocked him.

Jordde suddenly seized up a marlin pin, raised it, and shouted at Urson, "Get down below before I break your skull open."

Urson's fists sprang up.

"Calmly, brother bear," Geo began.

"In a b.i.t.c.h's a.s.s," snarled Urson and swung his huge arm forward.

Something leaped on Jordde from behind--Snake! The marlin pin veered inches away from Urson's shoulder. The flung fist sunk into the mate's stomach and he reeled forward, pa.s.sing Urson, with Snake still clawing at his back. He reached the rail, bent double over it, and Snake's legs flipped up. When Jordde rose, he was free of enc.u.mbrance.

Geo rushed to the edge and saw Snake's head emerge in the churning water. Behind him, Urson yelled, "Look out!" Jordde's marlin made an inch of splinters in the length of wood against which he had been leaning.

"Not him!" cried Argo. "No, no! Not him!"

But Jordde had seized Geo's shoulder and whirled him back against the rail. Geo saw Urson grab a loose rope behind them and suddenly swing forward, intending to knock Jordde away with his feet. But suddenly Argo moved in the way of his flying body, turned, saw him, and raised her hands to push him aside so that he swung wide of them and landed on the railing a yard from where they struggled.

Geo's feet slipped on the wet boards, and he felt his body suddenly hurled backwards onto the air. Then his back slapped water. As he broke surface, Urson, still on the rail called to him, "Hang on, friend Geo, I'm coming!" Urson's arms swung back, and then forward as he dove into the sea.

Now Geo could see only Argo and Jordde at the rail. But they were struggling. Urson and Snake were near him in the water. The last thing he saw was Jordde suddenly wrest something from Argo's neck and then fling it out into the sea. The Priestess' hands reached for the flying jewel, followed its arc as she screamed toward the water.

Then hands were at his body. Geo turned in the water as Snake disappeared from beside him and Urson suddenly cried out. Hands were pulling him down.

Roughness of sand beneath one of his sides and the flare of sun on the other. His eyes were hot and his lids were orange over them. Then there was a breeze. He opened his eyes, and shut them quick, because of the light. Then he turned over, thought about pillows and stiff new sheets.

Reaching out, he grabbed sand.

He opened his eyes and pushed himself up from the beach with both hands spread in warm, soft crumblings. Over there were rocks, and thick vegetation behind them. He swayed to his knees, the sand grating under his kneecaps. He looked at his arm in the sun, flecked with grains. Then he touched his chest.

His hand came to one bead, moved on, and came to another! He looked down. Both the chain with the platinum claw and the thong with the wire cage hung around his neck. Bewildered, he heaved to his feet, and immediately sat down again as the beach went red with the wash of blood behind his eyeb.a.l.l.s. He got up again, slowly.

Carefully Geo started down the beach, looking toward the land. When he turned to look at the water, he stopped.

At the horizon, beyond the rocks, was a boat with lowered sails. So they hadn't left yet. He swung his eyes back to the beach: fifty feet away was another figure lying in the sun.

He ran forward, now, the sand splashing around his feet, sinking under his toes, so that it was like the slow motion running of dreams. Ten feet from the figure he stopped.

It was a young black, very dark, skin the color of richly humused soil.

The long skull was shaved. Like Geo, he was almost naked. There was a clot of seaweed at his wrist, and the soles of his feet and one up-turned palm were grayish and shriveled.

Geo frowned and stood for a full minute. He looked up and down the beach once more. There was no one else. Just then the man's arm shifted across the sand.