Part 17 (1/2)
Occasionally there would be a sharp dip in the crest of the plateau where a hanging valley emerged.
When the icerigger was on a starboard tack, the lookout in the mainmast basket could see into such gaps in the rock wall. Some held trees that apparently shunned the top of the plateau itself, but none showed any sign of habitation, not of the fabled s.h.i.+p building city of Moulokin or of a single Tran hermit.
Days became a week, the week two, without a break in the cliffs. From time to time the plateau would reach outward or ripple inward, forcing them to alter their heading slightly. But never did it vanish or vary its general eastwest orientation.
By the beginning of the third week, however, the plateau began to curve gradually southward. Ethan mused on the distance they had come to the west. Nor was there any way of telling how far the cliffs extended westward.
”According to the mestapes I took long ago, back on the s.h.i.+p traveling here,” Ethan was telling September, ”survey work had been very limited on this world. Arsudun was the largest populated island the first team found, so they put the humanx station there. But this,” and he gestured expansively at the towering ramparts, ”it's either an island-sized continent, or a continent-sized island.”
”It's plain enough, feller-me-lad,” the giant commented, ”that we've found no mere mountaintop stickin' its head above the ocean.”
Hunnar joined them, braking to a halt on the star-board icepath, turning his chiv at the last moment so as not to shower them with ice. His excitement was evident from his expression and the fact that he al-most forgot to lower his dan. September caught him as he stumbled forward, nearly fell. He was so preoc-cupied he forgot to produce an excuse for his clumsiness.
”We have found the tracks of a s.h.i.+p! They travel parallel to this high land also, but they approach from the east before turning south.”
”Maybe someone else's calculations were a little off,” said an equally animated Ethan.
”Mayhap.” Hunnar regained some of his usual dignity. ”This may mean only that another raft is explor-ing or lost.”
”Sure. But if the Moulokinese do most of their trading with peoples to the south and west away from that pressure ridge we crossed, it would explain why we've encountered no tracks before now, and why they're so little known in Poyolavomaar.” Hunnar's excitement had proven infectious. ”Not to mention in far-off Arsudun.”
”All possible, all possible.” The knight's eyes flashed in the midday light. ”We shall see.”
The next day they came across two additional sets of s.h.i.+p tracks. Like the first, these approached from the east before turning south.
”If Moulokin does lie along this plateau,” Ethan was saying, ”then any s.h.i.+pmaster knows he only has to encounter it before turning south or north.”
The actual discovery, when it occurred, was anticlimactic. One moment the _Slanderscree_ was racing southward, its speed faster now that it wasn't running into the wind. The next, the fore lookout was yelling loudly to any who could hear.
Off-duty crew rushed to the port rail for a glimpse of a myth become real. From the day they had first en-countered the cliffs of the plateau, it had taken them nearly a standard month to reach their present posi-tion. Ethan couldn't estimate how far they'd come. But it was far enough to convince him that Tran-ky-ky could now boast at least one true continent in addi-tion to its thousands of islands scattered spice-like across its endless ice seas.
At the same time he understood why those islands rather than this landma.s.s of considerable but inexact extent were chose by the Tran for their towns and cities. Islands offered easy access to fields of pikapina and pedan, access to the ice ocean on which all commerce moved. Everything they had seen of the broad pla-teau hinted at an interior as barren as the lowliest tundra.
Like everyone else, the cries had roused Ethan from his cabin and sent him running to the deck to learn what all the shouting was about. As he snapped his suit closed he noticed sailors up in the rigging taking in sail.
”What is it, Skua?” he shouted at the giant as he ran to the railing. Then he didn't have to ask because he saw it for himself.
As though cleft by the axe of a G.o.d, the cliffs had been split from rim to ice just off the port bow. As they drew nearer, the extent of the chasm could be es-timated. Ethan guessed it was not quite two hundred meters across. It maintained that width as far down the canyon as he could see.
There was no sign of a city, but there were numerous signs of its nearness. September leaned over the railing, pointed wordlessly down to the ice.
Despite the light dusting of ice particles and snow, Ethan could clearly make out many sets of parallel grooves running through the smooth surface. They were the tracks of s.h.i.+ps which had pa.s.sed this way.
While they crossed and cut over one another, all converged on the chasm in the plateau wall.
September had his tiny monocular out. He'd flipped up the protective mask of the survival suit and was holding the compact telescope to one eye.
”What do you see, Skua?”
”Sheer rock, feller-me-lad. Rock no different from that forming the cliffs we've been pacing for weeks. Not a sail, not a building, nothing. Maybe the canyon takes a tight turn and hides the town.” He slipped the monocular back into the sealocket in his suit, squinted at the plateau. ”One thing's certain- all these tracks lead somewhere popular. I wonder at the clouds inland, though. Even if the wind's less there, you wouldn't think they'd linger so thick in one place.”
It did seem that the interior of the plateau immedi-ately behind the canyon was home to a dense ma.s.s of oddly whitish clouds. Blue sky around and above made the cloud-forms stand out sharply. Ethan thought briefly of volcanic smoke, such as could be seen from Sofold's steady-burning peaks. Only this smoke was much too light to be volcanic in origin.
”If it's such a busy port, why don't we see any other s.h.i.+ps?”
”That gal Teeliam did say this Moulokin's pri-marily a s.h.i.+pbuilding and manufacturing center.
Poyolavomaar, Arsudun, Sofold-they're all trad-ing ports. Maybe no one visits here unless they've a finished raft waitin' for them. Or maybe the Moulokinese are superst.i.tious and only trade certain times of the year. Be interestin' to see what they make of us.”
Cries sounded from the helmdeck immediately be-hind them. Tahoding was gesturing busily to mates and a.s.sistants. Gracefully, sails were drawn up and tied to spars. The _Slanderscree_ continued its cautious ap-proach to the canyon.
Something pressed against the face mask of Ethan's survival suit. He raised it cautiously, then shut it fast. His suit thermometer indicated it was minus twenty outside, but it wasn't the cold that made him hastily s.h.i.+eld his skin.
They were traveling almost due east. That meant the untiring westwind was directly behind them. Yet they were making little progress. The icerigger rocked slightly, and he saw that Tahoding was tacking.
That was crazy: n.o.body tacks away from the wind!
”Strong gale blowin' down _out_ of the canyon,” observed September with interest. A glance upward showed the sails flapping uncertainly against the spars. Occasionally the wind off the plateau was strong enough to shove pikapina sail material back against the masts. At such moments the s.h.i.+p shuddered as if reluctant to continue. But under Tahoding's careful and expert guidance, they kept making steady progress forward. Very soon they entered the mouth of the canyon.
Walls over a hundred meters high towered on both sides of the ice s.h.i.+p. As they progressed up the chasm, the sheer stone ramparts rose steadily higher, though the canyon showed no sign of narrowing.
At a hundred seventy meters high the cliffs leveled off, only then the canyon walls began to press inward slightly. There was less room to maneuver. Tahoding and his crew worked hard to keep the zigzagging s.h.i.+p from smas.h.i.+ng into unyielding canyon sides. He was making shorter and shorter tacks, threatening terribly if a sail crew was seconds too slow in s.h.i.+fting a spar.
Once, the sailors manipulating the foremast tops misinterpreted a mate's order and swung their spars starboard instead of port. With a lurch, the _Slanderscree_ continued on course to starboard instead of swing-ing around to cross the expanse of ice in the channel. Ethan stared, frozen, as they lumbered steadily toward the nearing gray cliff.
Sailors fought frantically to correct the error, com-pensate for the mistake. There was a dull, patient grind-ing noise. Fortunately the icerigger was now traveling so slowly into the headwind that the impact did no more than crack the railing and splinter a couple of deck planks.
The ease with which the planking splintered turned Ethan's attention to the treeless rims high overhead. How stable were they? In the event of a slide there was no room to escape in the narrow confines of the canyon.
He was worrying needlessly again. The crash of s.h.i.+p into stone hadn't loosened as much as a pebble from the clifftop.
Strong comments were relayed from helmdeck to foremast crew via the mids.h.i.+p's mate. They were in-tended to relax the atmosphere on board while chasttising the foremast sailors. Instead, the invective only added to the general tension, did not produce the laughter it would have in less threatening surroundings.
The mystery of the mythic citystate, the narrowing canyon walls that shut out the clean sky, the skate-scarred ice they were traversing, in conjunction with their unfortunate experiences at Poyolavomaar, combined to test the mental stability of the crew. Ethan knew it would be better if they encountered _something_ - hostile, friendly or even inexplicable-before many more minutes pa.s.sed.
It occurred to him to wonder what they would do if Moulokin proved as unreal as it had proven elusive and the canyon simply continued to narrow, perhaps to a lonely rockface dead-end. The many s.h.i.+p tracks might signify nothing more than a convocation of religious wors.h.i.+ppers at a favorite shrine, or indicate a well-used refuge from storms.
Such visitors would have no trouble turning their s.h.i.+ps around and racing back down the icefilled can-yon with the inland wind at their backs. But the can-yon was as narrow as the _Slanderscree_ was long. She could not possibly be turned 'round in so slim a s.p.a.ce. They might have to backsail, traveling sternfirst and steering in a fas.h.i.+on unthought of.
September had theorized a bend in the canyon. All at once it turned sharply southward. The crew had to struggle with lines and spars to swing the icerigger safely around the twisting walls.
The wind continued to buffet them from off the pla-teau, but it was gentler now. The ice raft could proceed up canyon on a softer tack.
Except that the canyon was blocked.
At first he thought it a landslide, tumbled down from those cliffs so stable in appearance. As they drew nearer it was clear that the obstacle was Tranmade, its great stones and blocks neatly piled with mortarless masonry to form a wall stretching across the ice strait like a granite web.
It was perhaps thirty meters high, deeper than he could casually guess without a higher view. As was the custom on Tran-ky-ky, the colossal double gate was constructed of wood. It rose nearly as high as the stone walls themselves and was flanked on either side by a triangular tower.