The Ocean of the Dead: Ship Kings 4 Read online

  And after the lieutenant had departed, Dow asked Jake and Fidel, ‘Are you so convinced of the need of this? He’s right, you know, the weight will only make things all the harder for those doing the rowing.’

  Jake nodded fiercely. ‘I feel it, Dow, that’s all I can tell you. We will rue it one day, if we leave them all behind.’

  Dow thought a moment and nodded with a sigh. ‘Four boats, then. Load them tonight – and tomorrow all strength to our arms.’

  *

  At dawn, their flotilla of cutters and skiffs were deployed – eight before the New World, six before the Chloe – and the tow lines fed out.

  The boats were normally crewed by six rowers each for the skiffs, or eight for the cutters, but in readiness for this great labour they had been altered by the carpenters to bear ten or twelve rowers respectively. So it was that – when the order came – one hundred and sixty men and women bent their backs and heaved as one upon one hundred and sixty oars. The tow lines groaned and lifted, shedding water. The oars strove again and then again at the reluctant sea, weeds languidly twisting . . . and slowly, almost imperceptibly, the floating islands parted, and the two great ships slid forward.

  The motion in itself was some relief, proof that the ships could be towed by manpower alone in such a mire. But soon the price of that motion was apparent. The coxswains set a moderate beat, one meant to conserve the rowers’ energy across a full four-hour stint, but as the sun climbed and the day’s heat soared, many of the rowers were prostrate after a single hour, sweating and red-faced and gasping for air, some all but insensible at the oars. After only two hours therefore – with the fleet having covered maybe six hundred yards in that time – the boats were recalled, so that new crews could be loaded.

  And so it went for all that day and on into the night: exhausted rowers replaced every two hours by fresh ones, until every fifth such rotation, when it was time for the first crews to go back out again. It meant that through any one period of twenty-four hours, no rower would be called on to do more than six hours in the boats – a roster that in the normal world would have been considered light duty.

  Here in the Doldrums, however . . .

  Dow experienced the reality of it firsthand, for he had included himself in the rowing lists, and instructed all his officers to do the same – aside from Fidel, excused by his age. Every able body was needed now, regardless of rank, if the fleet was to haul itself across a thousand miles of ocean. (He noted, however, that on the New World Prince Diego never took to an oar.)

  And from Dow’s first shift on, it was awful. The boat, crowded beyond its design, was a mass of moving elbows and knees that jammed repeatedly into his sides as he heaved on his oar, and the oar itself caught constantly in the weeds, wrenching at his hands, which soon chafed and blistered. He sweated in streams that evaporated almost instantly in the oven heat – yet gained no relief by it. Indeed, telltale white crusts on his skin revealed the deeper danger; he was losing too much salt in the process, a deadly risk, as the fleet’s doctors had warned. Water flasks were kept handy, and salt pills, both of which the rowers used liberally, but with little effect.

  At every stroke, meanwhile, the boat jerked grudgingly against its towline, the jolting as monotonous as a headache, and for all their efforts the great ships behind seemed to stand still. Dow battled cramps and nausea, and at length would have let his oar drop perforce had not the coxswain finally called time, and turned the boat back to the Chloe. It was all Dow could manage to climb the boarding ladder and shamble to his cabin before he collapsed in trembling exhaustion.

  It was no better at night, when he returned to the boats for his third shift. The fierce edge of the day’s heat was gone, but the sense of suffocation, the impossibility of getting a full breath in the stifling air, was even greater in the dark. A single lamp burned in the boat’s bow, but it illuminated little, and beyond the stern the tow rope vanished into blackness, apparently attached to nothing, but always unyielding. Indeed, it seemed to drag the boat backwards between strokes. And all around in the night, the Doldrums insects buzzed and whined, and flew choking into the gasping mouths of the rowers.

  And the result of all this hardship? When dawn came and the log was tallied, it emerged that the ships had covered, in that first day and night, nothing like the ten miles Diego’s navigators had so confidently promised. The true distance, by Fidel’s count – and his count was the only one that anyone on either vessel cared about now – was closer to six miles. This worked out to a mere quarter of a mile in an hour. No faster than an infant could crawl. At that rate, their one thousand mile journey would take over one hundred and sixty days.

  Half a year!

  In the Chloe’s Great Cabin, Dow and his officers consulted glumly over the figures. It was much too slow. Their supplies would not stretch so far. On their overcrowded ship, they had food enough for five more months at the outside. True, their stores could be supplemented by fishing, and even by the gathering of seaweed. But still, if they could not increase their pace, they would be close to starving by the time they reached the open seas once more, and could begin the search for land.

  An even sterner problem was that of the drinking water. The first day of towing had seen consumption rise to nearly double, for the usual rationing had been abandoned to feed the thirst of the rowers. Yes, both ships had brought huge supplies of fresh water with them; but in a world where it would never rain to replenish those supplies, water was more precious even than whale oil. And at six miles a day, both vessels would run dry long before they again reached seas where rain might fall.

  They must go faster!

  But through the second and third and fourth days at the oars, they fared no better. The weed and the drifting islands crowded the sea as thickly as ever, and every inch of progress had to be fought for. Dow, after four days of such rowing, was as sore and exhausted as he had ever been in his life – but at least he was still upright. Many rowers had broken down entirely while at the oars, their skin flushed and burning from heat stroke, some lashing out in hallucinations, others sinking into torpors, unable to be revived until they were brought back on board and had water poured into their stomachs via tubes.

  Most victims recovered from such episodes, but on the fifth day came the first death in the boats, a young man from the Chloe falling lifeless as he rowed. And by then the doctors had barred some fifty other invalids from the rosters, which only increased the workload of those still fit.

  Still, onwards the fleet pressed, through a sixth day and a seventh, even though the futility of it was becoming patent, for it was rare that they could cover more than five miles in a day, manifestly inadequate. Even those with little head for figures could calculate that their food and water would run out long before there was hope of reaching wind and rain and freedom.

  But on the ninth day of rowing came the miracle.

  Paradoxically, it was the floating islands – the very obstacles that so hindered them – that proved to be their saviour. So stable had many of these matted platforms become, tall leafy plants now grew on them, five or six feet high, reminiscent of tree-ferns, with stout, rough-skinned trunks and long fronds. On the ninth morning, sailors from one of the boats, while their craft was bumping along the edge of one such island, finally climbed bodily onto the raft, and found that the greenery was firm enough to support their weight. Two men even strolled over to a thicket of the tree-ferns and reclined in their shade, to the amusement of onlookers.

  Fidel, however, was more than amused. Ever the scientist, he commandeered a boat and had himself ferried to a floating island to collect samples for his collection. And it was while he was investigating one of the great ferns that he made the astounding discovery. When the trunks of the plants were cut through, a clear liquid flowed out of them in ready abundance; a liquid which proved upon a cautious taste to be – water.

  Fresh water.

  Warm and flat maybe, but drinkable.

  Word raced throug
h the fleet. Fresh water, and free for taking! Fidel speculated that it must be drawn up from the sea by roots of the ferns dangling beneath the islands, and filtered by those roots so that it was pure. But who cared how it was done? It was water where no water should be, an unheralded gift from the Doldrums. Just two or three such ferns, it soon emerged, could refill an entire water barrel, and there were hundreds of the plants in just the immediate vicinity. A bounty unimaginable.

  A halt was called to the rowing, and the boats were loaded instead with barrels and axes, and sent water-gathering. It went on all day, a holiday fete, shouts and laughter ringing across the ocean, sounds scarcely heard since the fleet had entered the inner Barrier.

  At Dow’s side, watching the harvest from the high deck, Fidel shook his head. ‘You know, it’s a remarkable thing. I’d have said a month or so ago, as we sailed in the Sterile Sea, that no place in the world offered less hope of supporting human life than the Doldrums: no food, no fresh water, no dry land. But now . . . consider. A human could indeed survive here, even bereft of a ship. On these floating isles there is shade from the sun, and water to drink, and various plants and animals for food. It would be no pleasant existence, of course, still too hot, only raw things to eat – for I see no means of making a fire – and in all ways very brutish. But a marooned man could endure in this place, perhaps for years on end.’

  Dow frowned. Fidel could not know it, of course, for he knew nothing of Nell’s prophetic nightmares, but the image he raised was all too close to one haunting Dow’s own thoughts. For perhaps this was exactly what Nell had foreseen in her terrors. That she would be abandoned upon one of these floating isles, left behind to a lingering, bare existence, a wretched life hardly better than death, as the fleet sailed away without her.

  And yet, still it made no sense. Why would Nell – why should anyone – be left behind here, if the fleet remained afloat and intact, and went on? Why would Dow – or anyone else – choose to leave her?

  Reluctant, he let his gaze drift across to the New World and to its high deck. Nell was there, come topside to watch the water-gatherers – and once again she was with Diego, the two of them standing alone at the rail. It had been the same every time Dow had glimpsed her over the last nine days, ever since the oil had run out. Always, she and Diego were together.

  Confusion wrung in Dow. What was she doing, spending so much time with him? What had that bow of her head, that submission, meant? She hated Diego, Dow knew she did . . . and yet there she was, seeking him out and seemingly eager now for his company.

  Was it her fear that drove her? In her dread that she would be lost here in the inner Barrier, had she turned to the one man who could perhaps prevent it? Not to Dow, now shorn of his importance – but instead to her childhood friend, her once-intended, and now commander of the expedition? Could Diego protect her from the future somehow, when Dow no longer could?

  And if so, what was she offering Diego in return?

  Fidel continued, oblivious. ‘And yet, I do not think a man would be welcome here, or could ever make the Doldrums a true home. To see nothing but this same exact scene, day after day; to breathe this same hot air, month after month, knowing that there is no possibility, ever, of a change in the sea or the sky. That, I think, is more than any human mind could stand.’

  And what, Dow wondered blackly, had the fear of it done to Nell’s mind, and to her heart?

  But now the old scholar straightened, gazing about searchingly at the wider world. ‘And yet that isn’t the core of it. There’s something else here . . . something I can’t pin down. Can you feel it, Dow?’

  Dow stirred at last, looked away from the New World. Watching her only made it worse. ‘Feel what?’ he asked.

  Fidel searched the gloom still. ‘It’s not just that we don’t belong here. It’s not even that we are unwelcome here. It’s . . . it’s that we’re resented here.’

  ‘Resented?’

  Fidel nodded. ‘Look at all this activity, the boats, the noise – a happy scene. And yet all around there is such a darkness, such a silence to this Doldrums world – it’s as if somehow it is observing us as we scurry about, begrudging the noise we make . . . and hating us.’

  Dow looked out. Nearby, boats moved and people walked upon the islands, axes on their shoulders. But beyond that small circle of life, half a mile maybe in radius, the Barrier haze hung like an immense wall, looming inwards, almost as an angry man might hunch forward, observing some outrage. Dow shook his head abruptly. His imagination was getting carried away. ‘I haven’t felt anything. Certainly not anything watching.’

  ‘No. But you, and most of the crew, have been preoccupied these last days with the labour of rowing. I, however, have not been called to the boats, and so have had leisure to study the waters around us. And it makes little sense, I know. There is most likely nothing out there but heat and stillness and the crawling life of insect and weed. And yet I feel that we wander now not in a mere empty wilderness, but that we have intruded somewhere, that we have trespassed into a territory that is in fact claimed by . . . by what? No, I can’t find the right words. But yes, I do feel watched here, and by hostile eyes.’

  Dow gave a hard smile. ‘Our poet would find the words. He would say that the Dead are watching, and that they do not want us here.’

  ‘So he would,’ said Fidel, not smiling in return. ‘Indeed, I’m sure that below decks he already is. We’d best hope then that the rowing keeps the crew too exhausted to listen to his tales and whispers. Because if they take the time to pause and look about for themselves, then soon enough they’ll come to the same conclusion as me. Something is not right here.’

  Dow did not respond, and in silence they watched the boats ferrying back and forth their priceless cargo.

  *

  Laden with fresh water, and reassured by the prospect of being able to harvest more as the journey continued, the fleet resumed its voyage the next morning, the rowers working with a renewed will.

  But for all that spirits had been raised, the rowing itself proved no easier, and their progress through the weeds no swifter. They made only five miles in that following day and night – which brought the sum of their first ten days under the oars to less than fifty.

  Gloom quickly settled again in the Chloe’s Great Cabin. Their water supply might now be assured, but hunger could kill a crew just as surely as thirst, and nothing had improved regarding their shortage of food. Under Fidel’s instruction, collection had begun of the strange plants and creatures of the Doldrums to see which might prove edible, but such efforts could only eke out their supplies, not replace them.

  And starvation wasn’t the only threat. Down in the sick bays of both ships, people were still dying from heat stroke and fever. Two dead one day, three dead the next, four the day after that. These were not catastrophic numbers in themselves – there were, after all, nearly nineteen hundred souls in the fleet. But if the dying continued like this for a hundred days more, say, or two hundred, increasing all the while, then there would be few left alive to raise the fleet’s sails, even if the southern seas of wind and wave could finally be reached.

  But on the fleet rowed, eleven days, twelve days, thirteen. And Dow rowed too, putting in his three shifts per day at the oars. He was as exhausted as ever, and between his stints on the boats had little interest in anything but sleep, and food, and water. And yet . . . perhaps it was only because Fidel had drawn his attention to it, but from time to time he caught himself staring out into the Doldrums gloom, suddenly on edge, his skin crawling, as if he had seen something move out there.

  Indeed, on the fourteenth day, as he shambled painfully towards the stern castle after two interminable hours rowing, Dow stopped short, and rubbed his grainy eyes. Far behind the fleet, on the fringe of visibility in the haze, on one of the floating islands, it seemed that shapes were rising up – one, two, then three of them, uncannily like people climbing to their feet after lying down. Dow blinked again, and lurched to the
rail. But when he stared hard a second time, the shapes resolved themselves into nothing more than a stand of the large fern-trees. At least, that’s what they looked like now . . .

  He was tired, that was all. Fidel had planted foolish ideas in his mind, and now his eyes were playing tricks. But from that moment on, Dow could never quite shake the feeling that whenever he was looking away, something stirred on the edge of his vision, something too cunning to let itself be sighted or identified.

  He said nothing, not even to Fidel, but the foreboding grew. He found he was watching the other officers for any hint that they were sensing the same thing. Was he imagining it, or did Jake Tooth’s gaze dart constantly to the sea, his whale-hunter’s eyes narrowed, as if trying to catch something out? Was Boiler Swan growing unusually tense and silent? Was the mood across the whole ship slowly tightening, like the drawing out of a bow?

  By day Dow could dismiss most of these fancies. But by night it was harder. With the whale oil gone, the only fuel left for the lamps was the far feebler olive oil, and even that could not be used too freely, lest supplies run out. The ships were thus cast into near-total blackness, with only a flicker here and there to show the way about the decks, leaving swathes of shadows in between and nothing but unrelieved night beyond, in which anything might be moving.

  It was worst of all during his night stints at the oars, down at water level amid the clinging weed and the hum of insects. The boat was only a tiny pool of light within the vast dark, and from that dark – over the groans of the rowers, and the creak and snap of the oars – came all manner of sounds and stealthy movements. Most, no doubt, were only the small Doldrums creatures scuttling about on the matted islands, or fish-things surfacing with a slap of water – but occasionally Dow was sure he heard deeper, more profound splashes from further off. And once he was certain he saw, dimly reflecting the lamplight from his boat, a set of eyes staring back from the darkness, standing at man height upon the water.