Songs of the Earth (15 page)

Conditions weren’t much better up there. The wind drove rain across the deck in sheets that rivalled the stinging spray flung back from the bow, and the storm shrieked and shook the rigging like a madman in his chains.

‘Damn thing came out of nowhere!’ Captain Dail reeled across the sloping deck from the wheel, where two steersmen were lashed in place, fighting to keep the
Kittiwake
’s course. ‘The wind backed so fast it nearly caught us broadside – all I could do was reef down and run. She’s shaking apart!’

Alderan hauled Gair to the mainmast and tied a rope around his waist. Around them the heaving sea was dark as ink. Clouds stretched long fingers out of the east to smother the last of the daylight. Rigging thrummed and seawater sheeted across the deck with every wave.

‘Never seen anything like it,’ Dail bellowed, ‘not in thirty years on these waters! Wrong direction, wrong time of year, and five hundred mile too far east!’

Water smashed into Gair and took his feet out from under him. His legs braced, Alderan rode it out, then helped him back up. The old man kept a hand firm on his shoulder, and once he could stand, fixed his gaze on his face.

‘I need your help, Gair.’ Urgency gave his voice an edge that cut through the keening of wind and water and timber in distress.

‘What can I do?’

‘Help me turn the ship. The storm is driving her too far south and there’re shoals off the Maling Islands that’ll smash her to kindling.’

‘How? I’m no sailor—’

‘The Song.’ The old man’s eyes gleamed in the fading light. ‘There’s something wrong with this storm, something that says it’s not natural, and it’ll be the end of this ship if we don’t do something about it. It’s too much for me alone, but with your help we can fight back. I know you can do it.’

Stunned, Gair put up a hand to push his sodden hair off his face. He must have misheard. ‘I don’t know how to use it like that,’ he started, ‘and besides, I can’t hear it. It’s been quiet for days.’

The old man’s grip tightened on his shoulder. ‘It’s still there, Gair. It never leaves you, never for a minute. It’s a part of you that no one can ever take from you.’

‘What if it gets away from me? I can’t control it, Alderan!’

‘Don’t worry about that. I’ll do the weaving; I just need your strength.’

Oh Goddess, he couldn’t do this. Too many times simple things had come unravelled in his hands – a roaring furnace in the grate, instead of a warming fire on a cold night, and dry wood that exploded into needle-sharp splinters. Conjured lights that wavered, went out and couldn’t be called again. It was too unpredictable, too wild; he did not know what to do – and now his life, and that
of everyone on board, might depend on him. Dread rose up in his throat, threatening to choke him.

Alderan’s gaze gripped him as if he could see the thoughts written on the inside of Gair’s skull.

He could not look away.

‘You can do this, Gair.’

That deep, mellow voice filled his ears, louder than the storm, soft as a whisper. Huge waves were slamming into the
Kittiwake
’s hull and boiling over the tilting deck, trying to scour it of men and gear. Surf crashed around their feet. Above their heads an over-stressed rope snapped with a whip-crack report.

Gair hesitated. ‘I— I don’t think I can. It’s too strong!’

‘Don’t think; just believe. Believe in the Song. Trust yourself.’

With Alderan’s words, a fluttering surrounded his mind, like the beating of strong wings. In response, a shimmering note sounded where previously there had been silence. Pale and fragile at first, it strengthened with every beat of his heart. More notes rang out, weaving around the first in a complex harmony that swelled and grew and pressed up against his will. All he had to do was reach out to it.

He couldn’t.

Don’t be afraid. It will not harm you
.

Alderan’s voice sounded as clear and close as if the words were spoken inside his head. Gair was astonished. The next wave nearly felled him and it was only the older man’s strong arm that kept him upright. Seawater stung him, momentarily blinding him; he blinked his eyes clear and found Alderan watching him steadily, intently.

Touch it. Embrace it. It is part of you, Gair. It is yours
.

‘I’m scared,’ he whispered, and let the magic in.

It flooded through him. The storm, the sea, the ship around him, all became secondary. He was still aware of them, but dimly, like a conversation in another room. What filled his senses now was soaring, thrilling music.

Instinctively Gair flinched from it. He could not do this! Any second now the magic would turn on him and rend him to pieces. Alderan had made a mistake. He had opened the stable door and instead of a stocky little barrel of a Barrowshire pony, there was a war-horse inside, nineteen hands of fire-eyed, battle-trained muscle, tossing its head and snorting in anticipation. Merciful Mother, it would trample him under its steel-shod hooves with no more thought than for the dung in its straw. How on earth was he supposed to rein in that behemoth? It would kill him for sure—

But there wasn’t anyone else, just him and Alderan. Rope and sinews could endure only so much, and there was no chance that the storm would break before the
Kittiwake
and her crew did. If there was a chance that the ship could be saved, there was no one else but him to take it. Steeling himself, he reached for the Song.

To his amazement, it came to him like a plough-horse to its master. It leaned into his will as the animal would lean into its harness, and he felt its strength, a sense of massive might shifting under that glossy hide, but restrained, tempered with something like respect.

He touched it wonderingly. The magic had never felt like this before, and he did not know how it could be possible. It had to be Alderan’s doing.

‘Are you ready? You’ve not got much time!’

The
Kittiwake
lurched again, falling away into a trough with stomach-turning suddenness. As she hit the face of the next wave, sharp reports punctuated the harp-like thrum of the rigging and the fore topmast sheared.

‘’Ware below!’ shouted sailors running from the fo’c’sle as, above their heads, the broken topmast plunged towards the port rail, sodden canvases flailing. Severed stays lashed the deck. Another wave snapped more shrouds; the sails slapped into the sea and began to fill with water. In moments
Kittiwake
was down by the head and ploughing deeper into each successive wave.

‘Hands forrard!’ the captain bellowed. ‘Cut it free or she’ll founder!’

Gair swept his streaming hair out of his eyes. He had to do
something
– it would take time for the crew to hack through the tangled tarry web that tied the ship to the great sea-anchor of the topmast, time
Kittiwake
didn’t have. The power waiting within him could scour his mind away in the time it took for
now
to become
then
. It had bitten and burned and scorned him often enough in the past … but now it was rising to his bidding, and he wanted to know what it would be like to ride that power.

He gulped. ‘I’m ready.’ He braced himself against the quivering trunk of the mainmast as the ship shuddered again. ‘Do it!’

Nothing could have prepared him for the sensation of another mind entering his. It enfolded his entire consciousness like a blanket and the Song leapt joyously in response. When Gair closed his eyes he could see the threads of Alderan’s weaving. The pattern was vast as the sky; following the warp and weft of it made him dizzy. Yet at the same time it was stunningly, beautifully logical, and there he was, at the centre, anchoring it. It was all so clear he wanted to laugh out loud.

In a matter of seconds the weave was complete, a web of force as bright as the refractions from a jewel. Around them the storm continued to rage, and the ship to suffer, then Alderan spoke.

Now
.

Gair gripped the mast with all his strength and released his hold on the Song. It washed through him, out into Alderan’s web, and slammed into the storm like a fist.
Kittiwake
staggered. Gair was flung back hard against the mast, but there was no diminution in the flow of power Alderan drew from him. Storm winds swirled in confusion, giving the seamen a breather in which to scramble aloft to begin cutting the shattered mast free. It splashed into the sea, and as the loose canvas ballooned and bubbled as the waves battered the air out of it, so the
Kittiwake
’s head came up at last. At the helm, the seamen gasped with relief as she pulled away, her
motion instantly easier, and they regained a little control. Slowly, slowly, the ship began to come round.

Then the storm struck again. It hammered into the starboard beam, sending the ship lurching across the waves. Alderan swore and reinforced his weaving, but it was not enough. The advantage they had won was being eroded, and under his feet Gair felt the
Kittiwake
pay off again as the storm harried her round. If she turned broadside to the waves she was done for.

He embraced more of the Song, even before Alderan asked for it. The flow through him was breathtaking, far greater than anything he had ever handled before, but the old man’s weaving simply soaked it up, shaped it and channelled it out into the teeth of the tempest. Degree by degree, the winds backed, forced round to a more easterly point by Alderan’s will, so that the battered
Kittiwake
could catch them and run northwestwards, instead of being driven relentlessly south towards the reefs off the Maling Islands.

Gair had not paid much attention to the chart on the wall of Dail’s cabin, and he could not visualise the reefs, but when he turned his head and squinted through the spray at the sea tossing beyond the port rail, the boiling white foam was unmistakable.

He swore, and shouted, ‘The rocks! We’re too close!’

Alderan did not even look round, but he redoubled his efforts. The weaving consumed more and more of Gair’s strength, and each point they forced the wind round demanded ever greater efforts, making each tiny gain all the harder. Overhead, the
Kittiwake
’s single reefed topsail strained and over-stressed timbers groaned with each wave that slammed into them, but now she was gaining, turning her quarter to the driving sea and picking up speed.

‘West-nor’west!’ Dail bellowed, his face eerie in the light from the binnacle lamp. ‘Give her her head!’

The bosun nodded and bawled for his maintopmen. ‘Aloft! Cut the reefs! Get some way on her!’

The drenched seamen climbed the corkscrewing mast and scrambled out along the footrope. One by one the reefs were sliced through and the full weight of the sodden canvas boomed to the wind. Down on deck, the teams at the halyards skidded and swore and hauled till their hands bled, edging the yards round to capture as much of the wind as possible. Slowly at first, then with increasing sureness, the angle of the
Kittiwake
’s deck changed.

‘She’s comin’ round!’ The bosun’s face was split by a huge grin of disbelief. ‘We’ve done it!’

‘We’re not out of the woods yet, man!’ The captain hauled himself hand over hand along the railing towards Alderan. ‘Can you get us clear of the islands?’

The old man’s face was taut with strain, his teeth clenched. ‘The lad has power and to spare. We can do it.’

In Gair’s mind he heard Alderan’s voice.
One more push to keep us clear of the rocks and then it’s finished
. His tone was gentle, but his voice resonated with all the power of the Song he commanded.
You’ve done well
.

Gair felt an upsurge of power within him and let it go. He was no more than a conduit now, a channel through which it could run. He had no control other than what was needed to focus that tremendous energy. His eyes were tightly shut, his head bent, and nausea swilled around his stomach, but he clung to the mainmast and fought it down.

It had become difficult to judge the passage of time. He had no idea how long he had been on deck; all he could feel was the ship, every shudder and groan of the
Kittiwake
transmitted to him through the thick wood under his hands and feet. The steersmen had brought her head round and she was running flat-out. Gair felt the rush of water under her keel as she hauled away from the islands towards the safety of open water.

As the ship’s motion steadied, still fast but smoother now, Alderan’s grip on his mind relaxed at last. The Song drained away. It left behind a ringing emptiness in which his ears buzzed.

He lifted his head slowly. Already the storm clouds had broken up, and tentative fingers of morning sunlight were poking through the rents. The sea was still a heaving, malignant grey, but the waves had slowed and the wind had dropped to little more than a stiff breeze. All around him were bruised, tired faces, dripping wet, and a couple of men were clutching broken limbs, but somehow they were managing to smile. The bosun grinned like a monkey and Captain Dail, clasping Gair’s hand, pumped his arm fit to break it off.

Then the nausea caught up with him.