It is true, then, about their wanting to die, Nortekku realized. Life is already over for them; nothing remains but the actual moment of termination. What happens to them between now and then is of no concern to them whatever.
Still, it had been sickening to watch the capture. The Sea-Lords might not care, but he did, and, of course, Thalarne, who was so strongly affected by it that it was several days before she came up far enough from her depression even to feel like speaking.
By then they were well out to sea. The continental coast behind them dwindled to the most imperceptible line and then vanished altogether. The course was a straight westerly one: they would not be going back to Sempinore, either to reprovision or to drop off the two Hjjk guides, but would, rather, leave the Inland Sea as soon as possible and head right across the Eastern Ocean to Bornigrayal with their booty.
Nortekku knew now what the hammering aboard the ship had been. They had converted the two storage holds at the ship’s stern into one large tank for the Sea-Lords. Some kind of siphon arrangement brought fresh ocean water up into the tank each day. Thus the four captives would have access to the environment in which they preferred to spend most of their time. At mid-morning each day they were brought out for exercise on the desk—a solemn ritual in which they flapped up and back for half an hour or so—and then they lay basking until it was time for them to return to their cabins. The ropes with which they had been pinioned had been removed. It would have been simple enough for them to leap over the rail and make their way back to their home at the edge of the southern continent; but either they believed that they were already too far from home to be able to accomplish the journey, or, what was more probable, their being prisoners here aboard the ship was of no consequence to them. All four seemed to be living in some private world. They paid no attention to their captors. Mostly they were silent; occasionally they spoke with one another in their language of grunts and barks, but once, when Thalarne asked one of the Hjjks for a translation, the Hjjk merely stared at her as though her own language were unintelligible to it.
The westward crossing was far easier than the eastward voyage had been. Spring had come to the ocean, now, and the air was nearly as warm as it was when they were in the region of the Inland Sea. There were no storms, only occasional gentle showers. An easy wind came from behind them, helping them along.
Nortekku and Thalarne were standing on the deck as the ship docked at Bornigrayal Harbor. Suddenly she caught her breath as though in shock, and grasped his wrist tightly with both her hands. He turned to her, amazed.
“Look! Look! Down there, Nortekku!”
He glanced down, toward the quay, where the deckhands were tying up the ship.
Hamiruld was standing there.
Thalarne could barely speak. Only choked monosyllables came from her. “How—why—”
“Easy, Thalarne. Easy.”
Struggling to regain her self-control, she said, “But what’s he doing here? What does he want? He should be back in Yissou. He’s got no business being here!”
Nortekku, feeling shaken also by the presence of Thalarne’s mate here, so far from their home, stared toward the slight, wiry figure of Hamiruld and was appalled to see him cheerily smiling and waving at them. The loving husband showing up at the pier to welcome his wife and a friend of hers as they returned from a little trip, yes. How sweet of him.
This is very bad, Nortekku thought.
As calmly as he could he said, “He’s come to claim you back, I suppose. Someone must have told him I flew out to Bornigrayal after you. Khardakhor, perhaps. Or even Prince Vuldimin.” Could that be, he wondered? Would he have cared that much? A more reasonable possibility presented itself. “Or perhaps he’s just here to represent the syndicate. I suspect they’d want to check up on our two Bornigrayan friends, and make sure that when the ship is unloaded they don’t go walking off with any Sea-Lord finds that don’t belong to them.”
Either way, it was the worst finish to the voyage he could imagine, except, possibly, if the ship had gone down at sea with the loss of all aboard. First to discover the dolorous state of the little Sea-Lord colony, then to have to participate, however involuntarily, in the capture of the four who had come back with them, and now to be confronted in the moment of their arrival by Thalarne’s mean-souled, spiteful little husband—
Hamiruld was courtesy itself, though, as they landed. He came sprinting up on deck as soon as the boarding ramp had been laid down, saluted the captain, warmly embraced Thalame—she held herself stiffly away from him as he hugged her—and even clapped Nortekku exuberantly on the shoulder. He proffered no explanation for being here on this side of the continent. He let them know that had already heard reports of the great success of the expedition and that he wanted to hear all the details, that night, at the hotel in town where they would all be staying. He had rented the finest rooms; there would be a grand celebratory feast.
“I will be spending the night aboard the ship, I think,” said Nortekku coolly. He assumed that Hamiruld would sweep Thalarne up into his own luxurious suite at the hotel, and the last thing he wanted was to be under the same roof. “There are a few details I have to finish up—I need to organize my notes, to do some final packing—”
Hamiruld looked a little surprised at that, but not greatly troubled. All his attention was focused on Thalarne.
She, though, said just as coolly, “I will be staying aboard the ship tonight also, Hamiruld.”
At that a flash of quick fury came up into his eyes, like a goblin face appearing at a window. Then, just as quickly, he grew calm again. “You will? And why is that, Thalarne?”
“I’d rather speak with you privately about that,” she said. “Nortekku? Would you excuse us for a moment?”
She was in full command, now. Obediently Hamiruld allowed her to march him off toward the ship’s bow, and just as obediently Nortekku swung around and walked to the other side of the ship, where he could look outward into the harbor instead of having to observe their conversation from a distance.
It went on a very long while. It was one of the longest moments of his life. Then she returned, grim-faced, her jaw tightly set. Glancing across, Nortekku saw that Hamiruld was gone from the deck that he had descended once again to the pier.
“Well?” Nortekku asked.
“I told him that we had brought four living Sea-Lords back with us, and that I wanted him to have them released. I told him that I would leave him if he didn’t.”
The conditional nature of that threat left Nortekku feeling chilled. But all he said, when she did not continue, was: “And then?”
“And then he shrugged. He said, ‘You’re going to leave me anyway, aren’t you? So why should I let them go?’ And that was all. He’s going back to the hotel now. I’ll stay with you aboard the ship.”
In the night Thalarne awakened him and said, “Do you hear noises, Nortekku?”
“Noises?” He had been in the deepest of sleeps.
“Thumps. Shouts. A scream, maybe.”
Nortekku pushed himself upward through the fog that shrouded his mind. Yes, there were noises. Muffled thumpings. A panicky outcry. Another. Then deep-voiced grunting sounds that could only be the bellowings of the Sea-Lords.
“Someone’s in there with them in the tank,” she said. “Listen—that sound’s coming from a Sea-Lord. But that one isn’t.”
“Hamiruld?” Nortekku suggested, pulling the idea out of the blue. “Could it be that he’s come on board, and—”
But she was already up and on her way out of the cabin. Nortekku ran madly after her, down the corridor, up the little flight of well-worn stairs, and down the upper corridor that led toward the stern of the ship and the tank of the captive Sea-Lords. The door of their hold was open. The light was on inside.