Corde noticed the captain watching it, his arms crossed and a ruminative expression on his face. His calmness did much to still Corde’s own nerves at being so close to such a giant, and he said, ‘I gather such creatures do not attack ships, Captain?’
Lochery looked sideways at Corde, and raised an eyebrow. ‘Oh, aye? And what makes you say that, Master Corde?’
Corde laughed. ‘Why, your unconcerned attitude, of course. You do not look like a man who suspects imminent death.’
‘Ah,’ said Lochery, returning his attention to the diminishing serpent, now beginning a descent back into its native depths. ‘Well, you see, if we had been in its path, it would have devoured the ship whole. They can do that, you know, and we would not have been able to do a thing to stop it.’
‘What?’ Corde’s sang-froid fractured abruptly. ‘We were in danger the whole time? How could you be so calm, man?’
‘I repeat, we would not have been able to do a thing to stop it. If we are to die, Master Corde, we can at least die well.’
Ten days, the trip took altogether, and the majority were much like one another. Once, when the ocean grew shallow over a submarine plateau, Corde excitedly pointed out that he could see a sunken city clearly beneath the waves. Lochery was unhappy to hear it and put a greater press upon the sails, the sooner to be clear. Nor was Cabal delighted by this remarkable sight, refusing even to look at it, instead pacing up and down the deck, muttering about how greatly he resented the loss of his pistol.
Everyone was relieved when, on the early evening of the tenth day, the lookout called, ‘Land, ho!’ and shortly thereafter Oriab Island crept over the easterly horizon. There was sufficient light to study the architecture as the Edge of Dusk glided between two lighthouses to rival the Pharos on either side of Baharna harbour, and approached the quayside before lowering her sails and sculling in the last few yards. Sailors leaped easily to the quay and, within a minute, were tying her off to the bollards. After such a long and occasionally harrowing journey, the sense of anticlimax was intense.
‘Well,’ said Bose, as they gathered their few items of luggage bought in Hlanith, ‘that was an adventure in itself. Sea serpents and sunken cities! Tell me, Captain, is this journey always so exciting?’
Lochery considered for a moment. ‘No pirates this time,’ he said, shrugged, and then bade his passengers a good evening before turning his attention to unloading cargo.
Baharna was a very different city from Hlanith, even larger (in their experience to date, the Dreamlands didn’t seem to do small – except for ships) and seemed to owe less to Earth in its architecture. Or at least, as Cabal commented, to any surviving architecture known on Earth. The city was terraced, but in such a way as to make the ranks of Hlanith seem very modest indeed. The streets of Baharna rose and fell steeply and, as a result, were frequently stepped. The visitors guessed that loads were carried on the sharply zigzagging roads that ran across the terraced levels, but people still managed to ride up and down the interstitial stepped highways by an unexpected method.
‘Oh, I say,’ said Bose. ‘That chap’s riding a zebra.’
It seemed that the zebras of the Dreamlands, or at least the zebras of Oriab, were far more biddable creatures than their terrestrial counterparts. A smiling trader in an orange silken robe, saluted them with something similar but not exactly a salaam gesture, and rode by on his patient and sanguine zebra, laden with panniers.
They watched him pass and then watched him ride off down the stepped road towards the quays. The observation grew to a slightly irritating length until it was halted by Cabal’s curt, ‘Oh, hallelujah. We have seen a man on a zebra and may now die content.’ He stalked off up the hill, looking for an inn the captain had told them of, and did not deign to make sure the others were keeping up.
As he walked, and they pursued him in a desultory we-were-going-this-way-in-any-event sort of way, he looked up at the huge archways that bent upon the highways of the city, archways upon which stood more buildings of the same dark purplish porphyry from which much of the city seemed to be built. It gave an impression of great solidity and great age. Cabal knew that an igneous stone like porphyry was difficult to cut; the ancient Egyptians had certainly made heavy weather of it, loathing the stuff for its hardness but loving it for its colour, finish and resistance to the elements. Or so the mummy of a master architect had once told him during a not entirely legal experiment at a respected science academy held long after normal hours. In fact, the virtues of building materials were all that ancient worthy had been prepared to talk about, probably because the rest of his brain was in a canopic jar somewhere.
The vast quantities of the stuff in evidence here, however, raised the question of just how large a quarry would have to be opened in the side of a nearby volcano to supply such gargantuan – indeed, Cyclopean – loads of the distinctive rock. Cabal considered the hypothesis that if all the porphyry were to be dumped neatly back into the quarries it would produce a good-sized hill after filling the holes. In short, that most had never been mined but dreamed into existence, long, long ago by men or things like men. The hard stone had been chosen because it reasonably matched the environment, but mainly because it emanated permanence, and permanence in the land of sleep is better than gold in the world of wakefulness. Cabal’s chosen profession meant that he must perforce dabble frequently in history and folklore and the misty hinterland between them. Over time, he had developed a sense of what was likely and what was not, which historical theories were probably true, and which were bunkum. To this sense, the Dreamlands stank of bunkum, a rank, musty smell like old sacking. Real history was unromantic, steeped in greed and blood and abject eye-rolling stupidity. An endless parade of putative Ozymandiases marching off to glory before snapping off at the ankles in the depths of the desert: that was human history. Every now and then there would be the pretence of civilisation, but soon enough the restless, hateful, atavistic hearts of humanity would tear down the towers and slide back into barbarism, squealing with glee. Decadence loves the taste of blood, even though it is poison.
The Dreamlands had none of that. The town squares had statues to poets and artists, philosophers and writers, not generals and statesmen. Cabal had heard of no wars or even border squabbles in living memory. Oh, there were tales of great wars and toppled states, but these all dwelled in the distant past. When an Ozymandian empire fell here, it was explicitly for the convenience of any passing Shelley looking for a subject for a sonnet.
Yet, Cabal concurred, the Dreamlands should have had all the necessary ingredients for conflict and anarchy. There were fat merchants with vast wealth, so money was important here, and where there was money there were jealousy and violence. There were pirates, mercenaries, marines and soldiers. There were kingdoms that chafed under ancient enmities with other races and neighbours. All the elements were here, so why did no spark start a conflagration?
Perhaps, he concluded, wars could only start here for aesthetic reasons. Tawdry little land grabs simply didn’t happen because they were revolting and wrong. Noble crusades and heroic ventures, on the other hand, were romantic and right. Perhaps, Cabal thought, when he had more leisure he might try his hand at starting a conflict here, just for purposes of scientific enquiry. The Trojan model looked simple and effective. He made a mental note to foment a war at some point, and returned his attention to finding the inn.