Purple flung away the empty water bag. “Give me the other.” Shoogar shoved it into position before the words were out of his mouth, and again Purple plunged his wires and funnel into it. Again the windbag puffed with a mixture that was half hydrogen, half throw-away gas.
We could hear the roar of the whirlpool now — and little else. We were less than two manheights above the water. Wilville and Orbur were frantically pulling their airpushers up so they would not get caught in the maelstrom below.
But we had stopped our descent!
The great whirling walls of water slipped thunderously past us — crashing and black. We could feel the wet mist I across our faces. Foam sprayed the beat.
“The mouth of Teev,” whispered Shoogar. “It appears at the end of every summer. As the waters recede, it sucks up everything within its reach, men, boats, trees, rocks —”
“But summer isn’t over yet,” said Purple. His face was I white, and the bones of his knuckles showed where he gripped the railing.
“No,” said Shoogar, “but it’s starting to wane. By summer’s end the Mouth will be much bigger than this. Its roar will be audible for miles.”
Purple peered nervously backward. The dark thundering water was slipping steadily behind us. Wilville and Orbur lay clenched across their outriggers.
“I never thought I’d live to see it that close,” Shoogar said weakly.
Purple grunted thoughtfully. He was looking at his airmaker.
“What’s the matter?” I asked.
“My battery. I think it’s dead.”
“What? No! Again?”
“I think so.” He disconnected the battery and shook it experimentally. “Look, the dial doesn’t even light up. We used up all the power we had.”
“We needed it. We’d be in the Mouth of Teev if we hadn’t made more gas.”
“We could have swum for it. Or cut the boat loose and hung onto the ropes! Or — anything —” He put his face in his hands and made sounds of pain. Then suddenly he stood up, picked up the battery and — for an endless moment I thought he was going to fling it overboard and perhaps follow it.
Instead he called briskly, Wilville! Orbur! Back on the bicycles. We’re so close to land, you don’t want to quit now!”
I could see that he was only acting. He didn’t want the others to see how deeply he felt his loss. He pretended to busy himself checking the rigging, but several times I caught him staring off into the sky with a faraway look.
The boys unslung the windmakers again and Shoogar began to chant with them — the I Think Icon, a fast chant, strong and purposeful.
The shore line loomed ever nearer — the surf was white and foaming; Shoogar steadily increased the pace of the chant. Even so, we kept sinking lower and lower toward the water — not as fast as before, but it was apparent that the airbags were no longer as tight as they had been.
The water slipped past us, the windmakers dipping through the higher waves; then cutting through the swells themselves, becoming visible only in the troughs between the waves; and at last, no longer visible at all. The outriggers hung low along the sides of the boat, and pushed us through the surf. The balloons hung in silent stillness overhead, and the sea splashed below. An occasional spray of wet foam came through the rigging.
Shoogar interrupted his chanting to call, “Lant, look! Do you recognize where we are heading? Come look!”
I climbed forward. Ahead lay a bleak and forbidding landscape of jagged black and brown. It was streaked with gray and purple, and ominously stained whites. All was pitted and scarred. Here and there a flash of red testified to a scorch-blossom’s attempt to take root, but little more was visible. Except — was that the fire-blackened shell of a wild housetree? It looked like a gaunt hand frozen in an anguished skyward grasp.
“Lant! It is the Cove of Mysteries — or what’s left of it. We are not far from the old village, just a few miles south of it.”
Purple came up behind me, a clicking device in his hands. I had noticed it on his belt before, but he had never explained its use. Now he tapped it experimentally and frowned. At last he smiled, “The level of — “ He used a demon word here, “is not as high as I thought it would be, not much higher than the normal background level. Certainly not dangerous, anyway. It will be safe to walk in this area.”
The boat was splashing through the waves now, and Purple directed the boys to head for a place where the ground sloped gently into the water. We could see one not too far ahead, and the boys shifted direction to make for it.
Purple peered ahead. “Lant, how far are we from Critic’s Tooth?”
“Well, it used to be over there, Purple,” I pointed. A few cracked, half-melted slabs of rock marked a conspicuous gap in the mountains to the north.
He misunderstood. “That peak is Critic’s Tooth?”
“No, that’s Viper’s Bite — one of the lesser foothills before Critic’s Tooth. Critic’s Tooth is gone.”
“Oh.”
The whole range of jagged mountains is called the Teeth of Despair. Critic’s Tooth was one of the sharpest peaks. The region is ruled by the mad demon, Peers, who gnashes and gnarls mightily. He attacks natives and strangers alike. We should approach no closer, lest he blame us for the damage to his Teeth.”
Purple was looking at his ticking thing again, waving it and pointing it. “A good idea.”
We bounced through the surf. There was a gentle bump as the nose of the boat slid up onto the sand. We had reached the northern shore.
“The Cathawk has landed!” shouted Wilville. The Cathawk has landed!”
As one person we jumped for shore, Shoogar and Purple and I scrambling over each other.
At last we stood on solid ground again. The land was desolate, mostly naked rock, blood-colored in the westering light of Ouells and the overhead glow of Virn, but it was solid. No more standing in air, no more standing in water. No more standing in both at the same time.
If ever I returned safely home, I swore, I would never again risk my life in so foolhardy a venture. The skies were not friendly.
Wilville and Orbur had slung up the airpushers and pulled the Cathawk high on the shore, out of reach of the lapping waves. Immediately they began filling the ballast bags, and the interior of the boat as well, with a low level of water. They began checking the rigging, the bicycle frames, and even the watertightness of the boatframe and the balloons. They acted as if they expected the Cathawk to fly again. How, I could not imagine. The gasbags were all limp from leakage, and I did not trust the seams on several of them. They still extended upward from their ropes, but none were very determined about it.
How they hoped to refill the windbags, I did not know.
Shoogar was walking around and chuckling to himself. “I won’t have to acquaint myself with the local spells or the local gods at all. I can start as soon as I check the moons…” and he wandered off toward a distant blackened hill, carrying his spell kit.
A strange black crust covered everything. It shattered when one stepped on it and left miniscule shards, or stinging dust which went up in wisps before the surly wind. Curious, I crunched across the ground toward the hill where Purple stood. He was attaching his big battery to another of his endless spell devices.
He looked both sheepish and defiant as I came up. “Well, I have to try it, don’t I ?”
“But you said it was dead.”