It was not sufficient for Targovi. He located the Crystal River and followed its course till it emptied into Dawnside Bay. There, where a harbor could lie sheltered from tidal turbulence, the Kursovikians had built their new town. Other societies had settled elsewhere, seeking to carry on their particular ways, but the Kursoviki folk were largely seafarers.
They were also those who had always been in closest contact with the Terrans, whose mission headquarters stood on a ridge to the west. Low and softly tinted, the building looked subordinate to the gray stone mass on a hilltop that was the Castle of the Sisterhood. Targovi knew how much of an illusion that was.
Nonetheless, Toborkozan had struck roots and grown; it could survive without further help if need be. Houses—timber, often bearing carven totems on the roofs—were spread widely along cobbled streets. The waterships in port were nearly all wooden too, archaic windjammers because those had been what the wrights knew how to make; but most had gotten auxiliary engines, and some were hovercraft of fairly modern design. A ferrocrete field on the northern headland offered landing to aircars, as well as the gliders and propeller-driven wingboats which various Tigeries had constructed for themselves.
Targovi, privileged, set his vehicle down in the courtyard of the Castle and got out. Guards raised traditional halberds in salute. They carried firearms as well, for emigration had not extinguished every feud or kept fresh ones from arising, not to mention lawlessness, and it was better to watch over your own, yourself, than depend on the Terrans. Targovi learned that his mother was in her apartment and hastened thither.
Dragoika lived high in the Gaarnokh Tower. Gaarnokhs had not been among the species which could be introduced on Imhotep, but memory lingered of their horned mightiness. She was standing in a room floored with slate and walled with granite. Tapestries gentled it a trifle. Books and a single seashell goblet were from Starkad. The rest—bronze candelabrum, things of silver and glass, massive table, couches whose lines resembled a ship’s—were crafted here. Carrying capacity between suns had been so limited; much worse decisions had had to be made than to abandon the works of an entire history. She was looking out an open ogive window, into the salt breeze and onward to surf on the reefs beyond the bay.
“Greeting, mother and chieftain,” said Targovi.
Dragoika turned, purred, and came to take his hands in hers. Though the female mane that rippled down her back was grizzled, she moved lithely. The sumptuous female curves had become lean, but her breasts jutted proud. True, they weren’t ornamental adipose tissue like human dugs, they were organs muscular and vascular, from which her infants had sucked not milk but blood. Targovi had seen Terran speculations that the need to maintain a high blood supply made her sex the more vigorous one, and that this accounted for its dominance in most Tigery cultures. His doubts about that did not in any important way diminish his respect for her.
“Welcome home, youngest son,” she said. “How fared you?”
“Into a wind that stank of evil,” he replied. “How fare the folk?”
“Well enough … thus far. But you are back sooner than is wont. It would not be for aye, this time?”
“It would not. It cannot. I tell you, death was in the wind I snuffed upon Daedalus. I must return.”
Her tendrils drooped. “Ever will you go forth—someday, if you live, beyond any ken of mine. Overbold are you, my son.”
“No more than you, mother, when you skippered a ship on the Zletovar Sea and the vaz-Siravo rose beweaponed from beneath.”
“But you are male.” Dragoika sighed. “The Terran example? Are you driven to do everything a female can do, as I’ve heard their females were once driven to match the males? I hoped for grandchildren from you.”
“Why, you shall have them. Just find me a wife who’s content if I’m often away.”
“Or always away, like him who begot your friend Diana?” Dragoika’s mood lightened. She did send a parting shot: “Long will it be ere many vaz-Toborko besides yourself are found on Daedalus, let alone worlds among the stars. How like you your celibacy?”
“Not much. It measures my feelings for you, mother, that I came here before seeking the waterfront minxes. However, if this is the price to pay—There is naught a fellow can get so far behind on, nor so quickly catch up on.”
She whistled in merriment. “Well, then, scapegrace, come have a smoke and we’ll talk.” She surveyed him closely. “It was not filial piety brought you first to me. You’ve somewhat to ask.”
“I do that,” he admitted. Excitement pulsed within him. Dragoika got word from around this globe. If anyone could aid him onward, it was she.
The wind blew slow but powerful. It filled the upper square sails, lower fore-and-aft canvas, and jibs that drove Firefish southeast. Seas rushed, boomed, flung bitter spindrift off their crests; they shimmered green on their backs, dark purple in their troughs. Following the wake soared a flock of flying snakes.
Abruptly the lookout shouted. Sailors swarmed to the rail or into the rigging to see. Captain Latazhanda stayed more calm. She had received word on the ship’s radio, and given directions.
The van lumbered down, extended pontoons, sought to lay alongside. Though Targovi maneuvered cautiously, he nearly suffered a capsizing. Waves under this gravity moved with real speed and force. His second pass succeeded. Leaning out an opened door, he made fast a towline tossed him and let his vehicle drop aft. He flew across on a gravity impeller.
Besides the crew, their passengers were on deck to meet him. He thrust aside awe at his first in-the-flesh sight of a Wodenite, and turned toward Diana Crowfeather. She sprang over the planks and into his arms.
“Targovi, you rascal, how wonderful!” she warbled. “What’re you doin’ here?” Anxiety smote. She stepped back, her hands still on his shoulders, and stared at him through the vitryl that snugged around her head. Aside from it and its pump, she was briefly clad. No matter the broad orbit, Imhotep’s atmosphere has a greenhouse effect felt even at sea. “Is somethin’ wrong?”
“Yea and nay,” Targovi replied in his language, which she understood and the Wodenite presumably did not. “I would fain speak with you alone, little friend.” He purred. “Fear not. I, the trader, have in mind to give you, in swap for this adventure of yours, a bigger and wilder one.”
“Oh, but I’ve promised Axor—”
“He will be included. I count on you to persuade him. But let me be about my devoirs.”
Saluting Latazhanda, he explained that he carried an urgent message. She and her crew were a rough lot, but had the manners not to inquire what it was. “I daresay you know whither we’re bound,” she remarked. “The Starboard and Larboard Islands, where this mad pair want to look at what may be ruins left by fay-folk of old.” She rumbled a chuckle. “They’re paying aplenty for the charter.”
“Need is that I must take them from you. But I’ll make your loss good, my lady. A fourth of the fare.” Targovi winced as he spoke. The price would come out of his purse, and it was uncertain whether the Corps would ever honor that expense account.
“A fourth!” yowled Latazhanda. “Are you madder than they? I declined a lucrative cargo to make this trip. Three-fourths at least.”