The First Protector

CHAPTER EIGHT

Ma'el Report. Day 112,548…

The officers and the other passenger on this ship are cultured and intelligent by their standards, and the crew are strong-willed and sensible so that they will dismiss my magic for what they think it is when they see or hear about it.

"Nothing more of Taelon technology will be revealed other than that already shown to my servants…"

–

The ship that lay alongside the jetty projecting from the west shore of the harbor of Cobh was a strange vessel, completely without grace of line and seemingly built by shipwrights who had changed their minds several times in the course of its building. In some ways it was like the ships of the Norsemen, except that it was longer and somewhat broader in the beam and mounted two masts and booms to carry a large square sail, and the shield-lined rowing and fighting positions amidships were higher above the waterline, and as an additional defense there were five posts that projected upward at equal intervals along each side to support the nets used to inconvenience would-be boarders. There was an additional mast and slanting boom forward that resembled drawings Declan had once seen of an eastern Mediterranean felucca and, just barely visible in the water under the bow, there was the dark shape of a long, sharp ram that belonged on one of the old Greek war galleys. The stern section, as well as mounting a heavy tiller for the rudder, was raised to give a view forward in the manner of a Roman fighting galley. Concealed by its weather covers amidships was an object that looked like a large arbalest. Altogether the vessel had such an odd look that Ma'el's skin-covered wagon, which was already secured to the deck and with two low shelters rigged under it for Sean and himself, seemed almost normal amid these other strangenesses.

It was plain from the captain's manner that the vessel was his pride and joy, an object held in greater esteem than his wife and family if he had one. As they were going on board Declan was careful not to mention any part or aspect of the sea-going monstrosity for fear of giving offense, but not so the captain.

"Your silent forbearance does you credit," he said, and gave a wry smile as he gestured toward the weapons Declan carried. "In many ways we are all robbers in that we steal many of the things that have been used against us over the years by enemies, and improve on them and use those same weapons to fight back. You have a Norseman's long-axe, specially weighted and improved to your needs, your sword is a well-tried Roman gladius and the shield we found for you, only that is Hibernian because there are few known to us that better it in lightness and strength."

He paused for a moment to watch Ma'el enter the wagon, the tenting of which had been firmly lashed down, and Sean climb onto the driving bench that no longer had its canopy in case a strong wind should blow it away. The boy stood on the bench, holding onto the nearby rigging and staring all around him with the bright-eyed, fearful, yet excited look of one who is viewing such surroundings for the first time.

'This is why honest men like myself become robbers, too," Captain Nolan went on. "We steal not just the goods and weapons of attacking seafarers but their sailing and ship-handling methods as well. This…" he gestured all around and above him, "… is a vessel completely lacking in beauty of line or proportion. She is a misshapen mongrel of a ship. But she has qualities that a stranger and land-dweller like yourself might not see. She has a very shallow draft, almost flat-bottomed, and with a narrow keel and rudder that enables her to move close inshore into waters where other vessels would run onto reefs or beach themselves. She has many other useful qualities, but suffice it to say that in a favoring wind Orla can outrun any other ship that I have met or learned of by hearsay. If there is an adverse wind she can even…"

The captain looked away and fell into the uncomfortable silence of one who thinks he has talked too much. There was an enthusiasm and a softness about this Captain Nolan, Declan realized, that did not show on the craggy surface. He laughed quietly.

"1 begin to feel great affection and trust for your misshapen mongrel," he said, and quickly raised a placating hand. "Remember, Captain, those were your words for her, not mine."

'True, but you will not at any time use them in anyone else's hearing," said the captain, then briskly, "We leave at once. Seamus! Raise the main sail. Stand by to cast off."

"B-but," Declan stammered, "without your other passenger?"

Captain Nolan shook his head. "He came on board last night, preferring that as few as possible of the local authorities in Cork know of his presence or business here. You will meet him this evening. But now, Declan, there is much work for the crew to do and you would oblige me by not allowing your large body to interfere with it. Go join your friends at the wagon and remain close to it."

The wind off the land was light, bringing with it the smells of a city preparing for a new day, so that the slow, regular creaking and splashing of the oars and the occasional shouted command were the only sounds until they were clear of the jetties and wharves of the city and had turned southward past Cobh into the wide, land-sheltered expanse of greater Cork Harbor. There the strengthening northerly caught their sail and made further rowing unnecessary, except when the wind brought them close to the shoreline of the south passage and they had to row themselves clear. But when they passed south of Ballinuska, almost hidden by frosty mist and the wood smoke of its fires, the oars were shipped because ahead lay the open sea and to the west the even-more-open ocean of legendary Atlantis.

Very soon the long, smooth-topped Atlantic waves were striking the vessel amidships and making it roll alarmingly, except that no other person on board, with the exception of the boy beside him, showed any signs of alarm. Declan wanted badly to talk, about anything to anyone, so as to have something to think about other than a belly that wanted to empty itself when there was nothing in it to throw up. But the pallid-faced and sweating boy was not disposed to talk, and there seemed to be an invisible but very real barrier between the busy sailors he approached and idle passengers like himself, which would not allow anything through it but a few impatient, grunted words. He clenched his teeth and when he felt particularly bad he looked through slitted eyes at the sun, which was the only object he could find that was moving slowly enough not to make him feel sick. Several hours later when it was touching the horizon and throwing wide, orange reflections off the larger waves, a member of the crew came to offer the boy and himself a bannock of wheaten bread and something in a stoppered flask which both of them refused.

After sunset, Declan transferred his attention to the bright, still shape of the rising moon. He was feeling much better although not yet well enough to eat, but by the time the moon had climbed high and a crew member came to say that Ma'el and his servants should come at once to the captain's cabin for the evening meal, his stomach was complaining of hunger rather than seasickness.

It was plain from the navigational instruments and rolled-up charts on the shelves behind it that during his working day the captain's table was used for purposes other than eating. Presently it was set for with six places with Captain Nolan at its head, his lieutenant Seamus at his right and the other passenger, Brian O'Rahailley, seated on his left.

"My name is Brian," he said, smiling as he looked up at Ma'el. "Please, sit by me. I have been told that you are a wizard and a seer of future events, and this is the first opportunity I have had to discuss the subject with one who may be truly versed in the magical arts."

The manner and appearance of the other passenger came as a complete surprise, Declan thought, as Ma'el took the proffered place while Sean sat facing the captain and he seated himself between the boy and Seamus. He had expected that a court advisor, a well-traveled philosopher and scholar and, according to Seamus the Black, a spy, should be old and wizened with hands gnarled by the twisting stiffness of age and a face marked deeply by long and varied experience. But Brian O'Rahailley showed none of those signs. Instead he could not have been more than a decade older than Declan, shorter and more widely built and with a round and open countenance that smiled readily and gave no appearance of his possession of high rank. It was only his eyes that looked old.

Brian talked freely and in a manner that was friendly, amusing, and interesting, so much so that even Sean looked at ease in his company and was sparing more attention to him than to the wine he was drinking. But Declan noticed that the other was somehow able to talk continuously while saying nothing of great importance, particularly about himself. Instead he was trying, with words that were subtle questions, to draw information from Ma'el.

Only gradually did Declan realize that the old man was doing precisely the same thing to the other passenger and that he seemed to be winning the contest.

It was Brian who was first to lose his patience as well as his politeness.

"Come, come, Ma'el," he said quietly, but with an angry edge to his voice. "Shyness sits ill on a magician who is, or at least should be, an entertainer. Perform for us, if you will, a few of your tricks. Tell us of the success that will attend our endeavors

…" he looked aside and smiled knowingly at Captain Nolan and Black Seamus, "… for I doubt that you would spoil our evening by foretelling death and destruction. Perhaps you will tell me of the next lady I shall meet, and whether or not she will bestow her favors or even, after many unsuccessful endeavors throughout my life, if I will find true love with her?"

Ma'el looked at the other for a moment, his smooth features seemingly as impassive to insults as they were to all other acts of threatened verbal or physical violence. "I do not perform tricks," he said, placing his hands palm downward before them in one of his fluid and almost ritualistic gestures. "But by using my mind and my eyes and my experience of the past and present, I can often see how future events will transpire." His gaze moved slowly from Brian to rest in turn on the captain and lastly on Black Seamus. "There is one here who will not find true love in his lifetime, and one who needs not the love of a woman because he. loves only the sea, and another who has already found the true and undying love he hungers for, but is as yet afraid to admit even to himself that this great good fortune is already his."

Brian began to laugh, softly at first and then more loudly before his face became serious again and he said, "Ma'el, you are indeed a trickster, but with words, and for a frail old man you placed yourself at great risk." He smiled, waved a dismissive hand and went on, "No, not from me, because your telling the company that I would never find true love was, I suspect, but an angry and well-deserved response to my earlier bad manners toward you for which, Ma'el, I now beg your pardon. And telling us that Captain Nolan's greatest love is the sea was a safe forecast, because there is not a man who serves in the fleets of Dalriada who would not use the same words about Mm. But telling the ugliest… My apologies, Seamus, you are a good man in a fight but we both know the description is regrettable but true… telling the ugliest man in that same fleet that he has found the true and undying love of a woman is… If you had been a younger man, Ma'el, I think by now you would have felt the fist of Black Seamus in your face."

Everyone including his captain was looking at the ship's Ionadacht whose eyes were regarding Ma'el from beneath lowered brows. All other expression was concealed by the thick blackness of his beard. But to Declan's surprise his mouth was closed and remained so for he neither moved nor spoke a word. Around them the quiet and almost unnoticed sounds of a ship at sea began to seem loud.

"You are a pleasant, educated, and interesting table companion, Ma'el." said Brian, breaking the long silence, "who will doubtless help us shorten the monotony of this long voyage but, alas, a wizard and magician you are not."

The bottom of Sean's drinking beaker slapped loudly onto the tabletop, without spilling any wine because there was none remaining in it. Speaking with the careful clarity of one whose mind is befuddled and his tongue reluctant to do his bidding, he said, "Ma'el is a wizard. He is not a trickster. I-I have seen him do great works of magic."

"In vino Veritas," said Brian, using a phrase of scholar's Latin, a language he would not expect servants to understand. He smiled again as he looked from the boy to the old man and went on, "My compliments, Ma'el, you have a loyal servant who has complete belief in you."

Declan cleared his throat and, looking steadily at Brian, said in a quiet voice, "He has two."

"Enough!" said the captain, slapping his open hand on the table. When the eating utensils had stopped rattling he went on, "This voyage will be a long one, and with enough dangers as it is without them being worsened by ill feeling among this company. I have no wish for, nor will I tolerate for a moment, fighting among my passengers regardless of whether their stations in life are highborn or lowly or, indeed…" he gave a small nod toward Brian, "… the part one of you played in providing the excellent food and wine we have all enjoyed this evening. Verbal warfare only will I allow, provided it is polite and, above all, entertaining, and it does not extend beyond this table. As the captain of a vessel at sea may I remind you that I am the sole and ultimate authority on board, the dispenser of high, middle, and low justice. This must be understood by everyone here present. Is it?"

He looked around the table until all had either spoken or nodded their heads in assent, then he smiled.

"Good," he said. "Providing the wind and weather favor us, and no other agency real or magical deems otherwise, we will dine here tomorrow evening.

"You have my permission to withdraw."