The Jewels of Aptor

cept for Urson and Snake. "Well?" asked Urson, sitting

heavily. He touched Snake on the s

ted for the door, bu

it?" Ge

ng with the jewel. He walked over to Geo, hesitated,

o keep it for

rned around

on. "Or did you find out. Come on

nything to you w

no nearer sleep than I came to the m

told

on said, "You're craz

cluded his story by recounting Argo'

All that in this little thing? Tell me, do

nt to," Geo said. "It

t's the point of sending us in there with no protection to do somethi

aid. "Urson, what stories do you know about Aptor?

everyone curses by it, and the rest

rubb

e stone there, if you had long enough, I mean? She said that the priests five hundred years ago co

ome stories fi

d, things neither man nor animal, and cities inhabit

anything mo

g more to know,

ou'd tell would not be

a tenth part of the truth in them. And I'm

r correctly," G

First, how that little four-armed fellow happened to be at the pier after two months just wh

her mind too, when he first sto

t's find out when he comes back. And I wonder who cut his tongu

"Don't you remember? He sai

Urson, "but which one of

n't know?" Geo

strange way," Urs

he said," went on Geo.

the closeness of it shivers in my eyes. I should have told you, yes. But it comes to me, sometimes, not like a memory, but something I can feel, as hard as metal, taste as sharp as salt, and

nt that this was an important job and one to be done well and right. Water washed our eyes, our hands slipped on wet ropes. It was no wonder my cloth suddenly flung away from me in a gust,

ll loose. I pulled mine in and bound her tight. The competition that goes rightly between two fine sailors drove a seed of fury into my flesh th

pulled open and snapped to again and again like a child's noise clapper. There was a rope near, and inch thick line coiled on a spike. Holding myself to a rat line by not much more than my toes, I secured the rope and bound the base of the broken pole. Each time it snapped to, I looped it once around and pul

ver some sailor's tale about another sailor and another sailor's woman, when the mate strode into the hal

er man beat me by bawling, 'It was the Big Sailor, sir

ved.' He took a gold coin from his pocket and tossed it on the table in front of Cat. 'There you go, Big Sailor. But I think it's as much as a

n deck, and through rain and darkness probably he could not have told me from my rival anyway at that distance. At Cat? But he was already getting

, and suddenly I was all fists and fire. We scuffled, we banged, we cursed, we rolled. In fact, we rolled right under the feet of the mate who was

ptains will allow. This was my third, and one too many. And the mate,

ard the first mate now. But black turned white in my head, into something that I could bite into, when he flung the whip to Cat and cried, 'Here, Big Sailor, you've don

ir rope is slack enough. I didn't fall until they finally cut the ropes from my wrists. Nor was it till I heard a second gold coin rattle down on the deck from th

orward, hands scudding into straw, I heard Cat's voic

pain mad

ck made it no easier on me. Pegs threatened to pull from their holes, boards to part themselves; one wave washed four men overboard; and while others ran to s

hift repair on the aft mast with another metal band. Nor, with my anger, had I yet even pointed it out to him as I had intended. It didn't hold a quarter of an hour. When it gave there was a snap like thunder. Under the tugging of half furled sails, ropes poppe

hoice of who became my mate was between the man most likely to live, figuring that he could take the harder situation more easily than the others, and the man most likely to die, figuring that it would probably make no difference to some one that far go

opple, but with a little sound that escaped from clenched teeth, like a child who doesn't want to show the pain. It d

aid him in. The crying had stopped and was replaced now by a gasped breath, sharp every few seconds, irregular, loud. I thought he must be unconscious,

I said. 'He

y gone for the most part overboard. But by now, hungry and thirsty myself, I could see it as nothing less than a stupendous joke when one

while. It's not true. The color is the deep purple of rotten, shriveled meat. And every taste bud on the dead flesh was tipped with that white stuff that g

e got out, 'You ... you please ..

is it?'

he breast of his torn tunic and pulled out a fist. He

oins, two of whose histories suddenly leap

then I leaned forward again.

ward me. 'Kill ... kill ...' and then he

ide of the cell. I came back. Then I brok

ly, that without all of that first bread and water I would have starved to death. They finally let me out because they needed the muscle, what was left of it. And the only thing I sometimes think about, t

spend them, though," he said. He tossed the little pile into the air, and then whipped

Geo said af

lace. You think it was old Cat, maybe, sometimes when I was in the brig, perhaps, earning

id I was so

e sighed. "Though I wish I knew which. But I don't think that's the answer." He lifted his hand to his mouth now and gnawed at h

kulls nearly

d Geo, "th

He leaped onto the floor and started

," Geo said, "I

along the side of the cabins,

hen he rammed against th

rgo whirled, her hand on h

osite wall, suddenly vaulted across the table toward Geo. Geo grabbed the boy to stea

o. "Don't you understan

a sudden

aid, "Close

Snake still held

aid. "It is t

ou mean?"

ve mine. Well, little thief, there's a stalemate. The forces are balanced now." She looked at Geo. "How do you think he came so easily by the jewel? How do you think he knew when I would

..." beg

interrupted, "when we heard a noise

ay have cost us

he knows how this thing works," said

e you wish!" hiss

und, Priestess Argo, and I thought you m

I am in no danger," she said evenly. "Wi

" Jordde suddenly asked, seei

d, lea

steps farther on, he glanced back, and seeing that Jordde had emerged from the cabin and was

orecastle, Urson asked,

our little friend here

u know?" a

esn't know he c

u mean?" U

ning her sister, the rightful head of Leptar, to her former position? And I'm sure her sister may well have collected some useful information that could be used against Aptor, so that would be some value even if we didn't find the jewel. It doesn't sound too sisterly a thing to me to forsake the young pri

n this one isn't an A

steal the jewel in the first place, that he would present it to her the way he did; all this hinted something so strange, that spy was the first thing I thought of, and I'm sure it was the first thing she thought as well. And she especially would thin

e was going to try and

take it with him, present himself to Argo with the jewel, showing himself as an equal force, and then come calmly back, leaving her in silence and us still on his side, espe

" said Urso

s power once. Perhaps he was going to pretend he had it hidden on his person. But he

ow to work the jewel now, don't you;

oy no

it?" Geo lifted the jewel from

and shook his

ooked p

earn from a sort of second hand observation. He knows that the power of this little bead is mo

, at least we'll have one of them little beads and so

thinks he's a spy

uh

nt as you and I are. But her only thought was to get it in any way she could. When we came in, just when she was going to put Snake under the je

noring on berths around the walls. One had wrapped himself completely up in a blanket in the middle berth of

mbled to t

that one

otioned

ne to keep warm against, go down and sleep with Geo there. It's more room

didn't

at he says," Geo said.

k. "Now move over and be very small." He stretched out, and Snake's slight body was completely hidden. "Hey,

flung forward from the form of Argo who emerged like silver from the bone-colored door. The whole movement of the scene made it look like a picture imagination fastens in the slow ripplings of gauze under breeze. One dark spot was at her throat, pulsing darkly, like a h

in a hour. The mate has been ordered to put the ship out b

lmost featureless face. Chest high in the

again in the thinned voice. "Are your allegiances to Argo or Hama?

emed to be the wind attempting to say,

e turned away and walked from

hrough the hall, the walls, more like polished steel than weathered wood, and wen

air was bleached white. On his chest was a pulsing darkness, a black flame, a dark heart, shimmering with the indistinctness of abso

ering the figure inside. On this the scene fixed, drew closer ... and

and knuckle

p. The gaunt mate stood across the room. "Hey, you," he was sa

itself from the

ng with you?" he demanded. "We're sailing, didn't you hear? Naw, you go back to sleep. Your turn will come, but we need experienced ones no