“But the water’s been running down into here,” objected Ornery. “Wouldn’t it fill it up?”
Questioner shrugged massively. “Kaorugi has no doubt taken that into account. Possibly it runs past furnaces of the deep which turn it into high-pressure steam and thrust it up somewhere else,” said Questioner. “We need not worry how it happens since it is evident it does. Otherwise, we would all have drowned by now.”
Far out on the luminous waves, a shadow appeared.
“A ship,” cried Ornery. “A sailing ship.”
Though of unfamiliar appearance, it was a sailing ship, with a curly prow and two short masts that held reefed sails. It was being towed by their old acquaintance, Joggiwagga, whose moon-eye preceded the craft. On the deck, along the rail, stood a dozen Timmys.
Mouche stared, searching. They did not include Flowing Green, and he felt a surge of relief. For his Hagion to be here with him would have been too much.
“Why can’t Joggiwagga just tow us where we need to go?” asked Ornery.
“Forbidden,” cried the Corojum. “His place is not there. His place is here and outside.”
“But our place is there?” cried Mouche.
“There, or nowhere, my friend. Together we will live or we will all die, as is the way of worlds. Together all creatures must live, changing together, else the world dies. All creation dances together, is this not so?”
“Usually,” replied Questioner. “Is there a way I can get on that ship, or must I fire up the gravities?”
“There is a way.”
The ship stopped at the edge of deeper water, unrolling a silvery tongue that extended across the shallows and up onto the beach, stiffening into a ramp. “Welcome,” said the ship. “Please watch your footing.”
The tongue was as rigid as a gangway, and when they had come aboard, it rolled up behind them. The Corojum showed them where to put their packs, and the Timmys invited them to a table set with food and drink.
Mouche watched them as in a reverie, and Questioner watched him watching the Timmys. She thought the boy was in the grip of dreamtime. It wasn’t sexual. She was sure of that. It was something else entirely, the lure of the marvelous and mysterious, the siren call of the unknown. Or perhaps the Timmy who had tended him as a child had had green hair.
After they had eaten and drunk and the Timmys had cleared away all evidence of the meal, the Corojum summoned Timmys, Ornery, and Mouche to work together in setting the sails.
“If it’s alive,” whispered Ornery, “why doesn’t it set its own sails?”
“It’s not alive like that,” whispered one of the Timmys. “It’s just alive enough to utter a few courtesies and keep itself mended.”
Slowly, after several tries, the sails were swung into the desired position, and the ship turned slowly with the wind, which endlessly blew, so the Corojum said, down the stairs behind them.
“It is so, for so Kaorugi designed it.”
“How far do we have to go?” asked Ornery, tightening a very organic-looking rope around a cleat that had obviously grown into place where it was.
“Until we get there,” murmured Questioner. “Is that not so?”
“That is so,” replied the Corojum. “That is always so.”
48—Westward the Wilderneers
By bane’s count, four or five days had passed since the death of Marool and their arrival in the camp. That morning Ashes told him and his brother to pack up and ready themselves for a journey.
“Where to?” Bane demanded.
“I told you about that time the Timmys took us? That pond kind of place they took us to?”
“Underground, you said.”
“No, not under. Just down in a deep valley, well, an old volcano. Anyhow, ever since then, some of us have kept watch on that place. Now, the mountains are getting ready to blow, and when that happens, we need all of us to be ready to take over, so it’s time to fetch all our friends.”
“Prob’ly dead by now,” said Dyre. “That was a long time ago.”
“They’re not dead,” asserted Ashes. “I told you we don’t die! And you’d best shut that backtalk, boy. Best remember what I can do if I need to keep you in line.” He patted his waist, where the whip hung, its tip twitching hungrily toward them, the tip opening like a little mouth, a living thing.