The first assault of rain rattled the canopy of interwoven reeds that formed the haodah’s upper deck, and the junq stirred restlessly as the air-pressure changed.
“Will the fine weather return?” asked Arranth.
Her question was mainly addressed to Ulgrim, but before he could answer Barratong cut in.
“It’s over-soon to guess, but either way we must get these maps to where they’ll be most useful. To begin with, I shall arrange to have them copied with the utmost care. I know who among the Fleet are most skillful at writing and drawing. Of course, I don’t know whether we have enough writing-material left. But we’ll do what we can, although we have to kill and flay one of the junqlings to make writing-sheets. Beyond that, though, there’s the question of what we should do with the originals.”
“Why, we take them back to Ripar, obviously!” Arranth burst out.
“It may seem obvious to you; it’s not to me. They should go to the finest of modern observatories, and that’s not at Ripar. Besides, Ripar is due to be flooded. Not all your spouse’s pumps can save it—can they, Yockerbow?”
He made sober reply. “From the bluff where we’ve installed the telescope, we’ve seen ice stretching to the skyline. I wouldn’t dare to calculate how far the level of the oceans will rise when it melts, but if it’s going to be the same as before the Freeze, nothing can save Ripar or any other coastal city.”
“Agreed. We should therefore present them to the observatory at Huzertol, inland from Grench and in a zone of clear skies.” The admiral spoke in a tone of finality, not expecting to be contradicted.
“Won’t do,” said Ulgrim instantly.
“What?”
“Won’t do,” the navigator repeated. “Huzertol may have the best astronomers in the world, the best instruments—it doesn’t matter. That far south, they can scarcely see the Smoke, and some of the other important stars nearby never clear its horizon.”
Barratong gave a dry laugh. “You know something, old friend? Next year I think we ought to circumnavigate the globe, if only to impress on your admiral’s awareness that we do live on a spherical planet! You’re right, of course. We must find a northerly observatory.”
“Or found one,” said Yockerbow.
“Hmm! Go on!”
“Well, if there isn’t any place in the northern hemisphere to outdo Huzertol, there ought to be. Ripar is wealthy, and Ripar is doomed. What better memorial than to create a city dedicated to learning and science on some suitable upland site, to which we could transfer—?”
But Barratong wasn’t listening. Of a sudden, he was paying attention to the junq. Her back was rippling in a rhythmic pattern.
“The water’s growing warmer,” he said positively.
To Yockerbow, that seemed unsurprising, since the heavy rain must be raising its temperature. That, though, seemed not to be what the admiral meant.
A gong-signal boomed across the water. A pattern of banners, rain-limp but comprehensible, appeared at the prow of the junq lying furthest to the eastern side of the bay.
Barratong rose to his normal height as he stepped out from the haodah’s protection. He said to Arranth, “Give me the map-tube!”
“What? I—”
“Give it to me! Bring cord to make a lashing and a bladder to wrap round it! There’s no time to make a new wax seal!”
Ulgrim recognized the scent of authority before the rest of them, and scrambled to comply. While the others stared in astonishment, Barratong folded the tube with its maps inside a skin bag, and tied it tight with all his strength to the thickest of the haodah’s multiple crossbars.
“Thus does the legend say Skilluck preserved his spyglass,” he muttered, while the gong-signals multiplied and grew more frantic, and the junqs began to fret and buck. “And for the sake of imitating him, I’m risking the greatest fleet that ever was…”
The job was done. He turned back to them, claws clenched. “Now, Ulgrim, give the signal! Open sea!”
And the Fleet incontinently turned and fled.
The order came in tune, but only just. Wide though the bay-mouth was, the junqs jostled and tossed in their mad retreat, and the first huge slabs of the ice-wall were already sliding down as they escaped and their commanders regained control.