Free The Merman's Children by Poul Anderson Page B

freedom of the world. If we don’t you’ll have peace.”
    â€œOr Hell,” she said tiredly. “I did not come along either for freedom or for peace. Now best we stay apart, Tauno, so they won’t think we’re of the same heart.”
    What kept Eyjan busy, and her brothers, was the search for lost Averorn. Merfolk always knew where they were; but the halflings did not know where their goal was, within two or three hundred sea-miles. They swam out to ask of passing dolphins—not in just that way, for those beings did not use language of the same kind; yet merfolk had means for getting help from creatures they believed to be their cousins.
    And directions were indeed gotten, more and more exact as the ship drew nearer. Yes, a bad place, said Fishgrabber, a kraken lair, ah, steer clear…it is true that krakens, like other coldblooded things, can lie long unfed; however, this one must be ravenous after centuries with naught but stray whales…he stays there, said Sheerfin, because he still thinks it is his Averorn, he broods on its drowned treasures and towers and the bones that once worshipped him…he has grown, I hear tell, until his arms reach from end to end of the ruined main square…well, for old times’ sake we’ll guide you thither, said Spraybow, seeing as how the moon wanes toward the half, which is when he goes to sleep, though he is readily aroused…but no, give you more than guidance, no, we have too many darlings to think about.…
    In this wise did Herning at last reach that spot in the ocean beneath which lay sunken Averorn.

VIII
    T HE dolphins took hasty leave. Their finned gray backs were rainbowed by the morning sun, in mist off the froth cast up by their flukes. Tauno felt sure they would go no farther than to the nearest edge of safety; that was an unslakably curious and gossipy breed.
    He had laid a course to bring the cog here at this time, giving a full day’s light for work. Now she lay hove to and the broad-beamed hull hardly rocked at rest. For it was a calm day, with the least of breezes in an almost cloudless heaven. Waves went small and chuckling, scant foam aswirl on their tops. Looking overside, Tauno marveled, as he had done throughout his life, at how intricately and beautifully wrinkled each wave was, no two alike, no one ever the same as its past self. And how warmly the sunbeams washed over his skin, how coolly the salt air blessed him! He had not broken his fast, that being unwise before diving to the uttermost deeps, and was thus aware of his belly, and this too was good, like every awareness.
    â€œWell,” he said, “soonest begun, soonest done.”
    The sailors goggled at him. They had brought out pikes, which they clutched as if trying to keep afloat on them. Behind suntan, dirt, and hair, five of those faces were terrified; Adam’s apples bobbed in gullets. Ranild stood stoutly, a crossbow cocked on his left arm. And while Niels was pale, he burned and trembled with the eagerness of a lad too young to really know that young lads can also die.
    â€œGet busy, you lubbers,” jerred Kennin. “We’re doing the work that counts. Can’t you turn a windlass?”
    â€œI give the orders, boy,” said Ranild with unwonted calm. “Still, he’s right. Hop to it.”
    Sivard wet his lips. “Skipper,” he said hoarsely, “I…I think best we put about.”
    â€œAfter coming this far?” Ranild grinned. “Had I known you’re a woman, I could have gotten some use out of you.”
    â€œWhat’s gold to an eaten man? Shipmates, think. The kraken can haul us undersea the way we haul up a hooked flounder. We——”
    Sivard spoke no more. Ranild decked him with a blow that brought nosebleed. “Man the tackle, you whoresons,” the captain rasped, “or Satan fart me out if I don’t send you to the kraken myself!”
    They scurried to