The Giant from the Fire Sea, page 17
The exertion ate up all the giant’s air. If he didn’t finish soon, he’d have to give up and race back to the flames, and then start all over. He didn’t know if he’d be able to get this close again. His strength was spent. His shoulder was growing useless.
Something twitched in his pocket. Jat! NO! He pulled with all his might. The tree stacks descended one painful foot at a time. When they were just within reach, he unhooked his legs from the stone giant. The timbers shot up through the water, dragging him behind. They exploded onto the surface. Newton kept going. His head smashed through one of the jumbles of trees, splintering it to pieces. He gasped for air, clawing wildly for something to keep him afloat. Realizing he was still holding the ropes, he gave them another pull and brought one of the timbers closer to him. He hung his arms over the side and paddled to a nearby vessel. With his very last reserve of strength, he pulled himself aboard and collapsed.
TWENTY-FOUR
Blue, Red, Black, White, Nothing
When he awoke, Jat was standing in front of his face. The boy scratched vigorously at his sides.
“I thought you’d never wake up,” he said. “I’m itchy all over. Does that happen to you?”
The giant sighed in relief. “Yes, Jat. It will wear off. I am glad you are back to yourself.”
“How about this?” he asked. He held up his left hand. It was still stone.
“Hrmmm…” said Newton. “That should not be.”
“Didn’t think so. It’s okay, though. I made it! Having a rock hand is worth it.”
“I hope so, Jat. Is everything else back to normal?”
“I think so,” said the boy. “Except the water is red—and screaming hot! It’s like that melted glass we made. But it’s not fire anymore. It’s not burning the raft.”
Newton sat up and stretched. His shoulder popped. It sounded like a cannon shot. “Oomph,” he said, wincing. “That hurt.”
“Are you all right?” asked Jat.
“Shoulders heal. No, it is not of a heat that burns wood. Or at least wood from a giant’s land.”
“Well, that’s good, because it’s of a heat that burns me.”
The giant surveyed his surroundings. There were six tree stacks still moored to the stone giant below. Each consisted of large cobbletrees—stacked crisscrossed and lashed together by strong vines. A huge wooden enclosure sat on one of them. He thought he heard sounds coming from it. Moo?
“Cows, it sounds like, yes? But a little more rumbly than cows,” said the boy. “I think your friends brought lunch for the trip back. I wish they cooked them first.”
“That is a mans thing, not a giants thing.”
“I know. I know.”
Far on the horizon spun the waterspout. It was where they’d be heading. But how would they get there against the current? First thing before next thing, thought the giant. He was hungry. Newton pulled the rope attached to the huge beast-bearing raft until it bumped into his own. He stepped onto the deck and looked down into the wooden corral. Fourteen oxen looked up at him. The giants had left the animals with enough food and water to keep them alive until their return. He heaved one out. “They are not the fattest of oxes. But … It is my regret, ox. Thank you, ox,” he said, and bit it in half, the head half first, always, to make it quicker for the animal. Newton moaned in delight. He finished that one and then he ate two more. The giant looked down at Jat, covered in spray from the constricted intestines of his meal. The boy looked sick to his stomach.
“I know you do not eat live animals,” he said, “but it might be of a time to start.”
“No thanks,” said Jat. “I think they will cook in this water, though. Could you…?”
Newton knew what he asked. He pulled out an ox. “It is my regret, ox. Thank you, ox.” He bit off its head with a merciful chomp and held it in the hot water until it was cooked.
“Thanks,” said Jat. “You know, they don’t understand what you are saying to them.”
“I am not an oaf, Jat. I know this. They do not understand, but this giant does.”
“Well, this … shoub … hobe me for a goob long tibe,” he said through a mouthful of boiled ox. He swallowed. “Speaking of which … let’s go! It’s hot here—real hot! For me, at least. I’m surprised those cows are still alive.”
“The oxes are of my land. They do not suffer heat in the way of mans and womans ox cows, I am of a guess. Unless you dip them in this red … water-but-not-water. We have to get to the twisting sea and join the ice stream. It is where I am told Pryat went. But a jumble of trees cannot move against the water that pushes it back.”
“Have you ever heard of a sail?”
“I have not.”
“The fishermen use them to travel the oceans in my world. They take a big sheet, like, say, your shirt, and hang it from a mast, like, say, these logs floating around us. The wind blows the sheet, which pulls the ship. I’ve tried it before. Not very good at it, but I got it to move my little boat.”
Newton’s face lit up! “It is like the seeds that ride the wind!”
The giant fished a couple of the smaller trees from the water, remnants of the craft he had smashed when he burst to the surface. He and Jat lashed them together with rope from the destroyed vessel and attached his shirt by sliding the sleeves over the crosspiece. There was no way to attach it to the raft, so Newton held it in place, sitting cross-legged in the middle. A board torn from the ox enclosure would be used as a rudder.
“Just keep turning it until it picks up the breeze,” said Jat. “It’ll puff out with air when you get the right spot.”
“How did you learn this?” asked Newton.
“I fish in the harvest season, remember? In a boat. In the water. Seen others do it. Tried it, but without a giant’s shirt. I’m burning up, Newton. I’m used to Fire Sea heat, but this is too much. I know what too much is! Come on!”
Newton’s shirt caught the wind and billowed out like an enormous jellyfish. “I have the wind!” he shouted. “I HAVE IT!” He laughed so hard he quaked the entire raft.
“Great! Don’t let it go! Now we drop the rudder in and steer. That’s my job. And it’ll keep me behind you, out of the hot spray.”
“Do not fall in!” warned the giant.
“Really? I thought I would enjoy a swim!”
“NO! DO NOT … Oh…”
The giant and the boy flew across the surface. Newton roared with excitement. “No giant has done this!”
Jat laughed. “You’re doing just fine, giant! We’re aiming straight for the waterspout, right?”
“Yes. Once we are close, we will not need the wind. The current will take us—at least I am of that thought.”
They sailed for the rest of the day. The breeze was strong and carried them a good distance. The waterspout soon loomed before them. To Newton, it looked like a tangle of vines lashing about a heavy, twisting stalk. It was a fearsome sight. It moves as if alive. And of anger. He wondered, as he had the first time he approached it, if this could be a way to escape the sea. It was surely large enough to lend boothold to a full thunder of giants. He looked up to where it disappeared into a spinning mass of clouds. How long would he be climbing until he reached a place to stop? But he knew this was not a plant but a tunnel of air and water. The enormous waterspout, a sickly gray-green mass, spun, anchored by its tail to a raging whirlpool. Whatever it drew from the sea fed the murky clouds above.
“It looks like a big tree,” said Jat.
“It does.”
Newton lowered the mast and slid his shirt off the crossbeam. He laid the logs on the floor of the vessel should they need the wind’s help again once they set on their new path.
The current was rapidly drawing them toward the vortex. The whirlpool at the base now demanded their attention. It pulled them toward a churning blend of fire, ice, blue ocean, blackness, and … nothing. A ribbon of nothingness, an absence of anything at all. The thought of it always clawed at Newton’s insides.
“What is that?” shouted Jat. “Or what isn’t that?”
“It isn’t something.”
The roar of the currents added to the deafening howl of the whirlwind. “Do you smell that?” shouted Newton.
The surging streams pummeled them and their craft, switching directions from one blink to the next. They held on tightly to the lashing.
“No,” shouted Jat.
“I don’t know what it is, but it is not new to this giant’s nose.”
“Thanks! I really needed to know that,” yelled the boy.
“I will steer now,” shouted the giant. “The water will pull hard.”
“Is your shoulder all right?”
“It will be. Is your hand still…?”
Jat rapped it on the log. “Still a rock.”
Newton breathed in deeply. “Does Jat smell that now?”
The boy sniffed. “No.”
“It smells of … everything. Of everything that is!”
They approached the foot of the swirling gray column of water. The surface broke into a pinwheel of colors, each maybe leading, Newton thought, to a different destination.
“What is that black one?” asked Jat.
“I do not know,” said Newton. He pointed to the blue-green stripe. “I know only the one that leads to my home. That one. We want the white, icy one.”
“I wonder where it goes.”
I am of a hope to Pryat.
Their craft picked up more speed as they drew nearer to the center of the whorling eddy. Newton held them steady as the water changed beneath them. Ice scraped against the timbers. The raft groaned loudly.
“NOW!” shouted Jat.
The giant wrapped his arms around the board and swept it across the water trailing in their wake. The raft turned hard; it picked up the current and was wrenched away from the vortex. The ice-choked course took charge of their destination. Newton and Jat each breathed a sigh of relief.
“And off we go,” said the boy.
“And off we go,” said the giant.
TWENTY-FIVE
The Ice Sea
The air was cold, colder than Jat was dressed for. The boy denied it, but Newton was pretty sure mans weren’t supposed to shake so much. He tore the edge from his sleeve and tossed it over him.
“Why did you do that?”
“Make a cloak to keep warm. Your teeth click like a sand cricket.”
Several days of floating on the icy current brought them to a vast white sea. The raft moved slowly, sometimes so slowly it felt as if they were moving backward. Jat assured Newton that they were not.
“Point your eyes on the star in the north, the one in the handle of the smaller spoon, or Baby Dragon.”
“We will call it the Dragon’s Whelp.”
Jat laughed. “Ha! Okay, now just hold your thumb under it and you’ll see it moves away from it, after a while. My dad showed me that. I don’t think it’s moving. We are.”
“I do see that,” said Newton. “I am learning to listen to the stars when they speak.”
Jat pulled another chunk of meat from his ox. At least the cold kept the meat from spoiling.
“You should have brought the raft of oxen,” he said.
“I would not leave the giants with no food. I took my fill. I will be all right.”
“You mean you won’t leave Marlite with no food.”
Newton’s face turned pale blue. “Her too.”
“What if we are stuck here for weeks—or months?”
The giant rubbed his chin as if he were pondering the question. “Well then, my ‘pet,’ I will do as giants do. I will eat you.”
Jat stopped chewing. His face turned serious. Then he laughed. He stood up and grabbed the giant’s finger, twisting it back. “You will have to defeat me in battle first! I will pound you with my hand of stone!”
Now Newton laughed. “Jat is a Puncher! Okay! Okay! You win! Please do not eat ME!”
The days and nights slid by with little to do but sleep, talk, and stare out at the sea and sky. One night, as they were lying back looking up at the stars, the same stars that were in each of their homelands, Jat asked a question he had promised to never ask again.
“Newton? I know you don’t want to talk about this, but you once said you might tell me what happened to your mother and father? I only ask because it seems to really make you mad, or sad, or both, and sometimes, I think, not telling anyone makes it worse.”
“Like you not telling me about the Fengiss brothers?”
“I know I was mad when you found out, but after that, I wasn’t. I was actually a little glad. I don’t know … With some people, not saying things is harder than saying them. But you just get used to keeping your mouth shut.”
The giant remained silent for a long time.
“Okay. Never mind,” said Jat. “I won’t ask again.”
“No,” said Newton. “It is okay. I am just not proud of what I did. You were not the cause of what happened to your father. It is different.”
“Never mind. Really,” said Jat. “I’m going to try for some more fish…”
“I learned about the shadow that hides the moon. My boooks showed me that my land is round, like a giant’s eye. This world is round. When the sun slips behind it, its shadow is put on the moon and the moon grows dark.”
“That happens every year,” said Jat. “Some people go crazy. They think the moon is being eaten by some giant something. Not the you kind of giant, but one in the sky. Hey, maybe it’s one of your Makers!”
“Hoomph … I should not laugh…”
“But then the moon comes back and everyone forgets about it until next time.”
“Yes. The giants say, the few that notice say, ‘The Makers feed. If their belly is not filled by the moon, they turn their hunger on us.’ But they never do. We giants are forever in fear of angering the fo fum Makers. But I, too, believed that to be true until I learned of our land’s great shadow on the moon. One night, I looked up and saw the shadow would come. When much of your time is passed looking at the sky, you sometimes know what comes and when it will come. You know this. The shadow was at the edge of the moon. I thought to use it for my own humor. I pulled Mother and Father out behind our home to show them ‘Newton’s great magic.’ It was a trick. I told them I was going to … eat the moon. There was jest in my words and humor in their hearts … They laughed.” Newton stopped, recalling their laughter. Jat said nothing. They looked up at the quarter moon in the night sky.
“I think I know what happened,” said the boy finally.
“I am of a thought you do not, Jat. I said to them, ‘Behold your son. He has the power to swallow the moon! You have bred a great Maker!’ And the shadow bit farther into the edge. The bites grew wider, the moon smaller. This giant was so held by the sight of it, he did not turn to see the smiles on his parents’ faces. When he did turn … there were no smiles. They were stone. The horror of what their son could do, a son with the great powers of the Makers, was more than a parent could bear. If any other had done this, Mother and Father would still be of bone and hide. But that it was their son … a Maker—their own son. It was a thought to wound a mind—two minds. They cared too much for this fool of a giant. It is frozen on their faces to this day.” Newton closed his eyes. “And it is frozen in my heart to this day.”
“I can see why it’s not something you talk about. I’m sorry, Newton.”
“I knew that you would be. It is why I told you.”
“Is that why your sister hates you?”
“Ooda cannot understand what I did. Her mind is like that of many giants. It knows what it knows, and it will not know more than that. If what is in a giant’s head is enough to keep that giant alive, that is enough. They circle through their lives—loops and loops and loops—doing the same thing over and over because it has yet to kill them. She knows I did not want to hurt our family—that it brings me pain, but she knows that it is a thing I did. I try to make her understand, but she just pulls my ears.”
“So … are they, your parents, are they stuck like that forever? Won’t they turn back? You always did. Even I did…”
“Yes, Jat. Everstone is forever a time lasting. It can come from more than one way. Gossan is Everstone because he can never leave the red water. He can never escape from the thing that turns him. But it can come also from a fear deeper than the loss of a giant’s own life. It can come from the fear of losing one a giant … loves … loves more than their own hide. My parents gave their own selves to the love of this foolish giant. And when they believed gone the Newton who carried that love, they, too, went. They feared a great fear of what the Makers had made me … What it would do to me. To them, this giant was gone … because of my jest of humor…”
“But, Newton, how is it you were not turned to Everstone? Don’t you feel about them what they felt about you?”
“There is a difference between fear and shame, Jat—between fear and sadness. Fear is what turns us. Shame and sadness … we live with.”
“There has to be something we can do—when we get back there. If we get back there.”
“Jat is a kind friend, but my land is not for boys. Or grown mans. It is said that a dragon’s fire can turn a stone giant back, but that is just a … what do you call them? Goatstories?”
“Nannytales,” said the boy.
“Yes, nannytales,” sighed the giant.
“You know what?” asked Jat.
“I do not,” said Newton.
“Remember what I said when I first met you? ‘I thought giants were just monsters in nannytales’?”
Newton laughed. “I do remember that.”
“Well, here you are.”
* * *
Several weeks passed on their journey across the vast and frigid expanse of ocean—the “Ice Sea,” they’d come to call it. Jat’s ox was nearly devoured. Newton refused to eat any of it. As hungry as he was, he was revolted by the thought of eating a cooked animal. The boy had managed to carve fishhooks from one of the bones. He was getting the hang of using one hand. The other one became more of a brace for whatever he was working on. Thread from the giant’s pants made strong lines. He baited the hooks with oxmeat and hung them over the edge of the raft to trail behind them. They caught the occasional fish, something to tease the empty stomach of his large friend. It wasn’t enough, but Newton was grateful for every bite. The giant silently hoped for a sea serpent to rear its head. With the mast still aboard the raft, he had a weapon with which to take one down, but none appeared. Maybe it is too cold for big snakes.
