The Boatwright

By Gordon Saunders and Anna Coleman

Dalat was Prince Regent. But he didn't think about it because it was too far in the future. He thought about the game, beating his opponents. And not simply winning, but crushing them, completely humiliating them.

But then disaster struck.

• Language: English
• Publisher: mediaropa
• Release date: Sep 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9781956228106

Gordon Saunders

Over a period of twenty-five years, Dr. Saunders lived in four countries in Europe--working in more than three dozen countries both before and after the end of communist rule--with the purpose of describing and purveying grace. Overcoming cultural differences and ways of communicating gave him insight both into what divides people and into what unites them. It also helped him understand elements in various cultures, baggage some call it, that keep people from hearing one another. Writing fantasy gave him a way to minimize the baggage and show truths to people they might otherwise be unable to see.

Book preview

1

THE END OF THE GAME

Glancing briefly toward the balcony above the inside wall of the vastly expanded new coliseum, Dalat assured himself that his father was watching his performance. As usual, he was dominating the game. His white shorts and shirt, dark face and black hair were covered with dust, making most of him beige except the bright red number one on his shirt. Sweat ran through the dust on his face, glinting off flat planes of cheek and chin, dripping down onto his shirt.

At a run, he deftly scooped the ball from the ground with his left hand, placing it in the curved racquet he held in his right. With one fluid motion he swung the racquet backward and downward, then snapped it back up, twisting it slightly, to release the ball. He watched the ball hit the red paddle about the size of a dinner plate, the height of three men above the playing field. The paddle dropped and its attendant reeled it back up to its normal location with the pulley.

Cha! Cha! the players cried, rushing to hug and pat Dalat. He grinned and accepted their praise. Of course, they praised him whatever he did, because he was the king's son. But he was good, after all. Denispri would have no difficulty defeating teams coming from council cities all over the Byotik League for the annual Council and games.

Dalat glanced up toward his father again, who nodded ever so slightly, and then allowed his teammates to out-do one another with further congratulations.

Which were cut shorter than he would have liked by Coach calling the two scrimmage teams to himself. As they gathered in front of him, Coach sent a scathing glance toward Dalat.

It’s a team sport, he said. No one can do it alone.

He didn’t look specifically at Dalat now, but Dalat knew he would direct the next comment at him since they’d run this little scenario many times before. You may be able to hit the paddle, but could you do it if no one got the ball to you? Could you do it if your teammates were not keeping the opponents from knocking you over as you swung the ball?

Dalat had asked his father to remove the coach on more than one occasion, but, without actually saying anything, his father had always tilted his head a few degrees to one side and smiled that thin smile that meant No. Dalat’s father, Damal, King of Denispri and Councilor Supreme of the Byotik League, rarely said No to Dalat. But when he did, there was little point disputing it. Coach remained.

He was now arranging the twelve players into two opposing lines almost as far away from one another as the shorter sides of the playing field. Dalat scrambled to get into his position, left-end player on the side opposite the balcony. Coach gave a ball to alternate players on the other side of the field.

When this exercise worked, it was a thing of beauty. Players one, three, and five, slung their balls to players two, four, and six, on the other side, who then slung it across to players one, three, and five on the first side, and back and forth and back and forth. Until, at a precise moment, the coach shouted, Long! Player one then slung his ball to player six, player two to player five, player three to player four, and so on and back. If each player did his part, as play continued, no ball would strike another in the air, and at the end, the three players who had started with the balls would have them again.

It had taken them weary months and innumerable practices to get it right, but it made them the best team in the league. And it was going very well this time. Dalat looked up at the balcony once more to see if his father was watching. Fortunately, he was not. Because just as Dalat looked up a ball came his way that he failed to see. He missed it. The rhythm was broken. And shortly the rest of the balls were collected or tumbled onto the dirt. Everyone on the team, as well as Coach, looked at Dalat.

Something other than the exercise on your mind? roared Coach.

Dalat shrugged.

Evidently that wasn’t good enough, because Coach continued to stare at him.

Sorry, he mumbled, hoping very few people heard.

What was that? shouted Coach.

Furious, Dalat now shouted as loudly as Coach had. I said, I’m sorry!

Everyone became silent. Finally, Coach said, less loudly, It’s a team sport.

Then he turned his head slowly, eventually taking in all the players. To the baths, everyone, he said. Be here at third watch, sharp.

The players dispersed toward the opening under the balcony.

Dalat shrank from looking toward his father as he left the field. This time, he looked toward a place in the stands where his mother often sat and where she sat now. Despite what had just happened, she was smiling as she glanced his way, and she waved her hand slightly. At least someone could always be counted on.

Sometime later Dalat joined his father, Damal, in the new Council Room that looked out from the coliseum’s balcony. He surveyed those councilors who had arrived. Most of them were swarthier than he, with flatter noses and eyes farther apart. His mother had been a conquest from some place in the south, and being much lighter-skinned than his father, had given Dalat skin lighter than Damal’s. If it was not a problem, that was only because he was the king’s son and no one dared say anything about it.

He gave his attention to the meeting in progress.

What says the King to the remark of the Councilor of Glini? asked the dry voice of Kalik, the Councilor of Broll, elegant in his maroon silk and bejeweled necklace.

Damal turned from the coliseum where another practice game was in progress. He nodded to his son and surveyed the dainty group of councilors. Damal had allowed Dalat in the Council meetings from an earlier age than his mother preferred. He had attended, now, for several of his sixteen years. In two more years he would be an official aide to his father.

You need to get to know these people, Damal had said, and how to deal with them.

Dalat had seen Damal’s technique of staring them down one at a time so that, though the entire group had the power to overrule him, individually, they were under his sway. When he worked his technique well, they seemed to forget they were a group. And each individual did just as Damal wished.

Lored, the Councilor of Glini — the folds of his chin lost in the frills of his collar — was the first to look down. He was followed quickly by Mondu of Mnof who looked away, twitching his moustache. Dineed of Lind glowered momentarily but then faltered. All the others, similarly, except Justin of Lerdi, could not endure his gaze. Damal had told Dalat that Justin would have to be dealt with differently, though just what that meant, he had not yet said. Justin was the difficult one.

While you gentlemen multiply words, said Damal, our adversaries gather strength. As early as next year they could knock at the gates of your cities. He paused and once more gazed at the thirteen men before him.

Damal was, after all, the military leader whose raids and exploits had helped fill their coffers. Though they squabbled and hesitated, they would follow him. And each one knew it. But they would continue this verbal jockeying for position for a while longer.

Dalat enjoyed watching it. One day he would handle them all as skillfully as his father did. He would play them like a Tospot game. In fact, watching them was much like watching a Tospot game, as the ball passed from one to another and finally back to his father who never failed to score.

Coming back to the council table, Damal stood at its end leaning forward on clenched fists. It is a good proposal. We need Kalura on the Council. What will it hurt you Lored, or you Dineed, if Kalura becomes a Council City? Is it not said that there is strength in many counsellors?

But we have already ships and spice enough. What more can Kalura give us? asked Dineed. Looking up at Damal briefly he continued, And is it not also said that too many heads muddy counsel?

This will not hurt Lind, said Mondu. You compete with Kalura already. It is we who are far away—Mnof, Gdaun, Dall, Beldorn—who will hurt as the League’s attention goes farther and farther from us. As it is...

Well, said Damal, cutting him short, since Borl has not yet arrived from Beldorn, we will do well to postpone our discussion until tomorrow when we meet in full Council. In the meantime, there are the games this afternoon and the Council feast this evening. The city is yours, gentlemen.

There was a general muttering as the councilors arose. Dalat saw Kalik catch his father’s eye and raise an eyebrow ever so slightly. He perceived this council would not be quite so pliable as his father and his father’s ally, Kalik, had hoped.

The councilors from Melnor and Bdorna went off with Klarind while Lored and Dineed talked together softly, stealing sideways glances at Damal.

And where is the full Council to be held on the morrow, Sire? Justin asked, somewhat icily. Dalat noticed that Justin, like his father, dressed in a simple tunic and lightweight jerkin — not for effect, but for action. He was the only one in the room who spoke his mind plainly. Dalat could see why his father had told him that Justin must be subdued.

You don’t like our new quarters? asked the King.

Is the Council not to meet in the Hall of Truth — with the Mwlahnni — to assure our openness and forthrightness with one another? Has the Council not always met there?

Are you, perhaps, asked the King in a tight voice, not intending to be open and forthright?

I am, said Justin. Those who remained in the room turned to look at him. He glanced around and said more softly, Is everyone?

In a voice just slightly louder than usual, with somewhat exaggerated enunciation, Damal said, You would accuse your fellow councilors of duplicity? The King paused to relish the effect this had on those watching.

Justin did not answer, nor did he avert his eyes. Dalat looked back at his father in time to see a scowl racing across his face, quickly replaced by that thin smile.

Is it not much more convenient not to have to walk once and again the dusty stairs from Council to game, game to Council?

Justin looked directly at the king and spoke quietly, with complete composure. Ispri has decreed that we meet there.

Oh, Ispri, said Damal, waving his arm off-handedly. You haven’t seen him lately, have you? He looked directly back into Justin’s eyes. This was the test. Why should we not meet here?

Justin did not drop his gaze. It is wrong, he said.

Then he turned without another word and left the chamber, followed by the councilors from Gdaun and Nanos. Kalik was the only councilor still in the room.

Damal turned to the map of the Byotik League, engraved on the wall opposite the columns overlooking the coliseum. He pursed his lips, gazing absently at it, shaking his head just enough for Dalat to notice.

This may be more difficult than I had expected, he said.

Dalat leaped into the air and intercepted the ball slung by a Lind opponent. With deadly accuracy, he threw it to his teammate in the next quadrant. Dalat’s teammates passed the ball to one another, evading Lind players and their attempts to intercept the ball, passing it through the other two quadrants and back toward Dalat, who was now running to his own color, preparing to score. Looking behind him for the ball, he fell headlong over a Lind player who had purposely thrown himself on the ground in front of him.

The crowd rose to its feet as one person, screaming at the offending player. Dalat and his opponent got quickly to their feet and wiped the dirt off their sweat-glistening bodies. Dalat wiped the corner of his mouth with the edge of his shirt, looking stiffly at the other player, and cleaned off the bit of blood that had trickled from his lip. He accepted the ball from the referee and walked to the center of the field.

Your foul will cost you not one, but two scores, my man, he said grimly, placing the ball in his sling.

In the incredibly smooth single motion that players all over the League tried to imitate, Dalat swung and released the ball toward his red goal. It sailed cleanly toward the mark, striking it dead center, and then arced over the playing field, more than the length of three good-sized boats, to hit the blue mark behind him.

The crowd roared wildly. Dalat’s teammates took their places to begin the next round of play. Dalat, fists clenched, eyes narrowed, signaled to Coach for a replacement and ran from the field through the door under the balcony.

Moments later, Dalat entered the Council Room, still at a run. He stopped dead and stood for a moment, looking among the guests standing at the periphery of the room. He located his father and watched him glance smugly around the hall, now set for a banquet, until his eyes found Dineed, Councilor of Lind. That was the man Dalat sought. He broke up the conversations of the councilors as he pushed roughly through them, then stopped abruptly in front of Dineed and said loudly, brusquely, Dineed!

The room became silent as Dineed turned to face him.

Dalat stood, legs spread, hands on hips, dusty, sweaty, the image of arrogant good health. Do not, he said, allow that scum on a Tospot field again!

Dineed looked at him silently for a moment, then turned and walked toward the exit. All eyes watched him go in the otherwise motionless silence. Everything waited.

Then, Dalat’s anger spent, he moved gracefully toward his father, seeking the approbation he knew he would receive. His father put a hand on Dalat’s filthy shoulder and congratulated him softly on his play. Conversation resumed. A silver bell announced the first course of the feast. Each councilor found his seat.

Dalat started toward the exit through which servers now entered, to return to the game. But the sound of a tray startled him as it clattered to the floor, crystal smashing, conversation halting. The councilors looked not toward the fallen tray by the exit, but to the columns overlooking the coliseum.

He could not read their faces, so varied were the reactions he saw there as he revolved slowly to look at what they were seeing. But before he saw it, he felt it. He had heard about this all his life, but few had expected to see it. The universe, they thought, did not really contain such things.

2

THE APPOINTMENT OF THE STEWARD

The people who jammed the amphitheater were standing and cheering, jabbering excitedly, eating, drinking, crowded together in a writhing mass. But slowly, in ones and twos and small knots, they responded to what the councilors saw. The cheering and jabbering, the eating and drinking, the motion, stopped. People turned, silently, to face the columns at the back of the amphitheater. Players on the field looked around at the stands, wondering. Gradually, all clamor stopped. The game stopped, the ball rolling to a lonely corner, unwatched. Life, as it had been, ceased.

Finally, all had turned to face the back of the coliseum. Some spectators wandered out into the playing field with the players. They stood looking meekly up at the columns in deep silence. Some knelt. Even in the bright afternoon light of a day just past the rain, they could see the object on the balustrade between the columns glowed. It became slowly brighter, then raised wings, perhaps the span of a child’s arms from tip to tip, fluttered them — spattering great shiny drops all around itself — and folded them away. Then it ceased to glow.

Damal, it said. No one knew how its speech was known. Did it speak into the air? Did its words fall on to the naked soul? In the upper chamber, Damal stood forth hesitantly. Each councilor and serving person sat or stood as if carved from a single chunk of rock.

Approach me, said the voice.

Damal did so slowly. When he was but a few feet before the source of the voice, he went clumsily to his knees, almost as if he struggled within himself whether to do so, but was ultimately compelled.

My... my Lord, he stammered, as his lips worked strangely over his teeth and his cheeks twitched. He trembled as he bowed his head, reluctantly lowering his eyes.

I am your rightful Lord; the voice went on. But you have chosen not to be a righteous servant.

Damal’s head fell still further.

I have offered you truth and honest dealing…

Still at the head of the table from where he had not been able to move, Dalat could not help but see and listen. The voice struck inside him like the clear single note of a bell.

Something in him loved it. But something else in him hated it. It angered him that he could be violated in this way. How loathsome to feel rather than to hear a voice. It’s almost like those rock creatures in the Great Hall who speak the thought of others into your mind and take your thought to them. How much better that father has built the coliseum with the Council Room up here so we can conduct our business privately, without every man knowing our thoughts and intents; the way business is carried out in every other part of the world.

But he was wrenched from his thoughts to know the words being spoken.

...but you have chosen, rather, to create your own truth, and to employ the devious methods of what you falsely call diplomacy.

Hear me then, said the voice, Hear me all Denispri, and know that today, throughout the League, the results of your deeds have come upon you. Today is your kingdom lost.

Damal slowly raised questioning eyes toward the speaker. Can you do this? his expression asked. Clear, unblinking eyes met his look.

Is there any doubt?

Damal faltered and dropped his head once more. Below, the people watched in stunned silence, perceiving the words within themselves.

Your truth, O Damal, is not true. Your hopes are not my hopes. They will not be fulfilled. It is your fears that will be fulfilled.

Dalat gazed, confused and awed, angry and afraid. He looked at the creature that spoke to his father as no one had dared speak to him before. It stood there, like any bird, perched upon the railing. Its height was not as great as the length of a man’s arm. White was its color, or tawny, with brown speckles on its breast and a golden beak. Its eyes were brown, like the eyes of any falcon. The balustrade supported it.

Yet Dalat had the feeling that of all the objects to be seen, this one, not-so-large bird, was the only thing solid, that were it to release the balustrade, it, and everything else but the bird would go crashing into oblivion. It — but no, he could not call the bird ‘it,’ Dalat realized somehow — He, the