Elf-Boy's Friends 35
To the Northern Ocean
by George Gauthier
[The further adventures of characters from the novel 'Elf-Boy and Friends']
Chapter 1. Fjordland
Once again, though for the last time, the Corps of Discovery flew north in their three autogyros. Drew Altair's red racer was the speediest and most nimble, impelled by the telekinetic force of a fetcher powerful enough to lift a couple of brontotheres into the sky bodily. Finn Ragnarson's larger aerocraft feature had a steel frame which let him propel it magnetically. Though not so fast nor so nimble as Drew's red speedster, it outclassed the third aerocraft in both respects. That was a big transport aerocraft which Liam had borrowed from an air freight line in keeping with the civilian nature of the expedition. The company had long-term contracts with the military and so was happy to oblige the well-connected members of the expedition.
The autogyros had to rise nearly a mile to clear the high ridge of the coastal mountains. Beyond lay a landscape such as none of them save Finn had ever seen before. Short rivers ran through incised canyons then fell vertiginously off the cliffs of a coastline deeply indented by sounds and fjords. Out to sea stood a line of low islands stretching east and west to the limit of vision.
The aerocraft dropped lower flying between the steep walls of the fjord and over a flotilla of fishing boats till they saw a largish town built on a sloping shelf near the mouth of the inlet. An impressive cataract fell to the top of the shelf and then ran down to the fjord, supplying both a spectacular visual accent plus an ample supply of fresh water. A couple more towns stood on smaller shelfs of land across the inlet on the western shore.
The inhabitants looked up as the three autogyros orbited overhead looking for a place to land. The rotors of autogyros were not powered and spun merely from the passage of air across the blades. Hence autogyros could not hover but they could execute slow tight circles, a maneuver which helped pilots to choose a landing ground.
Finn was trying to decide where to set down when a flash of light reflected from a mirror signaled where the inhabitants wanted them to land: the grassy commons. The crowd pressed back along the sides to give them plenty of room to land. Once the rotors stopped spinning they surged forward for a closer look at the visitors. Only about a third were human. The rest were Frost Giants. The crowd seemed friendly so the Corps of Discovery left their standoff weapons in the aerocraft.
"We come in peace." Finn assured the townsfolk."
A giant standing a foot taller than Finn and sporting the kind of close-trimmed beard no longer fashionable in the Commonwealth or New Varagnia stepped forward. He was flanked by two other bearded giants who were nearly as large plus a human of middle years who were clearly not guards.
"You come among us unarmed, so in peace we welcome you. My name is Thurig Karlsefni, I am the mayor of Nordstrand. These three are Councillors Herjulf Eriksson, his father Erik Svenson, and Ward Barrow. Now who might you be, and why have you come here in such wondrous flying machines?"
Finn had barely introduced himself when Erik interrupted asking:
"Can this little fellow really be the legendary Finn Ragnarson? The avatar of Thor is supposed to be a giant among giants with thrice the strength of any of us. Pardon a bit of skepticism, but why should we believe that you are he?"
Finn grinned as he drew his war hammer from his belt.
Axel nudged Drew and warned sotto voce. "Here he goes again."
Sure enough, Finn raised Mjolnir and cried:
"By the power of Thor!"
The clear sky answered with a clap of thunder and a bolt of lighting which struck the hammer. With nothing nearby to smash, Finn discharged Mjolnir into the ground. Raising it once again he held on to the haft as he levitated above the crowd to fifty feet then set down again.
"There, is that tall enough for you?"
That brought laughter and cheers especially from the giants, happy to have the greatest living hero of their people walking among them.
They were even more pleased when they realized that three giant friends were members of the Corps of Discovery.
"So you would be the famous twins, Jemsen and Karel." Herjulf said clapping them on the shoulder.
"In the flesh." Jemsen acknowledged.
"And this auburn-haired lad with you certainly lives up to, or should I say down to, his billing as the brave LITTLE fetcher who stood with Old Arn and Young Finn in the Breach."
Drew grinned. He didn't mind being called a little guy. He always maintained that physiques like his were more about quality than about quantity anyway. And if the locals could call Finn little, well, what did that make him?
The Mayor asked Finn to address the crowd and explain why he and his friends had come to visit. Finn's remarks were brief, to the point, and well-received. He even took a few questions. Then the mayor and the councillors lead the Corps of Discovery to a conference room in city hall for an extended discussion. They wanted to know what to expect from their visitors and what their visitors might expect from them.
Finn explained that they had a two-fold mission: firstly of exploration, mapping, and discovery and secondarily of fostering aviation in the Northlands in furtherance of improved communications and commerce and cultural exchange with and between their countries. In addition, the Commonwealth was interested in the shipbuilding techniques needed for oceanic travel. Frost Giants were well-known for building the stoutest vessels, ones that could safely brave the tempestuous northern ocean.
"Now the Commonwealth has no naval ambitions on this ocean, so far from its heartland, only for the southern ocean which is much closer to the territories it is acquiring in Amazonia. And yes the giants in New Varangia build fine ships. Good as they were for navigating the Great Inland Freshwater Sea they fell short of what is needed for the southern ocean."
Finn pointed out that the enclave of Frost Giants settled in the Northlands was far closer than their original homeland which lay in the far northeast in the temperate zone. That was why he had been sent to them to seek their collaboration with their Navy's own naval architects.
In return the Commonwealth would share its aviation technology, not only selling them autogyros but showing them how to build them. Once they got set up, about the only things the giants would need to import would be wire wheels for the tricycle landing gears.
The three towns on the fjord had a total population of forty-six thousand, the equivalent of a middle size city, large enough to have the range of skills and business enterprise required to become an industrial and communications hub. Their location on the coast was ideal with sea lanes along the coast east and west and north across the ocean. Aviation would give them access to all points south. Nordstrand would be the northern anchor of the route system.
"As one of the major shipbuilders here in Nordstrand," Erik began, "I think it is safe to say that all of us in the industry would welcome such a collaboration. Aerocraft building and transportation services would create two new industries for our folk, joining fishing, shipbuilding, and naval stores as the mainstays of our economy."
"Naval stores?" Dylan asked.
"Ah, you would be a landlubber then, young Dylan."
"Naval stores are resins used in building and maintaining wooden sailing ships. That includes cordage, mask, turpentine, rosin, pitch and tar. You see, ships made of wood require a material which is insoluble in water to seal the spaces between planks. Pine pitch is often mixed with fibers like hemp to caulk spaces to prevent leaks. The term naval stores sometimes includes timber products like masts, spars, staves, and sawn lumber, which we also produce."
The mayor also mentioned that an airfield would provide autogyros for aerial search and rescue when ships or fishing boats went missing or were just overdue after a big storm. A shipwrecked crew might be stranded on a skerry for many days. The weather and starvation were not the problem, which was thirst, though that might be relieved by a timely rainfall.
"Of course. The ocean is all salt water. Landlubber that I am I do know that much." Dylan offered.
"And we have tides," the mayor added, "which run up to six feet in places. With two moons in the sky the tide table is complicated. So it is easy to get hung up on rocks and reefs. Much of our fishery depends on the fecundity of the coral reefs at the mouth of the fjords, but a reef can tear the bottom out of a boat."
The mayor went on to explain that the line of skerries created a sheltered inner passage along the coast which was safe for fishing boats and coastal craft. Only stout oceanic vessels ventured beyond those sheltered waters even unto the Polar Isles. Jemsen asked about maps and charts of the area and was told that those would be provided.
"We don't actually know how deep the fjord is in most places. We do know that its bottom is well below sea level, about two thousand feet. A sill at the mouth of the fjord blocks much of the interchange of waters so the hydrology was complex, with layers of salt water below and brackish or fresh water on top, in various proportions depending on whether it was the rainy season or the dryer season plus prevailing winds and currents."
The mayor accepted Jemsen's offer to delve the fjord during their stay.
"Actually you sound rather than delve water depth." Liam pointed out.
"So speaks our naval person in his naval lingo." Finn explained. "Sir Liam is a war wizard and warrant officer in the Commonwealth Navy."
"Oh, have you see much action young man against the trolls?" Ward Barrow asked.
"I'll say he has!" Axel exclaimed loyally. "Liam won our nation's two top medals for valor: both the Sword and the Shield of the Commonwealth."
"Most impressive!"
"Thank you, but my friends are all heroes in their own right whether against trolls, centaurs, orcs, or ruthless criminals. One of the reasons we all took on this mission is to get away from warfare and all the terrible things that come with armed conflict." Liam admitted.
"If we are proud of anything it is how often we have been able to act as peacemakers." Drew noted.
"Five of us bear the formal title of Peacemaker: the twins, myself, Finn, and Axel, but the others have also contributed to improved relations with other peoples. Axel is the only person alive who bears the tattoo of orc-friend on the strength of his bringing a peaceful end to the Commonwealth's recent and mercifully brief war with the orcs of the Eastern Mountains. Dylan and Maddon Sexton have also helped us cement good relations with the Guardians of the Stone Ring and the Snow Elves."
"Snow Elves? Surely they are legendary, some kind of ghost or perhaps wholly mythological creatures." the mayor objected.
"Not at all." Madden Sexton countered. "They are as real as you or I. Snow Elves are the shape shifters born of Sylvan Elves. We took our leave of a family of them just before coming here."
"Are they close by?"
"Not any longer. We got them out of a jam that would have ended up with them killed, and before you ask, we can only tell you that they headed south. Snow elves are fine folk but reclusive."
"And what of these Guardians of the Ring? How did you yourself contribute to good relations with them, Lord Sexton?"
Sexton grunted then said. "The usual way for me, by killing their enemies, in this case vicious beasts called reptilian raptors. Don't get me wrong, I am all for peace, but in my long career it has more often come through victory rather than palaver. It is not for nothing that I won the title of Conquering Lion of Sogdiana, the land where my armies overthrew a vile regime that had preyed upon its neighbors and oppressed its populace for decades."
"Lord Sexton is understandably more bloody-minded than the rest of us since he is a particular kind of shapeshifter himself, a wir wolverine." Finn said, "but he is a good man and a good friend."
"And the mentor I hadn't realized I needed till we met." Dylan adding his endorsement.
Sexton's demeanor softened as he nodded his acknowledgement to the elf-boy who had become like a kid brother to him.
Asked whether fetchers or masters of magnetism would make better pilots, Liam said that there was little to choose between the value of the gifts for powering aerocraft. What did matter was that all commercial pilots be human. Frost Giants were too heavy weighing six or seven hundred pounds. That added five hundred pounds or more of dead weight to the load and subtracted the same from what the team could haul with a human pilot, whether in freight or paying passengers.
Finn indicated that it would be a year before aviation services could be set up to link the Northlands to the Commonwealth. In the meantime, when Finn got back to the capital he would have the authorities dispatch a delegation of naval architects and aeronautical engineers to get things rolling. One of the experts would be both a naval architect and the inventor of the autogyro, namely Karl-Eike Thyssen or Eike, who was best friends and roommates with most of the Corps of Discovery.
"Let me guess," Herjulf ventured. "This Eike would be very young and slender and cute and the sort who fancies other boys."
"Does he ever!" Liam declared fervently, which brought a chuckle all around.
Ward Barrow then asked about the short shorts which Drew, Axel, Liam, Dylan, and the twins were wearing. Humans living in Nordstrand dressed much like the giants in shirts and trews and sandals.
Madden Sexton explained that the shorts were not the usual garb of young males in the Commonwealth. When youths weren't running around sky-clad, which was rather too often in his opinion, they might wear no more than a modesty pouch or breechclout as casual wear while tunics, trews, and sarongs served for more formal occasions. These shorts were an innovation, a fashion statement, if you will. The boys hoped to set a trend when they got back home.
"It's not from just vanity and comfort." Karel pointed out. "Among our interests is an investment we made three years ago in a chain of smart shops offering the latest in fashion to a discriminating youthful clientele in the capital and two nearby cities. That's rags for rich guys in fashion parlance. So if we can set a fashion trend and be first to the market with the goods, we stand to clean up. That will definitely prove that the wisdom of this, our first venture into retail. We took a minority interest in the chain as a passive investment. Now it is going to pay off. Axel would have been in line for a windfall too, but no, he had to go and invest in a graphite pencil manufactory."
"Ah, pencils!" the mayor exclaimed. "Simple, convenient, and cheap. It is the best way to write. No messing with ink or pen nubs. Bless whoever invented them and those clever pencil sharpeners too which use a thin blade to shave and sharpen the point of the implement."
"Actually it was a guy who approached Axel's family for backing for a venture in writing implements. No one in the trade would give him the time of day, but Axel saw the possibilities and has profited handsomely."
"I had good advice." Axel pointed out. "Our business agent is a wily dwarf named Lennart who specializes in business innovation. He insisted that I not pass up this golden opportunity."
Herjulf nodded. "None have business acumen to match the dwarves." he affirmed.
Chapter 2. Mosasaur
At the celebratory dinner that evening the locals heard from the Corps of Discovery about their recent adventures with Snow Elves and raptors, and that so-called Dragon they had slain. Drew said that when he got back to the Commonwealth he would compile the reports he had already sent to the Capital Intelligencer plus new material into a book. The names of the mayor and councillors would be featured in the chapter on this visit to Nordstrand.
Drew was pleased that copies of most of his books had reached even this far corner of Valentia. Herjulf admitted that he had skipped Drew's book on the peacemaking process in the Far West. From what his father told him, it was all about politics, intrigue, and economics with little action or adventure, unlike Drew's war books. Drew promised that there would be plenty of action in the new book.
Meanwhile readers should look to the forthcoming book by his colleague, Corwin Klarendes about the recently concluded campaign in Amazonia and a planned follow-up volume on the Western or final campaign in the war against the trolls.
Erik Sevenson expressed a hope that one day someone would start a news-paper that covered the Northlands, not just their own towns but happenings in the whole region including the Stone Ring, the Cave of the Mountain River, the Medkari lands, and other places. Drew was all for that, but thought that starting a news-paper would require an initiative from local investors. His family's firm would be happy to sell the makings: moveable type, presses, and technical experts on both printing and journalism to get the new venture set up. In all likelihood the paper would eventually subscribe to the Altair's news service once a heliograph line reached Nordstrand.
Dessert was boysenberry iced-cream. Rich and creamy and sweet, the confection was a welcome surprise to Finn. Boysenberries were his favorite berry. He couldn't have been more pleased.
"We copied the Commonwealth's refrigeration technology exactly" Erik Svenson said proudly "by reverse engineering those snap together ice-boxes your friend Count Klarendes manufactures back in the Commonwealth. I built a manufactory next to my shipyard to turn them out, you see."
"As to how we get ice, it's the same process used in the Commonwealth. At the foot of the cataract we divert some of the water into holding ponds. After firecasters freeze the top layer, workers cut the ice into blocks and store them in ice houses. Over time blocks of ice are withdrawn from storage and delivered by the push carts to subscribers. The beauty of the arrangement is that delivery routes are downhill all the way. Only empty carts have to be pushed uphill."
Finn asked for only four guest rooms for the Corps of Discovery. A bed large enough for a frost giant could easily accommodate three slender youths like the twins and Dylan in one with another for Liam, Axel, and Drew. In fact they were much like those in their quarters back in the capital. Needless to say, the six did more than simply sleep in those beds.
Axel had become lovers with both Liam and Drew long before he took up with any of the others. Now eight of his closest friends shared an expanded suite of rooms in their residential hotel in the capital. The other members of their household were twins, Nathan Lathrop, and Eike Thyssen. So they were intimately acquainted with each other's bodies and how best to arouse them and have fun.
Finn now had a roving commission which took him away from his original post as a Hand of the Commonwealth in Flensborg, the capital of New Varangia. When in the capital he always shared a room and bed with one or more of the eight.
The forest rangers Dylan and Madden Sexton both operated out Elysion where the twins were frequent visitors who shared their room with Dylan if he was not out on patrol. For their stay in Nordstrand though Finn Ragnarson and Madden Sexton slept alone.
Over the next ten days Jemsen sounded the depths of the fjord and updated the local charts accordingly. Karel had learned to sail small boats on sheltered waters both for fun and for transportation. Sailing was a fine way to capitalize on his air wizardry which ensured that no matter which way the wind was blowing or even in a dead calm, he could call up a jet of air to fill his sail and push him where he wanted to go.
He loved the feel of the wind in his hair and the kiss of the sun on his skin especially on his bare bum for he always sailed sky clad. From time to time they boys heaved to and dove into the water. Saltwater provided more buoyancy than did fresh water making it easier for hard bodied types like them to float. Their bodies were too dense to simply float in fresh water. That was especially true about the legs, all bones and sculpted musculature. That was why slender pretty boys like the twins, Dylan, Drew, and Axel, among others, always had to scull with the arms and legs while floating on their backs.
The twins had been assured that it was safe to swim in the fjord. The predatory sea monsters of the outer ocean shunned the confines and brackish waters of the inlet. In any case the mouth of the fjord was jealously guarded by dolphins who hunted for fish in and around the coral reef just offshore. The inlet was their courtship and breeding ground and where females gave birth to their young.
The soundings confirmed the presumed U shape of a valley once sculpted by a river of ice and now occupied by an inlet of the ocean. Natural philosophers argued over whether the ancient ice age which created such land forms was the result of fluctuations in the output of the sun or of continental drift which at one time must have brought Valentia into the polar regions.
Next Jemsen and Karel, with Axel's help, jumped to the local peaks, not only those enclosing the fjord but those on the coast east and west and most importantly the peaks and the saddles of the coastal range which aviators would have to fly over once commercial aviation got started in those parts. The took readings both with a box barometer to establish approximate altitude plus azimuthal sightings for the twins to calculate relative position and height above mean sea level using trigonometric tables and logarithms.
"Are there any security threats in the region?" Madden Sexton asked at a follow-up meeting.
The mayor shook his head. "No, not any more. Not for almost sixty years. That was when the coastal states formed an alliance against a nest of pirates who operated out of an island fortress built atop one of the larger skerries. Their racket was extortion rather than pillage of towns or seizing ships. Pay them and they would not fall upon your town or molest the shipping on which your prosperity and theirs depended. To be fair they did fend off raids by outsiders, not out of any regard for the towns they milked but just to protect their territory."
"Exasperated by their rapacious and escalating demands, the Alliance put their stronghold under siege. The pirates thought they were invulnerable, perched atop a crag, and the only landing place on the skerry was at their fortified harbor. What they did not realize was that the Alliance had hired a powerful earth wizard from abroad. He delved the foundations of their fort and discovered it rested on a shell of rock above a great sea cave. When the wizard sent an earthquake to shake the skerry the roof collapsed dropping most of the fort into a hole in the ground while the rest slid into the harbor blocking it and making it unusable. Problem solved."
"Did you capture or kill the survivors?"
"Neither. We just waited them out, rather than risk the lives of our men. We knew that sooner or later they would run out of food or water. Two guard boats took turns watching the island. After a month we put a landing party ashore and found no one alive. It turns out that they had plenty of water in a cistern, but the collapse allowed sea water to ruin their food supply. They had resorted to cannibalism at the end. No one visits the island any more and not just from difficulty of access. It is seen as a place of ill omen."
Finn saw that it was all coming together, what the Commonwealth Council dubbed the Greater North Valentia Co-prosperity Sphere. The Sphere was ultimately about more than communications and commerce and cultural interchange. In time friendly and profitable relations among the peoples of the north would make armed conflict among them or with the Commonwealth virtually unthinkable.
It was not an ignoble ambition for a hegemonic state, Finn reflected. If a single country was destined to dominate the continent, then who better than the Commonwealth of the Long River? Hadn't the Commonwealth earned the gratitude of all peoples for battling the trolls in and on their behalf? The payoff for it efforts was that all its peoples could develop in freedom, peace, and domestic tranquility.
As arranged the pilots Finn and Drew and Liam met with the elders to outline the links they hoped to establish for air mail, transport of passenger and freight, an aerocraft industry, collaboration with natural philosophers from the Commonwealth, and for journalism and printing.
In aviation Finn had asked them to suggest routes for the new air services and in what order those locations should be brought into the network. Finn planned to meld these proposals with those of Raqqub and Kyle and the others in the Medkari lands who were hard at work on their business plan. Then they went over the capital requirements for investment in the new industries and the mix of trades and skills the manufactories would require.
With those three looking to be locked in meetings for several days the twins, Axel, Madden Sexton and Dylan accepted an invitation from Erik Svenson for a coastal voyage lasting a week. They would sail aboard his mail packet, a fast ship which carried letters and small parcels and a very few passengers between the settlements strung out along the north coast. Swenson encouraged them to bring along their diving goggles so they could explore the reefs at the mouth of each fjord.
Axel did ask about the predatory sea monsters of the outer ocean. All right, the dolphins kept them away from the reefs and the inlets but what about the waters where they they would be sailing? The line of skerries sheltered the coast from swell and storms but surely the monsters could swim through the many gaps. And what did these monsters look like anyway.
Swenson showed them an exhibit hall where the the skeletons of sea monsters were mounted. The smaller ones ran about twelve feet long. The largest skeleton was forty four feet long though the biggest on record was ten feet longer. A painting showed the appearance of the largest monster when alive. It was a creature out of a nightmare.
With a streamlined body something like a whale or a seal it had large flippers for steering and very long tail for propulsion. The head was huge with large eye sockets and jaws as long as a man's arms. They were lined with jagged teeth suited to snagging swimming prey and holding it while the animal engulfed it.
"Why so big a torso, and where are the arches for the gills?" Jemsen asked.
"No gills. The sea monsters breathe air hence the barrel torso to house the lungs. They are not fish at all but reptiles." Sveneson told him.
"I'd hate to meet up with one if I were swimming or diving." Axel said dubiously.
"Well if you do, Axel, you can always just Jump into the clear." Karel told him airily.
"That's not what I meant Karel, and you know it. What do you call these sea beasts anyway."
"They have several names but mosasaur is the most common. Mostly they keep out to sea where the bigger fish like tuna run. They patrol near the surface so they can breathe then dive to attack from below. Anyway close encounters with the larger mosasaurs are rare for the same reason that big fierce predators are rare in the jungle."
"Oh, you mean because they are at the top of the food chain?" Dylan asked.
"Actually it's more useful to think of them as apex predators perched atop a stepped pyramid which mimics the populations of prey and predatory species. Predatory species require much larger populations of prey to support them. At the bottom, the tiniest of predators feed on plankton which is ubiquitous in these warm seas."
At their first port the reef was spectacular with fish of all shapes and colors sharing the bounty of the reef amid coral shaped like the horns of a stag, a fan, or the human brain. Sponges and sea anemones and brittle stars added to the variety of bizarre life forms.
All five of the members of the Corps of Discovery aboard the packet disrobed and dove into the warm waters at the mouth of the fjord, wearing the goggles they had acquired from the Medkari plus a local innovation, shin fins made of flexible sheet metal. It strapped to the ankle and reached from just back of the toes halfway to the knees, folding around the lower leg yet flaring out to the sides.
For entirely practically reasons the shin fin was painted the same tone as legs bronzed by the sun. Anything colorful would look like a fluttering fish and so would invite attack by a hungry predator, and bright metal would act like a fishing lure.
The downstroke of the scissor or flutter kick delivered the full power of a kick from the hips instead of just from the knees as with swim fins that fit over the feet and with much less back kick and splashing. On the surface the shin fins helped keep the legs horizontal, something the slender boys appreciated since their hard bodies were too dense to float properly. Sexton too appreciated their virtues. He might not be slender, but he was all bone and muscle and sinew so he had much the same problem. They all agreed that in the future shin fins would be a permanent part of their kit.
Swimming at the surface looking down at the reef was a lot like flying over a landscape. When they spotted something interesting, they dove for a closer look. holding their breath for up to three minutes. You could not bring back souvenirs. Visitors would soon pick the reef clean if that were allowed, and the boatmen who took tourists out to dive were zealous protectors of the reef which furnished their livelihoods.
Boatmen in the second town rowed tourists out to view the colorful reef from glass bottomed boats. They assured patrons that watertight floatation compartments would keep the boat afloat even in the unlikely event that the glass panels set into the bottom broke.
Halfway to their fourth port the ship's wind talker listened to an emergency call via infrasound. As an air wizard Karel heard it too. A large passenger ferry had hit a reef and capsized, leaving its passengers floating in the water or stranded atop reefs and low skerries. Already the swells brought the water up to their shins, which meant that the reefs would be fully underwater at high tide. Two fishing boats nearby had taken aboard as many of the castaways as they could then sounded the alarm.
The mail packet was only a few miles away, the closest of any sizable vessel that might effect a rescue. The captain put on full sail and made her fly with the wind. Karel helped out by calling a jet of air to push her along though not too hard. He coordinated with the wind talker to keep from damaging the rigging. It was not long before they arrived and started collecting stranded passengers in their gig. Some active fellows and ladies swam out to the packet and clambered aboard via ropes thrown over the side. `
It looked like all was going well till a sailor spotted an ominous shape which had swum from the open ocean attracted by the commotion and slipped through the channel between two skerries. It could only be a mosasaur and a record size on at that. Sixty feet if it was an inch. And terribly close by. What to do?
Some of the stranded sailors and passengers drew knives, but hand held blades even those of frost giants were of little use in a confrontation with a sea monster. Oh a fifteen inch blade might wound it and cause it pain but it was too short to reach its vitals.
The captain and Svenson knew that sea monsters were hard to kill. The best non-magical method involved harpoon and lance which could penetrate to its heart or lungs, but such implements were never carried aboard a mail packet. He asked if the five expedition members could help.
Karel shook his head:
"I can't do much. A sun mirror is an area weapon and hard to focus on a point target, especially a moving one. As for an air blade, the monster will be upon them before I can firm one up. Besides a mosasaur's location in the depths is hard to judge because of refraction. Now I may not be able to kill it, but I can shield some of the stranded passengers."
Karel then formed a shield of hardened air fifty yards long and five high which he sank into the sea to keep the mosasaur from getting at the largest cluster of its intended victims. That still left plenty more potential victims swimming singly or in small groups or stranded on scattered skerries and rocks.
"Don't look at me." Jemsen said. I am an earth wizard. At best I can delve or rather sound the mosasaur's position in the depths to guide Karel's air blade if only he had time to firm one up."
Axel realized that time was too short to Jump more than a fraction of the stranded passengers. Anyway the packet ship was too small. Two hundred people, many of them giants, would never fit aboard a mail packet. He looked around for a better place to land what passengers he might save and gave vent to his frustration.
"Damnation!"
"If only Finn or Liam or Drew were around. Finn could blast it with lightning, Liam with white fire, and Drew could cut it to pieces with his steel discus or lift it high out of the water and let it fall from on high and smash itself on a skerry. But no, they had to go to a meeting. First the Dragon and now this. Is there some rule that says we have to keep running into monsters without our heavy hitters on hand?"
"I hardly think that's fair." Karel protested. "Jemsen and I are pretty heavy hitters in our own right. The problem is that here at sea we are out of our element, literally. My tutelary element is air and Jemsen's is earth. Liam is the water wizard in our group."
They had to watch helpless as the mosasaur snagged one of the swimmers and dragged it down. Blood darkened the waters. Soon the monster was back snatching one of a cluster of Frost Giants from atop a tiny reef. It did not get away entirely unscathed. The other giants stabbed and slashed at it as best they could.
Then Dylan spoke up.
"I sent out a telepathic call for dolphins to fight the sea monster. A pod of six answered my call. They are willing to battle their hereditary foe, but their echolocation has shown them that it is far larger than any monster they have ever tackled. Still they are willing to help if we could somehow wound it or disable it or slow it down, making their ramming tactics more likely to succeed."
"Ramming tactics?" Axel asked.
"Dolphins catch fish with their teeth, but those are small and would be useless against a mosasaur. Instead dolphins swim at top speed and ram their hard beaks into the sides of their foes and their gill arches if that is how they breathe. The impact from their momentum can tear up the insides of even the largest of sea creatures, even a monster like this one, and kill it by internal bleeding if nothing else.
"If only we had our bows." the twins cried. "We could shoot it with poisoned arrows."
"Fortunately, I did bring along my throwing stars." Sexton told them. "I never leave home without them. And these three with the red markings are coated with Aodh's potent venom. Now Dylan, can you have the dolphins drive or maybe lure the mosasaur so it swims along the side of the ship away from the stranded passengers?"
"Can do."
Two dolphins feinted at the mosasaur then darted away escorted by the others and led the sea monster on a chase at the surface which lead right by the side of the packet ship. Blessed with the strength of a Frost Giant and with enhanced speed and reflexes Sexton flung the throwing stars with such force as to bury them completely in the flesh of the monster. The poison dissolved in its blood and acted quickly. It wasn't nowhere near enough to kill the mosasaur but the pain was intense. The monster writhed and thrashed in agony.
That was the signal for the dolphins to close in and ram it repeatedly. The six members of the pod each hit it at least three times. One dolphin got a bit of his fluke bitten off but not enough to slow him down by much.
Within the hour fishing boats and other vessels arrived to take off the stranded travelers. The new arrivals all marveled at the gigantic mosasaur and wondered how it had been slain. One fishing boat threw part of its catch to the dolphins as a reward and to help them renew their strength after their prodigious exertions against the monster.
Dylan conveyed their thanks to the fishermen. Dolphins were intelligent creatures, air breathing mammals, not fish, and had always had friendly relations with the strange two-legged creatures with whom they shared their home waters. It was an infraction of the law punishable by a stiff fine to kill one even by accident and a serious crime to kill a dolphin deliberately. Their intelligence was why Dylan felt he had to ask the dolphins for help not compel it. Besides, beast master though he might be, he could never have coordinated the efforts of half a dozen unwilling conscripts. Nor did he have their fighting instincts and knowledge of how to battle sea monsters.
Captain Swenson paid two fishing boats to tow the monster to land where the flesh might rot and free up the skeleton for eventual display at the exhibit hall. He detailed two of his own sailors to stay with the carcass to maintain his claim then headed into port to deliver the passengers he had rescued. The twins made sketches of the monster knowing Drew would want them for his forthcoming book.
The grateful port captain readily accepted his claim on the mosasaur carcass and agreed to post a watch till Svenson got a crew there to flense the dead mosasaur and retrieve the skeleton. In time it was put up in center of the hall. Portraits of Dylan and Sexton sketched by the twins were prominently displayed. A second exhibit about the visit of the Corps of Discovery displayed portraits of all its members
All told, only eight passengers died by drowning and one sailor got crushed where the hull was stove in plus the two victims taken by the monster. Of the two hundred, almost two thirds were Frost Giants. On Svenson's nomination and to universal acclaim, Dylan and Madden Sexton were proclaimed Giant-Friends and given their blue tattoos.
Looking warmly at his protege, Sexton told him that he had made a fine start on a collection of capital letters all his own: Dylan of Reeling, Forest Ranger, Beast Master, and Giant-Friend. Dylan's eyes glistened. Sexton's respect and friendship had come to mean a whole lot to him.
"Lesson learned." Finn declared. "We all gotta stay in touch. When we separate by any distance, let's have Karel in one group and Liam in the other so they can send infrasound messages back and forth. And OK, maybe it did not matter this time the way things happened so fast, but Liam, forgot to hop Axel through a portal so he could Jump right to that spot from anywhere. Understand I am not try to single anyone out for fault. After action reports and briefings are not about blame but about lessons learned, Are you guys with me?"
Of course, when Finn put it that way how could they not be?
Chapter 3. The League of Independent Towns
For the return journey, instead of simply reversing course the Corps of Discovery flew southwest toward the League of Independent Towns. Anxious to get home and to find out what had happened in the war against the trolls while they were away, they stopped only long enough to rest and obtain supplies at one of the secluded vales of the Sylvan Elves, though not the one which Dylan hailed from. They were received cordially and much was made of them in their brief stay of only two days, but then it was time to push on.
The headed straight for the Leagues of Independent Towns, bypassing the lands in between. Finn persuaded the others to leave those regions for follow-up expeditions once an aviation infrastructure was in place.
The League of Independent Towns originated as an alliance formed to build trunk roads between the major towns strung out linearly for eight hundred miles. It started in a town north of the channeled scablands that impeded communications with the Commonwealth's new dominions in the Far West. In the east it ended at a turning circle in the town of Zeebring, a port on a canalized river just short of the Western Plains.
The headquarters of the League were in the town more or less in the middle called Waypoint. With twenty thousand in the urban area but twice that in rural areas, its population was about average for these towns. Like all the towns in the League its prosperity was built on trade, commerce, light manufactures, and providing services to outlying ranches and farms.
Rivaling the Commonwealth own trunk highways as a marvel of engineering the Trade Road had been laid along a properly surveyed course, abandoning the earlier haphazard routes and rights of way inherited from the past. Stone-paved and cambered for drainage, its main carriageway was flanked by footpaths, bridleways and drainage ditches. The road occasionally cut through hills or was carried by stone or timber bridges over rivers and ravines A few sections were supported on pilings to carry it over marshy ground.
The loosely organized League provided basic government services for the region including militia, law enforcement, and commercial courts. The timber palisades they had built around the easternmost towns had helped put an end to raids by the formerly predatory nomads of the Western Plains, which was now a land at peace under the tutelage of the Commonwealth.
The writ of the township governments ran not only in the towns proper but also into their surrounding agricultural lands. In those small but prosperous republics political factions made up of yeoman farmers vied with small ranchers and both contended for preeminence with factions of merchants, artisans, and workers in manufactories and service businesses in a lively but always non-violent wrangle of local politics.
The League had no army, only local militias and a small constabulary to patrol the roads and spot check that tolls had been paid. It helped that the League had no external threats on its borders nor any territorial ambitions of its own. No army had ever marched along the Great Trade Road. All of which inclined Finn to believe that they would fit in well with the Council's scheme for a Greater North Valentia Co-prosperity Sphere.
Coming in sight of the trade road from the northwest, the flyers turned and flew west following its course. All manner of travelers and conveyances moved along it. Those traveling by shank's mare kept to the footpaths while riders guided their mounts along the bridleways. The main roadways carried the heaviest traffic. Much of it was traditional freight wagons drawn by teams of horse or mules. Less common were the trains of four or five freight wagons linked in tandem and pushed down the highway by a fetcher seated up front. An aerodynamic cowl on the first wagon reduced wind resistance from the fast moving freight wagons. Stage coaches, many of them propelled by fetchers, provided passenger service and carried the mail.
Thanks to the ease of movement along pavement bicycles were ubiquitous not only on the trade road itself but also on the paved streets of the towns. Most riders worked the pedals, but many called on their magical gift, either telekinesis or mastery of magnetism, to move their bicycles along effortlessly and at high speed. Here too then as in the Commonwealth Eike's inventions had effected a revolution in personal transportation.
Too bad off road transport on land was still so difficult. At least they had autogyros which could set down virtually anywhere.
A little after noon the expedition arrived at Waypoint, the seat of government for the league. The crisp smell of the tree lined streets and the window boxes full of pretty flowers reminded them of the clean cities in the Commonwealth.
As their autogyros approached the town from the northeast the travelers were greeted by an extraordinary sight: a misshapen mud volcano two hundred feet high. Unlike an igneous volcano it produced no lava. Instead it continuously exuded a slurry made up of earth, hot water, and dissolved gasses. The temperature of its exudate was far below than that of lava though still fairly hot, about twenty degrees below boiling.
The stinky mud had spread over many hundreds of acres covering dozens of formerly prosperous truck farms and dairy operations. In time it might even encroach on the built up area of the town.
Finn had the autogyros settle onto the vacant fairgrounds north of the city. As his cohorts gathered around him Finn remarked that it looked like once again the Corps of Discovery might be in a position to help folks out of a jam. Before they took any action they had better clear it with the city fathers and mothers. The headquarters of the league could wait till later. Finn asked the boys to change out of their short shorts into their uniforms. Meeting with the city council was official business and they had better look the part. Time to make their fashion statement when they got back to the capital.
Liam reminded Finn that the first order of business was for him to create a portal for Axel to stop through. Once that was done they they took a side street that looked like it lead to the center of town.
At the next corner a comely youth with close cropped sandy hair got off a bicycle, took off a crash helmet, stripped off a pair of white silk shorts, and kicked off his sandals before stepping under a public outdoor shower to wash the salt and sweat off his now naked body. About Liam's height and with much the same build and with features that evidenced an admixture of elf blood in his ancestry, he had the slender physique of a bicycle racer: taut and tight and with virtually no body fat. His skin was glabrous and bronzed from constant exposure to the sun.
He went about his ablutions unselfconsciously lathering up with a bit of liquid soap, running his hands over his shoulders and along his corrugated chest and shapely limbs. Bending over to do his lower legs displayed the tightest set of buns any of them had ever seen. When his hands moved down to lave his manly parts, Dylan expressed the wish that it were his own hands that were doing the honors.
After rinsing off the boy stepped back toward his bicycle but did not mount, ostensibly waiting for the sun and the breeze to dry him off but really just as much to pose his exquisite body for lustful males to ogle.
Finn stepped up to him and asked:
"Excuse me son, but while we are waiting for a circle of admirers to gather around you, could you tell me the way to city hall?"
The boy came back with:
"Is that the real reason you are chatting me up, Big Boy, or do you fancy me for a tumble? I ask only since so many do, and you are not the first to use that line or one very like it."
"Actually we are not from around here, so we really don't know our way around. Perhaps you spotted our autogyros overhead just now?"
"That was you guys? Cool! Listen my name is Petr, Petr Shoskov. I am a messenger boy for the heliograph service. That's our logo."
The logo on both sides of the crash helmet featured a silhouette of a slender youth pedaling a stylized bicycle with speed lines to suggest fast motion. The unbroken lines of the youth's silhouette suggested he was nude but in fact all the messenger boys wore the hip-hugging mid-thigh length bicycle shorts which were becoming increasing popular as protection against chafing.
"Anyway what should I call you, stranger?"
"Finn Ragnarson."
"No way! Can you really be The Finn Ragnarson? And is that hammer really Mjolnir the Mountain Crusher"
Axel nudged Drew and predicted: "Here he goes again."
But Finn simply answered: "Yes to both questions."
"Wow! Wait till the other guys hear about this!"
"And city hall?"
"Right. Go straight for a block, turn left and its two streets down. Look for the red brick building with the clock tower."
"Thanks."
And with that, Finn hauled off and gave the kid the big kiss he was obviously angling for, leaving the messenger boy with even more of a story to tell the other guys.
Chapter 4. Mud Volcano
At city hall Mayor Evan Thorn and the men and women of the town council greeted their celebrated visitors warmly. Everyone had read of the exploits of Finn Ragnarson, the famous twins Jemsen and Karel, the war correspondent, author, and soldier Drew Altair, and Sir Liam, the intrepid war wizard who had won the Commonwealth's two top medals for valor. Just recently they had read of the exploits of the cute copper topped war mage cum Jumper Axel Wilde in Corwin Klarendes' reports from the battlefields of Amazonia.
Madden Sexton and Dylan were unknown, but from what the others told them of their exploits particularly against the mosasaur were also worthy of admiration.
So they officials looked on the famous visitors with hope. Could these intrepid aviators offer some solution to their intractable problem?
"What is it you think you can do for us, Sir Finn?" the mayor asked, granting him the courtesy title as a measure of respect.
"Sir Jemsen is a powerful earth wizard. He already has an idea of how to proceed so I will let him explain it."
"It's Sir Liam's idea as much as my own. Now the tectonic forces that are forcing the hot water to the surface to create the mud volcano are too powerful to contain. We must provide an outlet, but one which no longer destroys farmland or threatens the town."
"Here is what we must do. With earth magic I can redirect the eruption to the north away from the built up area. Sir Liam and I will lay out a channel from which I will clear the recent overburden of mud plus the soil beneath. Then Sir Liam will blast a wide channel deep into the bed rock leading to the lip of the escarpment. Finally he will blast an exit at the base of the northern face of the volcano to direct all future eruptions into the drainage channel, if I may call it that. That will provide a permanent remedy to your problem."
"Sounds like a plan." Finn approved.
Mayor Thorn added:
"Then go ahead with it. Don't worry about the land at the foot of the the escarpment. It is very lightly populated. The town will compensate those who will have to pick up stakes, and we'll have them cleared out by tomorrow noon."
Liam and and the twins went to survey the mud volcano and surrounding mud pit while the others headed over to the inn Mayor Thorn had recommended. On the way they spotted Petr Shoskov who was engaged in a lively discussion with four other off-duty bicycle messengers two still sporting their crash helmets though pushed back jauntily on the crown of their heads. It seems Petr was being razzed for claiming to have met the great Finn Ragnarson and even gotten a kiss from him.
They all looked up in surprise as Finn boomed a friendly greeting to Petr.
"Hi there Petr! I am so glad we ran into you again. As you might guess we are heading over to our lodgings. We'd love to have you join us for dinner and to spend the evening together. Do you think you can make it?"
"And how! Where and when?"
Finn told him and added that Petr would want to put on something nice then ruffled his hair affectionately before heading over to their accommodations leaving Petr to bask in the admiration of his friends.
Petr did put on something nice: loose drawstring trews of green silk worn low at the hips, moccasins, and a buckskin vest nearly the color of his sun bronzed skin. Small and lacking buttons or ties, the vest was more a fashion accessory than a garment, barely covering his pectorals and leaving his midriff bare. Somehow the outfit managed to look both classy and sexy at the same time.
"Yum, yum." Liam remarked as the messenger boy arrived.
"Just remember Liam, that I saw him first." Finn reminded the young war wizard, then made the introductions. Young Petr was impressed. He never expected to find himself in such famous company. Mostly he listened as Finn and the others related their recent encounters with the raptors of the Stone Ring, the dragon of the Cave of the Mountain River, and the mosasaur of the Northern Ocean.
"Gosh, if only I could go on adventures like that." Petr finally said.
Sexton shrugged:
"You are only seventeen and with your admixture of elven blood can look forward to a two or three centuries of youth and health and beauty. Just be ready when opportunity knocks."
"Ready, yes, but how do I prepare? I am hoping for a major gift to manifest itself. Right now all I have is my gift of Unerring Direction. It's a job requirement for all of us messenger boys. The street grid here in town is laid out logically enough, but there is no logic to the web of farm-to-market roads, byways, and footpaths in the rural areas."
"Do you like your job then? Karel asked"
It's fine as far as it goes. I like being outdoors and riding all over rather than being stuck inside one place like clerking in a shop or working in a manufactory. And all that exercise hones my physique so I am in really good shape."
"So we noticed." Drew said dryly.
"You're supposed too. We messenger boys are hired for good looks and hard bodies as much as other qualifications like a sense of unerring direction. Our looks draw attention not only to ourselves but to the heliograph service itself."
"Now sometimes customers are too attentive, if you take my meaning. So we have to politely decline invitations and offers to dally. Actually some boys do make arrangements to come by later, but not me. Sure I like the attention I get from young guys, and I enjoy an active social life, but I don't work as a rent boy on the side."
"Oh and twice I week I work half days as a messenger and spend the afternoons fixing bicycles. I am handy with tools, and I do a bit of tinkering too. Like the squirter I attached to my down tube. When dogs chase me I pull on a cord and spray a solution of hot pepper toward the road. The smell irritates the noses and eyes of dogs but doesn't harm them. Some of the other guys can snap electrum sparks to keep rambunctious dogs at bay, but not me. I'd love to get a close look at your autogyros, if that is OK."
"As the expedition's mechanic," Axel began, "I'll be happy to show you how they are built. I have to pull preventive maintenance on the machines anyway before we set out on the final leg of our journey. Besides, one of the rotor bearings is running hot. Would you like to help me fix it?"
"Definitely. Where and when shall we meet?"
"Well, I could just knock on Finn's door in the morning, to make sure you guys are up and about..."
"Is it that obvious?"
The grins Petr saw all around answered that question.
The next morning Petr and Finn might well have slept in late to recover from their exertions, but Axel's knock got the pair up in time for morning ablutions. Then they joined everyone for a big breakfast, which in Petr's case consisted of a sausage and cheese omelet with bacon strips and hash brown potatoes plus three big red strawberries as a color accent. And kaffay of course.
Jemsen mentioned that that he had flagged down another messenger boy and told him that Petr would not be coming in to work. He was spending the day with them.
"With me mostly," Axel pointed out as they finished up and headed over to where the autogyros were parked. Petr slipped out of his garments so they wouldn't get dirty and wore just a shop apron Axel lent him. That left his rump bare displaying the tattle-tale finger marks Finn had left as he held on while pronging the boy.
"Finn didn't hurt me, you understand. For all his tremendous strength Finn is a careful, gentle, and caring lover. I was never afraid he might hurt me unintentionally, though he did grip my rump pretty firmly, hence the bruises."
"Proof positive for any skeptics among your friends."
"My thought exactly."
Petr and Axel worked side by side, checking for cracks, lubricating, and adjusting the three machines. They tightened bolts and patched a small hole in the fuselage. The reason the main rotor bearing of Liam's machine was running hot was grit that had got into the housing for the ball bearings. These had to be removed, cleaned with a solvent, greased, and packed back in.
"You have a good feel for things mechanical, Petr. No wonder people bring their bicycles for you to fix. Where do you get your spare parts?"
"I order them from the manufactory two towns over which assembles the vehicles from a locally sourced frame, seat, handle bars and so forth married up with wire wheels and drive train imported from the Commonwealth."
"They build them in three sizes: regular frame for humans and elves, small frame for children and dwarves, and big framed tricycles for giants. Three wheels all the same size are a better way to carry the the heavy weight of a giant. The wheels are in the delta configuration with one wheel up front and two in back just behind and under the saddle."
"Makes sense." Axel nodded then went on to say:
"One of the goals of our expedition was to set up aviation routes across North Valentia. The northern terminus is to be on the ocean at Nordstrand. If Finn can persuade the League government, your town of Waypoint will be the western terminus and later a jumping off point for further expeditions to extend the air routes. What I am saying is that you might have a future in aviation, in the maintenance end of the business. Are you interested?"
"So it would like working on bicycles only autogyros?" Petr asked.
"Yes, except it is much more fun taking an autogyro up for a test spin than taking a bicycle out on the road for a test run. As a prospective crew chief, you would travel to the Commonwealth capital for training then fly back with the first consignment of aerocraft which will be dedicated to carrying air mail and light parcels."
"In competition with the heliograph and infrasound lines, you mean."
"A slower alternative, but at a reduced price yet faster than a mail coach. The postal service in the Commonwealth moves mail three different ways: surface mail by coach is the slowest but the cheapest. Heliograph and infrasound are the fastest and most expensive. Air mail is in between for both cost and speed. The three mode are complementary. Don't worry that you might be putting your friends out of business. That won't happen."
"Then count me in."
With the maintenance work done Axel and Petr cleaned up then walked over to see what was happening at the mud volcano.
Jemsen had delved the entire muddy area and located the best place to breach the volcano and to construct the drainage channel. Given the all clear signal from the area below the escarpment, Jemsen invoked earth magic. Fists clenched and raised and muscles tensed he heaved the slurry of earth and water aside all the way down to bed rock raising his fists to the sky.
Strictly speaking such gestures were unnecessary. The exercise of magical powers was an act of will, but all magic users gestured either for dramatic effect or as an aid to concentration. Drew's trademark shadow boxing technique when whirling his steel spheres around was a prime example of the latter.
Liam stepped forward then pointed to aim blasts of white fire slanting downward which gouged a deep channel into the rock. When Jemsen released the slurry along the sides, it dropped into the channel and flowed over the edge. Then Jemsen blasted the vent in the side of the volcano, almost getting scalded by the sudden release of pent up hot gasses, but Karel was ready for that and pushed the hot gasses aside with a jet of air.
In minutes the mud volcano that had threatened the town was rendered harmless. In time it would become an amenity as enterprising townsfolk touted the therapeutic effects of the mud and went into business offering lodgings, mud baths, massage, beauty treatments, and so on.
Having dealt with the town's problem the Corps of Discovery then sought out the League officials who turned out to be receptive to the proposal for air services with the Commonwealth. The extension of aviation services to the Northlands was a project that practically sold itself. The officials recognized the value of air mail both in the towns strung along the Trade Road, with the other lands in Northern Valentia, and with the Commonwealth. The proprietor of the local news-paper was particularly enthusiastic.
"Thanks to movable type technology licensed from the Altair family firm we have the most modern printing plant in the North. The weekly print run for our news-paper is only part of it. We also publish a varied line of books including reprints of those field guides which you twins write. And yes, as a condition of the license we do pay royalties. The League is the only jurisdiction outside the Commonwealth to do so, I might point out."
"Unfortunately the foreign news is stale by the time it reaches us. Much of our international reporting is three weeks out of date. That is how long it takes horse-drawn freight wagons to cross the Western Plains carrying news-papers from the Commonwealth which print news gathered by the Press Association of Valentia. I look forward to the day when autogyros will bring us the latest news within a day."
"And then who knows what might develop in the decades to come. What I would like most of all is a link to that projected heliograph line running north from the Commonwealth to Nordstrand."
The League was especially proud of its line of communications towers erected on heights twenty-five or thirty miles apart. It was the first dual line anywhere to employ both heliograph and infrasound messaging for when clouds obscured the sun.
The newspaper man enthused:
"Our traders look forward to the the day a road or even an iron-road is built across the Western Plains to link our own Great Trade Road to the Commonwealth's network of trunk highways. A new age is dawning, the modern age, and we in the League will be part of it!"
From the League officials they learned that every town specialized in some product or commodity taking advantage of local resources like soils, mineral deposits, microclimate, or clusters of skills and trades. That generated much of the exchange of goods along the trade road. Spices from one town, tea from another, raisins and figs, dried fruit, wheat flour, light manufactures like shoes, pottery, brass fittings. All were traded along the road.
The next few days were a whirlwind of activity. First came a celebratory dinner with officials of both town and league. Next the twins obtained a complete set of road and town maps from the League's cartographic office for eventual incorporation in their line of guides for commercial travelers.
Finn and Petr carried on their summer romance which included joy rides in Finn's autogyro to several towns farther west and to scenic spots in between for picnic lunches, long talks, and al fresco love making. Finn was glad that Petr was not just a pretty face set atop a fabulous body. He was just as gifted in the brains department. Who knew where that natural gift might take him? Look how far Eike's natural talents carried him before his magical gift manifested.
For Petr this interlude with Finn was the happiest episode in his hum drum existence. That was why he looked forward to becoming an autogyro mechanic not only in Waypoint but possibly on a future expedition with his new friends. Like all teenage youths he liked to imagine himself the hero of grand adventures. Who better to share them with than Finn and his companions, good people one and all?
Drew went by the offices of the news-paper to talk with fellow journalists. They were glad to welcome a scion of the Altair family who supplied the technology of printing by moveable type. Though the technology itself was in the public domain, the Altairs held a commanding position in the business of supplying the wherewithal to set up a printing business.
Later Drew and Liam rode along with their fellow fetchers on one of the tandem lines of freight wagons called wagon trains. Even without teams of horses to drive the fetchers who propelled the trains were still called teamsters. That pleased Liam who had started out as a teamster driving a stage coach in New Varangia which carried both passengers and mail.
The wagon trains had been inspired by the iron roads in the Commonwealth though its foreign wagons were much smaller than those on the iron roads. The trade road did not transport bulk cargoes like iron ore, coal, or phosphate rock for fertilizer. Its wagons had the same overall dimensions of a horse drawn wagon but with a lower bed to facilitate loading of shipping crates of uniform size.
Wagon trains were twice as fast and more efficient than hauling with animal drayage, requiring but a pair of fetchers instead of four of five teamsters plus as many teams of horses plus replacements. Horses could be temperamental or get sick from colic, and the feed bill for thirty horses added up fast, not to mention that wagon trains propelled by fetchers left no mess on the roads. Wagon trains were the future of freight transportation along the Great Trade Road.
Drew wondered how maneuverable the wagon trains were, thinking it must be hard to back up a wagon train, but his interlocutor pointed out that all he had to do to reverse direction for the return journey was to jump off the lead wagon, walk to the back, hop on, then push the other way.
Wagon trains ran between freight depots located right off the trade road and never had to thread their way through narrow town streets. At the depot they would unhook the wagons and roll them to the loading dock one at a time. Loads were never loose cargo. Goods were always packed in standard crates which made for fast loading and unloading, whether with winches or the telekinetic gift of fetchers.
The real problem with the big wagon trains was braking to a halt. Getting the train rolling required both fetchers to overcome inertia but only one at a time to keep in moving against rolling resistance and air resistance, but stopping meant countering the frightful momentum of four or five heavily laden wagons rolling down a road at twenty-five miles per hour. It took a combination of hydraulic and telekinetic braking to bring the train to a gradual halt.
With the others engaged elsewhere Axel, Dylan, and Sexton were free to stroll around town, to sample local cuisine, to visit the barber for a long overdue cut, to attend a couple of brass band concerts in a local park, and to browse the book stores and shops.
On the morning of their departure, the Corps took leave of Petr assuring him that when the time came Axel would Jump him to the capital for training as an autogyro mechanic. Then they took off heading for the Hot Lands to rendezvous with Raqqub and Kyle and their friends who by now would have prepared their business plan for aviation services in the Northlands.
The districts the travelers passed over were increasingly drier than those near Waypoint. In those more easterly regions the rains were less frequent and fitful, often tapering off disappointingly soon after a brief shower. Bustling towns, lush farms and fields, vineyards and woodlots gave way to ranches and pastures dotted with patches of scrub and gallery forest along the streams. Finally the paved trade road came to its terminus in the turning circle at Zeebring.
Flying over the Hot Lands they could still see signs of the devastation inflicted by the locust plague months earlier though Nature was quickly healing those wounds. At the oasis of Amity all went well. Raqqub and Kyle and devised a sound business plan. All that remained then was to fly them to the capital and to order the machines, tools, and spare parts the budding aviation entrepreneurs would need to start aviation services all the way to Nordstrand on the ocean and to Waypoint in the League.
The members of the Corps of Discovery were eager to find out what had happened while they were away. At the capital they learned from Corwin Klarendes of the climactic battles in the Troll War which had ended not merely in total victory but in an apocalypse.
But that is another story.
Author's Note
This story is entirely fictional, with no resemblance intended to any person living or dead.
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This story is one of an occasional series about the further adventures of the characters introduced in the fantasy novel 'Elf-Boy and Friends' and published by Nifty Archive. The chief protagonist of the novel, Dahlderon, elf-boy and druid, will appear in these stories in a supporting rather than starring role. Each story in the sequence stands on its own, with the focus on one or a few of the original characters.
Readers who like these stories might want to try my two series 'Daphne Boy' and 'Naked Prey' in the Gay/Historical section of the Archive. My 'Jungle Boy' series of Hollywood tales is posted in the Gay/Authoritarian section. The recent series 'Andrew Jackson High' relates the trials and tribulations of five of its gay students. For links to these and other stories, look on the list of Prolific Authors on the Archive.