Pirates of the Archipelago, Part Sixteen
Annie and the foys meet. It was never going to be easy...



Pirates of the Archipelago

Part Sixteen

I stood up and put my hands on my hips. 'Me! I'll go first!'

The locator sighed. 'Go on then, Annie.'

I had a quick think. 'Who am I talking to?'

'Everyone who is here.'

'Even the foys?'

'Especially the foys.'

'Will they understand me?'

'The real question is, will you understand them?'

'I don't speak foy.'

'Then I will translate for you.'

I drew a deep breath. 'OK. Number one; why am I here?'

'I led you here.'

'And why did you do that?'

'It seemed like a good idea at the time.'

'Locator! Stop trying to be funny. It doesn't suit you.'

'Sorry.'

'What I mean is, why aren't I inside a foy's stomachs? Why haven't they killed and eaten Roy and me?'

'Because I asked them not to.'

You asked them not to? What the hell? Suddenly I felt cold all over.

'Were you with my Dad when the foy killed him?'

'Yes.'

I paused. 'And could you have asked it not to kill him?'

'Annie...'

'Could you?'

'Yes, I suppose I could.'

'Did you?'

'No, I didn't.'

'Why not?'

'I can't say.'

'Coward! I don't believe you!'

'I'm sorry.'

'Oh. You're sorry, are you?'

'Yes, I am. But Annie...'

'What?'

'Alastair McLuskie is dead, and I wish he weren't. But you're still alive.'

'For now I am. All right, let's talk to the foys. But this isn't over. You just remember that.'

'I will.'

'I've got a score to settle with you.'

'Yes, I know. But not now.'

'OK.' I stood up as straight as I could and addressed the nearest foy. 'Why are you here?'

There was a pause and then, in some way I don't understand, the foy replied. It spoke English and the sound seemed to come from its mouth but I knew both those things were impossible. Foys didn't know English and their mouths were the wrong shape to form human speech. All the same, it spoke, and I heard and understood it.

'Why should we not be here?'

'No reason, I suppose. But what I mean is this; why have you brought Roy and me to this place? Do you want to kill us?'

'We kill when we need to, or as we desire.'

'Desire? You like killing?'

'It is not a question of liking.'

This wasn't going anywhere. I tried again. 'Is there a purpose for this meeting? Locator, did you call us together?'

The locator's voice, but different - high and starlit - floated across the empty spaces of the cavern. 'Yes, I did.'

High and starlit... Wait a minute… I had a sudden revelation. 'You're the 'Down, aren't you? You're speaking through the locator, channelling yourself. That's right, isn't it?'

'That is correct.'

So... Ten foys, two humans (one unconscious), and the 'Down. This was serious. This was more than just a question of whether Roy and I would make a nice snack for an overgrown fish. This was big...

I walked down the underground beach to the shoreline and sat down. The pillar of light from the locator was behind me now, casting my shadow across the water to where the foys waited, twitching their tails occasionally and breathing like a thousand snoring men. I folded my arms around my knees.

'All right. This is some kind of summit meeting. Very political. But look, I'm just an ordinary girl. I'm not especially bright or rich, and I'm certainly not political. If you want someone like that that you'll have to wake my friend Roy and talk to him instead.'

'Yes, that is true,' said a foy. 'She amounts to very little.'

'Nevertheless,' the 'Down replied, 'this girl is the human who is here now. I did not choose her; she left the Inner Sea of her own accord. But I am not dissatisfied that she is with us today. She is spirited, loyal and brave and she will make as good a representative of humanity as anyone I could have chosen.'

And in a confidential tone that I am sure only I could hear, the 'Down added, 'Don't worry, Annie. Just be yourself and it'll all work out fine.'

Still; a representative of humanity... I would have to be careful. 'Thank you. Now, if the 'Down would care to lead off?'

'Introductions first. I am the sailing ship Whistledown, presently in equatorial orbit above the world of Glory. I am speaking to you via my network of satellites and I apologise for any lag in my responses which may be caused by inevitable comms latencies.'

'I am Deepdiver Farswimmer Brightwater Icecracker Thrarn of the Gulf of Basrum. I will speak for my comrades here today.'

My turn. 'I'm Annalisa McLuskie. I live in the village of Parrolindon on Leaven Peak in the Ringland of Leaven. Whatever the 'Down may claim, I can really only speak for myself, my family and my neighbours.'

'Thank you, Deepdiver and Annie. This morning's meeting has only one item up for discussion and that is the coming of the Great Tide and its effects on human-foy relations.'

The foy spoke. 'Yet another of these pointless get-togethers, ship. We have no relations with humans and we welcome the coming of the next Great Tide. What is there to discuss?'

'You speak, with respect, as one who buries his head beneath a sargasso. The humans are here. They have been here for nearly a hundred thousand revolutions of Glory. You cannot continue to ignore them or, worse, antagonise them.'

'Why not? We own the oceans. They are our natural home. We defend our home, as is our right. If humans try to invade our home again, we kill them and destroy their flimsy vessels. Why should we not?'

The other foys shook their heads and thrashed their tails, creating waves that threatened to wash over me where I sat at the water's edge. I refused to move.

'What about the lands? Are they your natural home too? Do you claim them?'

'We do not care about the lands. They are insignificant. If you humans wish to squat on them that is no concern of ours, except when you befoul the waters that encircle them with your filth or steal the bodies of our demised comrades for your own revolting purposes.'

The creature was referring to Edge, I supposed, where the bodies of dead foys were harvested by the dwellers in Stilt Town and processed in the factories of the city of Shore. I had a thought.

'What about the aeroforms? Why aren't any of them here today?'

The 'Down answered. 'They are gentle beings, Annie, and although they have been affected by the coming of humanity to Glory, they are not in conflict with us and they will not be threatened by the Great Tide.'

The foys snorted and I wondered if they were laughing. They obviously didn't have much regard for the 'forms.

'All the same, I wish they were here.'

'You do? You know, do you not, that they avoid the lands because they fear the whirling blades of your windmills and the sharp beaks and gripping talons of the flying creatures you brought here with you? They are no friends of yours, human.'

My boat was named Albatross. What could I say?

The foy turned away. 'This gathering is without value. We will not kill you, small one, because you are not worth the trouble. You and your flying ship mean no more to us than the lightest of breezes or the mildest of currents. You cannot harm us, and when the Great Tide comes you will be swept from our world and your wreckage will sink to the bottom of the sea and be forgotten. That is all there is to be said. We are leaving now.'

'So soon? When we were just getting to know each other?'

'Hush, Annie. Foys, I will not let you go yet. If you try to escape to the open sea I will beam you. Watch!'

The 'Down spoke in my inner ear, 'Cover your eyes!' I bent forward, and put my hands over my face. With a hissing roar that nearly deafened me and an eruption of light that came close to blinding me, protected as I was, the inside of the cavern lit up like a flashtube. It pulsed twice and then ceased. 'OK,' the 'Down said. 'You can open them now.' I looked up. On the far side of the cave, moving in slow motion, a piece of rock the size of a house was falling from the roof. It struck the water with a mighty splash, and I jumped up and ran back to avoid being soaked by the waves it created. The air shook with the impact, but also with the cries of the foys; keening wails of agony. Their eyes had not been shielded as mine were.

'Now,' said the sweet voice of the 'Down. 'Shall we talk?'



'You know, 'Down,' I said, when we had all settled again and the foys had recovered their eyesight. 'You puzzle me.'

'I do?'

'You claim to be the Guardian of humanity…'

'I am.'

'And you have powerful weapons that you can use whenever you like. Your lasers helped build the barrages on the Ring, didn't they?'

'Yes, they did.'

'So why, when the early settlers tried to sail across the oceans from one land to another and the foys attacked their ships and sank them; why didn't you beam the foys the way you just beamed that rock?'

'Ride shotgun, you mean?'

'I suppose so.'

'Because there would have been no end to it. For every foy I killed, two would have taken its place, and I would have had to kill them as well.'

'But surely the foys would have learned to keep clear of our ships? Wouldn't you?'

'Our waters are our waters,' said the foy. 'Have you not been listening? They are our home and we will defend them to the last calf. We are not afraid of death and we are not intimidated by you or your weapons.'

The 'Down continued. 'The killing would not have ended until every foy was dead and the oceans stank with their bodies. The sea would have died with them and this world would have been ruined. Humanity lost the Earth; did it have to lose Glory too?'

'So you wouldn't save our sailors. You looked away as our ships sank and their crews died, just as you did when my Dad was murdered.'

'It's not as simple as you think.'

All the resentment I was feeling boiled over and I exploded with anger. 'Don't you dare talk to me like that! You... machine! You don't know anything! You're made of metal. You're a robot, you're not a person, you're not flesh and blood. You're worse than the foys, you're a… a ~*pineapples*~ piece of tin!' I went on like this for several minutes. It's only since that I've wondered how I had the cheek to bawl out the 'Down the way I did. It must have been my spirit, as the ship put it.

'All right,' I said after I'd cooled down. 'I'm too stupid to understand why the so-called Guardian of humanity can't, or won't, do her job. Like I told you before, ship, this isn't over, get it? So let's see if there's something I can understand. What's this Great Tide you and your fishy friends know all about?'

'It's not only us, you know,' said the 'Down. Humanity knows too.'

'I've never heard of it, and last time I looked I was a human.'

'It is sometimes called the Doom. But Annie, it's not up to me how humanity uses the knowledge it possesses or who it chooses to pass it on to.'

'You mean it's a secret?'

'Yes, I believe it is.'

'And do I get to hear this secret? I think I should, me being the representative of humanity and all.'

'The small one is right.'

'Very well. Taking the technical and maths stuff out of it, every few years the orbit of Glory wobbles and realigns itself. When this happens the world experiences enormous tides, tens of miles high. It's like when you shake a cup of coffee and waves ripple across its surface.'

'And these waves drown the lands?'

'Yes, they do.'

'Is that why the first landers found only grass and lichen and bare rock? Because the last Great Tide had washed everything else away?'

'It is.'

'Hmmm. You said this happens every few years. How much is "every few"? We've been on Glory for over five hundred years and there's never been a Great Tide. I'd have noticed it.'

'It varies. The orbital mechanics involved are complex and chaotic. Basically, Annie, it's impossible to predict. The Great Tide could come next year, or in ten years', a hundred years' or a thousand years' time.'

'And when it comes, you humans will be no more than foam resting on the surface.'

'But hold on... 'Down, you could look after us while all this was going on. We could fly up to you and wait for the tide to settle down again.'

'I can support no more than ten thousand people. The present population of Glory is five hundred and sixty five thousand, four hundred and seventy two and it is still growing. I could save but one in every fifty of you; and who would choose them?'

'Oh, I get it. That's why I don't know anything about this Great Tide. I'm not on the list, am I? Me and my family and my friends; we're going to be left behind, aren't we?'

'It's not my decision. I simply don't know. I think the Board will decide who goes and who stays.'

I fell silent. Was everything I thought I knew about the world wrong? I'd thought the foys were dumb beasts; it turned out they were intelligent. I'd thought the 'Down was all-seeing, but now she admitted there were gaps in her knowledge. I'd thought the members of the Board acted as the arbiters of disputes between the lands, but really they were only out to look after themselves. And I'd thought my world was safe; but actually I could be wiped out at any time by a cataclysm that was completely beyond my control. I felt sick and despairing and I sat on the beach and held my head in my hands.

'Courage,' whispered the 'Down. 'Do not give up hope.'

I crept back to Albatross and sat next to Roy. I took his hand - so pale - in mine. It was warm, and he was breathing slowly but steadily, but I could not rouse him. How I wished I could talk to him now! I felt so completely out of my depth with the 'Down and the foys. Me, little Annie. Some representative I was.

I leaned against Albatross's hull and sighed, feeling her comforting solidity at my back. My boat - at least I still had her. She had never let me down. Even when we had made our terrible leap from the barrage to the open sea below she had been strong and staunch and reliable. My Dad was dead, Roy had withdrawn into this strange trance and the 'Down seemed not to be concerned with my fate, but Albatross had stood by me and would be on my side whatever befell us. She was my truest friend and if I were to say anything to this meeting it would have to be about her and what she meant to me, even though she might be no more than an inanimate piece of wood, metal and fibre.

I stood up and faced the water where the foys waited.

'Deepdiver Farswimmer Brightwater Icecracker Thrarn of the Gulf of Basrum, may I call you Deep for short?'

The foy inclined his head.

'Thank you. Now look, Deep, I'm just a silly little pirate girl. I don't know anything about nothing. Not economics, not politics, not war, not diplomacy, not science, not books. I'm pretty thick really. I get terrible grades at school. But what I do know is this; I know what I love.

'I love the rays of the Blessèd sun when it rises behind the Ring in the morning and when it disappears in the evening and when it glitters on the waters of the Inner Sea in the mid-day. I love my village of Parrolindon, and my little house and its back yard and my Mum and even my baby brother Emmy. I love dancing. I love my friends. I love my beautiful land of Leaven, with its white towns and green plantations. I love the shade between the trees and the lustre of the sands and the grey rock at the summit of the Peak. I love the smell of the morning breeze and the warmth of the harbour wall in the afternoon. I love the shining silver Board ships when they come in to land and I love the flashing beacon of the 'Down flying overhead. I love the rain in the afternoon and the fresh air it leaves behind it. I love the feel of the Blessèd sun on my bare skin, the way it makes it glow and shimmer. I love to see the worlds in the sky; Hally, Sally and our moon.

'I love my world of Glory, everything about it.

'But beyond all these loves is one special love that's even more important to me, and that is the sea. The sea, and my Albatross. You know, before I ever had a boat of my own I used to sit at the end of the jetty on the front at Parrolindon and look at the sea. Just look at it, watching it move and change colour, admiring its smoothness when it was calm and the way the spume dashed from the wave crests when the wind was up. I spent hours there. I still do. When I was only ten I'd take the tram to Porth Leaven whenever I could and cadge a place on a fishing boat. Everyone there knew me. I expect they called me every name under the Blessèd sun when I wasn't there to hear them, but they were always very kind to me. I'm sure they used to get a message back to my parents to let them know I was safe, because although my Mum or my Dad told me off something rotten when I got home they were never really cross with me, so they must have known I was all right.

'I think those fishermen and those sailors must have seen it in me, almost before I knew it myself; that love I'm talking about. I'm not sure I know how to express it to you and your comrades, Deep, but I don't think I need to. You see, I believe you know all about it already. I believe you have it too.

'I'm right, aren't I? Don't you love the sea as well? Isn't it your whole world?'

There was a long pause. Then Deep spoke:

'The sea is our world, for Glory is the sea and the sea is Glory. You speak of your love for the sea, Annie, and I believe that you are sincere. But you have seen so little of it. I have told you my name; Deepdiver Farswimmer Brightwater Icecracker. I am Deepdiver, because I know the profoundest depths of the oceans, the dark places where the smoke-plumes fountain and the tube-worms live. I am Farswimmer, because there is no latitude of Glory that I have not explored, no coast I have not traced and no current that I have not followed. I am Brightwater, because at the rising of the sun I am there; I leap the waves and the plumes of spray I create in my flight are more brilliant than the dawn. And I am Icecracker, for I have burrowed beneath the polar caps and not feared their weight.

'I have many more names that I have not told you, machine, or you, small human. They proclaim my strength, my passion and my skill. And yet in all the syllables that make up my name and tell my life-story, there is no mention of love. That is strange indeed.'

Deep stopped speaking, and his head fell almost to the level of the water. His eyes closed. There was no sound. Even the foys' stertorous breathing seemed to have slowed and quieted to a low rumble.

An age passed. Neither the 'Down nor I dared to make any movement or speak any words, even to one another. The tension within the cavern was like a fog or some more solid thing, like a fishing net or a hanging growth of seaweed. It seemed to occupy the whole vastness of the enclosed space, obscuring the view, absorbing the light and damping all vibrations. We waited wrapped in coils of anticipation, unable to move.

Then the huge creature stirred and raised his head once more.

'Annalisa... What is it that you ask? What do you want of my comrades and me?'

'I ask for nothing but the right to sail the boat I love on the open seas of Glory.'

'That is all?'

'Just that.'

'And you think we could easily grant you that right?'

'I think you owe it to me.'

'You do not know what you ask.'

'Oh yes, I do.'

'Where you lead others will follow. We will lose our oceans for ever.'

'You will lose nothing,' said the 'Down. 'You will gain everything. Think about it.'

'We have thought about it in the past, and we have always rejected it.'

'But now...?'

There was another long pause. Then:

'Very well. I have listened to what this girl has said and it has affected me far more than I had expected. I am going to take a chance which I hope I will not regret.

‘I agree. I agree now, and I declare it here and now that the human Annalisa McLuskie of the village of Parrolindon on the land of Leaven Peak is granted the freedom of the seas of Glory, together with the members of the crew of her vessel. This is an exclusive right and it does not extend to any ship which she does not command. This freedom may be withdrawn at any time if she abuses it.'

'But what about my friends? What about Roy?' I pointed to my unconscious companion.

'Don't push your luck!' murmured the 'Down.

'It will be as I have said. It will be your exclusive right, granted as a token of our shared love. I will make sure that every one of my comrades knows of this.'

'I'd give it a month or two if I were you,' the 'Down added softly.

'I have spoken. But now the tide is ebbing. I have no wish to be trapped here in dismal confinement for a whole day and neither have my comrades. We will depart now. Do we have your permission to leave, ship?'

'You have my permission. Farewell.'

'Goodbye Deep!' I said.

'Goodbye to you, Annalisa McLuskie. I hope one day soon we will meet again. I have much to show you of the wonders of our oceans. Until then, be safe.'

'You too. Swim well.'

With an immense commotion the foys turned and swam towards the fissure by which they had entered the cavern. The gap between the water's surface and the top of the passage was larger than it had been when we first came here and I wondered if there would be enough draught for the foys to make their exit.

'Don't worry,' said the 'Down. 'They'll be OK.'

I watched as the Beasts dived into the passageway and swam away. Deep was last, and as he went he raised his tail and slapped it against the water in a farewell gesture. I waved back, unseen.

'Good. Now, what about us? Shall we follow them?'

'No, there is another way we must take. But look, first you'd better get Albatross afloat again.'

Good grief, yes. I hauled Roy away from the side my boat and then, with a great deal of bone-cracking and heaving I managed to lift and slide her down the beach and into the water. I sat next to the boy and panted like a dog until I got my breath back. Then I hoisted him over the side and dumped him in the bottom. That knackered me all over again. Last, it was my turn to get on board.

'Don't forget me!' said the 'Down's voice from the locator.

'Turn yourself down, then. I don't want to be blinded.'

The light faded until it was the same intensity as it had been at first. I picked up the locator - it was slightly warm to the touch - and reattached it to the mast. Then I sat in the stern, picked up the paddle, and backed water until we were near the middle of the cave, so far as I could tell in the gloom.

'Ninety degrees to port.' I paddled over the stern and brought Albatross round. 'And steady as she goes.'

We crossed the cavern and passed under a flat lintel in the rock face. The walls closed in around us once more and, led by the locator's guiding light, we crept through the tunnel.

I wondered how far the water would go out with the tide and whether we would be stranded underground until the flood returned, but I understand now that we must have crossed a bar or natural weir quite early on, for the water level remained unchanged as we slowly, with many bumps and scrapes, made our way through the darkness.

It took ages, and we must have been going for hours, and I was feeling deadly tired by the end, but eventually the time came when the light ahead of us stopped being the reflection of the locator's headlight and became the natural light of the Blessèd sun. And suddenly we emerged from a narrow crevice in the rock and found ourselves in the Inner Sea of the Ring of Leaven, with its waters stretching blue before us and the Peak of Leaven only twenty miles away.

'Look, Roy,' I said. 'Look, we've made it! We're safe! Safe at last.'

'Oh that's great, Annie,' said Roy, sitting by my side in Albatross's stern. His face suddenly clouded with worry. 'But Annie; are you all right? You look terrible.'

I felt terrible. A black cloud of nausea swept over me and I held onto the gunwale and retched over the side. My head thumped with pain and I let go of the side, collapsed and curled up in the bottom of the boat. 'Roy, take me home,' I moaned. 'Get me home, please. I want my home, I want my Mum. Please, Roy. Please.'

'Annie? Annie? Oh God, Annie!'

And I saw and heard no more.