<h2><SPAN name="XIII" id="XIII"></SPAN>13</h2>
<h3>The Sea Gate of the Foanna</h3>
<p>Ross raised a shell cup to his lips but hardly sipped the fiery brew it
contained. This was a gesture of ceremony, but he wanted a steady head
and a quick tongue for any coming argument. Torgul, Afrukta, Ongal—the
three commanders of the Rover cruisers; Jazia, who represented the
mysterious Power of Phutka; Vistur and some other subordinate officers;
Karara; himself, with Loketh hovering behind: a council of war. But
summoned against whom?</p>
<p>The Terran had come too far afield from his own purpose—to reach Ashe
in the Foanna keep. And to further his own plans was a task he doubted
his ability to perform. His attack on the Baldies had made him too
important to the Rovers for them to allow him willingly to leave them on
a quest of his own.</p>
<p>"These star men"—Ross set down the cup, tried to choose the most
telling words in his limited Hawaikan vocabulary—"possess weapons and
powers you can not dream of, that you have no defense against. Back at
Kyn Add we were lucky. The salkars attacked their sub and halted the
broadcast powering their flamers. Otherwise we could not have taken
them, even though we were many against their few. Now you talk of
hunting them in their own territory—on land and in the mountains where
they have their base. That would be folly akin to swimming barehanded to
front a salkar."</p>
<p>"So—then we must sit and wait for them to eat us up?" flared Ongal. "I
say it is better to die fighting with one's blade wet!"</p>
<p>"Do you not also wish to take at least one of the enemy with you when
you fight to that finish?" Ross countered. "These could kill you before
you came in blade range."</p>
<p>"You had no trouble with that weapon of yours," Afrukta spoke up.</p>
<p>"I have told you—this weapon was stolen from them. I have only one and
I do not know how long it will continue to serve me, or whether they
have a defense against it. Those we took were naked to any force, for
their broadcast had failed them. But to smash blindly against their main
base would be the act of madmen."</p>
<p>"The salkars opened a way for us—" That was Torgul.</p>
<p>"But we can not move a pack of those inland to the mountains," Vistur
pointed out reasonably.</p>
<p>Ross studied the Captain. That Torgul was groping for a plan and that it
had to be a shrewd one, the Terran guessed. His respect for the Rover
commander had been growing steadily since their first meeting. The
cruiser-raiders had always been captained by the most daring men of the
Rover clans. But Ross was also certain that a successful cruiser
commander must possess a level-headed leaven of intelligence and be a
strategist of parts.</p>
<p>The Hawaikan force needed a key which would open the Baldy base as the
salkars had opened the lagoon. And all they had to aid them was a
handful of facts gained from their prisoners.</p>
<p>Oddly enough the picklock to the captives' minds had been produced by
the dolphins. Just as Tino-rau and Taua had formed a bridge of
communication between the Terran and Loketh, so did they read and
translate the thoughts of the galactic invaders. For the Baldies, among
their own kind, were telepathic, vocalizing only to give orders to
inferiors.</p>
<p>Their capture by these primitive "inferiors" had delivered the first
shock, and the mind-probes of the dolphins had sent the "supermen" close
to the edge of sanity. To accept an animal form as an equal had been
shattering.</p>
<p>But the star men's thoughts and memories had been winnowed at last and
the result spread before this impromptu council. Rovers and Terrans were
briefed on the invaders' master plan for taking over a world. Why they
desired to do so even the dolphins had not been able to discover;
perhaps they themselves had not been told by their superiors.</p>
<p>It was a plan almost contemptuous in its simplicity, as if the galactic
force had no reason to fear effective opposition. Except in one
direction—one single direction.</p>
<p>Ross's fingers tightened on the shell cup. Had Torgul reached that
conclusion yet, the belief that the Foanna could be their key? If so,
they might be able to achieve their separate purposes in one action.</p>
<p>"It would seem that they are wary of the Foanna," he suggested, alert to
any telltale response from Torgul. But it was Jazia who answered the
Terran's half question.</p>
<p>"The Foanna have a powerful magic; they can order wind and wave, man and
creature—if so be their will. Well might these killers fear the
Foanna!"</p>
<p>"Yet now they move against them," Ross pointed out, still eyeing Torgul.</p>
<p>The Captain's reply was a small, quiet smile.</p>
<p>"Not directly, as you have heard. It is all a part of their plan to set
one of us against the other, letting us fight many small wars and so use
up our men while they take no risks. They wait the day when we shall be
exhausted and then they will reveal themselves to claim all they wish.
So today they stir up trouble between the Wreckers and the Foanna,
knowing that the Foanna are few. Also they strive in turn to anger us by
raids, allowing us to believe that either the Wreckers or Foanna have
attacked. Thus—" he held up his left thumb, made a pincers of right
thumb and forefinger to close upon it, "they hope to catch the Foanna,
between Wreckers and Rovers. Because the Foanna are those they reckon
the most dangerous they move against them now, using us and weakening
our forces into the bargain. A plan which is clever, but the plan of men
who do not like to fight with their own blades."</p>
<p>"They are worse than the coast scum, these cowards!" Ongal spat.</p>
<p>Torgul smiled again. "That is what they believe we will say, kinsman,
and so underrate them. By our customs, yes, they are cowards. But what
care they for our judgments? Did we think of the salkars when we used
them to force the lagoon? No, they were only beasts to be our tools.
So now it is the same with us, except that we know what they intend.
And we shall not be such obedient tools. If the Foanna are our answer,
then—" He paused, gazing into his cup as if he could read some shadowy
future there.</p>
<p>"If the Foanna are the answer, then what?" Ross pushed.</p>
<p>"Instead of fighting the Foanna, we must warm, cherish, try to ally
ourselves with them. And do all that while we still have time!"</p>
<p>"Just how do we do these things?" demanded Ongal. "The Foanna you would
warn, cherish, claim as allies, are already our enemies. Were we not on
the way to force their sea gate only days ago? There is no chance of
seeking peace now. And have the finned ones not learned from the
women-killers that already there is an army of Wreckers camped about the
citadel to which these sons of the Shadow plan to lend certain weapons?
Do we throw away three cruisers—all we have left—in a hopeless fight?
Such is the council of one struck by loss of wits."</p>
<p>"There is a way—my way," Ross seized the opening. "In the Foanna
citadel is my sword-lord, to whose service I am vowed. We were on our
way to attempt his freeing when your ship picked us out of the waves. He
is learned beyond me in the dealing with strange peoples, and if the
Foanna are as clever as you say, they will already have discovered that
he is not just a slave they claimed from Lord Zahur."</p>
<p>There it was in the open, his own somewhat tattered hope that Ashe had
been able to impress his captors with his knowledge and potential.
Trained to act as contact man with other races, there was a chance that
Gordon had saved himself from whatever fate had been planned for the
prisoners the Foanna had claimed. If that happened, Ashe could be their
opening wedge in the Foanna stronghold.</p>
<p>"This also I know: That which guards the gate—which turns your minds
whirling and sent you back from your raid—does not affect me. I may be
able to win inside and find my clansman, and in that doing treat with
the Foanna."</p>
<p>The Baldy prisoners had not underestimated the attack on the Foanna
citadel. As the Rover cruisers beat in under the cover of night the
fires and torches of both besieged and besiegers made a wild glow across
the sky. Only on the sea side of the fortress there was no sign of
involvement. Whatever guarded the gate must still be in force.</p>
<p>Ross stood with his feet well apart to balance his body against the
swing of the deck. His suggestion had been argued over, protested, but
at last carried with the support of Torgul and Jazia, and now he was to
make his try. The sum of the Rovers' and Loketh's knowledge of the sea
gate had been added for his benefit, but he knew that this venture must
depend upon himself alone. Karara, the dolphins, the Hawaikans, were all
too sensitive to the barrier.</p>
<p>Torgul moved in the faint light. "We are close; our power is ebbing. If
we advance, we shall be drifting soon."</p>
<p>"It is time then." Ross crossed to the rope ladder, but another was
there before him. Karara perched on the rail. He regarded her angrily.</p>
<p>"You can't go."</p>
<p>"I know. But we are still safe here. Just because you are free of one
defense of the gate, Ross, do not believe that makes it easy."</p>
<p>He was stung by her assumption that he could be so self-assured.</p>
<p>"I know my business."</p>
<p>Ross pushed past her, swinging down the rope ladder, pausing only above
water level to snap on flippers, make sure of the set of his weighted
belt, and slide his gill-mask over his face. There was a splash beside
him as the net containing spare belt, flippers, and mask hit the water
and he caught at it. These could provide Ashe's escape from the
fortress.</p>
<p>The lights on the shore made a wide arc of radiance across the sea. As
Ross headed toward the wave-washed coast he began to hear shouting and
other sounds which made him believe that the besiegers were in the midst
of an all-out assault. Yet those distant fires and rocketlike blasts
into the sky had a wavery blur. And Ross, making his way with the
effortless water cleaving of the diver, surfaced now and then to spot
film curling up from the surface of the sea between the two standing
rock pillars which marked the sea gate.</p>
<p>He was startled by a thunderous crack, rending the air above the small
bay. Ross pulled to one of the pillars, steadied himself with one hand
against it. Those twists of film rising from the surging surface were
thickening. More tendrils grew out from parent stems to creep along
above the waves, raising up sprouts and branches in turn. A wall of mist
was building between gate and shore.</p>
<p>Again a thunderclap overhead. Involuntarily the Terran ducked. Then he
turned his face up to the sky, striving to see any evidence of storm.
What hung there sped the growth of the fog on the water. Yet where the
fog was gray-white, it was a darkness spouting from the highest point of
the citadel. Ross could not explain how he was able to see one shade of
darkness against equal dusk, but he did—or did he only sense it? He
shook his head, willing himself to look away from the finger. Only it
was a finger no longer; now it was a fist aimed at the stars it was fast
blotting out. A fist rising to the heavens before it curled back,
descended to press the fortress and its surroundings into rock and
earth.</p>
<p>Fog curled about Ross, spilled outward through the sea gates. He loosed
his grip on the pillar and dived, swimming on through the gap with the
fortress of the Foanna before him.</p>
<p>There was a jetty somewhere ahead; that much he knew from Torgul's
description. Those who served the Foanna sometimes took sea roads and
they had slim, fast cutters for such coastwise travel. Ross surfaced
cautiously, to discover there was no visibility to wave level. Here the
mist was thick, a smothering cover so bewildering he was confused as to
direction. He ducked below again and flippered on.</p>
<p>Was his confusion born of the fog, or was it also in his head? Did he,
after all, have this much reaction to the gate defense? Ross ducked that
suspicion as he had ducked the moist blanket on the surface. He had come
from the gate, which meant that the jetty must lie—there!</p>
<p>A few moments later Ross had proof that his sense of direction had not
altogether failed him, when his shoulder grazed against a solid
obstruction in the water and his exploring touch told him that he had
found one of the jetty piles. He surfaced again and this time he heard
not a thunder roll but the singsong chanting of the Foanna.</p>
<p>It was loud, almost directly above his head, but since the cotton mist
held he was not afraid of being sighted. The chanter must be on the
jetty. And to Ross's right was a dark bulk which he thought was one of
the cutters. Was a sortie by the besieged being planned?</p>
<p>Then, out of the night, came a dazzling beam, well above the level of
Ross's head where he clung to the piling. It centered on the cutter,
slicing into the substance of the vessel with the ease of steel piercing
clay. The chanting stopped on mid-note, broken by cries of surprise and
alarm. Ross, pressing against the pile, received a jolt from his belt
sonic.</p>
<p>There must be a Baldy sub in the basin inside the gate. Perhaps the
flame beam now destroying the cutter was to be turned on the walls of
the keep in turn.</p>
<p>Foanna chant again, low and clear. Splashes from the water as those on
the jetty cast into the sea objects Ross could not define. The Terran's
body jerked, his mask smothered a cry of pain. About his legs and
middle, immersed in the waves, there was cold so intense that it seared.
Fear goaded him to pull up on one of the under beams of the pier. He
reached that refuge and rubbed his icy legs with what vigor he could
summon.</p>
<p>Moments later he crept along toward the shore. The energy ray had found
another target. Ross paused to watch a second cutter sliced. If the
counter stroke of the Foanna would rout the invaders, it had not yet
begun to work.</p>
<p>The net holding the extra gear brought along in hopes of Ashe's escape
weighed the Terran down, but he would not abandon it as he felt his way
from one foot- and hand-hold to the next. The waves below gave off an
icy exudation which made him shiver uncontrollably. And he knew that as
long as that effect lasted he dared not venture into the sea again.</p>
<p>Light ... along with the cold, there was a phosphorescence on the
water—white patches floating, dipping, riding the waves. Some of them
gathered under the pier, clustering about the pilings. And the fog
thinned with their coming, as if those irregular blotches absorbed and
fed upon the mist. The Terran could see now he had reached the land end
of the jetty. He wedged his flippers into his belt, pulled on over his
feet the covers of salkar-hide Torgul had provided.</p>
<p>Save for his belt, his trunks, and the gill-pack, Ross's body was bare
and the cold caught at him. But, slinging the carry net over his
shoulder, he dropped to the damp sand and stood listening.</p>
<p>The clamor of the attack which had carried all the way offshore to the
Rover cruisers had died away. And there were no more claps of thunder.
Instead, there was now a thick wash of rain.</p>
<p>No more fire rays as he faced seaward. And the fog was lifting, so Ross
could distinguish the settling cutters, their bows still moored to the
jetty. There was no movement there. Had those on the pier fled?</p>
<p>Dot ... dash ... dot ...</p>
<p>Ross did not drop the net. But he crouched back in the half protection
of the piling. For a moment which stretched beyond Terran time measure
he froze so, waiting.</p>
<p>Dot ... dash ... dot ...</p>
<p>Not the prickle induced by the enemy installations, it was a real coded
call picked up by his sonic, and one he knew.</p>
<p>Don't rush, he told himself sharply—play it safe. By rights only two
people in this time and place would know that call. And one would have
no reason to use it. But—a trap? This could be a trap. Awe of the
Foanna powers had touched him a little in spite of his off-world
skepticism. He could be lured now by someone using Ashe's call.</p>
<p>Ross stripped for action after a fashion, bundling the net and its
contents into a hollow he scooped behind a pile well above water level.
The alien hand weapon he had left with Karara, not trusting it to the
sea. But he had his diver's knife and his two hands which, by training,
could be, and had been, deadly weapons.</p>
<p>With the sonic against the bare skin of his middle where it would
register strongest, knife in hand, Ross moved into the open. The
floating patches did not supply much light, but he was certain the call
had come from the jetty.</p>
<p>There was movement there—a flash or two. And the sonic? Ross had to be
sure, very sure. The broadcast was certainly stronger when he faced in
that direction. Dared he come into the open? Perhaps in the dark he
could cut Ashe away from his captors so they could swim for it together.</p>
<p>Ross clicked a code reply. Dot ... dot ... dot ...</p>
<p>The answer was quick, imperative: "Where?"</p>
<p>Surely no one but Ashe could have sent that! Ross did not hesitate.</p>
<p>"Be ready—escape."</p>
<p>"No!" Even more imperative. "Friends here...."</p>
<p>Had he guessed rightly? Had Ashe established friendly relations with the
Foanna? But Ross kept to the caution which had been his defense and
armor so long. There was one question he thought only Ashe could answer,
something out of the past they had shared when they had made their first
journey into time disguised as Beaker traders of the Bronze Age.
Deliberately he tapped that question.</p>
<p>"What did we kill in Britain?"</p>
<p>Tensely he waited. But when the reply came it did not pulse from the
sonic under his fingers; instead, a well-remembered voice called out of
the night.</p>
<p>"A white wolf." And the words were Terran English.</p>
<p>"Ashe!" Ross leaped forward, climbed toward the figure he could only
dimly see.</p>
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