Chapter 14 - Equalized Pressure
Ma: “Looks like The Wind’s sallying from all the iron throats tonight.”
Dano: “A cylinder-rounder?”
Ma: “A south sea gale, at any rate. All you warriors and kings, at home or on the front, strap yourselves down tonight.”
The radio voices hardly rose above the spinner flywheel’s scream. The Man himself heard them not. His thoughts jumped from counting to pulling. He counted out twelve good pulls in his head, focusing on breathing form. He shoved his boots into the heel plate, and his own striations stood out on his legs. He swung back at his hips. He heaved upon the oar, wrists stiff, elbows wide, pulling with biceps and back. At the end of the twelfth perfect pull, The Man allowed himself a look through the new window.
The broad new sky raced past the tinted green glass. The shell rolled alongside hard black ice, like a waterborne vessel through loose arctic floes. The ice wasn’t glacial. The shell had passed through a ridge of steeper buildups as it had last time. This time, however, after about fifty kilometers, the Engi had leveled out.
Only now the slopes grew dense and darker. Water seemed to make only a small percentage of this buildup. The pack seemed to be a Wind-blown sheet of almost pure draff and pollution.
A huge swirl of Wind twisted the shell on its tracks. The bow pitched up, the starboard swung toward the glass, and The Man watched the black ice come close to his window. The shell dropped back before impact, but the Wind raged across the dark expanse.
The Man continued to spin.
He pulled six times while staring out the window. He pulled slower to catch his breath. As he stared, he saw that the dark ice must have crept closer to the striation. The narrow band of stars - the river of clear glass through which the striation ran - narrowed further. Farther ahead, The Man lost sight of the glowing motes. The ambient light around his shell waned. As The Man faced forward once more, he realized the spinning room had plunged into shadow.
The Man felt sweat beetling down his brow. The sweat was warm. The Man’s entire body, indeed, the entire inside of the shell, were almost toasty. The Man reached out in the dark for one of his spare headwraps. He kept moving, pulling with one hand. The Wind jerked the floor under him, but the new curved bowl-seat held him better than the old. The Man’s fingers found one of the bands of cloth swaying out from the wall. He pulled it off its nail. He let go of the oar with his hands temporarily. He set the oar in the crook formed by his hips, however, and kept his legs moving. He wanted to hold this surplus of energy.
The Man pushed his hair from his face and tied it back with the headband. He swiped the warm sweat from his eyebrows and nose. He picked up the spinner oar and rebuilt his rhythm.
The Man’s eyes searched for and found the painting. In the gloom thickening about him, its features were indistinguishable.
The dark did not bother The Man - not now. At other times he’d needed the view of the sky, and the canvas, and the stopwatch timer on the wall, all to keep him distracted.
But tonight The Man felt strong.
As he began to pull faster and faster the radio caught his ear.
Ma: “I’ve heard tales.”
Nikon, laughing: “Of course! No firsthand experience, but tales from others, certainly.”
Ma: “Forget my story then. You’re right. It’s probably untrue.”
Dano: “No, Ma, tell us. We want to know. Tell us about the storm that rained candlefish.”
Nikon: “You know I only jest, Ma.”
Ma: “I might have started it poorly. Some hydra’s cursed my speech today, I know it! The joke’s lost now.”
Nikon: “Give us the brief.”
Ma: “I was going to say a warning to warriors and scullers on the sea tonight. When the storm throws waves over the bow of your ship, be wary of shooting stars.”
Nikon, deadpan: “Hilarious.”
The Man ripped at the oar and made the flywheel scream. He swung himself into the spinning rhythm, renewing his effort. He counted out another twelve strong pulls; pulls of good form; pulls of heavy breath.
The Man tried to pace himself, to match his effort to the remaining hours of travel. But by the twelfth count on each set, he found himself pushing with all the strength of his legs, swinging with the full weight of his body, and hauling with his arms and back so that the oar slammed his chest.
The Man felt strong. The Wind railed in contest, but tonight The Man thought himself its match. By the little light left in the dark sky, his shell seemed to plunge effortlessly through the howling storm. The howling, and the radio too, lost The Man’s attention.
Tonight, fighting the storm in the dark, pulling with all his might, The Man neither needed nor wanted distraction. Tonight the Wind tossed the shell in vain. Tonight was a working night. Tonight the cold went unfelt. Tonight, The Man’s own working body, and the warm vent air from a stocked furnace, filled the shell with excessive heat.
Warm indeed was that air which came from the furnace. More hot than warm; more Wind than air; the furnace raged with an angry flame. Fire burst in long tongues up the stone brick, then sank back to shorter flickers beneath the wooden surplus; one moment wrathful, another seething. Out of the burning logs were formed palaces, and mountains, and hurricanes of flame, all to collapse and rise, and endlessly burn.
This flame was a hungry power. To build its mighty works - to blacken stone and scorch the metal vents - the flame needed food.
The flame was not a picky eater. The flame ate anything soft into which it could sink its bright fangs. But above all dishes, the flame liked best food made from the living. The flame could set a strong foundation with a stomach full of feathers, or leaves, or paper. On foods of denser chew - rope and textiles - the flame might make a castle.
But wood… On wood, the flame founded its greatest works.
The flame needed only a single twig to burn long and strong. On a good log it could build a glowing tower. The flaming power needed little wood before it started a low, contented growl.
Yet no matter how much wood it ate, the flame was never sated. The flame would eat whatever it was given - or could reach. The greater the feast the greater the hunger.
The Man had spread a grand meal. The flame seemed almost unable to contend with the huge stack of wood before it. So. Much. Food. And in such a little stomach! The flame pressed itself against the bounds of the furnace, chewing with wrathful, reckless abandon at the surplus.
The flame pressed vainly against the stones of its cave. The rock flushed with heat, but moved not a bit. It touched the furnace door. Once the flame had spread that way, but no longer; The Man had shut the path. The door warped, but did not give.
That left the vents. In one vent at the furnace’s base, lukewarm air rushed in from the cargo hold. The flame sucked this source to quench its thirst. But the opening was too small and the air too little for the gluttonous conflagration. The flame wanted more.
What little air the flame did steal from the lower vent, it instantly converted. The flame pounced on the precious fluid. Its long tongues and teeth of fire guzzled and slavered in their share of the take.
With each gasping influx, a plume rose. A second vent hid behind bars built into the furnace chimney. Each new tower and castle blew soot and fire across the protective grating. Long burning fingers reached far down the shell’s throat. The heat made the metal tunnel glow.
Like a living, breathing, feasting power, the flame gorged. But hunger was only one of the flame’s vices. The fire wanted power. It wanted to grow, and stretch, and build its collapsing architecture. It swelled and smashed against the stones, still in vain. It pressed down the long hall of the upper vent. With each new influx from the lower, however, ash and soot accumulated over the upper bars. Less and less was the flame able to spread down the vent.
The flame found itself trapped and hateful. A raging inferno now lurked within the furnace. It growled like a tiger. There was still some wood - some air - but not enough to go around. Like an animal that is starved, the flame smoldered, hot and mean, and waited for its moment to pounce. It burned lower, it burned hotter, and the air of which it made a carcass pressed upon the iron door.
The Man reached the end of a twelfth pull. He slowed on the return. He let the oar tap gently against the hole into which the belt fed. He released the handles. He pushed the seat back with a gentle press of heels and stretched his legs and arms. The limbs felt sore and stiff, but in a good way. The limbs would be ready if The Man called upon them again.
The Man rested. He caught his breath and let sweat trick from his beard. He heard it plink on the spinner rail as the flywheel spun to a low whine. The Man cricked his neck and glanced sideways in the direction of the window.
The sky was gone. The Engi was without light. The black ice covered the stars. Looking through the window, The Man beheld nothing. To The Man it seemed no window existed through which to behold; his spinning room lay in the same black state.
The Man was blind. And the stink of his sweat filled his nose. Had his memory deserted him at that moment, only touch and sound would have remained to tell his location.
By sound, he might have been in any number of places. The radio static (for the dish had turned in the hard Wind) tried to deceive The Man into thinking himself in a civilized place. The humming fire in the vents might have suggested a factory. The Wind, still blowing like mad against the shell and beyond the glass, might have been the same Wind of the hurricane storming across the sea below, heard from deep within a sheltering cave.
Touch, however, would have told The Man’s location. He felt the hard, curved spinner bench against his pelvic bones. He felt the shift of his weight with each shell sway.
The Man also felt the warmth of the furnace air on his skin. He stood. The Man knew a couple of hours remained until day. Not that ‘day’ meant much now. The Man might spin now until his body collapsed, without shining stars to radiate over him. The Man had energy for it too. He took the sweat band off and draped it over the rail. He meant to return.
But The Man had another task. He walked with a hand held out until he felt the cool curtain plastic on his knuckles. He raised the hand and found the crank lantern over the door. The Man stumbled while he ground a tiny light in the small chamber; the Wind had bucked the floor. The Man caught himself by one of the curtain strands.
Soon the lantern glowed over the space. The Man held it to the window. He looked beyond, but the electric light fell short of the frozen sky sludge. To The Man, it seemed as if he stood on an unstable ledge, looking over the brink of the void.
The Man backed through the curtain and into the corridor. He moved toward the study. He stopped when he reached the radio room. The Man ducked inside and reached a hand to the receiver lever, preparing to turn it off. He stopped, however, and instead cranked the radio room’s antenna wheel. After two turns he heard the voices.
Dano: “We see clearly enough the falling rain now. It’s pattering on the glass, if you can hear it, listeners.”
Nikon: “If you can’t, check your ears.”
The Man tuned out the voices, but he let them echo through the shell as ambience. He followed the echoes to the study chamber. His lantern glinted off the cracked window’s many facets.
The Wind maintained the assault. But The Man had his sky legs now. Any lingering weakness from his spinning session was fast fading. The Man’s stepped sure on the rocking floor as he crossed to the feathered coat.
The Man donned his gear with haste. He pulled the leather gloves on, but left the mitts dangling from the cuffs. He grabbed his logbook from the table. He reached for a quill and inkpot, then thought differently. The ink would probably freeze. He grabbed a lead pencil instead.
Pencil and book in one hand, lantern held forth in the other, The Man marched back down the corridor. He turned to the exterior door. He laid his left shoulder against the shell wall and used it to balance against the floor’s increasingly violent pitch.
The Man reached the door, tied himself to the safety bar, and set his book and pencil on the insulation. He put a boot overtop of them to hold them in place.
The Man had decided to take notes describing this sightless glass. The blackglass desert had been mentioned in other journals. But those were old. And The Man had never crossed a glass desert himself. He wanted a good look at this ice.
The Man took a moment to grind on the lantern. As he did, the radio voices caught his ear.
Ma: “Nakadana’s ships won’t fare well. Their hulls can’t stand a freak wave. They’ll roll too easily. Not like a swift, trim Leeges frigate.”
Nikon: “Ehhh, they deserve it.”
Ma, laughing: “Nikon!”
Nikon: “Not their sailors. But look how our own brave warriors were treated in their hands. It’s time they took a beating.”
Dano: “Chairos, the other kings; they said the same.”
Ma: “Well… the war’s different now.”
The voices stopped for an awkward pause. It coincided with a lull in the Wind. The Man caught the sound of the furnace hum as he reached for the door’s lever. The vents sounded soft. The fire sounded low, though The Man had stacked it full before spinning.
The Man twisted back the sealing lock. He threw the door open. Black windswept sky yawned ahead. The Man brought his lantern up and out.
The bitter slink of air over his body gave The Man pause. It sapped the heat from his gloved fingers. It bit the nose and teeth he’d forgotten to cover. The Man brought up and tied his mask, but he recognized this meaner cold. It was like the cold from the glaciers. It seemed to fit better here than there; here, in the lightless expanse of blackglass.
The Man pulled the door closed. He brought the sealing bar down, but only part way. It held the door shut by a sliver. The Man could reopen it easily.
Leaving journal and pencil on the floor, The Man untied himself from the rail. He set off for the furnace.
The Man would stock the flame higher. He wanted to get a huge flow of heat pumping through the shell. Then he could endure even this bitter cold; long enough to take sky notes, anyway.
The Man set his charged lantern on the hook above the furnace room’s curtain. Its light just hit the opposite vertex. The stone furnace stood like a dim cairn on the far wall. The Man heard the growl of flames within. He wondered why it had burned so low.
The Wind buckled the shell. The Man caught himself on the doorframe. Behind him, he heard the outer door latch come loose. The Wind rushed through the opening. The Man worried about his logbook. But, he chose not to run back. The Man ran forward, to get the furnace loading done as fast as possible.
The Man reached for the metal furnace door. The heat radiated through his glove, before he’d even touched the barrel bolt. The Man wondered at it.
He pulled his mitt on. He grabbed the bolt.
As The Man pulled against the resistant metal, he heard two things. The first was a fragment of the radio hosts’.
Ma: “…and a wharf collapsed in Dolon. The waves stove…”
The second sound was a shrill, sharp, tonal note. The note lived high above the Wind’s moan. The Man recognized the note. He’d heard it before, on the night of the Puga. It sounded clearer now with the exterior door ajar. In the brief flash before the furnace opened, The Man thought of Anka.
By then, however, it was too late. The Man had forced the door bolt loose. The powerful flame on the other side saw an opening. It struck.
Heat and light exploded forth. The door smacked The Man’s mitted hand aside, an instant acceleration from motionless to spring speed. The metal door struck The Man’s knee and shoulder. He spun, but a two-punch of expanding, hot air blasted his chest and face. The Man heard a last sound. He heard a ringing boom, louder than the heart-chamber’s thrum. Then all sounds seemed to stop at once.
The Man couldn’t guess why the sound had stopped. He didn’t have time. The blows of the metal door and hot air threw him against the far shelves. The Man hit the shelves skull-first. There was no wave of blackness. The electric light in the room simply vanished with its sound.
The Man fell unconscious.
[]{#_uywnngy0hr3u .anchor}