Expedition Beyond Read online

  “Girl?” Des asked Anastasia.

  “Woman.”

  B´ahta took her place, turned her war club around and stuck the point into the sand. When Alée clucked at her, she looked around her, took off her sandals, then straightened her back.

  “Drop your weapons!” Des commanded to his troops.

  No one moved. Anastasia shrugged her shoulders.

  Des wrestled the war club away from the closest woman and said, “Weapon. War club.” When he let it go, he said, “Drop.”

  “Drop war club!” Des commanded everyone.

  Clubs thudded to the sand.

  There was a screech from the last row. The woman next to B´ahta was hopping on one foot. B´ahta appeared unapologetic as the woman screamed at her.

  When the back row had quieted, Des got pen and parchment. He asked each warrior her name and wrote it down phonetically. Next to each name, he wrote identifying physical characteristics, glad no one else could read what he’d written, some of which had sexual connotations. When he reached B´ahta, he just wrote “short” next to her name. He asked Anastasia to hold the list.

  “Okay, troops, opening calisthenics!”

  Anastasia’s jaw dropped. Alée was waiting for her to translate.

  “Des—“ Anastasia began.

  “I’ll handle this,” he said, sure he now knew how to gain the warriors’ trust.

  He paced back and forth in front of the troops. “I know this is going to be difficult for everyone to understand, but we have a real threat out there. If we are going to do anything about that threat, we need to get our communications straight. Okay, how do we do that? If I am going to lead you to victory, then you must obey me. There will be no one second-guessing. If I say ‘take that hill’, then you do it. Understood? Of course you don’t understand, because you don’t know what I’m saying. So, let’s start with the basic commands.”

  He took the list back from Anastasia and picked a name from the first row. “Ray-na.”

  Her dark eyes met his, but she said nothing. Des remembered her from the inner circle at Say-ance. Beneath her short-cropped black hair, her Romanesque face was still unfriendly.

  “Anastasia, please translate. Tell Ray-na that she is to call me ‘sir’. It means I’m the leader, and when fighting the beasts, she’ll do anything I ask of her. When I call her name, she is to say, ‘Yes, sir’, and be ready to follow without question.”

  When Anastasia translated, Ray-na stared at him.

  “Ray-na,” Des said.

  Her eyes burned.

  Des’ eyes never left hers. “Ray-na, give me your war club. You’ve just been cut from the team.”

  As Anastasia translated, Ray-na became visibly agitated.

  “Ray-na!” Des demanded, giving her a second chance.

  She said hesitantly, “Yes, sir?”

  “Better. Now say it with conviction and you can stay. Ray-na.”

  “Yes, sir,” she said more forcefully.

  Des looked at his list. “Dee-ah-do.”

  Deahdo responded quickly, “Yes, sir.”

  “May-lee.”

  May-lee blurted nervously, “Yes, sir.”

  “B´ahta,” Des commanded.

  “Yes, sir,” her shrill voice replied from the back.

  “Now, it doesn’t matter what I say, when I do this,” Des held his hands up high and wiggled his fingers, “everyone say, ‘Yes, sir!’” He emphasized the last two words.

  “Mary had a little lamb.” He threw his arms up and wiggled his fingers. “Yes, sir,” said a few.

  “Oh, come on!” He raised his voice. “Let’s try that again. Mary had a little lamb.” He threw his arms up.

  Many more got it that time. “Yes, sir.”

  Des clapped his hands. “Better, better. Get the beat, get the beat.” As he chanted, he threw his hip out to one side and then the other. “Mary had a little lamb.”

  “Yes, sir!” all shouted in unison.

  “Ally, ally, oxen free.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  “Jack jumped over the candlestick.”

  “Yes, sir!” The sound echoed around the arena and floated outside.

  He sang alternating high and low notes.

  “Yes, sir!”

  “OK, troops. Opening calisthenics.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  Their voices thundered as one, and Des could tell they were proud of it. He clapped his hands and laughed.

  “Excellent, excellent. Give yourselves a hand. That was excellent.”

  He encouraged them into a few whoops. He had loosened up their minds, now for their bodies.

  “Okay, back in line, back on your spots. That’s it. Ready? Jumping Jacks. It’s easy—watch me. One.” He jumped, spreading his legs apart and slapping his hands together high over his head. “Two.” He jumped again, putting his feet together and his arms by his side. “Now, get the beat. One. Two. One. Two. Come on, everybody. Ready?”

  Everyone stood at attention.

  “One!” Des shouted and jumped.

  Only a few hands clapped, but all of the warriors held them over their heads.

  “Come on, come on, you’ve got to get the beat. One, two…One, two.” Des did ten, metered like a song. On the last two jacks, Des sang, “Ally, ally, ally, oxen free. When you go home, then you will see. We’ll kill the beasts, and they will learn. That we’re supreme, now it’s our turn.” When they all got it, Des laughed and said, “Yes!”

  There was a spontaneous outburst of applause and whooping.

  “Anastasia, have them form a big circle like at Say-ance, and bring their war clubs.”

  When everyone had been seated cross-legged, war clubs in their laps, the circle spanned fully half of the arena floor with Des in the center. He checked his list of names.

  “May-lee.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Come here.” He motioned.

  She stood, holding her war club.

  “Puma.”

  “Yes, sir.” Puma’s curly, long blond hair enveloped an angelic face a paler green than the others’.

  “Come here.”

  Des took each of the two women by a forearm and said, “Fight.”

  “Des,” said Anastasia.

  “It’s okay; I think they understand.”

  “They understand,” Anastasia confirmed, as the warriors’ eyes narrowed.

  “When I say ‘stop,’ they are to fight no more,” Des told Anastasia.

  Anastasia spoke to them, looking apprehensive.

  Des released their arms and backed to the edge of the circle. “Go.”

  Des planned to pair the women and thus find the best fighters. He’d rate them on his parchment—1 for good, 2 for better, 3 for best. The real warriors would be his vanguard.

  In ten seconds, he knew he’d made a mistake.

  The two women bowed briefly to each other. May-lee flipped up her club and rapidly whizzed it past Puma’s head, narrowly missing her jaw. Puma took the advantage and jabbed the ball end of her club forcefully into May-lee’s stomach. May-lee moaned and fell back, but Puma didn’t stop her assault; she bashed May-lee’s shoulder with her club. May-lee clawed and bit at Puma; there was blood.

  Des threw down the parchment and ran to them. “Stop! Stop!”

  As Puma readied her club for a final, deadly blow, Des shouted again and struggled to separate the women.

  Blood trickled from May-lee’s shoulder; Puma had bite wounds on her chest.

  “What just happened?” Des shouted to Anastasia.

  Anastasia looked at him with surprise. “We always fight to the death.”

  Well, thanks for not telling me that first, Des thought, as he pushed the two women back into place in the circle.

  The woman next
to May-lee ripped off part of her tunic and pressed it against May-lee’s bleeding shoulder.

  Des studied the grim faces around him. I’m with heathens. These people are so bloodthirsty, they are willing to kill even each other. He decided that he would let Alée decide who was the best suited.

  “Anastasia, please translate: This is an example of what we must not do. When we fight each other, we have no fight left for the beasts. From this day forward, we fight each other no more. We must behave as if we are all one.”

  Anastasia spoke, then called May-lee and Puma to stand near Des. May-lee still held the cloth to her shoulder, yet she also brandished her war club.

  “Anastasia, tell them not to finish this fight. I…didn’t know the rules.”

  The two warriors threw down their clubs and hugged each other warmly.

  “Anastasia, tell Alée that she is a captain who may train her own troops. Ask her how many other captains there are who have this many warriors.”

  Anastasia translated and listened to the response.

  “Five others,” Anastasia told him.

  “Good, that improves the odds. We’ll have six hundred warriors to fight against two hundred beasts. Ask her if all of the captains can meet tomorrow, at Say-ance.”

  “Yes, they can. When would be a good time?”

  “I will leave that up to Alée. When does she think we should?”

  “After eating a second meal.”

  “Lunch time,” Des said.

  Anastasia and Des walked in the gentle surf. He thought her lacy tunic was very inviting and he had to force himself to pay attention to what she was saying.

  “His name is Oom. He is...” She shook her head in disgust.

  “You don’t like him,” Des guessed.

  “No, I don’t. Why do you want to meet him?”

  Des had asked if he could meet the man who made war clubs. How would he explain that like the ironmonger, he, too, was a metallurgist?

  “He does what I do. His job is my job.”

  Anastasia stopped and looked at him with surprise. “You make war clubs?”

  Des had designed war clubs that could fire seven rounds a second and hit targets thousands of meters away with deadly accuracy, and others which could have easily incinerated her entire village with one floosh.

  “Yes.”

  “I didn’t know that.” She seemed to be reevaluating him unfavorably in light of this new information.

  “I don’t make war clubs anymore Annie; that was a long time ago.” He squeezed her waist. “Now I command armies.”

  She laughed.

  They passed four fishing boats reminiscent of Indian dugout canoes with a reed skin covered wooden ribs and gunwales; a single rope stretched between bow and stern to display the morning’s catch. Women standing nearby exchanged greetings with Anastasia.

  Des said, “Fishermen.”

  “Fishermen?”

  “They catch the fish we eat, so they are fishermen.”

  “Fisherwomen,” Anastasia corrected.

  “Fisherpersons,” Des compromised.

  The beach was narrowed by sharp cliffs five hundred meters tall which plunged directly into the sea. There were clusters of red rocks jutting out of the water. Near the shoreline was an adobe shack with a thatched roof; smoke curled up beside it.

  The man outside ignored them as he stoked the fire in his kiln. Des remembered Oom from the bazaar where he’d been selling his war clubs. His aged arms were still muscular. He wore a soiled cloth headband close to his brow; white hair stuck up over it. His shirt and face were oily, his hands covered with grease and soot.

  Anastasia spoke to Oom, who then motioned for Des to follow, but Anastasia held him back.

  “It’s okay,” Des told her. “You can go for a walk on the beach while I talk with Oom.”

  She looked concerned, so he added, “I won’t need you to translate. Brethren in the trade can always find a way to communicate.”

  Anastasia shrugged, then walked toward the surf.

  Oom worked the bellows on his kiln while Des inspected the rock-lined ditch that carried water from a nearby stream past Oom’s granite worktable. Now he understood at least one reason why Anastasia disliked Oom—his body odor was rank. The five-by-four-meter kiln was made of granite bricks; smoke rose from its two-meter-high chimney.

  Des picked up a rock, pointed at the kiln, then dropped it into the ditch. “Water for quenching,” he said.

  “Yi, yi, yi,” Oom responded.

  Des could see inside the kiln through a round opening; charcoal glowed around iron ore as bamboo pipes delivered air from the bellows. He was sure this kiln would withstand the higher temperatures needed to smelt stronger metals.

  Oom pulled the sponge iron from the forge using wrought-iron tongs, and beat it on his table with a rock hammer. Slag sputtered away from the iron. When he’d finished, he replaced the sponge back inside the furnace and billowed the fire with his foot.

  Des remembered from Metalworks 101 that you could put iron ore into a campfire, and it wouldn’t melt because the fire wasn’t hot enough, though the ore might oxidize from the air and could carbonize from the burning wood—add charcoal, and it would definitely carbonize. Campfires burned at 1100° to 1300° Fahrenheit. Could Oom’s furnace achieve 2400° to melt the iron ore? If it couldn’t, there’d be no need for quenching.

  But how to change iron into steel? Ancient civilizations must have known how to smelt steel without knowledge of the Bessemer Process, or utilizing coking coal in blast furnaces. As Des watched heat waves rising in the air over the kiln, he remembered that the professor in his beginning metallurgy class had lectured about ancient smelting, but Des and Mitch had gone skiing that day and so had missed the lesson on early civilizations’ steel-making.

  “Asa bui á natra.” Des asked Oom for pen and parchment, then drew a picture of a sword.

  “Yi, yi, yi,” Oom said.

  He brought to his table a sword he’d smelted. Short, fat and tapering, it was made of wrought iron, with a pitted, dull edge that had apparently been polished by stone. Judging from the many scrapes along the blade, he knew that Oom had worked hard on the piece.

  “Good try, Oom, good try,” Des said, nodding, though he knew it would shatter if struck violently and could never have a sharp, cutting edge.

  Oom brought a coconut to his worktable and showed Des how he peeled the fibers from the nut with a crooked wrought-iron knife. He demonstrated how to cut the nut in half with a fish-tooth saw. He held up the half bowl of one he’d previously polished on the inside after removing the meat, then showed Des another with the two halves laced together with vine; there was a hole in the eye for pouring in molten iron ore. Des realized this was the mold for the war club ball. Once quenched, it would have a durable outer surface.

  Oom motioned for Des to follow him into his small home.

  “Voilá!” Oom said.

  French?

  When Des’ eyes adjusted to the dim light, he could see rock samples arranged in rows on slats of wood. He picked up one laden with gold. He put it back carefully, then looked at the others. He thought he might pick them up in order of descending value. But, what would Oom consider valuable? Perhaps he should have picked up the iron ore first. Nevertheless, he chose silver next.

  There was also bauxite, iron ore and pyrite; and rose, opaque and translucent quartz. Des picked up the pyrite with a smile, and Oom smiled back.

  In all, there were forty-three samples, including copper and tin, feldspar, and granite. Des picked up each one; it was truly a magnificent collection.

  He patted Oom’s shoulder. “Splendid, Oom, simply splendid. Now, what we need to do is to figure out how to forge steel.”

  Des looked through the doorway and saw Anastasia ankle-deep in ocean water, examining something she h
eld in her hand. He drew a small circle on the parchment, then a smaller circle inside the first. When he had Oom’s attention, he pretended to pick up the drawn ring and force it onto his finger.

  Oom rubbed his chin and peered out the doorway. “A-ka-a, Anastasia?” he asked.

  “Abba. A-ka-a Anastasia.”

  Oom continued rubbing his chin while looking at Anastasia, so Des thought he didn’t understand. In fact, he hadn’t seen a single piece of ornamental jewelry on any of the women in the village.

  “Ah!” Oom exclaimed. He hurried to the rear of his hut and returned with a small wooden box. “Yi, yi,” he said and bowed, handing it to Des.

  Des removed the top; inside the box was a silver band. Even in the poor light, he could see the Spanish inscription and many small facets that covered the rim of the ring. He knew it was Old World in origin, but he didn’t know that the finest artisans had handcrafted this ring, and only Spain’s grandees had been meant to wear it. Des wondered how Oom had come to have such a treasure. He tried to return the box to him, unsure of how he could pay for it.

  “I-ta-ka,” Oom said, gesturing.

  Des gave his sincerest thanks and put the box in his pocket.

  “Ready to go now?” Anastasia asked from outside.

  “Not quite yet,” Des told her. He and Oom returned to the kiln, where Oom stomped on the bellows. Near him was a pile of short bamboo stalks to feed the furnace.

  Des picked up one. “Please ask Oom if I can have this.”

  Oom replied in the affirmative.

  “Tell him many, many thanks.”

  When she did, Oom smiled.

  “Please ask Oom to try putting another bellows on the far side of his furnace with more of these.” He stuck the bamboo end against the oven.

  She translated, but Oom looked puzzled.

  “When he’s finished with that,” Des pointed to the sponge in the furnace, “ask him to almost melt his sword, fire it, and pound it into pieces.”

  Anastasia told Oom, who rubbed his chin.

  Des continued: “Tell him to place the pieces with powdered charcoal in clay pots and cook them in the kiln, with heat not high enough to cause them to melt.”

  “What is powdered charcoal?”

  Des showed her.