Fathom (7 page)

“I waited for him to learn some more.

“Out in the open water, he laced his guns together with knotted rope and slung them around his neck. He leaped from deck to deck, and he fired them quickly, one after another, one shot into one body, and the next, and the next. The wood that creaked underfoot was baptized with the entrails and vomit of men, and women, too. He learned that wealth and power cost blood, and he took the lesson to heart. He learned it well.

“I waited for him to learn the rest.

“Once, he chose a woman from his captives. He did not yet fathom the way a heart is won, or which hearts are worthy of winning. He chose poorly, and she resisted him. He should have cast her into the water, wrapped in chains, but he resisted killing her. The crew saw his hesitation as weakness, and they, in turn, resisted his rule.

“In desperation, and in anger, and in fright, he ran her through with his first mate’s sword. It met her at the throat, and nearly took her head. And with that sacrifice, he learned much, much more about the company he should keep. He regained control of his ship, and of his heart. He seized the next vessel and annihilated its contents, man and beast and treasure alike.

“I only had to wait a little longer, though if I counted out the years to you, you might think it an eternity. When I wait, I am patient. I have more seasons and suns behind me and before me than you’d ever dream. I have more time than any God you’ve ever prayed to.

“I waited until he had finished, almost. I waited until he’d had a long life, and a long career for a man of his kind. And I knew he was mine—I knew he was meant to join me, when his greed would not let him retire to die an old man in his bed. He tried to be
wise and withdraw while the odds might let him vanish; but there was one more boat, fat and low in the water with gold or slaves. And it sailed under a flag he hated, a flag from the country that first compelled him to leave his land-life and come to my domain.

“He called his crewmen off the beach where they were sorting out their spoils, and he said to them, ‘Look, in the bay, you can see it there. It’s a beautiful ship and it is heavy in the water. One last venture, then. One last ship and its treasure, and then we can part ways. You can go to your island, Roberto; you can return to your Sanibel in Spain, Arturo. This is the last of the wealth we’ve grown between us, and now it is divided according to rank and skill. But one last ship, my men. One last ship and we will call ourselves kings and retreat to distant shores, distant homes, and distant memory. It is fair and fitting that we have been so long spared the squad or the noose.’

“And the sailors on the shore agreed with him, and they rallied beside him, running to the ship and raising the anchor, unfurling the sails. They urged their ship into the bay, and out through the water, and they drew their vessel alongside the easy victim, and they raised their flag of plunder.

“But the other ship had a secret. Its flag was a false one, and its mission was one of deceit. It had set itself against the shore to serve as bait, as a tempting lure to draw the Spaniard out.

“When the attack began, the other vessel lowered its treacherous sheet and raised its true colors. It was no merchant ship but a ship of war, a ship called the
Enterprise
from the New World. The other craft returned fire and the Spaniard was furious. It was a trick that he had taught them, the lure and the attack, and now they used it against him.

“Overpowered, outmanned, and outgunned, he found himself alone on the deck as his men died or surrendered around him. He was no fool. He knew that they would not let him leave or live. Even if he raised his hands and let them take him, he’d only face
execution at a later date. He would not allow such a thing; he was not made for public humiliation such as that.

“And down below I waited for him; I smiled and was pleased, for I had been waiting on him for years, and the moment was at hand.

“He rushed to the bow and he seized the anchor’s chain. He slung it around his neck and wrapped it around his shoulders. He faced the New World ship and he saluted its commander. And he said to him, ‘Gaspar dies by his own hand, and by no enemy.’ He turned his back to the deck and he cast himself into the water.”

“I caught him.” Arahab breathes cool bubbles into the woman’s ear. “I caught him, as I caught you.” She tightens her hold and smiles when the woman returns the embrace.

It might be heartfelt, or it might be a reflex from a dying body too long left without air.

“I swam beneath the ship, and let him fall into my arms. He struggled against the chains he chose, but he did not struggle against
me.
Even as the sky left his lungs, and even as his chest convulsed, and his eyes burned from the unfamiliar salt, he understood that I was there to take him, and he did not fight
me.

“I brought him here, held him close, and told him great stories, as I now do for you. But you, I have more to tell—because to all the great histories of the earth, I add the story of how my son came to me, as well.

“And he, my cherished son, was a bold and wonderful thing. I gave him tasks, and he performed them. But then I gave him a quest, and he hesitated.

“He made me promise him a boon, for attempting the quest I
assigned. I admit and I grant, the quest was a tremendous one. So he asked of me, before he agreed, ‘I want to be a legend among men; I want you to make me a myth. Let them remember my name forever, and throw festivals in my honor. The very men who scorned me and refused me—the society that forbade me entrance, and deemed me unfit to join it—let them recall me as a hero.’

“I gave my word, and my word does not bend. He set out to do my bidding.

“I sent him to another ocean, in another vessel. I gave him a crew of creatures I’d claimed and altered to better move on board, eels and sturgeons, octopi and dolphins with intelligence and strength greater than anyone save their captain. Together they would go deeper and farther and faster than any man could dive or swim, or any whale could sink.

“I sent him to a trench, to a great crack in the earth’s face, to a split that reaches past the water, past the lava, and down to the earth’s very bones.”

The woman without air shifts, makes a softly questioning sound.

Arahab understands the query, so she nods, and then she says, “I will tell you why. It is because of the thing that sleeps below. He sleeps much farther down than I hold you now. He sleeps at the center of the world, almost. He sleeps beyond the touch of men, or machines, or even me. Or so I’ve come to fear. This thing that sleeps, he coils himself tightly because he must—his size is so great, and his body so tremendous, that he scarcely fits within this world at all.

“At least, that is how I remember him. It has been so long since last I gazed upon him, I almost could not say. There is a chance that my memory fails me. A few million years here and there can cloud the details.

“But he is large, and he is sleeping, and by his very absence the
rest of us are pushed aside and forgotten. We are shunted to the fringes and overrun by lesser beings. Long have I stood aside and watched, insulted. Long have I waited and been disconnected, and disgraced, and disregarded.

“While the Leviathan rests, the rest of us are wraiths—despondent and abashed. So I have made it my goal to awaken him. But he will not rise easily, or quickly. He has gone so far and sunk so deep that it is no longer easy to touch him. But there are places where the skin of the earth grows thin. There are cracks through which he can almost be seen; he rises almost to the surface, and a very small portion of his bulk can be reached with diligence. These places are scattered throughout the globe, but they are difficult to navigate.

“And that is why I took the Spaniard.

“I took him for being wise, and merciless. I took him for being strong and quick. I embraced him because he was tough and driven, and he would not be stopped.

“His errand was to reach the slumbering Leviathan. All I asked was that he touch the old god, and I believed it might be enough to rouse him.
Reaching
him would be the trouble. ‘Go to the trench off the Chinese seas,’ I told Gaspar. ‘The crew I’ve created will lead the way, down through the waters and into the gap—down between the waves and into the fissure. At the bottom of the earth you will find him, quiet and unmoving. You will glimpse only very small portions of him. His size is too immense to see more. Touch him, and do it kindly. There is no need to strike or scar him, for you cannot harm him. There is no need to shout or scream, because he cannot hear you. Rouse him, and the world will shatter and realign. Rouse him, and I’ll make you more than the myth you’ve asked.’

“The Spaniard agreed to these terms and he set sail with the
strangest crew that ever did pilot a vessel. They led him into the Chinese seas and down to the trench itself. The vessel, which he called the
Arcángel
, closed in upon itself and dived down between the waves, into the sand, and down to the trench itself.

“The crew braced itself against the terrible pressure, the awesome gravity of the earth’s center. They found it hard to breathe, even the creatures whom I fashioned from the ocean’s deepest living things. The crushing weight of the water squeezed them tight, and I realized that the ship was too small and the task was too large. I had set it adrift, and it was barely a seed, being crushed in the fist of a god. I clung to my hope that the Spaniard would see the mission through; and I waited for him at the trench’s edge, down at the bottom of the world.

“I waited for him like a father awaiting the birth of a child.

“I waited, and hours passed. Days followed. Weeks went by, and I feared that my Gaspar was lost, and the
Arcángel
with him. And finally, when I was prepared to abandon all hope, the
Arcángel
emerged from the trench—as if it had been expelled, as if it were coughed up out of the deep.

“All aboard had perished, succumbed to the burden of the water’s impossible load; but my Spaniard remained. He alone had guided the vessel back to the portal, and he alone had forced the sails to press against the pressure. He alone returned with the
Arcángel
to the surface of the water, though he was weakened and exhausted by the trial.

“I was pleased to see him, even
relieved
to see him, despite the fact that he failed me.”