Old Mars Read online

  “Come with us to where?” Tyr asked. “You don’t mean to return them to Praxis, do you? Or ferry them to Vend? Either way you’ll be consigning them to oppression, death, or worse.”

  Jason crossed his arms over his chest and shook his head.

  “No, they’re coming back with us to Freehaven.”

  The angry muttering from some of the crewmen made it clear this was not a solution they would have preferred. Jason hoped that it wouldn’t come to a vote.

  Every member of the Argo’s crew had signed the Articles of Freehaven, the list of rules and regulations that governed the life of pirates on the red planet, both aboard their ships and at home in Freehaven. The Articles outlined, among other things, how plunder was to be spread among all the members of the crew, with a portion being set aside to contribute to Freehaven’s community coffers, to be doled out to residents in times of need. But perhaps more important, the Articles also specified who would lead, both ship and community, and when.

  Jason was the captain of the Argo because he had been elected to the position by the crew, though they were technically the crew of the Sand-shark’s Tooth before Jason became her master and gave the ship a new name. Likewise, the headman of Freehaven was the captain who had been elected by the community at large to govern them.

  But simply because Jason had been elected once did not mean that he held the post for life. Just as he had challenged the authority of his ship’s previous captain, so too might his crew challenge his. One method would be for enough of the crew to be dissatisfied with his command that they mustered the quorum necessary to call for a vote and simply elected a new captain. That was how Jason had come to command.

  The other method, a holdover from the pirates’ less egalitarian days, would be for one of the crew to challenge Jason to single combat, with the winner of the duel being the one who had proven himself fit for command. This latter method had seldom been used in recent generations, and never during Jason’s time as a pirate, in large part because the rules required that the combat must be to the death; but it was kept in the Articles as a tribute to the early pioneers who had risen up out of the waters and sought the freedom of the high sands, proving their worth not by persuasive argument but by the strength of their sword arms. It was the last vestige of a time before Freehaven had truly earned its name.

  When Jason could see the ruins of the buried city from the deck of the Argo, it meant that they were almost home.

  “Where is that beast of yours?”

  Jason turned to see Tyr approaching. He had spent much of his time in recent days belowdecks tending to the needs of the Praxian refugees, leading them in recitations of scripture, sharing memories of happier days, and so on.

  “You mean Bandit? I’m sure he’ll turn up sooner or later,” Jason answered. “He always does.” His leatherwing pet had flown off before their fight with the Praxian corvette, and Jason hadn’t seen him since. But it was hardly unusual. His “pet” was only one step removed from a wild animal and clearly valued its independence.

  Tyr joined Jason at the railing and looked out over the buried city as it drifted slowly by. They could hear the muttering of some of the other crewmen, who still rankled at the presence of the Praxian “rabble” belowdecks.

  “We were a better people once,” Tyr said to Jason in a low voice, glancing sidelong at the disaffected crewmen. “A great people. But the drought that dried our world, I fear, dried out the wellsprings of compassion in too many of us.”

  When he had first arrived on Mars, Jason had been surprised to discover that the dominant life-form of a desert world was aquatic. But he had soon learned that, when life had first evolved on the red planet, Mars had been entirely shrouded in deep oceans. Complex civilizations had flourished in the ancient waters of Mars, vast city-states woven in a complex web of trade and cultural exchange.

  But just a few thousand years before Jason’s arrival, that had all changed. The oceans had begun to recede, slowly at first, then more quickly with each passing year. Skeptics among the populace had argued that what they were experiencing was a natural cycle and that the waters had ebbed and flowed many times before. But the more forward-looking had seen what lay ahead if the seas continued to shrink. And they had a solution.

  By the time that places like the buried city before them had been lost to dry land, a complex system of canals had been constructed, linking points of extremely low elevation where, it was hoped, the waters would be retained even if they disappeared from the rest of the globe. The populace relocated to these new sanctuaries, leaving their old homes behind but retaining as much of their former cultures as possible as they continued to exchange goods and ideas along the narrow canals that connected their new homes.

  And for a few generations, it appeared that the worst was behind them. The oceans had receded drastically, but there were still waters in the canals and in the low-elevation sanctuaries. Life continued much as it always had, albeit under considerable strain.

  But the drought that had dried their world had only slowed, not stopped, and in time some of the canals became shallower and shallower, until in the end they were no longer navigable by the aquatic residents of the sanctuaries. What had been a globe-spanning system that connected every living person on Mars became fragmented networks, isolated from one another, separated by the unforgiving sands.

  Now all that remained of the once-proud globe-spanning culture were ruins like this buried city, where crumbling statuary, the spires of the highest roofs, and the tallest columns were all that rose above the sands, like an orchard of tombstones.

  Jason looked from the ruins to Tyr, a solemn expression on his face.

  “Your people can be great again, you know. If enough of you want it.”

  The Argo had reached the anchorage outside of Freehaven, and while the crew prepared to leave the ship, Tyr led the refugees down the gangplank onto the stone docks, and from there down into the waters of the oasis. There were nearly a dozen other sand ships at anchor, nearly all of those who called Freehaven home, some of them in the process of unloading their most recent plunder, others preparing to sail out onto the sands again.

  When the engineers of several millennia past had constructed the network of canals that connected the areas of lowest elevation, there were a handful of likely spots that were too far distant from the others to be included. One such was the lake the first pirates had named “Freehaven.” It was several days’ sail across the high sands from the nearest point in any of the canal systems, its location a closely guarded secret. Shielded from view by the ruins of the buried city to the east and by a mountain range that ran from southwest to northeast, it could be approached only from the south, and even then captains had to be careful to navigate clear of the many hidden baffles and traps that had been set by the inhabitants just beneath the sands. Any who tried to approach Freehaven without knowing the circuitous route to take would find themselves stranded out on the sands, their hulls shattered to splinters, at the mercy of the pirates’ defenses.

  Jason was on deck, in the process of strapping on the complex breathing apparatus that allowed him to move through the streets of Freehaven without drowning. The building he called home was pressurized with breathable air within and air locks in place of doors, but with enough standing water in indoor fountains and pools that his native friends could visit him without running the risk of drying out or suffocating. But in order to reach his home, he had to pass for a considerable distance beneath the waters, as he did when he wanted to join in with the daily life of the Freehaven community.

  So it was that Tyr already had the refugees over the docks and down into the waters by the time that Jason was able to join them, his ditty bag slung over his shoulder, a transparent globe-shaped helmet completely enclosing his head. The knee he had injured aboard the galleon was better but had not healed entirely, and so he was thankful to get underwater and take his weight off it.

  Tyr had already removed his encumbering br
eather, and the refugees were glorying in the sensation of breathing freely for the first time since they boarded the Vendish galleon some weeks before.

  “Finally!” A voice echoed through the material of Jason’s helmet, loud enough to carry through the waters. “You bring us something of value, pink-skin!”

  Jason cupped one hand palm forward and the other palm back, and waved his arms to spin himself around in place. It was sometimes difficult for him to discern one Martian voice from another underwater, but he knew exactly who had spoken this time.

  “Rac,” he said. Inside the helmet, the name sounded like a curse in Jason’s own ears. But his words were being picked up by a microphone beneath his chin and amplified through speakers incorporated into the outer shell of his breathing apparatus, at a volume that the natives could perceive, and he wasn’t sure if the venom in his voice was lost in the process. “How nice to see you.”

  “That’s Captain Rac, I remind you.” The water before Rac’s face rippled with waves, the visual cue that his mandibles were clacking with laughter. He stood with his crew, who were in the process of preparing to put out to the high sands.

  It was custom when at home in Freehaven for all residents to be treated as equals, their ranks and titles only evoked when they were aboard their ships. But one major exception was the captain who was selected by the others to govern Freehaven itself, who was regarded as the commander of the entire community.

  Rac approached, giving the refugees gathered nearby an appraising look. “And here I thought you always disapproved of selling prisoners to the Vendish. This is a sorry rabble you’ve netted, but still will their sale swell the coffers of Freehaven.”

  Jason bristled, and from the corner of his eye, he saw Tyr take a defensive posture. They had first come to blows with Rac on the pirate ship that had taken them on board after their escape from Praxis, on which Rac had served as a junior crewman. He had resented the fact that the pink-skinned outlander and the defrocked priest had been welcomed as members of the crew and not sold into slavery, and tensions between them had only been prevented from erupting into a duel to the death by the intercession of the Articles, which forbade crewmen from doing harm to one another.

  In the years since, Rac had gone on to get command of his own ship, as Jason had his, but the enmity between them had only faded, never truly vanished. They argued frequently, especially since Rac had been elected by the others as the head captain of Freehaven, and never more so than when the subject of selling prisoners into indentured servitude was discussed.

  “These are not prisoners,” Jason sneered, fighting the urge to draw his sword. “They are our guests.”

  The waters in front of Rac’s face swirled and ebbed as his mandibles vibrated with laughter. “Very funny, pink-skin! Like that beast you call a pet, I imagine?” He laughed even harder, the waters practically becoming a whirlpool.

  Jason took a step forward. “No, Rac. I’m serious. You’re not touching them.”

  The water rippled in a brief chuckle. Then Rac grew serious. “Have they signed the Articles?”

  Jason shook his head inside the bubble helmet. “No, of course not. Look at them. They couldn’t handle the life of a pirate.”

  “If they have not signed the Articles of Freehaven, then they are not residents of Freehaven.” Rac pushed up off the ground and drifted through the waters closer to Jason until he was within arm’s reach of the refugees. “And if they are not residents, then they must be classified as plunder. And no one man can keep a ship’s plunder all to himself. It must be divided among the crew and among the other residents.”

  “They are free individuals!” Jason shouted. “You can’t just treat them like property!”

  Rac scoffed. “Freehaven is the only home of the truly free. All others are slaves of one kind or another, whether to wealth or to ideology.”

  “Freedom should be everyone’s birthright!” Jason countered.

  The crews of the other ships that were loading and unloading at the dock had taken note of the exchange, and many of them had lingered, waiting to see what transpired, including many of their captains.

  “Watch yourself, pink-skin,” Rac said. “You come close to violating the Articles with that kind of talk.”

  Jason looked around at the faces of the assembled residents, seeking out the other captains. He could see that more than a few of them were clearly sympathetic to his position but that others were decidedly not.

  “And as Captain of Freehaven,” Rac went on, addressing himself to the assembled crowd, “I claim Freehaven’s portion of the Argo’s plunder now.” He grabbed the arm of the nearest refugee, a woman just entering the age of maturity, and motioned for his crewmen standing nearby to approach. “And since your contributions to the coffers have been inadequate for some time now, leaving the Argo in arrears under the terms of the Articles, Freehaven’s portion will include all of this rabble.”

  As Rac’s crewmen rounded up the confused refugees, preparing to escort them onto Rac’s ship in preparation for transporting them north to Vend, Tyr came alongside Jason, bristling with barely restrained rage.

  “You must do something,” Tyr said in a quiet voice.

  Jason had gone completely still and quiet, trying not to let his emotions overcome his judgment, trying to work out a solution.

  “Captain,” Tyr urged again. Even at home, he was ever the first officer, never entirely comfortable treating his captain as an equal.

  Jason realized that his hand gripped the handle of the sword at his side so tightly that his palm ached.

  Tyr grabbed Jason’s shoulder. “You know what will become of them in the north.”

  He could try to convince enough of the other captains to form a quorum, Jason knew, and call for an election in the hopes of ousting Rac as the head of Freehaven. But that would take time, and Rac would have long since sailed away before he had time to speak to enough captains to make a difference. And there was no guarantee that the next captain elected to succeed Rac wouldn’t feel the same way about the slave trade.

  Tyr tightened his grip on Jason’s shoulder.

  “Captain Rac!” Jason called out, pulling away from Tyr and stepping forward, drawing his sword. “I challenge you, by the First Article, for the right to lead Freehaven.”

  All eyes swung first in Jason’s direction, then to Rac, who stood with his arms folded over his chest, the water before his face swirling with mirthless laughter.

  Jason stood atop the shoulders of a headless statue that was buried to the waist in the sands. A short distance off, just outside of arm’s reach, Rac crouched on top of a broken column that rose like a tree leaning in a high wind.

  Tradition demanded that, as the challenged, Rac had the choice of venue for the single combat. It was hardly surprising that he would choose the drystone dueling sands of the buried city.

  “Your freak muscles won’t do you much good here, pink-skin,” Rac scoffed. “Jump as high and far as you like, and chances are they will be there waiting when you come down.” He pointed at the sands that surrounded them, where the threaded traces of sand-sharks passing by rippled all around.

  Jason’s right knee still ached from the injury he’d taken aboard the galleon days before. From a way off, he could hear the sound of Rac’s partisans laughing at his barb. Some half dozen sand ships drifted at anchor all around them, their decks crowded with nearly the entire population of Freehaven. Aboard Rac’s own ship, the Praxian refugees were herded together, shackled in chains, gasping for breath as they passed their portable breathing dispensers from one to another.

  Tyr and the rest of Jason’s crewmen were on the deck of the Argo, their expressions solemn and tense. If Jason’s challenge to defeat Rac failed, the Argo would be electing a new captain. Either Jason would prevail, or he would die. There was no third option.

  Jason could see that Tyr was praying, arms raised overhead. It was upon a drystone just like the one Jason stood atop that Tyr’s god had been
martyred. And it was for much the same reason that the inhabitants of Freehaven had selected the buried city as one of their principal dueling grounds in generations past. There was no escape for a Martian from this place, nowhere to hide. The sun bore down mercilessly from above, and the sands held dangers of their own. Once a Martian’s breather ran out, he would die of suffocation and dehydration in short order.

  But the weapons that the combatants carried ensured that neither of them would have to wait quite that long.

  “Rac, there’s still time for me to withdraw the challenge,” Jason called out. “We don’t have to do this. Just let those people go, and we can …”

  The rest of his words were drowned out by the high-pitched pop of a whip snapping only inches from his face, the dry air crackling with the electrical discharge from its tip.

  “I’ve heard enough of your talk for one lifetime,” Rac shouted. “Shut up and die.”

  As the challenged party, Rac had been given the choice of weapons, as well. So naturally he had chosen one that least suited Jason’s talents.

  “All right,” Jason snarled. He flicked the whip he held in his right hand, allowing it to uncoil and hang down past his feet. “Enough talking.”

  Jason raised his arm overhead in a slow swing, the whip trailing through the air, then pulled back with a jerk after making a complete circle, sending the tail of the whip racing ahead, only to snap back just as it reached the column atop which Rac stood.

  Rac’s mandibles quivered with laughter as he leapt nimbly from the column to a rooftop that rose above the sands, just in time to avoid Jason’s lash.

  “You never could get the hang of it, could you, pink-skin?”

  Since arriving on the red planet, Jason had made full use of the increased speed and strength that he enjoyed relative to the natives of the low-gravity world. But tasks that called for finesse and a light touch, requiring him to rein in his strength, were actually more difficult for him. The whips, which the natives were able to manipulate like sinewy snakes beneath the water and like lightning in the air above, had always presented Jason with difficulty.