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The waves tumbled us head over heels. Many a man was struck and knocked unconscious and slipped beneath the contused surface of the sea. But some of us struck out boldly, struggling and fighting to stagger at last up onto a long shelving beach between rocks. The waters dragged at our shoulders, our waists, our legs, until we finally staggered free and collapsed, like drunken men, breathing in loud, harsh gasps, sprawled on the silver sand — but safe!
    That night passed miserably as we huddled up the beach, exhausted, trying to sleep and regain our strength. Along toward midnight enough wood had been gathered and stripped to expose the dry layers within, and a fire was started. The men of Kregen do not need an electronic or gas-fueled lighter in order to make flame; if a bow and drill do not suffice, a compression tube will do the trick. We gathered about the fire, warming ourselves and drying our clothes, and I could not fail to remark upon the tameness of this fire compared with the one that had destroyed us. Man is adept at using forces so powerful he barely understands them.
    With the first glow in the sky heralding the coming of the suns we stretched and yawned. Awake now, we stood up, ready to take stock of our situation.
    The Risshamal Keys consist of a number of fingerlike extensions of islands, cays, mere rocks, shoals, and reefs, all running out in a generally northeastward direction from the northeastern corner of the continent of Havilfar, which is also, of course, the northeastern corner of the empire of Hamal. At the farthest extent of one long island chain rises the island of Piraju. In all, we might have come to grief in worse spots. The length of the longest chain is something of the order of a hundred and seventy dwaburs. [2] Many of the islands are quite deserted, others support a small fishing population. Hamal’s laws extended to this remote spot, and I knew there would be garrisons scattered throughout the Keys, evidence of which we had received in so unwelcome a fashion when the airboat attacked us.
    “We will have to find a fishing village,” said Captain Ehren. “And barter, buy, or steal a boat.”
    The Vad of Kavinstok made a disgusted sound.
    “We can barter our ibs, we have nothing with which to buy. You will have to steal a boat, Captain.”
    “Whatever method,” said Lars Ehren, frigidly polite. “We will secure a vessel in which to sail for Vallia.”
    Wersting Rogahan was coming up the beach swinging a line on which dangled a number of fine fish. I made a face.
    I said: “It is practically certain there will be war between Hamal and Vallia. The Hamalians are insane with imperial ambition. Therefore we can claim privilege if we take a boat. The laws of Hamal are precise on the subject.”
    The Vallians were thoroughly sick of the subject of Hamalese laws. Everything in Hamal is ordered, numbered, ticketed. At this time in their development as an empire the Hamalians still held to many of the old, rigid laws that had given them strength in the past. The signs of a new age were everywhere apparent, not least in the coming to power of Queen Thyllis, who merely awaited the favorable opportunity of a great victory against Hamal’s foes to prove in her coronation as empress her divine right to rule. I was sure she would cut through the strict law-structure of Hamal to further her own ends and in the process fatally weaken her nation. Mind you, I welcomed that day. Indeed I did.
    A most unpleasant odor curled into my nostrils and, wrinkling up my nose, I turned to where the seamen were busy with their fish and their fire.
    The smell did not come from the fish. It is not true, I suppose, to say I dislike all fish. Sardines in olive oil are fine, though not in tomato sauce, and kippers are also very fine. In later years I have taken to tinned salmon where the fresh fish leaves a mere rubbery taste in the mouth. But the smell that was now offending everyone on the beach came from the fire