2569 A.D.!
THE DULARNIAN QUEEN
AN ADVENTURE IN THE SECOND DARK AGE OF MAN
By Jerome B. Bigge
Chapter Fifty Four


     
"Storm's blowing itself out," Danny said to me, having been
sent down from the quarterdeck by the first officer. The roll of
the ship was becoming slightly less, and I could tell from the
sound of the wind in the rigging that Karis spoke the truth here.
     
"Inform Karis to hoist the main sails as soon as she consid-
ers it `safe'," I answered, giving him a smile as he nodded back.
We'd use the last of this "wind" to get another hundred miles un-
der the keel back towards home, although I suspected from my own
calculations that we were somewhat now to the south of Dularn...
     
"Be good to get back home again, your majesty," he spoke.
     
"No doubt your mother will be glad to see you," I smiled.
     
"A guy's `lucky' to serve under you," he answered me.
     
"I'm `lucky' too," my husband grinned as he left us.

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"I see you've raised steam," Darlanis said, the wind having
died out, leaving the hot mid summer sun burning down upon them.
The black smoke from the Astarte's funnel drifting up into the
sky overhead and spreading out like an ominous black pall now. A
steady "thud-thud" of the steam engine causing the ship's fabric
to vibrate slightly as the bronze propeller churned at the stern.
Artemis clinging to her mother's hand, the three year old girl
like a lovely doll, the very image of what Darlanis herself had
once been long ago when Queen Tulis of Dularn had raised Aurora's
daughter as her own, while at the same time yet suspecting the
"truth" here that her husband had "cheated" on her with Aurora!
     
"Better than sitting waiting for a wind," Sharon smiled.
     
"We'll have one," the Empress "promised" with a smile.
     
"My captain seems to `agree' with you," Sharon noted.

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"I wish you'd tell me `who' you are," Mara said, there being
"something" about this horribly scarred woman she felt that she
should remember. That the woman was wealthy she had no doubts...
One could tell that from her own mannerisms, the way she acted.
     
"I am a `friend'," the former Princess of Baja smiled back,
taking Mara's hand for a moment before then leaving there on the
deck of the ship that would take her back home to distant Dularn.

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"I think she `smells land'," Karis said to me as the North
Star now raced through the growing light of a false dawn. I did-
n't want to dash her hopes, but I didn't think we were that close
yet. On the other hand trying to calculate our position by "dead
reckoning" after being this long at sea wasn't accurate either...
The upper sails now pale ghosts against the blackness of the sky.
     
"When it is light we will heave to and make some deep sea
soundings," I answered. That would at least give us a "hint" of
just how far we were from land as the continental shelves them-
selves went out several hundred miles from the coast line of
North America. If the "depth" was less than a thousand feet,
then we were no doubt now sailing over the continental shelves.
On the other hand my own calculations placed us three days sail
yet from land, and that was at averaging 200 miles a day too...
     
"She's a good ship, `better' than any Imperial," Karis said.
     
"They build good ships, and Lorraine is my equal," I smiled.
     
"Let's just hope their `Warlady' decides to practice mother-
hood instead of `war'," my first officer smiled right back at me!
"Without Bob and Carol we don't `have' anyone the `equal' of Lor-
raine now." I nodded thoughtfully, thinking of the dried remains
we'd found. Of the "implications" here, considering the coffins.
     
"I've `proved' that I can `match' Lorraine at sea," I an-
swered, perhaps a bit "shortly" upon reviewing my own words here.
"And the knowledge they possessed is also ours to use," I added.
     
"I didn't mean to `imply'..., your majesty," she breathed!
     
"Sometimes we all say things we wish we didn't," I smiled.

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"Seas are getting up, your majesty," Sharon's captain said,
her eyes glowing down into the azure of her young Queen's, while
those of Darlanis and her daughter gleamed there in the glow from
the lamp. The roll and heave of the Astarte now growing heavier.
     
"Shorten our sail to mains and full reefs in those," Sharon
spoke, the woman nodding while Darlanis and Artemis watched them.
"We'll `use' this wind to shorten the distance to Trella a bit."
     
"Aye, aye your majesty," the woman replied, leaving them.

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"Lower away," I ordered, the North Star rolling in the swell
as she rode hove to. The weight at the end of its long slim cord
quickly disappearing beneath the restless surface of the Pacific.
I wondered if it would touch bottom before the full thousand feet
of cord was run out. The watch on deck standing there quietly as
the sun rose there in the east, a golden orb upon the moving sea.
     
"Hundred feet out," the man muttered, watching the cord play
out from the spool. We were at least five hundred miles yet from
land according to my own calculations, but how "accurate" these
were now was a question that even I couldn't answer anymore now!
     
"Two hundred feet," I breathed, watching the cord play out.
I thought of the darkness of the depths, the cold, of the forms
of life that inhabited these depths. Strange creatures rarely
seen by anyone except by fishermen who ventured far out past the
sight of land. Creatures perhaps more "legend" than "reality"...
     
"Three hundred feet, your majesty," the sailor breathed out.
     
"Three times the length of the North Star," I muttered back,
the length of the rope out now sixty fathoms, or 360 feet for you
landlubbers, although the "length" at the waterline is shorter.
A vision going through my mind of the North Star sinking into
these depths, a ghostly shadow in the shifting deep violet deep.
     
"Four hundred feet," the man spoke, the cord still running.
     
"We probably won't be able to touch bottom yet," I spoke.

     
"Nine hundred," the man spoke, looking up at me, the line
still running out. Then suddenly, the line stopped running out!!
     
"Nine hundred and twenty feet!" I breathed, the man nodding!
The crew muttering among themselves, aware that we had indeed
managed to "touch" bottom here with our deep sea sounding line!!!
     
"Home," I breathed, looking to the east, into the rising sun
as it stood gleaming above the restless moving azure green water.
The crew breaking out into a cheer for the ship and its captain!

     
"A beautiful day," Diane said to me, Karis grinning as she
stood there swaying on the quarterdeck beside me. "And in a cou-
ple days now we'll be in sight of land!" she now added hopefully.
     
"`If' the wind holds as it does," I answered, giving her a
smile. The North Star was being driven hard right now, being
well heeled over. Bob's reinforcement of her masts and rigging
had made her even "better" than she had been back in the days
when we'd fought the Imperials under Lorraine as best we could
against their superior numbers and heavier more powerful ships.
     
"I never doubted we could `do' it, your majesty" she smiled
right back. I nodded, wondering if she'd always felt that way...
     
"We proved that this ocean can be `crossed'," I smiled back.
     
"And it was the Queen of Dularn who `did it'," she smiled.

     
"The `depth' is now only six hundred and seventy feet," I
announced to the listening ears of the crew the next morning as I
stood there at the bow next to the sailor with the deep sea line.
There was no doubt now that we were over the continental shelf.
Doubtlessly we still had hundreds of miles to sail, but we were
for all practical purposes now once again sailing in North Ameri-
can waters. Just "where" we were in relation to the land now was
something I didn't know, although my "sight" of the sun yesterday
indicated that we were somewhat to the south of Dularn proper. I
had thus ordered a course change that would take us to the north
more, hopefully such that our first sighting of land would be Du-
larn itself, and not part of the territory claimed by the Empire.

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"Another couple days will see us to Trella," Sharon spoke,
Darlanis nodding as she stood so radiantly beautiful in her gold-
en attire on the quarterdeck, little Artemis there at her side.
The wind off the sea blowing the hair of this lovely golden pair.
     
"It will be `good' to see Lorraine again," Darlanis smiled.
     
"She is a woman quite like no `other'," Sharon laughed back.
     
"The greatest Warrioress of all time," the Empress grinned.
     
"I'm glad we flew through the `Gateway'," Sharon smiled.
     
"So am I," the Empress of Imperial California answered.
     
"I think `history' has been `made'," Sharon agreed.
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