Nation

“Have I succeeded? ”

“No, demon boy! What I have told you is right and true! ”

Mau stopped hammering, but held on to the hammer. “I’ve found another god anchor. It’s not the one for Water. So that means I’ve found you a new god, old man… and I think he’s a trouserman. ”

In the end they worked from one of the big canoes.

Milo, Mau, and Pilu took turns diving with the hammer and steel chisel from the Sweet Judy’s toolbox and pounding at the coral that held the white cube in its grip.

Mau was hanging on to the canoe to get his breath when Pilu surfaced on the other side.

“I don’t know if this is a good thing or a bad thing, ” Pilu said, glancing up nervously at Ataba’s hunched figure in the stern, “but there is another one down there, behind the first one. ”

“Are you sure? ”

“Come and see. It’s your turn anyway. Careful, though — the tide’s really tugging now. ”

It was. Mau had to fight against the pull of the water as he swam down. As he did so, Milo dropped the hammer and chisel and swam up past him. It seemed as though they had been doing this for hours. It was hard to hammer under the water; the hammer just didn’t seem to work so well.

There was the stone Mau had first dived for. It looked free of coral now, but where it had been broken away there was the corner of another cube, in the unmistakable white stone. What did all this mean? Not more gods, he thought; we’ve had enough trouble with the ones we’ve got.

He ran his fingers over the shape cut in the first of the new stones. It looked like a tool from the trouserman toolbox, one that he’d held in his hand and wondered about, until Pilu had told him what it was for. But there had been no trousermen around even when his grandfather was a boy, he knew that. And coral was ancient. One of these cubes had been right inside the rock, even so, like a pearl in an oyster. He would never have found it if the wave hadn’t smashed up the reef.

He heard the splash above, and a hand reached past him and snatched the hammer. He looked up into the furious features of Ataba, just as the old man brought the hammer down on the stone. Bubbles rose as the priest man shouted something. Mau tried to grab the hammer and got a surprisingly powerful kick in the chest. There was nothing for it but to swim for the surface with what breath he had left.

“What happened? ” asked Pilu.

Mau hung on to the side of the canoe, wheezing. The old fool! Why did he do that?

“Are you all right? What is he doing? Helping at last? ” asked Pilu, with the cheeriness of someone who doesn’t know what’s going on yet.

Mau shook his head and dived again.

The old man was still hammering madly at the stones, and it occurred to Mau that he didn’t have to risk getting another kick. All he had to do was wait. Ataba needed air, just like everyone else, and how much of it could that skinny chest hold?

More than he expected.

Ataba was hammering wildly as if he intended to be down there all day… and then there was an explosion of bubbles as the last of his air ran out. That was chilling, and also quite insane. What was so dangerous about a rock that the old fool would waste his last breath trying to smash it?

Mau fought his way down through the running tide, grabbed the man’s body, and dragged it back up to the surface, almost flinging Ataba into the arms of the brothers. The canoe rocked.

“Drain the water out of him! ” he yelled. “I don’t want him to die! I can’t scream at him if he’s dead! ”

Milo had already turned Ataba upside down and was slapping him on the back. A lot of water came out, chased by a cough. More coughs followed, and he lowered the old man to the deck.

“He was trying to smash the new stones, ” said Mau.

“But they look like god anchors, ” said Milo.

“Yes, ” said Mau. Well, they did. Whatever you thought about the gods and their stones, these looked like god anchors.

Milo pointed to the groaning Ataba. “An’ he’s a priest, ” he said. Milo believed in laying out the facts of the matter. “An’ he was trying to smash the stones? ”

“Yes, ” said Mau. There was no doubt about it. A priest, trying to smash god stones.

Milo looked at him. “I’m puzzled, ” he said.

“One of those down there has got calipers carved on it, ” said Pilu cheerfully. “The trousermen use calipers to measure distance on their charts. ”

“That means nothing, ” Milo intoned. “Gods are older than the trousermen, an’ they can make what they like on the stones — Hey! ”

Ataba had jumped over the side again. Mau saw his feet disappear under the water.

“That was the caliper stone he was trying to smash! ” he growled, and dived.

The water was pouring through the gap now. It grabbed Mau as he swam after the skinny figure, tried to play with him, tried to throw him against the jagged coral.

It had got the priest already. He was struggling down toward the blocks, but the racing tide snatched at him, banged him against the coral, and tumbled him away, struggling, with a thin trail of blood blooming in the water behind him.

Never fight the tide! It was always stronger! Didn’t the old fool know that?

Mau swam after him, curving his body like a fish, using all his energy to keep away from the edges of the gap. Ahead of him, Ataba struggled to the surface, tried to grab a handhold, and was spun away into the foam.

Mau rose to take a breath and swam on —

Blood in the water, Mau, said Locaha, swimming alongside him. And there will be sharks outside the reef. What now, little hermit crab?

Does not happen! thought Mau, and tried to swim faster.

Demon boy, he calls you. He smiles in your face but tells people you are mad. What is he to you?

Mau tried to keep his mind blank. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the gray shadow, easily keeping up with him.

There’s no shell for you here, little hermit crab. You are heading for the open sea.