Inversions

'No, I don't think so.'

'Well, one day the two friends had to part. Sechroom had made up her mind that she would become a soldiermissionary, taking the message of Lavishia to far-off lands and teaching the peoples there the error of their ways. Hiliti had tried to talk his friend out of this, still believing that it was the wrong thing to do, but Sechroom was adamant.'

'What?'

'Determined.'

'Oh.,

'One day,' DeWar continued, 'not long before Sechroom was due to leave, they went to one of their special places, which was on an island. This island was a very wild place where people went to get away from all the riches of Lavishia. There were no streams of wine and sugar water, no ready-cooked game birds hanging in the house- trees, no perfume fountains, no piles of sweet-rocks, no-'

'People wanted to get away from sweet-rocks?' Lattens asked incredulously.

'Yes, and from being able to fly, and from having hot water gush from wash basins and from having servants pander to their every whim, too. People are strange like that, Lattens. Give them every comfort and they start to pine for the rougher life.'

Lattens frowned mightily at this, but did not protest further. It was obvious he thought that the people of Lavishia, or perhaps just all adults, must be quite mad.

'Sechroom and Hiliti,' DeWar said, 'went to the island as a sort of holiday from all the luxuries they were used to. They left all their servants behind and they even left behind the magic amulets and jewels that protected them from harm and which let them call on the local gods, and the two of them were left to fend for themselves in the wilderness. They could still find fruit to eat and water to drink, and they were able to make a shelter from the giant leaves of trees. They had with them bows and arrows and a pair of blow-pipes which fired poisoned darts, too. They had made these before they had come on the holiday and were quite proud of them They used the bows and blowpipes to go hunting for some of the animals on the island, though the animals were not the cooperative sort of animals they were used to, and they didn't want to be killed and cooked and eaten, so they were quite good at keeping out of the way of two people who were really very inexperienced hunters.

'One day, when Sechroom and Hiliti had been out trying to find some animals to shoot their poison darts at, but without success, they were returning to their leaf-shelter, arguing and becoming annoyed with each other. They were both bored and hungry and that was probably one of the reasons that they were each so upset with the other and blaming the other for spoiling the hunt. Sechroom thought that Hiliti was too aggressive and wanted to kill the animals just for the sake of it, for Hiliti was proud of his skills as a bowman and a blowpiper and at hand-to-hand fighting, while Hiliti secretly thought that Sechroom, who didn't like to kill things, had deliberately made noises so that the animals they were stalking would realise they were there and run away.

'Their route took them back over a steep-sided stream where there was a natural bridge made by a fallen tree. It had been raining quite a lot that day — that was another reason they were miserable and arguing so much — and the stream below the tree-bridge was in spate.'

'What's that?'

'It means the stream was swollen, full of water. So they started to cross the tree bridge. Now, Hiliti thought about saying that they should cross one at a time, but by then they had started out across the tree, with him going first,

and he thought if he turned round and told Sechroom to go back and wait, Sechroom would just get even angrier than she was already, so he didn't say anything.

'Well, the tree-bridge gave way. It had been lying there rotting away for many years no doubt, and the banks on either side had been partially washed away by all the rain, so when the two of them put their weight on it, it obviously decided that it was time to give up the struggle and just succumb — ah, that means give in — to gravity, and fall into the stream.

'So down it tumbled, breaking in the middle and bringing down other bits of branches and a few rocks and a load of earth and so on from either side just for good measure.'

'Oh no!' Lattens said, hand to his mouth. 'What happened to Sechroom and Hiliti?'

'They fell down along with the tree. Hiliti was the luckier, because the bit of the tree he was on took its time collapsing, and he was able to hang on to it as it went down and throw himself on to the bank before the trunk hit the water. He still ended up tumbling into the stream, but he was all right.'

'But what about Sechroom?'

'Sechroom wasn't so lucky. The part of the tree trunk she was on must have rolled as it fell, or she did, because she ended up underneath it, trapped beneath the water.'

'Did she drown?' Lattens looked very concerned now, both his hands at his mouth. He started to suck one thumb.

Perrund put her arm round him and brought his hands away from his mouth. 'Now come, don't forget this is just before Sechroom goes off to become a soldiermissionary.

'Yes, but what happened?' Lattens asked anxiously.

'Yes,' Perrund said. 'And why didn't the tree trunk float?'

'Most of its length was still on the steep. bank,' DeWar told her. 'The bit sticking into the water trapping Sechroom wasn't enough to float. Anyway, Hiliti could see one of his cousin's boots sticking up out of the water on the far side of the tree and waving around. Hiliti swam and pulled himself through the water and over the rocks and the broken branches to get to Sechroom, who he realised was trapped under the water. He dived down. There was just enough light for him to see Sechroom struggling desperately, trying to push the tree trunk off her leg, but making no impression on it, because it was very big and heavy. Even as Hiliti watched, he saw a last few bubbles of air float out of Sechroom's mouth and be swept away in the strong current. Hiliti came back up to the surface, took a deep lungful of air and then went back down again and put his mouth over his cousin's and blew the air into Sechroom's mouth, so that she could live a little longer.

'Hiliti tried to push the tree trunk off Sechroom too, but it was too heavy. He thought that perhaps if he could find a strong enough, and a long enough lever, then perhaps he could take the weight off Sechroom's leg, but that would take a while. Meantime, Sechroom must be almost out of breath again. Hiliti took another gulp of air and dived back down. Again, the bubbles came out of Sechroom's mouth and again Hiliti gave his friend his own air.

'By now Hiliti could see that this could not go on much longer. The water was cold enough to be sapping his warmth and strength away, arid he was becoming exhausted and starting to gasp for air himself.

'Then he thought of the blow-pipe. His own had been washed away by the stream when he'd fallen in, but he had seen Sechroom's when he'd first dived down, still slung over her back and partly trapped under her. Hiliti dived down, blew more air into Sechroom's mouth, then took hold of Sechroom's blow-pipe and pulled and twisted with all his might until it slithered out from underneath her. He had to return to the surface to gasp for air, but then he went back down and pointed to the pipe, and Sechroom took it into her mouth.

'But the situation was not yet saved. Sechroom had to spit the pipe out again, because there was too much water still inside it. Hiliti took the pipe to the surface, let the water out, held his hand over the end this time, and went back down.

'Finally, Sechroom could breathe. Hiliti waited a few breaths to make sure Sechroom was going to be all right for the moment, then he got out of the stream and looked for a lever. Eventually he found a branch straight and stout enough to do the job, he hoped, and he waded back into the river and went under, setting the branch under the fallen tree trunk and over the top of a rock.

'Well, at last it worked. The lever almost snapped, and when the tree trunk moved it hurt Sechroom's broken leg, but she was freed, and she floated to the surface, and Hiliti was able to lift her out of the stream and get her to the shore. The blow-pipe floated away downstream.

'It was just as big a struggle for Hiliti to get Sechroom to the top of the bank, because of course Sechroom was almost helpless with her badly broken leg.'

'Did a surgeon have to cut her leg off?' Lattens asked, squirming on the couch, his eyes wide.

'What? Oh, no. No. Anyway, eventually Hiliti got Sechroom to the. top of the bank. He was so exhausted he had to leave his friend there and return to their camp by himself, but there was a… a signal fire near the camp which he was able to light and that drew the attention of people who came and rescued them.'