Maia

About an hour later, as they were quenching the ashes and Zirek was getting together what little remained of the meat to carry with them, Maia finally gathered courage to speak.

"Captain Zen-Kurel, I want to make a'suggestion. I hope you'll listen to it fair and square, 'cos I reckon it might make a lot of difference."

They all stopped what they were doing and looked at her with some surprise, for not once in their hearing had she addressed him directly before. Zen-Kurel, too, was obviously startled.

"Naturally I'll listen," he answered after a few moments; his manner suggesting that while he did not particularly wish to, he had no alternative, "if you've got something to suggest which you think's important."

She forced herself to look him in the eye and assume an air of detachment.

"Trying to walk down the bank of this river's going to be next to impossible. I don't reckon it can be done, not with all the undergrowth an' that." She waited to see whether he would interrupt her, but he said nothing. "What we ought to do is use the river. I don't mean swim; even without tools we can make a raft as'll be plenty good enough. Three or four logs, that's all, lashed together down their length. You don't sit on it: you just hold on to it and it'll take us down."

He was looking at her uncertainly and frowning slightly. She hurried on, "I wouldn't have said anything, only I reckon it might very well make all the difference 'tween being dead and staying alive."

It was Bayub-Otal who broke the pause. "I think she's probably right, Zenka, but before we make up your minds I'd like to get a clearer idea of this raft and how we're to make it."

"I've helped to make them on Lake Serrelind 'fore now," she said. "Of course we had proper cord for binding then, but I reckon creeper'll do near enough, long as we use

plenty, right down the length. 'Sides, we can use some of our clothes as well."

As they discussed the idea, it was clear that Zen-Kurel was anxious to avoid giving any impression that he might be prejudiced against Maia. He sat silently, looking from one to another and listening intently. It struck her that he had probably realized, as had she, that in fact the practicability of her plan depended on whether the rest of them decided in favor of attempting it.

"Maia," asked Meris, "are you sure there's nothing in the river that might attack us?"

She shook her head. "River's safer than the forest. All we'd have to look out for would be sunken branches an' that under water, might go into you, but 'tain't very likely. 'Course, we don't even have to make a raft. If everyone had a log it would be enough to keep afloat. Only we could put our stuff on a raft, see."

Having said this much, she kept quiet. To be too insistent would only spoil everything. Anyway it could, she felt, only be a matter of waiting until they had accustomed themselves to the idea. After all, the only alternative was the forest, and surely to Cran they must have had enough of that by now?

"But this raft-it can only be a very rough sort of job, Maia, can't it?" asked Zirek. "What happens if it hits something in the river and falls to pieces?"

"We'd still be able to get to shore holding on to the logs," she said. "I taught myself to swim holding on to a log, when I wasn't no more 'n five or six years old."

"Years and years ago," said Zirek solemnly. Even Zen-Kurel smiled.

Anda-Nokomis was with her, she knew; the least fit for it of them all. Even as she realized this, Zirek put it to him point-blank.

"Do you want to try it, sir?"

"Y-es," he replied pausingly. "Yes, on the whole I think I do. Even if we don't get very far, you see, we'll still be no worse off."

"I think we must try it," said Zen-Kurel. "I admit I had no idea the forest would be as bad as this. If we're to get through at all it's the river or nothing."

They toiled for three or four hours, and with every hour Maia's standing gained. Though she was, of course, careful to avoid any suggestion of it, they were dependent on her.

Zen-Kurel, obliged from time to time to confer with her as the work went on, spoke to her with detachment, his manner suggesting that their joint need made it necessary, for the moment at all events, simply to concentrate on what had to be done.

Finding suitable logs took longer than Maia had expected. When she had first put forward her suggestion, she had had in mind the idea of a raft about five feet long and three feet wide, made of no more than four logs. They were lucky enough to find two good ones almost at once. One was already smooth along its entire length, while the other had a few outgrowths and small brandies which they were able more or less to trim with her knife. After this, however, they hunted in vain for the best part of an hour. Finally Maia decided that they would have to be content with two smaller rafts.