People of Babel (Ark Chronicles 3) Read Online Free Page B

but he fought it down.
    “ Oh, Gilgamesh,” she said, taking his hand. “I am well pleased.”
    “ What?”
    Semiramis laughed as if she were a naiad of the grasslands. “I but tested your love for Nimrod. Oh, you have surpassed my fondest hopes. Now, I can trust you. Please forgive me for doubting you, and for putting you through such a bitter test.”
    He frowned . He had thought about killing her. “No, Semiramis. I ask forgiveness. I thought… I don’t know what I thought. How could it have been anything but a test?”
    “ Noble Gilgamesh,” Semiramis said, with a bitter smile. “Let us forget this incident and return to the hunt.”
     

6.
     
    Nimrod returned from the north with a raft of mighty cedars. He sought out Ham, reminding the patriarch of the stories he used to tell of an Antediluvian tribe that made giant outrigger canoes.
    “ You have your reed boats,” Ham said.
    “ They’re not good enough for deep-sea voyages.”
    “ Why bother with that?
    “ To explore,” Nimrod said. “To outdo the exploits of the sons of Japheth, who, they say, went to the Far North and saw strange sights and returned with secret treasures. Might there not be lands beyond the delta-marsh filled with nuggets of gold or copper ores?”
    Under Ham ’s direction, and with adzes and axes, Hunters hollowed out the two biggest cedars. With sturdy but flexible planks, Ham joined the two giant dugouts, making a catamaran. He spread reed mats onto the planks and made a deck, and in the center of the deck, he built a post for a small sail. In the bow and stern of each dugout, Ham built watertight compartments, there to store jerky, dried fruit and clay jugs of water. With a bow drill, he fashioned holes in each dugout’s sides, screwing in short wooden struts and stretching oiled awnings as shelter from the wind, rain and sun. Lastly, he fixed leather loops or tholepins onto the outer side of each dugout and slid five oars through them to an outrigger.
    With t he vessel finally built, Ham named it the Odyssey .
    As Nimrod selected his crew, growing lyrical on the joys of adventure, of exploring the unknown and of the possible treasures, a company of notables urged Ham to guide the youngsters . Ham declined, citing two reasons: First, his bad hip precluded him from taking rugged journeys. Second, ever since surviving the Ark, he loathed the idea of sea travel.
    “ But that’s just it,” Nimrod said one day by the boat. “Who among us has spanned the world like you? Who knows more about ship-handling than you?”
    Ham snorted . “For a year, I sat in a barge that slid wherever the tides moved us. That’s my ship-handling expertise.”
    “ What fools you are,” Deborah later told Nimrod. “Convince Rahab that Ham should go. She’s the only one who can persuade him when his mind is made up.”
    Nimrod took her advice, and soon thereafter Ham reluctantly agreed to join them.
    Several days later, they tested the oars and sail and found the Odyssey a maneuverable little ship. As they cruised down the Euphrates, the fifteen-man crew accustomed themselves to it.
    In the delta marsh , Ham kept them in the fastest flowing channels, avoiding swamps and canebrakes and trying to stay out of stagnant lagoons. They spied many birds, although the migratory ones had left for summer breeding grounds.
    On the fourth day, in the afternoon, they crossed the sea bar and headed toward a vast expanse of water . Everyone but Ham marveled at the sight of waves and a distant horizon where sea met sky. The young men shouted and pointed out how deep the waters seemed.
    “ It’s horrifying,” Enlil whispered, as he peered into the green depths.
    Gilgamesh swallowed hard . Waves, small ones according to Ham, thumped against the boat, making it rise and fall. Anu fell overboard. The Hunters laughed as they hauled him back aboard.
    Leaning over, cupping his hand, Gilgamesh tasted the water . He spit it out. Salty, just as Anu said.
    “ We should