The water in the Gulf of Seechul was remarkably calm, with only a slight ground swell. Stars strewed the sky and reflected on the oil-smooth water below. Two related packs of sullsi lay floating semi-vertically in one group, digesting, facing a young sellsu who recited the Tale of Zeltis Long Nose, a romance, a favorite, very old. None of the others made a sound. They'd wait till the youthful reciter was done, then discuss his style and delivery. He was free to tell the story any way he pleased, so long as he did not change what happened—the givens, the "facts" of the story. That, and that only, would bring interruption.
The presentation was interesting, with assonances in most lines, a rather daring effort for a sellsu. Mostly they left such technique to the Vrronnkiess.
Three protector sullsi, singlemindedly alert, had posted themselves on the packs' perimeter to listen for sarrkas and the rare but frightening rokkas. Rising and falling slowly on the ground swell, the rest were absorbed in the tale, waiting for the part in which Zeltis confronts the great sarrka chief. For the young of the year, it was their first hearing of this, one of many sagas.
It was no predator or protector that interrupted the saga's spell, but a young serpent swimming up to them on the surface. The mood broken, the teller fell silent, and his audience assumed the ready attitude. The senior pack leader confronted the serpent.
"Did you not hear the saga teller?" the leader asked severely. The serpents had their own sagas, sung instead of told. It was unheard offer either species to interrupt a telling by the other.
"Yes. It sounded like a very fine telling; my deepest regrets for interrupting. But I have an urdsent messits for the sullsi. Other packs will be hearing it also. It comes from Sleekit, the sellsu who taught the human, Suliassa, to speak your tongue. You have heard of Sleekit? It was passed on to me, and to all Vrronnkiess, by an old mother named K'sthuump."
"We have heard of Sleekit. What about him?"
"Then you've heard of the great death fight whitss the humans of the south expect to have with the big-ssip people. Sleekit returned to the nursery beatses, believing to be called there by the Lord of the Sea."
"Yes yes." The pack leader was impatient to hear the message, but it would be both futile and discourteous to hurry the serpent.
The serpent told them what Sleekit and K'sthuump had learned about the big-ship people: That they had butchered the sullsi across the ocean till the survivors had fled, and that they would no doubt do the same here if they won the great killing fight. Then he told them what the humans of the south wanted the sullsi to do. The serpent was young, not yet of breeding age, but had the talent of a saga master, and knew everything about the matter that K'sthuump did. When he was done, he floated quietly.
The sullsi also floated quietly for a long minute, starlight glinting on sleek wet heads. It seemed to them that they faced the near destruction of their kind unless the big-ship people were defeated.
They conferred. When they were done, the two packs had given the Almites a new name—the sarrkas people—and ten of their twenty breeding males would turn back to help the humans of the south. The protector sullsi would stay with the pack and its juveniles.
It seemed to the sullsi that those who went back would soon be living the greatest saga ever, and two of them were saga masters.
The young serpent, Tssissfu, would travel with them. Tssissfu would stay in touch with K'sthuump, and through K'sthuump with the humans, so the sullsi could be informed as plans developed. Meanwhile they'd head for the islands that formed an inner channel off the coast of Djez Gorrbul.