Call of the Bone Ships

by Rj Barker

  “I have been so long among people who think differently I have started to take it for granted.” She turned back, the mask of shipwife back in place. “You are right, it must be Dinyl.”

  But now she had talked of letting him go, the thought was filling Joron’s mind. He heard an echo of Garriya’s voice: When you will just repeat all you have done and return here, under my knives all over again . . .

  “No, Shipwife,” he said. “I am wrong. You are right. I should go.”

  “Why?” she said.

  “Because I am wounded. A boneship being chased by traitors? Its shipwife sorely injured? They will throw open the gates and let me rush onto the docks with my people. It would be expected that there would be chaos, raised voices.”

  “They would think you helpless,” said Meas. He nodded.

  “So I must make sure I am not. There will be no repeat of what happened on Bernshulme.” He shuddered, at the thought of Gueste and being locked in that box.

  “Indeed,” she said, and paused for a moment, letting silence settle around them like sediment in water. “The gullaime wishes to see you. I have kept it away for as long as I can – I did not want you tired and Hag knows that creature can be tiring. But I think it worries.”

  “I would be glad to see it. Only . . .” Meas raised an eyebrow. “. . . Maybe give me an hour alone, first?”

  “I will send it after the third bell, when the crew have eaten.”

  “Thank you,” he said, and she left him in the cabin. Alone with his thoughts. For the first time he felt truly awake. Whatever drugs Garriya had been dosing him with were fading, leaving an ache where his foot and lower leg should be, and a space in his mind, as if whatever part of him had controlled that missing piece of flesh and bone had also been neatly excised.

  He had not yet dared look under the blanket. He dimly remembered Garriya coming in with unguents and water and cloth, and the pain that ensued. But he had looked away when she had pulled back the blanket. Pushed the reality of it to the back of his mind, sure that with the loss of his leg came the loss of himself and everything he had become.

  But that was not to be.

  He stared down the hammock, one side a whole leg, the other a rumpled blanket from just above his knee down. He pulled the covers up, up and up, revealing his foot, then the leg of the dirty and stained trouser he wore, had worn since the island. Then the stump of his missing leg, the end of the trousers neatly folded back over and held in place with a bone pin. He reached down, shards of pain lancing through him, and with shaking hands pulled out the pin. The cloth of his trouser had been slit so it could be folded back and opened. He gently did so.

  The stump of his leg had not been bandaged, or if it had Garriya had chosen to take it off now. It was smoother than he had imagined, a flap of skin neatly sewn up and over just where his knee had been. It seemed somehow unreal. His thigh looked the same, and then his lower leg was gone. But he could still feel it. If he closed his eyes it was there and he was sure he could reach out and touch his toes.

  But when he opened his eyes it was still gone.

  So much gone.

  His leg, his father; friends, enemies. Lost. Taken by the eternal war machine that was life in the Scattered Archipelago, bodies ground up between the Hundred Isles and the Gaunt Islands. He stared at the space where his leg should be and felt a desolation within. Empty. As arid as a waterless island. Something within him shook, and grief erupted like the keyshan from McLean’s Rock, smashing through the desolation, shaking his body, and he clasped his arms around himself. Keening silently for all that was lost, to him, to everyone.

  And for what?

  For what?

  . . . you will just repeat all you have done and return here, under my knives all over again . . .

  Sleep took him, eventually, a deep and exhausted sleep he had been denied by the cocktails of drugs he had taken, and outside his cabin, unseen and unheard by him, the deckchilder did all they could to remain as quiet as it was possible to be on a boneship, with its many duties and never ending jobs, for they knew the deckkeeper had been though much. And if they heard him weep a little, did they care? No, they did not, for what did it matter to them if a brave man wept? It did not make him any less brave, and had they not all wept at some point in their lives? So they smiled to themselves and went on with their jobs, never to mention it again.

  When he woke it was to the familiar hot smell of the ship’s gullaime. He opened an eye, crusted with sleep and dried tears, and stared around the dimly lit cabin. He had slept through the day and into the night. He heard a late bell. Knew that Skearith’s Bones would be twirling overhead. There were two gullaime – Tide Child’s own windtalker, and Madorra – squatting like statues in opposite corners of the cabin. As far from each other as it was possible to be without leaving the small room. Madorra barely covered, a mass of white feathers and pink skin, one brown eye glinting from an unmasked face. The gullaime, its robe coloured and adorned with trinkets and dye, its mask surrounded by feathers it had stuck all over it and which now almost entirely covered its face. It looked like some fierce priest of its race, some demigod of bird people.

  Its head turned, the beak pointed at him. Opened.

  “Jo-ron Twi-ner.” It stood, squatting to standing in one move, and hopped over. “Joron Twiner awake?”

  “Yes.”

  “Not dead?”

  “No. Not dead.”

  “Good. Good.” Its head passed down his body, stopping at the empty space below his stump.

  “Leg gone.”

  “Yes.”

  “Hurt?”

  “Yes.” With that admission the pain came flooding in. He gritted his teeth. Closed his eyes. When he opened them again the gullaime’s face was in front of his.

  “Shorn gone,” it said.

  “Yes,” he said, and once more those tears threatened.

  “Why?”

  “He gave his life to save yours.”

  The gullaime did not move.

  “Why?” Through the mask Joron could feel the unwavering gaze of those glowing eyes.

  “It thought you were important.”

  The gullaime’s head slowly moved backwards, away from him. Then it turned its beak, looking down his body, coming back to his face.

  “Leg gone,” it said again.

  “Yes.”

  “Hurts.”

  “Yes.”

  “Shorn gone,” it said.

  “Yes.”

  “Hurts,” it said. Then it opened its mouth and made a sound so quiet Joron was sure only he could hear it: the lonely call of a skeer, riding the wind above a cliff without any of its fellows. The shout of a deckchilder as they slipped beneath the waves. The cry of a babe as the blade fell and the ship took its soul for a corpselight. “Not know why.” It said it so quietly it was barely even a whisper. “Did not know. Hurts.”

  “I am sorry, Gullaime, but know it died happy, sure it had done the right thing.”

  “No,” said the gullaime. “Not right. Not right. Not want. Not want hurt. Not want this.”

  “What do you mean, ‘this’?”

  “Windseer.” That from Madorra. The windshorn bird stood. “Windseer,” it said again, then its single eye focused on Joron. “Caller.”

  “No,” said the gullaime.

  “Caller,” said Madorra again, voice gathering strength. “Is Caller. Is Windseer. Is true.”

  “No,” said the gullaime once more. And took a step back from Madorra as it slowly advanced.

  “Show face.”

  The gullaime shook its head, such a human motion.

  “Show face.”

  “No,” it said, and for the first time ever, Joron felt that there was real fear in the gullaime’s voice. It was not fear as would be heard through a human’s voice – no shake, no tremor. But it was, recognisably, fear. Madorra lunged at the gullaime, a wingclaw catching the mask and ripping it from its head. Beneath the mask the gullaime’s eyes were
screwed shut; around them the beautiful feathers that caught even the tiniest bit of light and reflected it back in myriad colours. The gullaime backed away, eyes still tightly closed.

  “Open eyes,” said Madorra.

  “No.”

  “Open eyes!”

  “No!”

  “Open. Eyes,” said Madorra once more and, as if the gullaime was unable to fight the command in the windshorn’s voice, it obeyed. First, just a crack of white light in the centre of the lids. And then the eyes opened fully. Burning orbs, black corkscrew iris spinning into being.

  The effect on Madorra could not have been more dramatic. The windshorn’s posture went from one of aggression and authority to one of abject submission. It fell to the floor, body pressed as hard as could be against the bone boards, thinly feathered wings spread out. “Windseer!” it said. And where Joron had heard fear in the gullaime’s words he heard awe in Madorra’s. “Windseer is come.” Awe – and was that calculation? Was it cunning? Or was he ascribing things to the windshorn’s voice he only imagined as he did not like the creature?

  “No, no, no,” squawked the gullaime and it retrieved its mask, placing it back over its eyes. “Not want. Not want.”

  “Is!” said Madorra. “Is!”

  “No,” said the gullaime quietly and, even in the dimness, he was sure its wingclaws were shaking.

  “What is the Windseer?” said Joron. “What is the Caller?”

  Madorra sprang from its prone position on the floor and hopped over so its scarred and ruined face was in front of Joron’s.

  “Windseer is freedom of gullaime. Caller is freedom of gullaime.”

  “Windseer is death,” said the gullaime quietly. “Is death. Is destruction. Is end.” And as it spoke Madorra was nodding its head. Joron saw in its eye the same light he had seen in the hagpriests as they cut open the throat of a babe, the unwavering belief of the fanatic.

  “Yes, yes,” it said. “Windseer and Caller. Bring back sea sither. Then Skearith reborn.”

  “Fire and blood,” added the gullaime. “Death to all. The burning door.”

  “Yes, yes,” said Madorra, as if the idea of death and fire and blood was nothing but an inconvenience. “All gullaime die, all reborn free.”

  “Not want!” said the gullaime.

  “Stupid bird!” shouted Madorra. “What want no matter. What is. Free people. Fire and death and—”

  Joron’s hand shot out, grabbing Madorra’s beak and holding it closed. For a moment he thought the windshorn would lash out. It did not. The single eye only rolled to look at him.

  “And my people? And all else that lives on the isles?” said Joron.

  “All dead,” said the gullaime, and there was a weight of sorrow in its voice despite how its people had been treated.

  “You believe this wholeheartedly?” said Joron to Madorra, and he felt the windshorn nod its head by the movement of the beak in his hand. “So you will protect the gullaime? Even with your life, exactly like Shorn did?” It nodded again. Joron removed his hand from its beak.

  “All gullaime will,” said Madorra, more calmly.

  “You cannot tell the others what you believe,” said Joron.

  “Windseer is importa—” it began, but once more Joron held its beak closed.

  “What do you think will happen if your people talk? If this crew, if humans in general, find out that the gullaime here, your Windseer, is their doom?” The single eye rolled to look at Joron once more. “They will kill it, Madorra. Then they will kill you and it would not surprise me at all if they went from there and killed every gullaime in the Hundred and the Gaunt Islands.” He stared into that single eye. “Would such actions surprise you?” The eye blinked, as if in agreement, and Joron let go of its beak. “You can tell no one.”

  “Told you,” it said.

  “I can keep a secret,” he said. “Now go.”

  Madorra turned and hopped across the cabin, opening the door. While it did the gullaime shuffled over to Joron.

  “Not kill all,” it said quietly. “Windshorn mad. Gullaime not do it.”

  “I never thought you would kill us all, Gullaime,” he said, and the gullaime bobbed its head and followed Madorra out of the cabin.

  Joron looked down at the space where his leg should be and the desolation within him ruled once more. A vast emotional wasteland where, even though he was not sure he believed in prophecies, he could not help feeling that if Madorra was right and the gullaime was this Windseer, this harbinger of the end for humanity, then maybe it was for the best.

  46

  First Steps

  They were days and weeks of pain and frustration and stumbling. They were days and weeks of much kindness and support.

  The bone leg, that thing that was part him, part ship, was uncomfortable, and for days he bore it until the stump started bleeding and Coxward chided him.

  “It is easier to fix a lump of bone than a man, Deckkeeper. It will not fit straight off. We must work together to find your comfort.”

  And they did. Not just Coxward either. When he slipped and tripped there was Farys or Mevans to help him back up. When he sat, exhausted, on the slate deck, sure he would never master it, there was Solemn Muffaz or Gavith with a story of how they had failed and come through some trial in their lives. When he ached there was Garriya rubbing salves into his stump, into his bruises. When he thought he could go no further and the crew’s will for him to succeed was an almost physical force. When he was determined to carry on and Dinyl gently took his elbow and told him he must rest. When he thought all was lost and he would never walk again and Meas was there, silent but full of surety that he would.

  And he did.

  Step.

  Two steps.

  Then three steps.

  And then four steps.

  Then once he had mastered that success came in a wave – this sense of balance, this knowledge of how the bone spur moved with him, of how his body would react. Oh, he would win no races. He still fell and swore, often joined in that by Black Orris, but by the time the call of “Land rising!” went up and Tide Child hove into view of Cassin’s Isle and the waiting fleet, he no longer felt like a burden. He could stand on the rump of the deck with Meas and Dinyl, he could haul on a rope and he could pace up and down the slate picking on those who took a moment to slack. And when he did pace the deck, if his gait was marked by a slight limp from the pain where his spur attached to his stump, then what of it?

  Often, when he walked, the gullaime would follow him, mimicking his walk, putting on a limp of its own. “Good leg. New leg. Good leg,” it would call. If he stopped it would lower its head to examine the false leg, tapping it with its beak and screeching out in glee, “Like mine! Like mine!” There was much joy in it, though behind the gullaime was always Madorra, who made something cold run through Joron in a way that Shorn had never done. A dark and ascetic cloud to the riotous colour, noise and joyous curiosity of the gullaime.

  When the other shipwives were brought on board Joron stood with his shipwife to welcome them. And if they noticed he was missing a leg they said nothing, and never once was his ability questioned or doubted. For he was the choice of Lucky Meas and they had named her shipmother of the small fleet, and for all she pretended not to want it and commanded they not use the title, she could not hide her pride from Joron, who knew his shipwife’s moods as well as he knew their ship.

  Five shipwives came aboard. Brekir, Meas had asked for, and the remaining four had been chosen as the most senior of those gathered, because no more than five could be fitted into Tide Child’s great cabin. Had this been Safeharbour, reflected Joron, they would have all met together on land. But it was not, and Safeharbour was a ruin now, its ashes long grown cold, and Leasthaven had nowhere large enough for them all to meet. So Meas must either bring them here in dribs and drabs, or tell a few of the most senior and let them spread her plans, and it was the latter she had chosen to do.

  In her cabin they sa
t, around a thin spread of food that was the best Mevans and the cook could put together, though none seemed bothered by the meagre spread and they ate with the same relish they would have shown if it was a true feast.

  “Brekir,” said Meas. “How many ships do we have?”

  “Those of the five shipwives here are the largest of our fleet. Though none are as large as Tide Child, Adrantchi’s Beakwyrm’s Glee is almost as big, even though it is only a two-ribber.”

  “Less of the only, please, Shipwife Brekir, for the Glee is a fine ship and he has done his crew well.” Adrantchi was a solid man, with thick black eyebrows that gave his face an imposing, serious and fierce look that Joron had heard was more than deserved. He ruled his black ship with a hand of iron, though his crew loved him for it.

  “The shipwife is right,” said his deckkeeper – a tall, thin woman who they called Black Ani, despite her skin being unnaturally white and her eyes pink. It was commonly held the two, in defiance of the Bernlaw, were lovers and Joron could believe it. They sat just a little closer than was right for a shipwife and deckkeeper. But how a shipwife ran their ship was their own business, and Adrantchi and Black Ani were from the Gaunt Islands – they did things differently there, so Joron gave it no more thought. “The Glee will fight as hard as a ship three times his size and our crew will outloose any other.”

  “I in no way disparage you,” said Brekir, “I only tell Shipmo—” She caught herself, looking as miserable as ever. “I only tell Shipwife Meas the technical aspects of our fleet. I speak not of their fierceness.” Adrantchi nodded and used a knife to take a piece of rubbery-looking fish from the serving platter and place it before him.

  “You said you loose faster than any other,” said Shipwife Turrimore, dark-skinned like Joron, and of the Hundred Isles, though she was far thinner than Joron, little more than bones beneath her tight purple fishskin. She had no deckkeeper with her, only her deckmother, a huge woman that Turrimore did not bother to name and who sat behind her, glowering silently. “Only, Shipwife Adrantchi, if you are sure of the speed of your loosing, perhaps we could make a small wager? For I reckon the Bloodskeer looses faster than any.” She grinned, showing she had no teeth at all in her bottom jaw, some congenital defect that let Joron know she had risen to shipwife on her black ship through fury and strength, not birth.