Half turning, something smacked him in the head, sending him crashing into the water.
61
Arent came awake groggily, waves of pain greeting the smallest movement of his head. He was still in the cargo hold, but he’d been tied to a beam, a gag stuffed in his mouth.
He struggled, but the bonds were knotted tight.
Vos was standing next to him, carving the mark of Old Tom onto a pillar. He’d already completed three of them, though this one was coming along better. The others were clumsy.
Arent wriggled, trying to loosen the ropes. When that failed, he wondered whether he’d be able to stretch his neck and bite Vos’s ear off.
Hearing him struggle, Vos turned his head. Fear showed on his plain face.
He put the dagger to Arent’s throat.
“I’ll pull down the gag so we may speak,” he said urgently. “If you try to call for help, I’ll slit your throat. Is that understood?”
For all his fear, the threat came easily enough.
Arent nodded.
Tentatively, Vos pulled the gag down, the material scraping across Arent’s whiskers.
“Not many men can get behind me,” said Arent. “I’m impressed.”
“I’ve learned to go unnoticed in my years of service to the governor general.”
“Handy talent for a thief.”
Vos’s eyes widened slightly, then narrowed. He relaxed.
“Then you do know,” he said. “Good, that makes this easier. Who else knows? Who’s waiting for me upstairs?”
“Everybody,” said Arent. “Everybody knows.”
“And yet you came alone,” said Vos, tipping his ear to the air. “And I hear no steps, no distant chatter, none of the sounds that would indicate anybody else is down here.” A horrifying grin split his face. “No, you’re alone. I think you saw poor, wretched little Vos and mistakenly thought him no threat.” He wagged his dagger at him. “You’re not the first, but one does not rise out of the mud to become the governor general’s chamberlain without putting a few rivals out of the way.”
“And now you have the Folly, you won’t have to be the governor general’s chamberlain any longer.”
Vos became confused. “The Folly? Is that why…” He burst out laughing. It was a wholly unnatural sound coming from him. “Oh, my dear Arent. Fate has no love of you, does she? I didn’t steal the Folly, though. I’m honored you think I could. I’m afraid you’ve hit upon the right criminal, but the wrong crime.”
The idea obviously tickled him, for he was still chortling as he tugged the gag back above Arent’s mouth, then returned to carving the mark of Old Tom on the pillar.
“Odd as it may sound, I’m glad of this,” he went on. “My work requires that I hide myself and pretend to be less than I am, but I was always thinking about my future. I was never content to be the governor general’s favorite hound forever. It’s pleasant to finally be seen, however accidentally.”
A candle appeared in the distance. A tiny spot of light coming steadily closer.
Vos traced the point of his dagger over the mark of Old Tom. “Fear not. I haven’t succumbed to the creature’s whims, if that’s what you’re thinking. The beautiful thing about fear this large is that nobody will look beyond it. I’ll carve this mark onto your chest, and everybody will believe the demon killed you. They won’t even think to question it. They’ll want to believe it. People like fantastical stories more than they like the mundane truth.”
The candle came closer, rags emerging out of the darkness, the light illuminating the bloody bandages around the leper’s face. Vos had his back to it. Enthralled by his own voice, he didn’t heed Arent’s muffled cries of warning. “Old Tom whispered to me, you know. Creesjie’s hand for the governor general’s life. It even offered to leave a dagger under his bunk to use.” He became thoughtful. “I’ll confess I was tempted by its offer, but thankfully, I have my own plans.” He sighed, tapping the dagger against the wood ecstatically. “I knew Creesjie would accept me eventually. It was a matter of patience, that’s all.”
The leper was only two paces behind him. Arent strained, jerking his head toward it, screaming through the gag.
Vos furrowed his brow, as if perplexed by a man in Arent’s situation making a fuss. “Calm yourself and you may have your final words,” he said.
The leper was a solitary step away. Arent stopped yelling long enough for Vos to tug the gag down.
“Behind you!” roared Arent. “Behind you, you damn fool!”
Startled by the terror in Arent’s voice, Vos spun around, coming face-to-face with the leper. From somewhere under the bandages, it hissed, driving a blade into Vos’s chest before twisting it.
The chamberlain screamed in agony, the sound echoing around the cargo hold. His body went limp, and the leper slowly withdrew its dagger, letting Vos collapse with a splash.
The leper stepped over his body, bringing its bloody bandages within touching distance of Arent’s face. It stank of the midden.
Its knife appeared in front of Arent’s face, Vos’s blood still dripping off the edge. It had a crudely carved wooden handle and a strange, thin blade that looked like it would snap the very second it was used.
It touched the point of the dagger to Arent’s cheek, the metal cold against his flesh.
Arent squirmed, trying to pull his head away.
The blade ran down his cheek and along his neck, crossing his stomach. Through its bandages, Arent could hear its rasping breaths. The dead don’t breathe, do they, he thought triumphantly.
The dagger pressed against his stomach, then it stopped suddenly. The leper sniffed him. Then again, deeper this time, as if surprised by something. A hand snaked its way into his pocket, slowly pulling out the rosary. Cocking its head, it stared at the beads in fascination, letting out that strange animal growl he’d heard with Sara.
For a second, it considered him.
Hissing, the leper blew out the candle and disappeared.
62
Sara didn’t have to wait for the knocking to know that Arent was coming down the corridor. His stumbling steps reverberated through the wood, falling heavily enough to be heard over the harp she was playing for Lia, Dorothea, Creesjie, and Isabel.
Opening the door, she saw him carrying a heavy sack over his shoulder, every one of his long labors these last days showing. Blood trickled down his forehead and from the slash she’d stitched up on his forearm. His wrists were rubbed raw. He was soaked through with stinking bilgewater, his face so weary, she couldn’t imagine how he’d dragged himself up here.
The other women joined her in the corridor, still holding the wine they’d been drinking.
Arriving in front of them, Arent dropped the sack on the floor.
“Sammy was right about Vos,” he said hoarsely.
“He was a thief?” asked Sara.
“Yes.”
“Is this the Folly?” asked Creesjie, eyeing the sack.
“No,” said Arent. “Sammy was wrong about that part. Vos didn’t steal it. He stole this instead.” Arent kicked the bag over, spilling silver plates and chalices, tiaras and diamonds, gold chains and beautiful jewelry.
Creesjie stared at the jewels sparkling by her feet. “He told me he was coming into wealth,” she said, kneeling down to sift through the stones covetously. “This must have been what he meant.”
“This is a fortune,” said Sara, astonished. She peered at Arent. There was a sickly sheen to his skin, and his eyes were unfocused. “Where did Vos get all this?”
“The leper killed him before he could say.”
“The leper? You saw the leper?”
“It saved my life,” said Arent, resting his weight against the wall. “It killed Vos. It was going to kill me, but then it seemed to sense my father’s rosary on me. It stole it and left me to wriggle my
way out of the ropes.”
“Vos is dead?” said Creesjie, momentarily stricken. “Oh, that fool!”
While Lia consoled her, Sara placed a hand against Arent’s chest. She could feel his fever through the thin shirt.
“You need a bed, Arent. You’re burning up,” she said.
“Some of these pieces are older than me,” said Dorothea, who was gleefully piling ring after ring onto her fingers. “These suit me, don’t you think?” She held her adorned hand out for Sara to admire.
“Wait,” said Sara, tugging one of the rings off Dorothea’s finger. “I recognize this crest. My father made me memorize reams of heraldry when I was a girl. Every coat of arms, every family name, every piece of genealogy. This is the crest of the Dijksma family.”
“Hector Dijksma was one of the people possessed by Old Tom,” replied Creesjie, surprised. “He was on that list I stole from Jan’s cabin.”
“Yes, I remember reading about him in the daemonologica,” said Sara, struggling to recall the exact passage.
“Dijksma was the second son of a wealthy trading family,” supplied Isabel. Seeing their confusion, she explained. “Sander made me study the daemonologica until I could recite every page. Dijksma was possessed by Old Tom in 1609, and he used him to perform dark rituals in the family home. Maids had been going missing from nearby villages for months, and Pieter discovered they’d all been summoned up to the house. He went to free them, but they’d been butchered. He battled Old Tom and managed to exorcise him from Hector, who fled the Provinces before a mob could build him a pyre.”
“Did the daemonologica ever say what became of him?”
“No,” said Isabel. “But if this is Hector Dijksma’s treasure, perhaps Vos was actually Hector? Once his family name was ruined, maybe he fled with what was left of his family’s wealth?”
“Or Vos was Old Tom,” speculated Creesjie. “Could that have been it?”
“I caught him carving its mark onto the crates,” supplied Arent. The others could barely understand him. His words were running together. “But he denied being our devil. He said fear was a great cover for a crime.”
“Come on, Arent,” said Sara, worried. “We need to get you to your berth.”
“I’m going to see Sammy first. Can somebody tell my uncle about Vos? Let him believe Vos stole the Folly. I don’t want another innocent person getting flogged.”
As he staggered off, Sara ran after him. He was having to balance against the wall to stay upright.
“Will you be okay?” she asked.
He laughed grimly. “It’s been a long day, and a lot of people have tried to kill me.” He considered it. “Vos may or may not have been Old Tom, a demon that may or may not exist. If it does exist, it was summoned by my uncle—a man I loved once but who now seems to be a vindictive, callous, murdering bastard. Vos has treasure stolen from a family Old Tom destroyed nearly thirty years ago, my newest friend butchered an island full of people, and we’re a solitary unholy miracle away from everybody being slaughtered, according to the prophecies of a murdered predikant. Worst of all, the only man who could hammer a beam to this mess is locked away in the dark under false accusation from my grandfather, and there’s not a damn thing I can do to help him.”
With that, he collapsed.
63
The governor general was disturbed by three polite knocks on his cabin door, which he recognized from their swiftness as belonging to Guard Captain Drecht.
“Come, Drecht,” he said.
After two weeks being pecked at by his own thoughts, Jan Haan had become whiskered and gaunt, with deep, dark circles under his eyes. What little weight he’d carried from Batavia had fallen away, leaving a body made of bones and will.
He was working by the light of a solitary candle, comparing the list of people Old Tom had possessed and the passenger manifest. An old debt was being called in, and somebody on board was responsible. The mark of Old Tom had been daubed onto the sail to let him know his past had swallowed his present and was now coiling around his future. He’d trusted Arent to put a sword through Old Tom before that happened, but he hadn’t given him enough information. Arent was strong and clever, but even he couldn’t fight with a hood over his head.
Haan carried few regrets, but lying to Arent all these years was one of them. The past was poisoned ground; that was what Casper van den Berg had taught him. God chose every individual’s path, so what use was worrying about those who fell by the wayside, those you hurt or caused to be hurt, those who had to fall so you could climb?
Haan believed this, but he’d longed to tell Arent the truth about the forest and his father and the bargain that had been struck. So armed, Arent would surely have discovered who was threatening this boat, but the secret was buried too deep. Try as he might, Haan couldn’t tug it loose.
And now Old Tom had stolen the Folly.
His ascension into the ranks of the Gentlemen 17 was predicated on delivering that device to them. It was the only reason they’d looked past their distaste for him in the first place.
He couldn’t return to Amsterdam empty-handed.
He wasn’t sure if the constable had bargained with the devil or was innocent as Arent had insisted. It didn’t matter. Fear was contagious. The crew had seen what he’d done to the constable, and they knew it would be one of them tomorrow. In their foul hearts, one of them held the information he needed.
After enough of them had bled, they would bring it to him.
In the meantime, he stared at the manifest and the list of possessed souls. Old Tom was on this boat, and Old Tom always bargained. Haan just had to work out what to tempt him with.
Drecht jangled into the room, dragging a heavy sack behind him. Halfway inside, it tipped over, a cup tumbling across the floor and landing at Haan’s feet. He scooped it up and held it to the light. Turning it over, he saw the crest on the other side.
“Dijksma,” he murmured.
“You know it, sir?”
“From long ago. Where did you come by it?”
Drecht straightened and placed his hand on the hilt of his sword. This was the posture he always adopted before delivering bad news. “Your nephew recovered it from Cornelius Vos, sir. He identified Vos as the Folly’s thief, but Vos tried to kill him.” He puffed out his chest. “Vos is dead, sir. Killed by the leper.”
“And Arent?” asked Haan, in concern.
“A fever has him, my lord.” Drecht’s face twitched beneath his beard. “He’s being tended to.”
Haan leaned back in his chair. “Poor Vos. Ambition is a burden few can carry. I’m afraid his crushed him.” He shook his head. “He was an excellent administrator.” And there ended his eulogy, for his thoughts had already moved on.
“Was the Folly recovered?”
“No, sir.”
Haan cursed. “How did he steal it?”
“Apparently, he hid the three pieces in three separate kegs, then had accomplices roll them out when battle stations were called.”
“Three?” Haan murmured. It had taken three of them to summon Old Tom all those years ago. That couldn’t be a coincidence. “The others must have turned on him. Do we have these accomplices?”
“Not yet, sir.”
“Then flog two men at the mainmast each day. I want them found.” He drummed the table with his sharp fingernails.
Vos had betrayed him. Could it really be so simple? It had always struck him as a waste to kill those you’d defeated, for how else would they understand the totality of their loss. Mercy, he believed, was the gravest wound you could inflict, for it was the only one that wouldn’t heal. Had that mercy back in the Provinces brought this upon him? Would it also point the way out?
He stared out of his porthole at the full moon, prowling behind tattered white clouds.
“Old Tom,” he muttered, as if he saw t
he devil’s face floating there. “We should have been more careful,” he said, speaking to nobody in particular. “We should have known that something that powerful would get free of us eventually. That’s the problem with summoning demons, you see. Sooner or later, somebody else raises them against you.”
Drecht’s face moved from bafflement to concern as the governor general’s eyes drifted to the names of those the demon had possessed over the years.
Bastiaan Bos
Tukihiri
Gillis van de Ceulen
Hector Dijksma
Emily de Haviland
“Who were his collaborators?” Haan muttered, comparing the names to those on the passenger manifest. “Where are you hiding, devil?”
Haan’s eyes widened in surprise, as specific letters swam into focus. For two weeks, he had stared at these two documents, trying to drag out information that was being given to him plain. How had he missed what was so obvious?
“This isn’t about the Folly,” he said sickly. His face had gone pale. He ran a trembling hand across his eyes, then looked up at the worried guard captain. “Come, Drecht. We’re going to the passenger cabins.”
Outside, rain tapped the wood as if trying to get inside. The ship groaned unnervingly. It hadn’t been the same since the storm. The creaks had become shrieks, the rigging messier, like a broken cobweb.
Like everything on this ship, the solidity had been an illusion.
They’d encased themselves in wood and nails and thrown themselves to the sea, believing their courage would see them safe. And then their enemy had raised its hand and showed them how foolish they’d been.
Rain ran down the governor general’s nose and off his pointed chin. It flew off his eyelids when he blinked. The guard captain could barely keep up.
“Wait here,” Haan demanded as they reached the entrance to the passenger cabins.
“Sir, I don’t—”
“Wait here. I’ll call if you’re required.”
Drecht pressed his lips tight, exchanging uncertain looks with Eggert before taking a place on the opposite side of the hatch. Straightening his breastplate formally, Haan stepped inside and swung the red door shut behind him. Drecht quickly maneuvered his sword sheath into the gap, preventing it from closing fully. He couldn’t see what was happening inside, but at least he’d be able to hear.
The Devil and the Dark Water Page 33