by Robin Hobb
The old woman turned and rushed from the room. There was no dignity and strength in her retreat. Malta knew that meant she had won. She had faced her down, once and for all, and now they all would have to treat Malta differently. She had won, she had proved her will was as strong as her grandmother’s. And she didn’t care, not really, about that last thing her grandmother had said. It was all a lie anyway, about sacrifices made for her. It was all a lie.
A lie. And that was another thing. She hadn’t meant to lie to her about the box. She wouldn’t have done it, if the old woman had not been so sure she had both stolen it and lied about it. If Ronica Vestrit had looked at her and wondered a little if she were innocent, Malta would have told her the truth. But what was the good of telling people the truth when they already believed you were wicked and the truth would just prove it to them? She might just as well lie twice and be the liar and thief that her grandmother not only believed she was, but hoped she was. Yes, that was true, her grandmother wanted her to be bad and wicked, because then she’d feel justified in the horrid way she treated Malta’s father. It was all her grandmother’s own fault. If you treated people badly, then it all just came back on you.
‘Malta?’ The voice was very soft, very gentle. A hand came to rest tenderly on her shoulder. ‘Are you all right, my dear?’
Malta whirled, seizing up her porridge bowl and dashing it at the floor at Rache’s feet. ‘I hate porridge! Don’t serve it to me again! I don’t care what else you have to cook for me, don’t serve me porridge. And don’t touch me! You don’t have the right. Now clean that up and leave me alone!’
She pushed the shocked slave out of the way and stormed out of the room. Slaves. They were so stupid. About everything.
‘Paragon. There’s something I have to talk to you about.’
Amber had spent the afternoon with him. She’d brought a lantern with her, and explored inside him. She’d walked slowly through his hold, the captain’s chamber, the chart room, every compartment inside his hull. In the course of it, she’d asked many questions, some of which he could answer, others he would not or could not. She’d found the things that Brashen had left and boldly arranged them to suit herself. ‘Some night I’ll come out here and sleep with you, shall I?’ she had proposed. ‘We’ll stay up late and tell each other stories until dawn.’ She’d been intensely interested in every odd bit of junk she found. A bag with dice in it, still tucked up in a crack where some sailor had hidden it so he could game on watch and not be caught. A scratched out message on one bulkhead. ‘Three days, Sa help us all,’ it read, and she had wanted to know who had carved it and why. She had been most curious about the bloodstains. She had gone from one to another, counting up to seventeen irregular blotches on his deck and in various holds. She had missed six others, but he didn’t tell her that, nor would he recall for her the day that blood had been shed or the names of those who had fallen. And in the captain’s quarters she had found the locked compartment that should have held his log books, but did not. The lock was long shattered, even the plank door splintered and torn away. The logs that should have been his memory were gone, all stolen away. Amber had picked at that like a gull at a body. Was that why he would not answer her questions? Did he have to have his logs to remember? Yes? Well, then, how did he remember her visits, or Mingsley’s? He had no log of those things.
He had shrugged. ‘A dozen years from now, when you have lost interest in me and no longer come to visit, I shall probably have forgotten you as well. You do not stop to think that you are asking me of events that most likely occurred long before you were born. Why don’t you tell me about your childhood. How well do you remember your infancy?’
‘Not very well.’ She changed the subject abruptly. ‘Do you know what I did yesterday? I went to Davad Restart and made an offer to buy you.’
Her words jolted him into silence. Then he coldly replied, ‘Davad Restart cannot sell me. He does not own me. Nor can a liveship be bought and sold at all, save from kin to kin, and then only in dire circumstance.’
It was Amber’s turn to be silent. ‘Somehow, I thought you would know of these things. Well. If you do not, then you should, for they concern you. Paragon, among the New Traders, there have been rumours for months that you are for sale. Davad is acting as the intermediary. At first, your family was stipulating that you must not be used as a ship any longer because they… they didn’t want to be held responsible for any deaths…’ Her voice trailed off. ‘Paragon. How frankly can I speak to you? Sometimes you are so thoughtful and wise. At other times…’
‘So you offered to buy me? Why? What will you make from my body? Beads? Furniture?’ His edge of control was very thin, his words sharp with sarcasm. How dare she!
‘No,’ she said with a heavy sigh. Almost to herself she muttered, ‘I feared this.’ She took a deep breath. ‘I would keep you as you are and where you are. Those were the terms of my offer.’
‘Chained here? Beached for ever? For seagulls to shit on, and crabs to scuttle beneath? Beached here until all of me that is not wizardwood rots away and I fall apart into screaming pieces?’
‘Paragon!’ She cried out the word, in a voice between pain and anger. ‘Stop this. Stop it now! You must know I would never let that befall you. You have to listen to me, you have to let me talk until you’ve heard it all. Because I think I will need your help. If you go off now into wild accusations and suspicions, I cannot help you. And more than anything, I want to help you.’ Her voice went lower and softer on those words. She drew another deep breath. ‘So. Can you listen to me? Will you give me at least a chance to explain myself?’
‘Explain,’ he said coldly. Lie and make excuses. Deceive and betray. He’d listen. He’d listen and gather what weapons he could to defend himself against all of them.
‘Oh, Paragon,’ she said hoarsely. She put a palm flat to his hull. He tried to ignore this touch, to ignore the deep feeling that thrummed through her. ‘The Ludluck family, your family, has come on hard times. Very hard times. It is the same for many of the Old Trader families. There are many factors: slave-labour, the wars in the north… but that doesn’t matter to us. What matters is that your family needs money now, the New Traders know that, and they seek to buy you. Do not think ill of the Ludlucks. They resisted many offers. But when finally the money offered was very high, then they specified that they could not sell to anyone who wished to actually use you as a ship.’ He could almost feel her shake her head. ‘To the New Traders, that simply meant that your family wanted more money, much more money, before they would sell you as a working ship.’ She took a deep breath and tried to go on more calmly. ‘Now, about then, I began to hear rumours that the only ship that can go up the Rain Wild Rivers and come back intact is a liveship. Something about your wizardwood being impervious to the caustic white floods that sometimes come down the river. Which makes sense in light of how long you have rested here and not rotted, and it makes me understand why families would go into debt for generations to possess a ship like you. It is the only way to participate in the trade on the Rain River. So now, as that rumour has crept about, the offers have risen. The New Traders who bid on you promise they will blame no one if you roll, and bid against each other.’ She paused. ‘Paragon, do you hear me?’ she asked quietly.
‘I hear you,’ he replied as he gazed sightlessly out over the ocean. He kept all expression out of his voice as he added, ‘Do go on.’
‘I will. Because you should know this, not because I take pleasure in it. So far, the Ludlucks have still refused all offers. I think perhaps they fear what the other Old Traders might think of them, if they sold you and opened up the Rain River trade to the newcomers. Those goods are the last complete bastion of the Bingtown Traders. Or perhaps, despite their neglect of you, there still remains some family feeling. So. I made an offer. Not as great as the others have bid, for I don’t have the wealth they do. But coupled with my offer was my promise that you would remain intact and unsailed. For I think
the Ludlucks still care about you. That in an odd way, they keep you here to keep you safe.’
‘Ah, yes. Chaining up one’s odder relatives and keeping them confined to a garret or cellar or other out of the way place has long been how Bingtown dealt with madness or deformity.’ He gave a bitter laugh. ‘Consider the Rain Wild Traders, for example.’
‘Who?’
‘Exactly. Who? No one hears of them, no one knows of them, no one considers our ancient covenants with them. Least of all me or you. Pray, go on. After you buy me and leave me intact and don’t sail me, what did you have in mind?’
‘Oh, Paragon.’ She sounded completely miserable now. ‘If it were up to me — if I could dream as a child does and believe those dreams could come true — I would say, then, I would have artisans come here, to right you and build a cradle to support you upright. And I would come and live aboard you. On the cliffs above you, I would plant a garden of scent and colour, a bird and butterfly garden, with trailing vines to hang all the way down to the beach and bloom sweetly. And around you I would sculpt stone and create tidepools and populate them with sea stars and sea anemones and those little scarlet crabs.’ As she raved on of this strange vision, her voice grew more and more impassioned. ‘I would live inside you and work inside you and in the evenings I would dine on the deck and we would share our day. And if I dared to dream larger than that, why, then I would dream that someday I could obtain wizardwood and work it wisely enough to restore your eyes and your sight. In the mornings we would look out to the sun rising over the sea, and in the evenings we would look up to it setting over our cliff garden. I would say to the world, do what you will, for I am done with you. Destroy yourself or prosper, it is all one to me, as long as you leave us alone. And we would be happy, the two of us.’
For a time he was at a loss to say anything. The childish fantasy caught him up and wrapped around him and suddenly he was not the ship but a boy who would have run in and out of such a place, pockets full of shiny stones and odd shells, gull’s feathers and…
‘You are not my family, and you can never be my family.’ He dropped the words on the dream like a heavy shoe on a butterfly.
‘I know that,’ she said quietly. ‘I said it was but a dream. It is what I long to do, but in truth, I do not know how long I can remain in Bingtown or with you. But Paragon, it is the only hope I have of saving you. If I go to the Ludlucks, myself, and say that you have said you could be content in such a way, perhaps they might take the lesser offer from me, for the sake of the bond…’ Her voice wisped away as he crossed his arms over the star scar on his broad chest.
‘Save me from what?’ he asked her disdainfully. ‘Such a nursery tale as you can spin, Amber. I confess, it is a charming image. But I am a ship. I was created to be sailed. Do you think I choose to lie here on this beach, idle and near-mad with that idleness? No. If my family chooses to sell me into slavery, let it at least be a familiar slavery. I have no desire to be your playhouse.’ Especially not as she had just admitted that she would eventually leave him, that her friendship with him was only because something else kept her in Bingtown. Sooner or later, she would leave him, just as all the others had. Sooner or later, all humans abandoned him.
‘You had best go back to Davad Restart and withdraw your offer,’ he advised her when the silence had grown very long.
‘No.’
‘If you buy me and keep me here, I will hate you for ever, and I will bring you ill luck such as you cannot even imagine.’
Her voice was calm. ‘I don’t believe in luck, Paragon. I believe in fate, and I believe my fate has more terrible and heart-rending facets to it than even you can imagine. You, I know, are one of them. So, for the sake of the child who rants and threatens from within the wooden bones of a ship, I will buy you and keep you safe. Or as safe as fate will allow me.’ There was no fear in her voice. Only an odd tenderness as she reached up to set her palm flat to his planking.
‘Just wrap it up,’ he told her brusquely. ‘It will heal.’
Etta shook her head. Her voice was very soft as she told him, ‘Kennit, it is not healing.’ She set her hand gently to the flesh above his injury. ‘Your skin is hot and tender. I see you wince at every touch. These fluids that drain do not look to me like the liquids of healing but the—’
‘Shut up,’ he ordered her. ‘I’m a strong man, not some snivelling whore in your care. I will heal, and all will be well once more. Wrap it for me, or do not, I scarcely care. I can bandage it myself, or Sorcor can. I have no time to sit here and listen to you wish bad luck on me.’ A sudden pain, sharp as any toothache, rushed up his leg. He gasped before he could stop himself, then gripped the edges of his bunk hard to keep from screaming.
‘Kennit. You know what needs to be done.’ She was pleading with him.
He had to wait until he had breath to speak. ‘What needs to be done is feed you to a serpent so I can have a measure of peace in my life again. Go, get out of here, and send Sorcor to me. There are plans to be made, and I don’t have time for your fretting.’
She gathered up the sodden bandaging into a basket and left the room without another word. Good. Kennit reached for the sturdy crutch that leaned against his bunk. He had had Sorcor fashion it for him. He hated the thing, and when the deck pitched at all, it was virtually useless. But with it, on a calm day at anchor like today, he could get from his bunk to his chart table. He hopped there, in short painful hops that seared his stump with every jolt. He was sweating by the time he reached the table. He leaned forwards over his charts, resting his weight on the edge of the table.
There was a tap at the door.
‘Sorcor? Come in.’
The mate stuck his head around the edge of the door. His eyes were anxious. But at the sight of his captain standing at his chart table, he beamed like a child offered sweets. He ventured into the room. Kennit noted he had yet another new vest, one with even more embroidery. ‘That healer did you some good, then,’ he greeted Kennit as he came in the door. ‘I thought he might. Those other two, I didn’t think much of them. If you’re going to have someone work on you, get an old man, someone who’s been around a bit and…’
‘Shut up, Sorcor,’ Kennit said pleasantly. ‘He was no more useful than the other two. The custom in Bull Creek seems to be that if you cannot cure an injury, you create a different one to distract your victim from your incompetence. Why, I asked him, did he think he could heal a new slice to my leg if he could not cure the one I had? He had no answer to that.’ Kennit shrugged elaborately. ‘I am tired of these backwater healers. Like as not, I shall heal just as fast without their leeches and potions.’
The smile faded from Sorcor’s face as he came slowly into the captain’s room. ‘Like as not,’ he agreed dully.
‘This last one as much as said so himself,’ Kennit asserted.
‘Only because you threatened him until he agreed with you,’ Etta pointed out bitterly from the doorway. ‘Sorcor, stand up to him. Tell him he must let them cut the leg higher, above the foulness. He will listen to you, he respects you.’
‘Etta. Get out.’
‘I have nowhere to go.’
‘Go buy something in town. Sorcor, give her some money.’
‘I don’t need money. All in Bull Creek know I am your woman, if I so much as look at anything, they push it into my arms and beg me to take it. But there is nothing I truly want, anywhere, save that you should get better.’
Kennit sighed heavily. ‘Sorcor. Please shut the door. With the woman on the other side of it.’
‘No, I promise, please Kennit, I’ll be quiet. Let me stay. You talk to him, then, Sorcor, reason with him, he’ll listen to you…’
She kept it up like a whining dog and all the while Sorcor was quite gently pushing her out of the room and latching the door behind her. Kennit would not have been so gentle if he’d been able to deal with her himself. That, of course, was the whole problem. She saw him as weak, now, and would try to get her will in e
verything. Ever since she’d tortured his prisoners, he’d suspected she enjoyed the idea of cutting up helpless men. He wondered if there were some way he could leave her in Bull Creek.
‘And how are things in town?’ Kennit asked Sorcor pleasantly as if he had just entered.
Sorcor just stared at him for a moment. Then he seemed to decide to humour Kennit. ‘Couldn’t be better. Unless you’d come ashore and talk to the merchants yourself. They’ve all but begged that you come and be their guest. I already told you once. They saw our Raven flag coming into the harbour and turned out the whole town for us. Little boys were shouting your name from the docks, “Captain Kennit, Captain Kennit”. I heard one tell another that when it came to pirates, you were better than Igrot the Terrible.’
Kennit startled, then made a sour face. ‘I knew Igrot when I was a lad. His reputation exaggerates him,’ he said quietly.
‘Still, that’s something, when folk compare you to the man that burned twenty towns and—’
‘Enough of my fame,’ Kennit cut him off. ‘What of our business?’
‘They’ve resupplied us handsomely, and the Sicerna is already hove down for repair.’ The burly pirate shook his head. ‘There’s a lot of rot in her hull. I’m surprised the Satrap would entrust a gift’s delivery to a rotten tub like that.’
‘I doubt he inspected her hull,’ Kennit suggested dryly. ‘And they welcomed the new population we brought them?’
‘With open arms. Last slave-raid carried off the best smith in town. We’ve brought them two new ones. And the musicians and such are all the talk of the place. Three times now they acted out The Liberation of the Sicerna — got a right handsome lad being you, and a great worm made of paper and silk and barrel hoops that comes right up…’ Sorcor’s voice died away abruptly. ‘It’s a really good show, sir. I don’t think there’s anyone in town who hasn’t seen it.’