by Rob May
She looked inside; it was full of ivory discs, each inscribed with a denomination and etched with a twisting serpent design.
‘Count it if you like,’ Benedict said.
Kal briefly weighed the pouch in her hand. ‘It’s good,’ she said, getting up to leave.
‘Kal, wait. Sit down. There’s something else.’
Kal dropped back into the chair. Benedict rolled a glass bottle to her over the top of the stone table. She uncorked it and took a swig. Kal wasn’t usually one for afternoon drinking, but what the hell.
‘I have another job for you,’ Benedict told her. ‘Well, more of a mission really; a quest if you like. But it pays well: more than I’ve ever paid you before.’
‘I’m listening,’ she said cautiously.
Her patron took a gulp of his own beer and looked her in the eye. ‘Good, because I’m in trouble, Kal, and you might be the only person who can help me.’
II.v
Gold
Benedict stared at the neck of his beer bottle as he spoke. ‘You probably wonder where I get all my money from these days, considering that all I seem to do is drink, gamble and chase women.’
Kal shrugged. ‘That’s none of my business.’
‘I’ve made a few investments over the last couple of years—spent the last of the family fortune and acquired a few … assets … here and there. Strictly off the records, if you know what I mean. One of them is a gold mine; it’s on an island off the coast of Balibu. It’s an almost bottomless seam, and so deep that the heat down there makes it impossible for people to work. So now we use goblins.’
Goblins! Kal didn’t know what was worse—goblins this close to civilisation, or goblins being put to work mining gold.
‘They’re perfect for it, really; they don’t steal the gold because they have no idea how much it’s worth; and if they do … well, they’ll happily trade it back for a dead chicken.’
Benedict drained his beer. ‘But anyway, six weeks ago, there was no gold to be had when my ship from Balibu docked here in the city. Two weeks later, there was a message from my man out there, the governor, saying that all contact with the island and the mine had been cut off. And this week, the captain of my ship informed me that there was no more news from the governor because the governor had been killed.’
Benedict paused to let this sink in.
‘Okay,’ Kal said, ‘so you want me to head over and see what’s going on?’ Fine, she thought; Balibu was a fun place, and there was a large gaming house, the Crocodile Casa, that she had always wanted to check out.
‘If it was just a matter of a murdered governor, I could send the Senate Guard in to investigate,’ Benedict said. ‘But Kal, there’s more: the governor wasn’t stabbed, shot or even poisoned. His smoking skeleton was found in the burned-out ruins of his villa. And there are other rumours flying around too: strange cries and sounds coming from the island, livestock going missing … and the locals claim to have seen a large black shape that blocks out the moon and stars.’
Kal considered this in silence for a few moments.
‘So if you do accept the quest,’ Benedict said, ‘you might want this.’ He placed a shortsword in a black leather sheath on top of the stone table. Kal took it; the hilt and pommel were plain, but when she drew the blade she drew breath.
‘This is …’ she began, turning the blade to inspect it. In the torchlight it had a silvery sparkle.
‘Yes, it is,’ her patron said. ‘Well, it wasn’t doing much good just hanging in my vestibule. I had a smith shorten the blade for you. There was enough left over to make a nice dagger, too.’
He tossed the dagger over. Kal was lost for words. ‘I don’t know, Ben …’
‘Come on, Kal, you’re the only person I can ask and you know it. After all, you killed a dragon once; you can do it again.’
END OF PART TWO
PART THREE
THE GAME
III.i
Mena’s Mirror
Kalina was rooted to the spot in shock and horror. The creature flapped its wings lazily and glided down from the spire of the shrine, landing in the burning ruins of the manor house. Ash and cinders swirled up around it as the great beast clawed about in the debris. Kalina stared in rapt fascination: a dragon! Perhaps not the Dragon, the god of all monsters, her rational mind told her, but a dragon nonetheless. Her eyes scanned the mountain peaks on every horizon. Did one dragon presage the flights of thousands that, according to legend, heralded the end of the world?
The skies were clear, but Kalina could hear other noises in the forest: the yelps and howls of the goblins behind her. She was going to get caught or killed if she didn’t move. Reacting on instinct alone, she launched herself over the edge of the ridge. The slope down to the village was almost vertical. She slid the first few yards, but soon lost her balance and found herself rolling over and over on her side. Thorns and rocks stabbed and knocked her; she banged her head, hit her hip hard, and seconds later felt her shoulder rip open. A breathless panic overtook Kalina as dirt and dust choked and blinded her.
Then she hit the bottom. She scrambled to her feet as goblin arrows dropped all around her. They were on the ridge above her now, hooting and barking. Kalina stumbled onwards blindly, across a scorched field and towards the village. The dragon raised its head as it saw her coming. It flexed its wings and screamed at her. It was as big as a two-storey house, with glossy black scales and teeth like swords.
Kalina plunged onwards regardless, vaulting a stone wall and racing through the burning village. The dragon was less than fifty yards away now, and it turned its whole bulk to face her. She coughed and spat as she ran through the smoke. She had to jump over a charred corpse that was lying face-down on the ground. Forty yards now, but the dragon couldn’t wait: it lifted itself off the ground with a slow flap of its wings, and glided down to get her.
Kalina rushed forward and met the dragon eye-to-eye. Then she jumped …
… and dived into the deep cold water of the Green Beck. The dragon’s shadow passed above her, but all sound was immediately wiped out by the water. She sunk in silence, then the swift current caught her and bore her away. Kalina held her breath, opened her eyes and kicked like a frog, driving her body down into the darkness at the centre of the riverbed. She fought on until her lungs screamed for air; then she fought on some more.
Three long minutes later, her head breached the surface. She had left the village at least a mile behind her, around a bend in the river. Now she was in a different world: here it was just another quiet, sunny spring day. A herd of deer watched her from the bank as she floated past. Downriver, the Green Beck joined the long Cold Flow. Kalina’s first thought was that she could stay in the water and let it carry her a thousand miles to Amaranthium, far away from dragons and goblins.
Away from her village, from the people she knew and loved. Away from Deros. She had left him dying in the meadow on the mountain slopes. Dare she go back and try to find him? Did she even have a choice? How could she go back on the promises they had made there as they had lain together in the grass? She couldn’t!
She forced her aching body into action and made for the shore. Where the two rivers met, a tangle of willows covered an outcropping of land. Kalina knew this place; she had been here before. The low, twisted trees would provide more than just shelter and cover; they would also provide sanctuary. The willow grove was the home of the forest god, Mena.
A tunnel of spiralling roots and branches led to a circular depression in the earth with a small pool in its centre. Above was a domed roof of woven willow limbs that, save for one small round oculus, completely blocked out the sky and sun. The shaft of light that fell through the hole in the roof reflected off a large oval mirror that was held upright by a lattice of branches. Catkins grew all around it, framing the shining surface with a floral border of red and yellow.
Kalina stood before the mirror: Mena’s mirror. In the days when the gods were alive, Mena had lived here
and stood before the mirror, too. The forest god was cloven-hoofed and bestial, but her reflection revealed the golden-haired, beautiful woman that she really was. As Kalina looked at her own image, all she saw was a wet, cut and bruised, skinny adolescent with watery-blue eyes that were too big and too far apart, and a tangled mane of dirty reddish-brown hair.
She knelt at the foot of the mirror. The villagers were not generally inclined to pray to the old gods—no one believed that the gods could actually hear them—and Kalina was no exception. Instead she was looking for something. An old legend had resurfaced in her mind: it was said (in fireside tales) that the weapons of the gods could not only slay dragons, but could fell the largest of them with just the barest of touches.
Kalina sifted through the collection of objects piled around the mirror that had been left here by visitors: carved wooden animals, bronze jewellery, brown wreaths of winter holly, a bowl of nuts. Honestly! What was she expecting to find—a magical sword? Kalina looked back up at the mirror: the creature that stared back at her appeared to be laughing and sobbing hysterically at the same time, a mixture of blood and tears streaming down its bruised face.
III.ii
The Swordfish
Kal leaned against the bulwark of the Swordfish, chomping on an apple as she watched the crew prepare to make sail. She was wearing a loose long-sleeved shirt and a wide-brimmed floppy hat: ideal clothing for avoiding both the sun and the stares of lecherous sailors. Tossing the apple core into the harbour, she noticed one final passenger making his way up the gangplank: a man dressed in full plate armour, struggling with two bags full of swords, spears and other things that rattled and clanked.
‘If you fall into the water, don’t expect me to dive in and rescue you,’ Kal shouted. ‘I didn’t pack my can opener.’
The man gave her a broad smile of recognition as he stepped on board. ‘It’s easier to wear my armour than to carry it,’ he explained. ‘And no true knight would even think about leaving it behind.’
‘You’re not a knight yet,’ Kal reminded him. ‘What are you doing here, Rafe?’
‘Senator Godsword is sending me to Balibu to investigate the death of the governor. What are you doing here, er …’ He looked at her expectantly.
‘Kal,’ she introduced herself. ‘I’m going on a bird-watching trip.’ She didn’t want to reveal her own association with Benedict Godsword just yet. ‘Here, let me help you with those,’ she said, relieving him of one of his bags.
‘Thanks, Kal. Let’s go and dump all this stuff in the captain’s cabin.’
She raised an eyebrow. ‘The captain’s cabin?’
‘Of course. As a representative of the Senate, I’m entitled to make full use of the captain’s quarters for the duration of the voyage. I trust that he’s already prepared them for my arrival.’
Kal looked over to where the captain, a fat muscular man with a collection of evil scars and a peg-leg, was sharing a lewd joke with two equally dangerous-looking members of his crew. ‘I think you’d better follow me,’ she told Rafe.
She led him through a hatch and down to the cargo deck. Near the stern of the ship was a curtained-off area with two hammocks, one hung above the other. ‘I’ll take the top,’ Kal said. ‘I don’t want you falling on top of me, especially if you sleep in your armour.’
Rafe wasn’t happy. ‘But there are other people down here … and a strange smell. And probably rats, too.’
Three sailors were sat around an upturned crate throwing dice. They stopped what they were doing and turned to stare at Rafe.
Kal put a hand on his shoulder. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘If any of these rapscallions so much as touch you, I’ll make sure that they regret it.’
The sailors laughed and returned to their game. Rafe threw down his bag of weapons with a huff.
***
They were back up on the main deck when the Swordfish passed through Amaranthium’s seagate. It had been more than a hundred years since the city was last struck by monsters from the deep, but still the massive gate only opened once a day for an hour at noon. The Swordfish was just one of around thirty vessels that headed out under oar in single file, passing a similar-sized line of incoming arrivals on their port side.
Kal was apprehensive as they struck out into the unbounded, uncharted Silver Sea. Beyond the secure city walls, whether on land or at sea, anything could happen in what was commonly known as the Wild, and it often did. Rafe didn’t seem as worried, though; rather than nervously monitoring the horizon like Kal was doing, he was scribbling intently in a leather-bound notebook.
Kal tried to take her mind off thoughts of sea serpents and kraken. ‘What are you writing?’ she asked Rafe. ‘Your journal? Sunday the tenth: met a girl,’ she imagined out loud. ‘Unfortunately, she’s out of my league.’
Rafe laughed. ‘No. We’ve got two weeks to kill. I’m going to try and finish my epic romance, The Song of Banos. I’ve written three hundred stanzas so far.’
Kal sighed. She looked over to where the captain was patrolling the deck, supervising the raising of the small schooner’s sails. ‘Hey, Dead Leg,’ she shouted. ‘What can we do to help?’
The captain stumped over to them. ‘The bilges haven’t been cleared for three days. You did a good job sorting that mess out last time you were on board with us, Kal.’
‘In that case, I think I deserve a promotion,’ she countered.
Dead Leg grunted. ‘Fine! You can scrub the decks instead.’ The captain then turned to Rafe and gave him an evil leer. ‘You, sir, are on bilge duty.’
Rafe looked aghast. ‘No,’ he spluttered. ‘The Senate … I represent …’
‘The pumps are blocked, so you’ll need to go and grab a bucket,’ the captain ordered. ‘Make your way to the very bottom of the hull, near the foremast. The smell will guide you.’
Rafe staggered away. ‘And take your armour off,’ Dead Leg called after him. ‘The bilgewater will do more damage to it than troll blood!’
‘I think I’d rather fight a troll!’ Rafe moaned.
III.iii
Brimstone
One hundred and fifty feet up the Swordfish’s mainmast, Kal looked out from the crow’s nest. The empty sea stretched out for fifteen miles in all directions. It was the thirteenth day since they had left Amaranthium, and so far Kal had spotted a pirate gang (which they had managed to outrun) and a school of hydra (which they had followed for a while). Now she was looking out expectantly for something else.
And there it was! A low line of dark green on the western horizon. There were few mountains near the coast around Balibu: just miles of endless mangrove swamps and mahogany forests under a sweltering tropical sun. Kal was cool under her hat, but down on the deck the crew were bare-chested and sweating as they hauled on the rigging.
She leaned out over the basket and called down ‘Land ahoy!’ Nobody noticed. The boatswain was ordering the crew around and commanded all of their attention. Only Rafe, who was halfway up the mizzenmast, heard her. He was hanging from the end of a spar, untangling some of the sails, and was quite a sight, clad only in a headscarf and a loincloth. ‘What did you say, Kal?’
She cleared her throat. ‘Land Ahoy!’ she croaked.
Rafe gave her the thumbs up and dropped down so that he was hanging from the spar by his legs. He cupped his hands to his mouth and bellowed:
‘LAND AHOY!’
* * *
The Swordfish tacked along the coast for the rest of the afternoon, and evening was falling by the time they reached the port of Balibu. The town had a seawall like Amaranthium, but it was wooden and strung with colourful lamps. The seagate was left open: either the locals didn’t fear an attack from the sea, or perhaps they didn’t think that a shut gate would make that much of a difference.
Kal gripped the rail as they sped towards the dock. Dead Leg appeared on deck at the last minute and gave calm orders that all but the topsails were to be struck. ‘HEAVE-TO!’ the boatswain shouted, with an edg
e of panic in her voice. Rafe looked terrified as the crowded jetty got nearer and nearer. Dead Leg, however, remained calm through it all; he gave Kal a wink and nodded at two of his sailors. They threw out the anchors at the last possible moment and the Swordfish slotted neatly sideways into a gap between two smaller brigs. Water slopped all over the jetty, causing a man to spill a basket full of crabs, but otherwise the thrilling manoeuvre was executed perfectly.
The crew waved Kal and Rafe off as they descended the gangplank. Rafe, dressed once more in his armour, turned back to face the ship, gave a theatrical bow and raised his sword in salute. The crew whooped their appreciation. Kal waited patiently for him to finish taking his leave. The night was warm and balmy, and the docks were busy: fishermen finishing up their day’s work mingled with the emerging nightlife. Music and singing could be heard emanating from several of the dockside taverns.
Kal looked out to sea. The moon lit the horizon, but there was no sign of Benedict’s island gold mine. It must be farther out than she imagined. As she looked around, her eyes fell on a colourful mural painted on the side of a nearby inn: a grinning skull-like feminine face surrounded by flowers. Vuda; the god of dark magic. Kal felt a chill run down her spine.
‘Where are you going to be staying?’ Rafe asked her.
She shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I was going to play cards until dawn at the Croc, then hire a boat in the morning to take me out … ahem, bird-watching.’
Rafe looked at her like she was mad. ‘Really? Well, I have a whole floor to myself at the Discovery Inn. They have big copper baths full of steaming soapy water. I also heard that they serve up a mean seafood platter. Why don’t you join me for supper? The Senate is paying.’