Blood Under Water

by Toby Frost

  Edwin suddenly appeared at her side, breaking free of the crowd as if he had been hiding among the customers to spring an attack. “Hello again! Who’d like another drink?”

  They sat at a battered table on mismatched stools.

  Edwin glanced at Hugh as he passed the jug around. “So, you’ve known each other for a few months, then? You’re not, um…?” he said, nodding at Giulia.

  “Oh no,” the knight replied. “We’re friends, that’s all. Brothers in arms, you might say.”

  “Siblings, surely,” Elayne corrected.

  “So who came up with the wyvern hunting?” Edwin said.

  Elayne smiled. “Was it Hugh, by any chance?”

  Hugh smiled back. “Well, somewhat. We did some minor hired work on the way here,” he said. “Bits and pieces, really—”

  “Which doesn’t matter,” Giulia added. “We thought we’d have a change, and so we came to Averrio. So, er, what brings you here?”

  Edwin took out a pipe and knocked the bowl into his palm. “We’re picking up a shipment of glassware to take back home. People want lenses these days, for telescopes and things. Or at least that’s what I’m here for; Elayne’s come with me to visit some magician fellow. Porthoris, was he?” he asked her.

  “Portharion,” she replied. “He lives on an island off the coast, but apparently he’s on good terms with the scholars’ clubs here. They say he can call spirits out the air.”

  “You’re a wizard too, aren’t you?” Giulia said.

  “I certainly am. A specialised one, I should say, but a wizard of sorts indeed.”

  Giulia had the feeling that talking to Elayne was always going to be like swimming against a current of words. “Can you do that? Call up spirits to work for you?”

  “No, that’s not really my field, I’m afraid. I know – when I meet Portharion, why don’t you come along? We could all go, all four of us.”

  Edwin had started to talk to Hugh, but he stopped and looked back at Elayne. “Now, I’m not sure that’s a good idea—” he began.

  “Oh, it’ll be fun! If Hugh’s prepared to vouch for Giulia, I’m sure she’s fine.” She glanced at Giulia and gave her the big smile again.

  Kind people, I’m sure, Guilia thought, but not my sort.

  “So,” Edwin continued, “buying and selling wool and glass: that’s what I do. There’s good money in it, too.”

  Giulia finished her drink. She wanted to join the conversation, but could not think of anything to say.

  “Still jousting?” Hugh asked.

  “No,” Edwin said, “not for a while. You know, about a year ago I was at a militia training ground, and I saw a levy-man put a hole in plate armour with one of those matchlock guns. It really shook me up. For the first time, a peasant like that could put a knight down before we could ever get close to him.”

  Hugh shrugged. “There’s always been bowmen,” he said. “And guns have been around for a while.”

  “Not like that. It used to be that you could rely on a gun either blowing up or not going off at all. Not anymore. So here I am – and in clothes that aren’t falling apart, for once.”

  “Very dapper.” Hugh looked unconvinced. “How’re the others back home? Tarquin and Lionel and the other fellows?”

  Elayne tugged at Giulia’s sleeve; she looked mischievous. “Look at this.” She took a little cloth parcel out of her bag and unwrapped it. Inside was a frame no bigger than four inches square and, in that, a piece of coloured glass.

  Elayne passed the frame to Giulia. “Look in the middle,” she said.

  Giulia held it up. She could see the warm blur of the fireplace through the frame. As she peered at it, she made out a picture, stained – or maybe painted, somehow – into the glass itself. A translucent sky and, under it, waves. Land rose above the water at the horizon – an island with a single tower.

  “There’s a picture there,” she said.

  Elayne’s smile was gentler now. “Keep looking.”

  Giulia stared into the glass, and saw that the sun really was shining in it, reflecting on the sea. No, surely not: it was the glow of the fireplace behind doing that. But the water – it was rippling. The room was a masculine hum of voices somewhere far away.

  A trick of the light. She held the frame steady, and the water shifted.

  “It’s moving!” she said.

  “Keep watching. It’s just a picture.”

  A dark streak threaded through the water. It swayed, as if some tiny snake was crawling beneath the frame.

  There’s something under the water.

  It broke the surface. Dark blue, shining, like a seal’s back but much too long. Giulia’s chest felt tight. Just a picture.

  Something rose from the water, glinting in the glass, something she thought was a tail – but no, it was a neck like a swan’s but far, far larger, and at the end was a head, shaped like a horse’s and draped with seaweed. Slowly, languidly, it looked towards the island, and then swung as the body turned, back towards Giulia—

  She thrust the glass back at Elayne. “There’s something in there,” she said.

  “Did you see it?”

  “I saw an animal in the water. It moved. What the hell is that?”

  “It’s a water-wyrm. Clever, isn’t it?”

  “That’s one word for it. Did you make that?”

  “Oh no.” Elayne wrapped the frame up again. “It’s an imprint,” she said. “Like a painting. The glass is enchanted to show a moment that happened a long time ago. There’s nothing in there really, nothing that could harm you. It just remembers the moment it was enchanted, that’s all.”

  “Is it safe?”

  “Totally. Only the greatest glassmakers can produce something like that, and only here. This piece is just an example, to show people what can be done. You can see why Edwin does business with Averrio.”

  “You trade wool for that? Hell of an exchange.” Giulia got to her feet. “Would you excuse me for a moment? I need to get some air.”

  In a moment she was outside, standing under the porch at the back of the Old Arms, pulling up her hood against the winter chill. The sounds of the inn washed out behind her. Giulia sighed, watching her breath curl like smoke, and stepped out into the night.

  The canal stirred gently by her feet.

  Creepy damned thing, that glass.

  Giulia walked to the stable, rubbing her hands together. She took her crossbow and her thieving gear from her saddlebag and hid it on a low rafter. She wasn’t entirely sure if it was legal to own a crossbow in the city – usually, you could carry a bow so long as it was wrapped up – but the lockpicks wouldn’t look good, and it was best not to take any chances.

  Leaving the stable, she hesitated. Giulia didn’t want to go back inside: for now, she needed to be on her own. Hugh’s friends seemed kindly enough, but they lived in a different world. They had grown up on farms and estates, with swordplay and archery instead of fist-fights and the sudden shine of knives. Edwin and Hugh were soldiers, not thieves, and their lives had a kind of brave glamour that Giulia’s would always lack.

  She strolled along the pavement beside the canal. The water was still, and the light reflected off the occasional ripples was almost white. Across the canal, a solitary figure hurried along in a long cloak like her own, head lowered. Giulia caught a glimpse of a face – long and chiselled with enormous, beautiful, inhuman eyes. A dryad. No wonder it kept its head down: outside the district set aside for unbelievers and heretics, a dryad would draw attention, and as a pagan it could expect little protection from the law.

  Giulia thought about another inhuman head, rising from the sea in Elayne’s magic glass, and looked at the canal and shuddered. No, she thought, things like that could never swim up here. Surely not.

  She missed being alone. Hugh’s friends would be good comp
any for a while, but soon enough Giulia and Hugh would have to earn some money of their own. Most of her reward from foiling the coup in Pagalia had gone on new thieving equipment, the rest on an expensive dress that she was beginning to regret. Besides, Giulia didn’t like the way Hugh looked at Elayne. He ought to be searching for companionship somewhere else, she thought. So should I.

  Somewhere, distantly, a bell was tolling, inviting paupers to a church where they could trade worship for warmth. In the corner where two houses met, a pile of blankets moved as the man underneath shifted in his sleep. She carried on.

  Tenements rose up around her. Statues of saints clustered on a church roof, their faces angled down towards the canal as if about to jump in. A servant slept outside one wide-fronted house in an open boat, part-hidden by several cloaks. He opened one eye as Giulia approached, grunted, and went back to sleep.

  The bell was still ringing as she turned and walked back towards the inn. She could see the light of the Old Arms, and by now she was cold enough to want to get indoors. Hopefully, the others would have finished swapping stories about people that she didn’t know, and there would be a conversation in which she could take part.

  There was a narrow wooden bridge almost opposite the inn, arcing across the canal. Nearly a dozen people stood on the bridge, looking at something in the water. A couple of men, probably from the City Watch, were prodding the object with a boat-hook.

  Giulia stopped next to them, suddenly uneasy. “What’s that?” she said. “What’s going on?”

  An old woman turned to look at her. “It’s some poor bastard drowned himself,” she said, and she looked up and made the Sign of the Sword across her chest. “Some children saw him floating. They thought he was an animal come up from the bay.”

  The Watchmen were arguing over the boat-hook. It caught on the body, and the man turned over lazily, his arm making a loose, drunken gesture that seemed to take in the sky and the crowd that had come to watch. It was a scene drawn in white, blue and black, as though the death had drained the colour from the air.

  The man’s empty face stared up at the moon, his mouth a shapeless hole. His throat had been torn out.

  The Watchman yanked on the boat-hook and called, “Somebody bring the boat up, for God’s sake. People drink out of there. Get the boat, Pietro!”

  “Doesn’t look like he drowned,” Giulia said. People were leaving the Old Arms in a steady flow, eager to see the corpse: the inn was losing a lot of its trade to the dead man. As the hook tugged more of him into view, she saw the marks on his chest, rips in his clothing through which his white body shone as brightly as the moon. She saw his features properly. It was the man she’d spoken to outside the Old Arms, the man who had been afraid.

  Giulia ran towards the inn.

  She pushed past a thin stream of people going out and ducked inside. She saw Elayne’s dress, ran over to the Anglians and said, “Hugh, we’ve got trouble.”

  Hugh tipped the contents of his cup down his throat. His Adam’s apple twitched like something that had just been killed. “Fighting, eh?” he said, eyes gleaming.

  “What’s going on?” Edwin asked. Elayne reached out and took his hand.

  “They’ve found a body in the canal that runs behind the inn. They’re just fishing him out. Looks like he was stabbed.”

  “God,” Elayne said, “how awful!”

  Giulia spoke to Hugh. “Look, I think we ought to go. Maybe all of us should.”

  “Go?” Edwin said. “That’s not going to look good, is it?”

  “This doesn’t look good anyhow,” she replied. “They’ll be looking for someone to bring in. You three are foreigners, and I’m – well, we don’t look right.”

  “It’s them who’re the bloody foreigners,” Hugh muttered. He rubbed his chin. “Right then, let’s have a look outside.”

  Edwin said, “Perhaps we ought to get our things together, love.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know…”

  Giulia thought, This’ll take all year. “Elayne, Edwin, you get your stuff ready. Hugh and I’ll fetch the horses.”

  “Right,” said Hugh, standing up. “See you round the back.”

  The fresh night air sharpened Giulia’s mind.

  Watchmen had converged on the bridge as if drawn by a scent. There were half a dozen of them now, all trying to help bring the corpse to land. A boat had been found, and with the help of a couple of rowers they hauled the body out of the canal. Its arms dangled; it reminded Giulia of a hanged man.

  “I’ll check the horses,” Hugh said.

  “Do it quickly. We need to be going right now.”

  Men gathered around the body. Someone slipped and cursed. Voices babbled and overlapped. “It’s not proper, just leaving him out here.” “Put your cloak over him.” “My cloak on a dead man? You think I want to catch plague?”

  On the water’s edge, a fat Watch captain dropped into a crouch and began to search the body as his colleagues shoved the onlookers away. Giulia saw him slip a square packet from the dead man’s belt and drop it into a pocket in his cloak.

  She clenched her fists; the urge to run was winding her taut inside. Dammit, Hugh, hurry up!

  She looked at the body, at the crowd, hissed with irritation and ran back into the inn.

  The Old Arms was three-quarters empty now. Giulia strode to the stairs and looked up.

  “Edwin? Elayne! Are you there? Edwin? We have to go!”

  The door banged open behind her and winter air rushed into the room. Giulia whirled around. Five Watchmen stood in the doorway. At their head was the tubby captain that she had seen outside.

  “You!” he called. “You with the scars! You know a man called Hugh of Kenton – tall man, from Albion?”

  “Yes,” she said, “I know him.”

  “Then come out here.”

  For a moment she looked them over. There would be no point arguing. She nodded, drew her cloak close around her, and walked to the door. They stepped aside to let her through.

  Outside, Hugh stood next to Edwin and Elayne. A young man with a pimpled face covered them with his crossbow. He looked ludicrous next to the three of them, a part-timer signed up for the extra coins and the chance to carry a bow. But the tip of the bolt was pointed at Elayne, and that was enough to secure obedience from the men.

  Above them, far off, a hawk shrieked. Giulia glanced up and saw a black spot moving across the sky, silhouetted by the gibbous moon: a mixture of eagle and lion, four-limbed and winged.

  The sight of it made her shiver, with awe as much as fear. It seemed miles away.

  “Wild griffon,” the fat captain said, looking at her. He gestured towards the heraldry on his tunic, and his mean, podgy face became dreamy and proud. “Symbol of the city.” It hardened again. “All right, let’s go.”

  She looked away from the moon, back to the Watch captain. “What d’you mean?” Giulia said. “Go where?”

  The captain grinned. “Where do you think, girl? Your friends are going to jail until we’ve decided what to do with them. And guess what?”

  “What?”

  “You’re going with them.”

  TWO

  The cell smelt of earth and stagnant water. It contained two low benches and a trough on the floor. There was water in the trough, and algae at the bottom of it. Giulia was not sure of its purpose. After a careful search by the sole candle, she discovered that there was no way out except the barred, heavy door. Without weapons or lockpicks, they were trapped.

  The four of them sat in a grim row on one bench. On the other bench was a thin girl with eyes like polished rocks. Giulia didn’t like her; she looked wiry and fast.

  Giulia thought about where she would have liked to be: a house in the countryside, perhaps a small manor, with neat, tame gardens outside. She imagined herself owning it, somehow. T
here would probably be a man involved, but she wasn’t sure where exactly he’d fit in.

  Two months ago I kissed Marcellus van Auer. And now Marcellus is building his machines and painting his pictures in a palace miles away. He’s probably got a woman now, and a commission of his own. And I’ve got this.

  “What you in for?” the girl opposite demanded, stretching out on the bench.

  “I’m not sure yet,” Edwin replied. “How about you?”

  “Whoring.” She yawned. “They pull us in every so often: it happens.”

  Giulia leaned forward. “You’ve been here before, then?”

  “Once in a while. Shithole that it is.”

  “What’s the best way to get out of here?”

  “The best way out?” The girl adjusted her dress. It was frilly and slowly falling apart, hitched up at the front to show off her legs. “Hard to say. But sucking off the guard tends to help.”

  “I’m sure we can get out soon,” Edwin said. “I just need to talk to the right people, that’s all. I’m sure it’s a misunderstanding.”

  “Oh, we’ll be fine once it’s all explained,” Elayne said. “Though I will be writing to the Anglian ambassador about this.”

  “I don’t think there is one,” Edwin said. “There’s an embassy in Pagalia, though.”

  “Pagalia is fifty miles away,” Giulia said. “And it’s a different state.”

  “Bloody foreigners,” said Hugh.

  Elayne pulled her skirts up so they did not touch the floor. Her shoes were smart and delicate, but without the platforms that were in fashion on the Peninsula. The prostitute looked at Elayne as if considering robbing her.

  Giulia took a deep breath and said, “So I suppose you can’t just, er, magic us out of here, then?”

  Elayne shook her head. “No, I’m afraid, though I wish I could. It doesn’t quite work like that. To be honest, I wouldn’t know how.”

  “Don’t they teach you that at wizard school?”

  “There isn’t such a thing as wizard school. Sometimes a great scholar takes on an apprentice, but that’s it.”