The River of Shadows cv-3

by Robert V. S. Redick

  For those who had always loathed and feared the “crawlies,” the recapture of the vessel should have brought a feeling of triumph. It did not. They would go to their hammocks that night more afraid than ever of being murdered in their sleep.

  The humans had chanted Death, death. Only some forty-three ixchel proved willing to die that day, however-though it might be assumed, thought Lady Oggosk, picking her slow way through the bodies on the topdeck, that they would all remember the sentiment.

  Time Regained

  1 Modobrin 941

  230th day from Etherhorde

  A warlord pauses on the field

  Newly silent, newly taken by his men

  There among many corpses shines a face he knows: They were friends as children

  A time like a dream

  The heart, once shattered, is open at last.

  — SULIDARAM BECTUR, circa 2147

  Three days passed. The stone oven was dismantled, and the stones carried away. The dlomu delivered much in the way of raw foodstuffs, and several enormous crates of mul. But they brought no more hot meals, and none of the black beer Mr. Bolutu had longed for. Masalym had evidently decided that the ship was intoxicated enough.

  Pazel had never felt more disheartened. To think of all the hopes they had placed on Bali Adro! An enlightened Empire, Bolutu had said, a place of just laws, peace among the many races, a wise and decent monarch on the throne. A place where good mages of Ramachni’s sort would be waiting to deal with Arunis, and take away the Stone. Bolutu had not lied to them: he had simply been describing the Bali Adro of two centuries before.

  What would they do with their visitors now? The signs were hard to read. From beneath the hull came the noise of saws and hammers: the repairs, at least, were going forward. Soldiers remained plentiful along the rim of the berth, but the ordinary townsfolk were no more to be seen. Teams of dockworkers, using two of the big cargo cranes, raised what were unmistakably gangways, and swung the wooden structures into position between the ship’s rail and the edge of the berth: lowered, they would have formed wide, railed bridges between ship and shore. But they were not lowered. The workers left them dangling, thirty feet above the topdeck, like a promise deferred.

  The “birdwatchers”-so someone had named the dlomu in the ash-gray coveralls, with their notebooks and field glasses-came each morning, and left only at sundown. They studied the Chathrand in shifts, whispering together for a while when one man replaced another. Vadu joined them at the end of each day. He read the watchers’ reports, his usual gaping expression often changing to a frown. When he looked at the ship his head bobbed faster.

  What had the dlomu really made of the slaughter four days ago? Were they shocked, or was sudden, mindless killing all too familiar to them? In a sense it hardly mattered. They had seen humans at their worst. Any chance of winning the city’s trust had surely disappeared.

  So, of course, had some five hundred ixchel.

  Early morning, the first day of the last month of the year: in the North, winter would have begun in earnest; here each day felt warmer than the last. Pazel woke with sunlight already hot on his face through the single porthole of the cabin he now shared with Neeps. He groaned. Neeps was snoring. He rolled out of his hammock and groped around on the floor for his clothes.

  “Such a racket,” mumbled Neeps into his pillow. “Thought you were Old Jupe, outside my window back home.”

  Pazel pulled on his breeches. “Your neighbor?”

  “Our sow.”

  Pazel tugged at one of the ropes of Neeps’ hammock, untying it, and lowered his friend’s head to the floor. Eyes still shut, Neeps oozed like softening butter from his canvas bed. He came to rest among their boots. “Thanks,” he said, appearing to mean it.

  “Get up,” said Pazel, rubbing his eyes. “Fighting practice, remember? If you want to eat before Thasha and Hercol start whacking us, it’s got to be now.”

  The scare tactic worked. In short order Neeps too was dressed, after a fashion, and the boys stumbled into the corridor.

  “I dreamed of my mother,” said Pazel.

  Neeps responded with a yawn.

  “She was free. Not a slave or a Mzithrini wife, like Chadfallow’s afraid she’s become. She was doing something on a table-top with jars of colored sand, or smoke maybe, in a little house in a poor quarter of some city-I thought I knew which city, when I dreamed it, but I don’t remember now. And there was a dog looking in at the window. That’s curious, isn’t it?”

  Neeps might well have been sleepwalking. “I dreamed you were a sow,” he said.

  In the stateroom, Thasha and Marila were finishing a breakfast of Masalym oats, boiled with molasses. Felthrup crouched on the table eating bread and butter, a cloth napkin tied at his neck. The boys looked around carefully for Hercol. The Tholjassan often began their fighting-classes by appearing out of nowhere and swinging hard at them with a practice sword.

  “Don’t worry,” said Thasha, “he’s not hiding anywhere.”

  “We’re alone, are we?” said Pazel, surly already.

  Thasha stared at him. “Isn’t that what I just said? Nobody’s lurking in one of the cabins, if that’s what you mean.”

  “Well that’s blary good,” said Neeps, yawning again. “Because you just never know.”

  “Come here, you two,” said Marila quickly. “Be quiet. Eat oats.”

  At least Fulbreech hasn’t moved in, thought Pazel acidly. Yet.

  Then, waking farther, he shook his head. “Hold on. The ixchel. Where are the ixchel?”

  “One is behind you,” said Ensyl, leaping onto the back of an armchair, startling both boys. But to Pazel’s shock, the young ixchel woman proceeded to explain that she was the last. The other ten who had sought refuge in the stateroom had departed at sunrise, not planning to return.

  “They asked me to thank you,” she said, “and to say that you may always count on their help, should your paths cross again. Those are not idle words, either: ixchel do not make promises of aid unless they mean to keep them.”

  “But where in blazes did they go?” Neeps demanded. “The same place as all the others?”

  “So I imagine,” said Ensyl. “They asked if I would hinder their departure, and I said they were guests, not prisoners. Then they offered to take me with them. ‘Your final chance to stand with your people,’ they grandly declared. ‘I might do that, if my people stood for anything,’ I replied. Then they spat on the backs of their hands and called me a traitor, and left.”

  “But everyone knew where to run, that first day,” said Pazel, dropping into an armchair.

  Ensyl nodded. “Every clan has its disaster protocol. They change often, but they are always remembered. If the signal came we were all to fly to different rendezvous points deep in the ship. Elders were to meet us there, and take us to a place of safety.”

  “Safe from Rose?” said Thasha, incredulous.

  “We doubted that ourselves,” said Ensyl. “But this plan came from Lord Talag, and it was followed without question. I heard the ten who took shelter here discussing it-though they fell silent at my approach. All the rendezvous points were on the orlop deck, between the steerage compartment and the augrongs’ den. If they had not been trapped on the upper decks, that is where they would have gone.”

  “Orlop, portside, amidships,” said Neeps. “That’s a lonely spot, all right. Especially now that the animals are-” He stopped, looking from one face to another. “The animals. The live animal compartment. It’s right smack there, isn’t it, forward of the augrongs?”

  “Yes,” said Thasha, with a glance at Marila. “And that’s where the… strangest things have happened, to some of us.”

  Marila’s round face looked troubled, and Pazel knew why: several months ago, Thasha and Marila had one day found themselves on a very different Chathrand. A Chathrand sailing a frigid winter sea, a Chathrand crewed by pirates. They had barely escaped with their lives.

  Of course men passed throu
gh those chambers every day, and met with nothing strange. Pazel himself had spent more hours than he cared to recall filling buckets with manure and spoiled hay. Still, it was an odd coincidence. If the ixchel had gone where Thasha and Marila went, they couldn’t be much better off. But perhaps the magic didn’t work that way. Perhaps one never went to the same place twice.

  Suddenly Thasha gasped. She placed a hand on her chest, then started to her feet.

  “Someone’s just stepped through the wall! It’s not Hercol, nor Fiffengurt or Bolutu or Greysan. I didn’t let them pass through; they just came. Get your weapons! Quick!”

  She and the two boys raced for their swords. Marila grabbed Felthrup and backed away. Jorl and Suzyt crouched low, silenced by a warning finger from their mistress, every muscle tensed to spring. Pazel gripped the sword that had been Eberzam Isiq’s, wishing he could use it half as well as Thasha used her own. Hercol was right. He always said the worst thing we could do was to depend on the magic wall.

  Thasha flattened herself against the wall near the door, sword raised to strike whoever entered. Then they heard the footsteps: a single, heavy figure, walking with long strides to the door. When they reached the threshold, someone knocked.

  Thasha looked at Pazel: a tender look, gone in half a heartbeat. Then she set her teeth and snarled: “If that’s you, Arunis, come. Ildraquin is waiting for you. It’s here in my hand.”

  She was lying; she had only her own fine sword, not Hercol’s Curse-Cleaver. Then a voice spoke from beyond the passageway: “Your pardon, Lady Thasha. It is only me.”

  They stared at one another. The voice belonged to Prince Olik. The door opened a few inches, and the man’s bright silver eyes and beak-like nose appeared in the gap.

  “A splendid morning to you all,” he said.

  Thasha opened the door wide. She lowered the sword but did not sheathe it. “Your Highness,” she said. “How did you get in here? No one has ever been able to pass through the wall without my permission.”

  “Then you must have given it, my lady,” said Olik.

  “I did no such thing,” said Thasha.

  All at once she leaped back into fighting stance and pointed her sword at Olik’s breast. “Stay where you are!” she shouted. “We haven’t seen Prince Olik in four days-and suddenly here you appear out of nowhere, alone? How do I know you’re not Arunis in disguise? Prove that you’re you!”

  Olik smiled. “That is just what the Karyskans said. Mistaken identity appears to be my fate. Alas, I’m not sure how to prove myself-but as it happens, I’ve not come alone.”

  “Thasha Isiq!”

  Captain Rose’s bellow carried down the passage. Olik stepped aside, and they could all see him, toes to the painted line, fists pounding empty air. Behind him, pressing as close as they dared, were four well-armed dlomic warriors.

  “Let me pass!” bellowed Rose. “This is a royal visit, I’m escorting His Majesty on a tour of my ship!”

  “Your guards I won’t allow,” said Thasha to the prince.

  “I am delighted to hear it,” said Olik. “They were inflicted on me by Counselor Vadu.”

  “And you yourself, Sire? Not armed?” she asked.

  “Certainly I am,” he said. “Knife in my boot. I’ve carried one that way since I was a boy. Would you feel better if I surrendered it?”

  “Yes,” said Thasha, “and I’m glad you told me the truth. I spotted that knife straightaway.”

  Olik passed her the knife. It was broad and well used, the leopard-and-sun design on the sheath nearly worn away. Without turning to the hallway again, Thasha said, “Come in, Captain Rose.”

  Rose’s fast, limping gait echoed down the passage, and then he barreled into the chamber and spread his hands. “The master stateroom,” he said, rather more loudly than necessary. “Fifty-four heads of state have traveled in these chambers during the ship’s public history alone-her early years being classified, you understand. Note the aromatic woods, the Virabalm crystal in the chandelier. To your left there’s a panel that once disguised a dumbwaiter. And the walls are triply insulated, for the warmth and privacy of our guests.”

  He slammed the door and fell silent, leaning on the frame, breathing like some winded animal. Then, slowly, almost with fear, he turned his head so that one eye could look at them. Pazel’s hand tightened on his sword. Rose’s eye swiveled about the room, left to right, floor to ceiling.

  “Sweet Rin in his heaven,” he whispered. “There’s not a ghost in this room.”

  After a long silence, the prince asked amiably, “Is that unusual?”

  “They can’t get in,” said Rose. “Outside the wall they’re thick as flies in a stable, but here-” He turned to look at them directly, standing straight. “Here a man can breathe.”

  An expression came over his features that Pazel knew he had never seen before. It was not satisfaction, or not that alone (he had seen the man satisfied, often for the worst of reasons). The look was closer to contentment. On Rose’s face it was stranger than a third eye.

  Ignoring the prince, he walked forward until he stood directly in front of the youths. “It’s as I thought all along,” he said. “Ghosts avoid you, and that makes you blary useful. Waste not-that’s my father’s iron law. I told him I shouldn’t have you killed.”

  Pazel sighed. That was the Rose he knew.

  “You’re not on a tour of the ship,” said Thasha. “Why have you come here, Captain?”

  Rose waved a hand at the prince. “His Majesty-”

  “Desired an audience,” Olik interrupted. “With all of you, who fought so hard to protect the little people. Captain Rose would not agree to it unless I gave my word that he too could be present. I did so, reluctantly. But now that he is here I think it is for the best.”

  Thasha opened the door once again, and a moment later Hercol, Bolutu and Fiffengurt entered the room. Hercol stiffened at the sight of Rose.

  “Excellent,” said Olik. “Now everyone I wished to speak to is here.”

  “I do not understand your interest in these mutineers,” said Rose. “You’ve still not met our spymaster, or Lady Oggosk, my soothsayer hag.”

  “I saw quite enough of Mr. Ott four days ago,” said the prince with finality. “As for these people, I wished to see them because their behavior in that terrible circumstance was the opposite of his-and yours. But I have another reason, and this one includes you, Rose: for you also bear the mark of Erithusme.”

  Thasha whirled. “Do you mean our scars? What do you know about them, Sire? What do they have to do with Erithusme?”

  “Close the door, Lady Thasha,” said the prince, “and let us keep away from the windows, too. Counselor Vadu and his legionnaires know quite enough about me as it is.”

  “We, however, do not know much at all,” said Hercol. “I would ask you to change that, Majesty, before asking for our trust.”

  “Nothing could be more fair,” said the prince, “or alas, more difficult. I cannot say all that you might wish, for I don’t know how far my words will travel. Oh, I’m not impugning your good faith, my friends. You won’t breathe a word if I ask you not to-I’m confident of that. Even in your case, Captain Rose.”

  “I’ve given no such promise,” grumbled Rose.

  “But you will keep my secrets, all the same,” said Olik with a twinkle in his eye, “except perhaps from that Lady Oggosk of yours, and she will not breathe a word. But not only words can be spied upon-as you should know, who fight Arunis.”

  “You know about Arunis?” asked Pazel.

  “Who does not, in the South? You are safe within this splendid chamber, but you cannot always be here. And when you emerge, he probes at you, and feels the outlines of your thoughts.”

  “Just a minute,” said Neeps. “You still haven’t told us how you know about our blary scars. Maybe you saw Pazel’s hand, and Thasha’s, and Rose’s arm. But Hercol’s scar is under his shirt, and Bolutu’s hair covers his. And I was never anywhere near you, unti
l today.”

  Thasha sheathed her sword. “I know the answer to that question,” she said.

  “Let us not discuss that now!” said the prince. He went to the table, lowered himself into a chair. “We may have only minutes,” he said. “The physicians have nearly made their choice.”

  “Physicians?” said Ensyl, who had climbed onto the table.

  “The men who watch you from the quay, and report to Vadu-the ones your men have so delightfully labeled ‘birdwatchers.’ They are about to choose a few representatives for an audience with the Issar. And I have a strong hunch that you will be among them, for they are tasked with determining who is uncontaminated.”

  “Uncontaminated!” thundered Rose. “That is outrageous! Fewer than twenty of my men have touched dry land this side of the Ruling Sea, and six of those disappeared without a trace. Of the rest, it is precisely these agitators who spent the longest time ashore. Yet you expect them to be chosen to visit the lord of Masalym? What, pray tell, does that Issar think we might be contaminated with?”

  “Why, madness,” said the prince. “Captain Rose, you appear to care about your men. Do you realize the harm you have done them already? The Masalym physicians were on the point of attesting to your crew’s sanity when you ordered that killing spree against the little people.”

  “So they’re admitting we’re human after all?” said Fiffengurt.

  “My dear quartermaster, everyone in Masalym knows that you are human-the poor of the Lower City, the shipwrights under orders not to speak to your own carpenters, the Issar’s scientists and above all Vadu and other servants of Emperor Nahundra. They have known since we sailed into the Jaws of Masalym. They simply hope, with some desperation, to keep the world from learning about it. From their perspective it is convenient that we are at war. This city and its Inner Dominion are effectively quarantined. News does not easily escape by land or sea. I happen to know, however, that letters have already been sent by courier albatross. I can only assume that they repeat the official story.”