by Iain Lindsay
You want me to be an animal? Talin bared his teeth in a savage shout of fear and anger. The youth dove forward, only for the chair legs to strike out at him, knocking his arms painfully.
Tal wanted to kill. He would have squeezed the life out of the horrible old man with his bare hands if he could. He was probably the quicker and the stronger of the two, but he didn’t have the knowledge or cruelty of the older.
“Ha! You think you’ve had it tough, boy? I’m going to show you pain like you wouldn’t believe!” Jekkers advanced further across the room on small, quick steps, daring and pushing with the upheld chair in his hands.
The weapons! Tal seized the largest of the leather-handled whips. He had no idea even how to use one of these things, but, as Jekkers shouted and rushed forward, Talin snapped his hand forward like he was throwing a stone over the edge of the docks.
Crack! The sound was like a clap of thunder in the small space, and the Overseer was falling back, blood blooming from the side of his head.
“Ach! What have you done? What have you done!” Jekkers was shrieking as the door behind him banged open, closed, open, closed again in the rising storm winds.
The sight of his tormentor injured filled the young man with a dark glee. Never again will you hurt me, or any of us… Tal raised his wrist. Crack!
This time, however, the long, studded leather strips coiled around the chair leg and held fast. Talin pulled, but they were caught.
“Yargh!” The Overseer charged, blood seeping down his face and lips with the chair in front of him, striking Talin in the chest and powering him against the wall. Tal’s head rebounded. He saw stars and felt sick.
“Filthy!” Jekkers thumped the chair against Tal’s chest again, knocking him against the wall behind. “Dirty!” Smack. Talin tasted blood in his mouth, and he was having trouble knowing which way was up. “Thief!”
THUM-THUM-THUM-THUM!
The final blow didn’t have a chance to fall, as the dock bells rang out in alarm.
7. Don’t Touch My Boat
“Hold her steady!” Captain Tremaine growled, hair plastered to his face and looking exhausted as he wrestled his ship towards the welcoming docks. Or not so welcoming, he thought as he looked at the forbidding, ramshackle towers of Breaker’s Reach.
The Storm swam heavy in the airs, with the furious winds carrying her. Sand hissed against the sails, hammered into the deck, bit exposed cheeks and scratched sore hands.
“She’s got no welcome flags” Lura was calling, having replaced Odestin at the bowsprit. It was customary for a dock to at least signal to an airship that they could seek mooring, but the only sign from the unoccupied eastern dock was the clang and thum of dulled alarm bells.
“Since when did the Storm need a welcome?” Tremaine wrenched at the wheel, sliding towards the available pier faster than he would have liked. There were people on the platform, dressed in rags.
The Storm had ridden at the head of the thunderheads all the way from the Aratine Hills. The biting downpours of rain had stopped, expending their precious moisture on the dark heights, but the gale-force winds had continued across the plains, whipping up dust and sand and scattering the wild herds before it. One of the airship’s air fans was badly splintered, her canvas ripped and torn, useless until they had a chance to stop. Half of her stolen Izant cargo had been lost or ditched over the sides to keep them racing ahead of the fury – and still it hadn’t been enough. The Storm and the dust arrived at Breaker’s Reach at the same time.
Crunch. A sound of grinding wood as the vessel scraped down the length of one of the wooden piers, sending jolts through the wheel and into Tremaine’s arms. “Slow down, beautiful, slow down…” He pleaded with his beloved vessel as the ship bounced against the packed canvas breaks of the near pier – huge bales of padded leather designed for just such an accident.
With a thuddering sound of protesting wood, the Storm settled, rising and falling in the winds.
“Get her secure!” Tremaine locked the wheel with the wooden wedges as Lura in her green-stained leathers jumped expertly to the pier, hauling the front guide rope with her as she fixed it to one of the many winches. At the rear of the vessel, Odestin was a little less sure of his leap, but did the same none the less. The sound of the hand-pumped winches was lost in the howling winds, but Tremaine could feel the boat snugging tighter, her bobbing shakes calming.
“Stop! What are you doing? How dare you!” Someone was shouting, pushing the ragged children out of the way as he stormed up the wind-beaten docks.
“And here comes the party,” Jos shook his hair out of his eyes to see the thin, emaciated form of the Overseer furious next to his ship. He was an old man, whose canvas and leather clothes were strapped tight to his body as if he was scared that the wind would blow him away. “Is that man talking to us?” Jos muttered to Gulbrand, emerging from below decks alongside Sevesti, their portly Izantine chef. Gulbrand wavered on his feet, his linen sleeves rolled up to his shoulders revealing thick blue-scaled arms. He had spent the night wrestling with the internal cogs of the air fan, a task that no human could manage. Sevesti, too, looked tired, his tanned skin taking on a pallid hue beside his orange shirt and white cook’s apron.
“I guess so, Sier,” Sevest’s thick accent did not hide the fact that he was amused by the thin Overseer’s railing, as the cook wiped a grubby hat across his rounded face.
“Listen to me!” Thwap! The Overseer struck the side of the Storm with a cruel-looking leather whip, black strips flashing with bronze studs.
“Did he just touch my boat?” Tremaine glared.
“Easy, Cap’...” the heimr Quartermaster muttered at his side. “This is his dock, right? Play nice.”
“Still. Not polite to touch another man’s boat,” Jos pulled a face, before staggering under the assault of the winds as he turned to the Overseer. “Sir! We are travelers seeking shelter from this hellish wind, we’ll only be here long enough to conduct a few repairs and be on our way…”
“You cannot. I forbid it!” The thin man slapped the side of the boat once more with his whip.
“that man really needs to stop doing that...” Tremaine’s eyes went hard, and his gauntleted hands tightened on the stilled wheel.
Black-bearded Odestin dragged himself forward as the sands whipped and roared around them. “Sir – we can pay. Please, just until the storm -” his words were stolen from him, but Tremaine saw Odestin pointing at the tattered netting on the deck that held the barrels, crates, and sacks.
“Odestin, Sweet Airs!” the Captain watched the thin man toy with the whip at his side, clearly more interested in his prospective earnings than their safety. A shout, and he was summoning the youths that huddled, coughing and covering their eyes, to come and help Odestin unload.
“Outstanding” Tremaine growled, as the boat rocked with an increased gust of wind. “I’m going below decks.” He shouted to the two men beside him. “I’ve yet to tally Reece’s death-pay.” A shadow of grief passed over their features, quickly obscured by the storm. “Gulbrand? Make sure that fool Odestin doesn’t give half our cargo away. Lura – see what these swabs want to repair the air fan. Sevesti…”
“Find some food? Amongst these heathens?” The Izant looked mortified at the prospect, but tugged his heavy storm cloak over his shoulders all the same.
The Eastern Docks howled with the wind. The sand got under clothes and into ears. It scratched against the skin and stung the eyes, but the youths worked. The hands that took the sacks of grain from Gulbrand’s were small and dirty, lacerated with old scars. The heimr bit his tongue and said nothing. Not our business, he reminded himself, as he heaved another sack over the side to land with a thud on the wooden planks. With his thicker hide he felt the scouring winds less than the fleshy humans, but it still made his bark-like scales itch.
Oh, for one of the hot springs of distant Heimjall, he allowed himself the moment’s reverie, remembering his youth amongst snow plains and fj
ords.
“Troll” a voice shouted. Gulbrand scowled. Now that is no way to talk to the people paying you. He flickered a glance to the troublesome youth, to find himself looking at another heimr, a youngling like he had been, once. A lot of his colleagues had abandoned the work now that the Overseer had retreated for shelter, and they huddled behind the casks and crates wherever they could, leaving only the oldest and largest youths to carry out their master’s orders. This young heimr barely had fangs, and his brow horns were little more than nubs, but he was already one of the largest of the dock slaves.
Gulbrand shook his head. No sense talking to the youngling. What good would it do?
“Troll!” the younger said again, fiercely.
“Ugh,” with an annoyed grunt, Gulbrand dropped the sack he had been lifting to his feet and glared at his much smaller provocateur. “Don’t say that,” he shouted over the winds.
The young heimr lunged, grabbing onto Gulbrand’s heavy arms, his face desperate and angry. The Quartermaster could see thick white cords of scars at his wrists where manacles had once sat. “Help us!” The smaller shouted, refusing to let go.
“Get off me!” Gulbrand waved his arm as the younger heimr clung on desperately.
“Help us!” again.
“Not. Our. Business!” Gulbrand growled, and wrenched his arm away. He didn’t know if his words had reached the younglings’ pointed ears past the roaring sand, but the smaller heimr fell back, a look of furrowed defiance on his face. Poor little spit, Gulbrand sighed, as the slave turned and fled from the pier.
‘Dear Mother Vin,’ Tremaine read. The captain sat in his state room; a small cabin at the rear of the Storm with shuttered windows that looked out over the rudder. Around him sat the accoutrements of a captain’s life: the writing desk where he figured accounts and tallies, and where, he grimaced; he wrote such letters as these.
A wooden bed was built into the walls, with a stuffed mattress and Izant blankets disheveled on top. Spare black leather boots sat underneath, along with his clothes chest. On the walls hung the spare ornaments he had allowed himself: his fine Maricci sabre affixed to the wall in its red scabbard, dressed with iron studs. A shelf held a small collection of hide-bound books and scrolls, and on the wall underneath hung his chart of the World Islands, and a certificate of trade (forged) from the Protectorate itself.
Dear gods, what a small amount to show for the life I’ve led, Tremaine looked at the words in front of him. The vellum was held to his desk of a piece of cord, and the inkpot was secure in its cut-out holder, but the missive still didn’t appear worthy of describing the life of a man who had served him well.
‘Dear Mother Vin,’ he scrubbed out the words, and started again, lower down.
‘To those who cared for Reece Vin, of the city of Ausbridge,’ he began again. He was sure that Reece had never mentioned a worrying mother somewhere, as the Captain had picked him from a team of sailors from the docks, each one eager to travel because if they didn’t, then they would be facing jail or execution for something or another.
He had been adventurous and daring, the Captain thought. And he didn’t back down from a fight. That was why he had picked him, after all.
‘It is with great sadness I declare that Reece Vin was lost at sea off the Izant coast during a great storm, whilst working to save his crew. He rose to the position of First Mate, and was well-regarded. This letter to be delivered to the Dock Master of Ausbridge, along with the promise of,’ Jos checked the small pile of coins by his side. ‘Twelve Ducats, 3 Half Crowns, and twenty-three pence. That line of credit to be claimed by those who can show parentage affiliation comradeship to Seaman Reece Vin, the next time that The Storm, under Captain Joselyn Tremaine, arrives at port.
Yours regretfully,
Captain Tremaine.’
“Although I’ll probably arrive at Ausbridge quicker than this letter gets there,” the man grumbled, before dusting the parchment with powder and folding it into an envelope, which he then sealed with a line of wax, and finally to set the golden signet ring of his right hand against it. A small, blurry image of a bird – the Heimarian Fishing Eagle that was the insignia of House Tremaine – appeared. Or it could just have been a seagull or a splodge of wax.
What a long way I have come, father, the young man looked at the letter for a moment, aware that the storm was at least dying down a little outside. The roar of the sand hitting wood had finally ceased, becoming just the howls and whistles of winds.
“The sooner we can get out of this accursed place, the better…” Tremaine stashed the letter beside the scrolls, knowing that it would be better to await a more civilized port to send it, than from the infamous Breaker’s Reach.
“Sorry, old girl,” he stood, pressing a hand to the wood of the ship. “You’re not going to see this place again, not if I can help it…”
A gentle knock on the door. “Come in” he called, for the door to creak open and the disheveled form of Lura in her heavy storm cloak crossed the threshold. The tyl didn’t look tired, but her heavy eyes and down-turned mouth did look annoyed.
“We’ve got the sail for the air fans, but it cost us a pretty penny,” she said irritably.
“How much?” Tremaine considered.
“Another two satchels of the silks.” The almost albino tyl said, her white and speckled tail lashing against the floor. “We’ve got six left, but I managed to convince that odious little human to take grain instead for the wood repairs.”
Tremaine nodded. He could trust Lura to haggle. The tyl was permanently annoyed it seemed to him. “How long before we’re shipshape?”
“Odestin wanted to eat first, but I told him to get to work on the repairs straight away, I figured you wouldn’t want to hang around.” Her large, oval eyes with their bright pupils flickered over the Captain. “You should sleep. It’ll take me and Odestin a couple hours yet to do a good job of it.”
At the mere suggestion of rest, the electric weariness that ran through the man jittered through his limbs. Every muscle ached. Even his eyes hurt from the effort of staying awake for what, three days?
Ever since that storm on the Aratine coast. “No, I can’t.” He ran a hand through dry and sand-caked hair. “Not until she’s away from this place. The ship doesn’t like it,” he added in a softer tone, patting the wooden sill. Some other sailors have called Tremaine suspicious, treating the ship he had taken from his family docks as if she were haunted, but Tremaine knew better.
“Aye-Aye, Cap.” The tyl just nodded. “Sevesti has come back, but all he got were pies that, and I quote; ‘if the blind gods of the abyss were to puke and make food, then they would make these’. So, I’m not expecting anything great for dinner…”
“I’m sure our good chef has worked with worse fare,” Tremaine waved his Master Rigger and Scout away, she left without saying a word, gently closing the captain’s door behind her. Leaving the Captain’s eyes to turn back to the shelf where the dead man’s letter sat.
“And now I’m down a First Mate, running a skeleton crew, and with a fraction of my cargo…” He muttered. On the wall, the chart of the World Islands showed Breaker’s Reach sitting at the edge of the plains, where the nearest bit of water was the Izant Seas where he had so recently been pirating. That would be a bad direction then, at least for a moon or two. But to the east there was still the trading city of Marduk. A place where a man could get rich if he had the right cargo, the right friends, and a bit of luck. A memory snagged in his mind, and a half-smile appeared on his long features. That might work. If Rath is still living there… “What do you think, old girl? See the Lady Rathine again?” He murmured to the Storm.
Knock-knock-knock! His thoughts were disturbed by another series of pounding knocks on his state door.
“What now?” He grumbled, flinging open the door to see his Quartermaster, barely fitting into the boat’s corridor and with a look that was fiercer than normal. In his hands he held the long-handled metal mace with i
ts pine-cone of iron studs at the end.
“The storm’s passing. And something’s happening on the docks. Something bad.” Gulbrand muttered, turning to quickly march back the way he had come.
“I guess it would be stupid to ask if I need to bring my sword?” Tremaine could have wept with exasperation. This moon just keeps on getting better and better. He seized the sabre from the wall, and ran after his Quartermaster.
8. Never Been Partial to Beatings
Talin awoke in the gloom of the Overseer’s office to the sound of shouts from outside. His head hurt, and his shoulders felt raw where they had scraped against the rough wooden planks of the wall. “Ugh” he tried to move his arms, to find them tied to the chair which the Overseer had used to menace him.
“Ladies and Gentlemen!” The hateful voice of the Overseer carried clear through the shutters, now that the storm winds had died down to the softer hiss and whisper of the normal gales that permeated the Reach.
What time is it? Talin wondered. Have I been asleep? No. The blank spot in his memory was like a bruise, pain-tinged around the edges, as if his mind had been turned off. Oh yeah, he recalled the fight, the savage glee, the sharp-edged terror, the anger he had felt. The Overseer must have hit him hard enough to make him fall unconscious. Strange, the old man didn’t seem capable of such strength.
“We are going to have what is known in my home town as a bit of Old Time Justice!” The Overseer crowed, and, even more disgustingly, there were cheers of youthful voices outside to answer.
“Every time we had a thief coming through, you know what we did?” Talin tried to wriggle from the chair, but he was tied firm.
“We BEAT them out of town!” The Overseer shouted with joy, followed by a crack like thunder.
“You and you, get the dirty little thief from my office, now!”