Ship of Magic

by Robin Hobb

  “Thank you for seeing me home,” she said, her voice as level and formal as if he had escorted her home in a carriage after a Trader festival.

  “You're welcome,” he said quietly. As if the words had awakened in the rough sailor the genteel boy his mother had once schooled, he bowed deeply to her. He very nearly lifted her hand to his lips, but the sight of his own battered shoes and the tattering edges of his rough cotton trousers recalled to him who he was now. “You'll be all right?” he half asked, and half told, her.

  “I suppose,” she said vaguely. She turned away from him and set her hand on the latch, only to have the door violently jerked open before her.

  Kyle filled the door. He was in his night robe and barefoot and his pale hair stood up in tousled tufts on his head, but his fury was such that there was nothing ridiculous about him. “What goes on here?” he demanded. He had pitched his voice low, as if for secrecy, but the force of his emotions gave them the same strength as a bellow. Instinctively, Brashen straightened up before the man he had served as captain. Althea initially recoiled in shock from him, but recovered quickly.

  “None of your damn business,” she declared and tried to walk past him into the house. He caught her by the upper arm and spun her about. “Damn you,” she cried out, and made no effort to keep her voice low. “Get your hands off me!”

  Kyle ignored that, instead giving her a shake that snapped her smaller body about like the weight on the end of a lash. “This family is my business!” he growled. “This family's reputation and good name is my business, just as it should be yours. Look at yourself. Barefoot, looking and smelling like a drunken slut, and here's a rogue sniffing after you like he'd go after some cheap whore. . . . Is that why you brought him here, to your own family home? How could you? On the night of your father's death, how could you shame us all like this?”

  Althea had bared her teeth like a vixen at his wild accusations. She clawed at the hand that gripped her so firmly. “I've done nothing!” she cried wildly, the drink all too plain in her voice. “I've done nothing to be ashamed of. You're the one who should be ashamed. You thief! You've stolen my ship from me! You've stolen my ship!”

  Brashen stood transfixed by horror. This was the last thing he wanted to get mixed up in. No matter what he did, it was going to be wrong in someone's eyes. But worst was to stand still and do nothing at all. So. Be damned for a ram as deeply as a lamb. “Cap'n. Kyle. Let her go, she did nothing except to get a bit drunk. Given what she's been through today, I think that's to be expected. Let her go, man, you're hurting her!”

  He hadn't lifted a hand, had given no sign that he intended to attack Kyle at all, but Kyle abruptly threw Althea aside and advanced on the sailor. “That might be what you expect, but it's not what we expect. ” Behind Kyle, down the darkened hallway, Brashen caught a glimpse of a light being kindled, and heard a woman's voice raised questioningly. Kyle made a grab for Brashen's shirt front, but Brashen stepped backwards. Behind him, Althea had staggered to her feet. She was crying, hopeless as a lost child. She clung to the door frame, the sweep of her hair hiding her bowed face, and wept. Kyle ranted on. “Yes, you'd expect her to get drunk, wouldn't you, you scurvy dog? And followed her hoping for more than that. I've seen you watching her on the ship, and I know what you had in mind. Couldn't wait for her father's body to settle to come sniffing after her, could you?”

  Page 76

 

  Kyle was stalking forward towards him, and Brashen found himself giving ground. Physically, he was no more afraid of Kyle than he was of any man larger than himself, but Kyle carried more than the weight of his fists as he advanced. He had all the advantage of Old Trader family line to fall back on. If he killed Brashen right here, few would question any account he might give of the event. So he told himself it was not cowardice, but savvy that made him back up, lifting his hands placatingly and saying, “It was nothing like that. I was just seeing her safely home. That's all. ”

  Kyle swung, and Brashen sidestepped it easily. The one swing was all he needed to gauge the man. Captain Haven was slow. And he overstepped his balance. And while the man was bigger, and had a longer reach and might even be stronger, Brashen knew he could take him, and without too much difficulty.

  In his brief moment of wondering if he'd have to fight him a woman's voice sounded from the door. “Kyle! Brashen!” Despite the age and grief in her voice, or perhaps because of it, Ronica Vestrit sounded as if she were a mother rebuking two unruly children. “Stop this! Stop this right now!” The old woman, her hair braided back for sleep, clung to the door frame. “What is going on? I demand to know what is happening here. ”

  “This son of a pig-” Kyle began, but Althea's low, even voice cut through his outrage. Her voice was hoarse from weeping, but other than that it was very controlled.

  “I was distraught. I had too much to drink. I ran into Brashen Trell in a tavern and he insisted on seeing me home. And that is all that happened or was going to happen, before Kyle stormed out here and began calling people names. ” Althea lifted her head suddenly and glared at Kyle, daring him to contradict her.

  “That's true,” Brashen added just as Kyle complained, “But look at her, just look at her!”

  He never could decide who Ronica Vestrit believed. Something of the steel she was known for showed in her as she simply said, “Kyle and Althea. Go to bed. Brashen, go home. I'm too tired and heartsick to deal with any of this just now. ” When Kyle opened his mouth to protest she added compromisingly, “Tomorrow is soon enough, Kyle. If we wake the servants, they'll tattle this scandal all through the market. I don't doubt that more than one is listening at a door right now. So let's put an end to this now. Keep family business inside the walls. That was what Ephron always said. ” She turned to face Brashen. “Good night, young man,” she dismissed him, and he was only too happy to flee. He did not even say good-bye or good-night, but walked briskly away into the night. When he heard the heavy door shut firmly, he felt it had closed on a chapter of his life.

  He strode back toward the harbor basin and Bingtown proper. As he wended his way down, he heard the first cautious calls of the dawn birds. He lifted his eyes to the east, to a horizon that was starting to be tinged with light, and felt suddenly weary. He thought of the cramped bunk awaiting him on Vivacia, and suddenly realized the truth of the day. No bunk awaited him anywhere. He considered paying for a room at an inn, someplace with soft beds and clean quilts and warm wash water in the mornings. He made a face between a snarl and a grin. That would deplete his coin rapidly. Maybe tonight, when he could take a full night's advantage of the bed, he'd pay for one. But the most sleep he was going to get this morning was a few hours before the light and noise and heat of the day had him up again. He wouldn't spend coin for a bed he'd hardly use.

  Long habit had led him toward the harbor. He shook his head at himself and turned his steps toward Wield Road, out of town and down to the rocky beaches where the poorest fishermen pulled up their small boats. Paragon would put him up for the day and be glad of the company. Afternoon would be soon enough to recover his sea-bag and begin to look for work and lodgings. For now, he'd take a few hours rest for himself, well away from both Vestrits and Havens.

  Maulkin halted where he was. His jaws gaped wide and closed repeatedly as he tasted this new atmosphere. The tangle settled wearily into the soft muck, grateful for this brief respite from his dogged pace. Shreever watched their leader with something like fondness as he sampled the brine of this Plenty. His ruff stood up around his throat, half-challenging, half-questioning. A few of the other serpents rumbled at his attitude, shifting their coils uneasily.

  “There is no challenger here,” observed Sessurea. “He feints with bubbles. ”

  “No,” Shreever asserted quietly. “Memories. He fights to capture them. He has told me. They shine before his mind like a great school of capelin, confounding the eye with its multitude. Like a wise fisher, he must gap
e and lunge into the midst, trusting that when his jaws close there will be substance in his grasp. ”

  Page 77

 

  “Silt, most likely,” Sessurea said softly.

  Shreever stood her ruff up at him, and he swiftly turned aside from her, to nose at his own tail as if grooming. She herself stretched, preening showily to demonstrate she did not fear him. “Tubeworms,” she observed as if to herself, “are always content with a stationary view. ”

  The others, she knew, were beginning to question Maulkin's leadership. She did not. It was true that of late his thoughts seemed even more unfocused than usual. True, also, that he trumpeted strangely in his dreams during the brief rests he allowed them, and that he spoke to himself more often than he did to his followers.

  But the very things that unnerved the others were the signs that convinced Shreever that Maulkin was guiding them true. The farther north they had followed him, the more certain she became that he was truly one of those who carried the old memories. She watched him now. His great copper eyes were shielded by his milky eyelids as he danced the full length of his body through a knot, stroking himself over and over until his golden false-eyes glowed. Some of the others watched disdainfully, as if they believed Maulkin stimulated his senses simply for the pleasure of it. Shreever watched him hungrily. If the rest of the tangle had not been so intently watching him, she might even have dared to join him, to wrap his length with her own and try to share the memories he was seeking.

  Instead, she discreetly drew more brine into her own half-opened jaws and then let it escape slowly over her gills. She tasted the strangeness of this new brine. It carried foreign salts that near stung with their intensity. She tasted, too, the salts of Maulkin's body as he twisted strenuously against himself. The lids of her own eyes rose, cloaking her vision. For an instant, she dreamed, and in the dream the Lack was the Plenty and she soared freely within it.

  Before she could control herself, she threw back her head and trumpeted triumphantly. “The way is clear!” she called, and then came to awareness of her own cry. The others were watching her now with the same tension with which they regarded Maulkin. She sleeked her ruff back to her throat in confusion. Maulkin sheered towards her and suddenly wrapped her firmly in the full length of his body. His ruff stood out in wild aggression, welling toxins that both stunned and intoxicated her. He gripped her with immense strength, daubing his musk against her scales, deluging her senses with the half-grasped memories that lured him on. Then he freed her abruptly and whipped his body clear of hers. Slowly, limply, she settled to the bottom, gulping to breathe.

  “She shares,” Maulkin declared to his followers. “She sees and is anointed with my memories. With our memories. Come, Shreever, arise and follow me. The time of the gathering is nigh. Follow me to rebirth. ”

  CHAPTER NINE - A CHANGE OF FORTUNES

  THE CRUNCHING OF SHOD FEET ON THE SANDY ROCKS BROUGHT HIM TO ALERTNESS. DESPITE HIS YEARS OF blindness, he lifted his head and turned his eyes towards the sound. Whoever was coming was silent save for the footsteps. It was not a child: children walked more lightly and besides, they usually came in groups, to run past him shouting insults at him and dares to one another. They had thrown rocks at him, until he learned not to dodge them. When he endured them stoically, they soon became bored and went off to find small crabs or starfish to torture instead. Besides, the rocks did not hurt that much, and most of them did not even hit. Most of them.

  He kept his arms crossed over his scarred chest, but it took an act of will to do so. When one fears a blow and cannot know from what quarter it will come, it is hard not to try to guard one's face, even when all that is left of that face is a mouth and nose and the splintered wreckage that a hatchet has made of the eyes.

  The last high tide had nearly reached him. Sometimes he dreamed of a gigantic storm, one that would come to lift him from the rocks and sand and carry him back out to sea.

  Even better would be one that almost lifted him, one that would slam and crash him against the rocks, break him up into planks and beams and oakum, and scatter him wherever the waves and winds pushed him. He wondered if that would bring him oblivion, or if he would live on as a carved chunk of wizardwood, bobbing forever on the tides. Sometimes such thoughts could deepen his madness. Sometimes, as he lay on the beach, listing to starboard, he could feel the screw worms and barnacles eating into his wood, boring in and chewing deep, but never into his keel nor any of the wizardwood planking. No. That was the beauty of wizardwood; it was impervious to the assault of the sea. The beauty and the eternal condemnation.

  He knew of only one liveship that had died. Tinester had perished in a fire that spread swiftly through his cargo holds full of barrels of oil and dry hides, consuming him in a matter of hours. A matter of hours of the ship screaming and begging for help. The tide had been out. Even when the blaze holed him and he sank, salt water pouring onto his internal flames, he could not sink deeply enough to douse the deck fires. His wizardwood self had burned slowly, with black greasy smoke that poured up from him into the blue sky over the harbor, but he had burned. Maybe that was the only possible peace for a liveship. Flames and a slow burning. He wondered that the children had never thought of that. Why did they fling stones when they could have set fire to his decaying hulk a long time ago? Should he suggest it to them sometime?

  Page 78

 

  The footsteps were closer now. They halted. Feet grinding sand grittily against underlying stone. “Hey, Paragon. ” A man's voice, friendly, reassuring. It took him a moment and then he had it. “Brashen. It's been a time. ”

  “Over a year,” the man admitted easily. “Maybe two. ” He came closer, and a moment later Paragon felt a warm human hand brush the point of his elbow. He unfolded his arms and reached down his right hand. He felt Brashen's small hand attempt to grasp his own.

  “A year. A full turning of the seasons. That's a long time for you folk, isn't it?”

  “Oh, I don't know. ” The man sighed. “It was a lot longer when I was a kid. Now each passing year seems shorter than the one before. ” He paused. “So. How have you been?”

  Paragon grinned through his beard. “Now there's a question. Answer it yourself. I'm the same as I have been for the past, what, thirty of your years? At least that many, I think. Passing time has little meaning for me. ” It was his turn to pause. Then he asked, “So. What brings you out to see an old derelict like me?”

  The man had the grace to sound embarrassed. “The usual. I need a place to sleep. A safe place. ”

  “And you've never heard that just about the worst luck that can be found will be found aboard a ship like me. ” It was an old conversation between them. But they had not had it in a while, and so Paragon found it comforting to lead Brashen once more through its measures.

  Brashen gave a bark of laughter. He gave a final squeeze to Paragon's hand before releasing it. “You know me, old ship. I've already got about the worst luck that anyone could hunt up. I doubt that I'll find worse aboard you. And at least I can sleep sound, knowing I've a friend watching over me. Permission to come aboard?”

  “Come aboard and welcome. But watch your step. Bound to be a bit more rot than the last time you sheltered here. ”

  He heard Brashen circle him, heard his leap and then a moment later felt the man hauling himself up and over the old railing. Strange, so strange to feel a man walk his decks after such a long time. Not that Brashen strode them easily. Hauled out as he was on the sand, the Paragon's decks sloped precipitously. Brashen more clambered than walked as he crossed the deck to the forecastle door. “No more rot than the last time I was here,” the man observed aloud, almost cheerily. “And there was damn little then. It's almost spooky how sound you are after all the weathering you must take. ”

  “Spooky,” Paragon agreed, and tried not to sound glum about it. “No one's been aboard since the last time you were here, so I fancy you'll
find all within as you left it. Save for a bit more damp. ”

  He could hear and feel the man moving about inside the forecastle, and then into the captain's quarters. His raised voice reached Paragon's ears. “Hey! My hammock is still here. Still sound, too. I'd forgotten all about it. You remember, the one I made last time I was here. ”

  “Yes. I remember,” Paragon called back. He smiled a rare smile of remembered pleasure. Brashen had kindled a small fire on the sand, and drunkenly instructed the ship in the ways of weaving. His hands, so much larger than a man's, had proven a challenge to Brashen as he tried to teach the blind ship the necessary knots by touch alone. “Didn't no one ever teach you anything before?” Brashen had demanded with drunken indignance as Paragon had fumbled his way through the simple motions.

  “No. No one. At least, nothing like this. When I was young, I saw it done, but no one ever offered me a chance to try it for myself,” Paragon had answered. He wondered how many times since then he had dragged out the memory to pass the long night hours, how many times he had held his empty hands up before him and woven imaginary lines into the simple webbing of a hammock. It was one way to keep the deeper madness at bay.

  Within the captain's quarters, he knew Brashen had kicked his shoes off. They slid down into a corner, the same corner that everything slid into. But the hammock was secured to hooks that Brashen had mounted, and so it hung level as the man grunted and clambered his way into it. Paragon could feel it give with his weight, but the hooks held. It was as Brashen had said: surprisingly little new rot. As if Brashen could sense how hungry the ship was for companionship, he roused himself enough to call, “I'm really tired, Paragon. Let me sleep a few hours and then I'll tell you all my adventures since the last time I saw you. My misadventures, too. ”

  “I can wait. Get some sleep,” the ship told him affably. He wasn't sure if Brashen heard him or not. It didn't matter.