The Rats and the Ruling sea tcv-2

by Robert V. S. Redick

  Only now did Pazel realise what he'd sensed in the room: not a difference but a sameness that should have warned him. The room should have felt emptier; instead it was as crowded as before. Rose was seated; it was his boot on Pazel's chest. Dastu, holding a fengas lamp, stood to the captain's right. Sergeant Haddismal and another Turach were in the room as well. The sergeant had a thrusting dagger fitted over the knuckles of his right hand. The blade was red to the hilt.

  Behind the Turachs sat a row of bound men. Four had their faces concealed by leather hoods; the fifth, Lieutenant Khalmet, was slumped sideways against the wall, mouth open, blood darkening his chest.

  Haddismal glared down at Pazel. 'I'll cut off your ears if you so much as sigh for that dung-eating dog! Khalmet swore to live and die for Magad the Fifth. There hasn't been such an oath-breaking in the history of the Turachs. A stab through the heart was a mercy he never deserved — and he knew it, the coward, he all but lunged on my blade. The rest of you won't be so lucky.'

  Despite the hoods, Pazel recognised the others. Fiffengurt was still in the shirt he'd worn to the council meeting; he hadn't even rolled down his sleeves. Pazel spotted Druffle by his gauntness, Big Skip by his size, Bolutu by his monk's cloak and the blackness of his neck below the hood. The men's hands were tied very firmly behind their backs. All four were trembling.

  'Pazel Pathkendle,' said Dastu, almost sadly, 'you never should have let old Chadfallow mix you up in all this. I hear you had a fine arrangement on the Eniel, and were halfway to citzenship.'

  Pazel looked at him, and could not even feel the hate he expected. He was numb to any sensation but a kind of appalled disappointment. 'Why?' he said.

  'You should be asking why not,' said Dastu. 'You never knew me, of course. You knew my second self — the one I'm done with at last, I think, Master?'

  'Yes, lad, you're done with it,' said Ott. 'You've passed the exam with rare distinction.' He caught Pazel's eye, and gave a hideous grin. 'What do you say, Pathkendle? Top marks for Dastu? Certainly he had you believing in him. The good tarboy, the one without cunning or prejudice or vice, the one nobody could hate.' Ott looked appreciatively at Dastu, who basked in the praise. 'Six years he's been refining the part. Fiffengurt wanted to make him a midshipman; he saw officer material there. I think the truth hurt more than the blows.'

  Rose withdrew his sword, and his boot. 'Stand up, Pathkendle. Ott, you will release the girl's hair. She knows better than to fight you.'

  Ott slid his hand from Thasha's hair to her shoulder. 'There are a dozen Turachs behind me in the passage,' he said, his lips almost touching her ear.

  Pazel got to his feet, still aching from the blow to his stomach. 'Dastu, how can you be with them?' he said, still incredulous in his shock. 'You were at the council. You know what they're doing is insane. You know that Arqual can't win another war — that nobody can, except Arunis.'

  'I know you cannot face the truth,' said Dastu, 'but that doesn't surprise me. How could you be expected to embrace Arqual's coming supremacy? You lost your mother and sister in the Rescue of Chereste. You're an Ormali, with an Ormali's small, stay-at-home mind. I understand these things. But the world is large and cruel, Pazel. It needs Arqual more than ever.'

  'That's not you talking,' said Pazel. 'That's just something they told you.'

  'Something real,' said Dastu.

  'I guess believing that is part of the exam, too,' said Thasha.

  Dastu turned her a look that made the hair stand up on the back of Pazel's neck. But Sandor Ott just laughed. 'Yes, he said. 'An essential part — and the only part your tutor failed, Thasha Isiq. Hercol called it freedom of thought, but in fact his freedom began to bleed away the moment he left the Secret Fist. Was he free when he lived like a hunted thing in the Tsordons? Was he free when his lands were seized, his sister and her family beggared, his ancestral home in Tholjassa burned to the ground?'

  Thasha twisted in his grasp. 'You!' she spat. 'Did you do those things to him?'

  'He did them to himself, lass,' whispered Ott, pressing his lips even closer. 'And where is he now? In a cage, at the end of a wasted life. All for a withered old woman named Maisa — a cause as hopeless as petitioning the sun to rise in the west. Dastu, I'm glad to say, shows no such taste for lost causes.'

  'You put it best, Master,' said Dastu. 'Arqual is the future of Alifros. In time we will need just one name, for world and Empire alike.'

  'Boy,' said Rose, 'you've served your purpose well, but I don't give a damn for your Imperial platitudes. Fawn on your master elsewhere; for now concentrate on the task. Nine mutineers you spoke of; only seven have you produced.'

  'Captain,' said Dastu, 'I fear I played the part too well. Undrabust and the stowaway girl meant to come, but I protested, the better to assure they'd not suspect I wanted-'

  'Go and find them,' Rose interrupted. 'If they are still behind the magic wall, lure them out. Tell them their friends are in need; tell them whatever occurs to you. Haddismal, send a man along with him. I want the stateroom emptied once and for all.'

  Dastu smiled. 'I have an idea already, Captain.' He looked to Ott, received a nod from the spymaster. Then he handed the fengas lamp to another Turach, and slipped out of the room with Haddismal's lieutenant.

  Rose turned a stern and formal look on the captives before him, and pointed his sword at each in turn. 'Pazel Pathkendle. Thasha Isiq. As Captain and Final Offshore Authority of the IMS Chathrand, I hereby charge you with the crime of mutiny. The crime was both premeditated and sustained. You have held council with the aim of planning the seizure of this ship. You have recruited others to your cause. You have already assumed control of the admiralty-level stateroom, and held it by magical means, creating a space beyond the reach of shipboard justice. You have taken oaths to persevere in this crime as far as it leads — even to the destruction of this vessel, and the death of its entire crew.'

  At the last words, Mr Fiffengurt began to squirm and kick, and cry out beneath his hood.

  'Your quartermaster begs to differ,' said Rose. 'He would put all the blame for that last notion upon himself. But Dastu tells us that the whole council discussed the possibility — that you hoped it wouldn't come to that. Which means you accepted that it might.' Rose turned to the four captives seated behind him. 'Remove their hoods, Sergeant,' he said to Haddismal.

  One by one the Turach unlaced the leather hoods and wrenched them free. Druffle spat at the commando, and received a blow that rang loud in the little chamber. Fiffengurt already had a gash across his forehead, straight as a chart line. Blood had trickled down one side of his nose, and left a cinnamon stain on his white whiskers.

  'Pazel,' he said miserably, 'Miss Thasha. Forgive-'

  'Silence!' barked Haddismal.

  Big Skip was still and watchful, like a bear that has given up struggling in its chains. Bolutu, unhooded last of all, did not even glance at his captors. His eyes too went straight to Pazel and Thasha, but what was that keen glance trying to say? Help me? Save yourselves? Have faith in my plan?

  A sudden glimmer of hope leaped in Pazel's mind. Dastu left the council before Bolutu told us that his masters could see through his eyes. He can't have told Rose and Ott. They don't know that we're being observed, that Bolutu's empire is expecting us.

  Rose opened the chamber door, and beckoned. Turachs began to file into the room, hugely muscled men in leather armour, gauntlets, and short blades for close-quarters fighting. Two lifted the body of Khalmet and bore it from the room. The others, at a word from Haddismal, tugged the bound prisoners to their feet and made them face the captain.

  'Mutiny has been a danger from this mission's inception,' said Rose. 'But despite yourselves, you have in fact helped me to prevent one.' Rose pointed at Pazel and Thasha in turn. 'I have known since Ormael that the two of you, along with Undrabust and Hercol Stanapeth, wished me harm. What I could not know was just who else might wish it also. But I did not have to find them, fortunately. I simply had to wait for
you to find them for me.

  Now his gaze swept all the prisoners. 'The punishment for mutiny is death. So is the attempted theft of a vessel belonging to a chartered interest of Arqual. I might have found a way to construe your crimes as falling short of these worst offences, but for the fact that you spoke of destroying this ship. For those who would hatch such a conspiracy there can be no second chances. You are all condemned men.

  'The spell on the Shaggat forces me to delay most of your executions: you will be held in the brig until the matter of the Nilstone is resolved. We know Pathkendle is not the spell-keeper, but he too must wait a little longer for his punishment. That leaves us with Mr Sunderling, who joined the crew only after the spell was cast. Since you were in such haste to mutiny, sir, I see no reason to make a slow affair of your punishment.'

  Big Skip's eyes went wide. 'Captain,' he said, low and serious, 'don't do it, sir. We weren't after your ship. I'm a good Arquali like you. It's a doomed voyage, sir, an evil one. You didn't want to be part of it no more than me. I've heard the talk. They sent the Flikkers after you, sir. They caught you with a ticket for an inland coach.'

  'Take him aloft,' said Rose. 'Put him in stocks by the jiggermast, and nail the charges above his head.' He hesitated, studying the carpenter's mate. 'Give him some water. At midday tomorrow, he hangs.'

  For an instant the room looked poised to explode. Thasha cried out; Ott had given her a warning nick below the ribcage, even as the captain spoke. Pazel whirled, and felt the captain's sword cut him through his shirt. 'Hold!' roared the captain.

  Of course there was nothing else to be done in a room full of Turachs. But as he felt his flesh torn open by the blade Pazel's wisdom simply vanished. He struck at Rose's sword-arm, the fastest and most thoughtless blow he'd ever attempted, and felt the captain's wrist buckle. Rose howled in astonishment and pain, Haddismal leaped forwards with his dagger raised, Thasha screamed No! Then a foot out of nowhere struck Pazel's cheek with the force of a club: Ott's foot. He had kicked the youth without taking either hand away from Thasha.

  The blow turned Pazel's body like a snapped towel. Mouth agape, he crashed into Rose. The captain seized him snarling and threw him to the floor. Something — perhaps the cold, wet draught through the planks — kept him from losing consciousness. Then Rose came down on top of him and took his throat in both hands. The ferocity of his grip, the excruciating pain, left no doubt as to his intentions. Pazel smashed his knees against the captain's ribs, but Rose only grunted, lifted Pazel's head and slammed it down against the boards.

  'I had plans for you,' he said. 'Plans, or hopes at least. But I can damn well make other arrangements.'

  He pressed his face to his victim's chest, for Pazel was clawing desperately at his eyes. Thasha was fighting Ott, Fiffengurt was begging the captain's mercy for the youths. And Pazel was dying. He knew that, even as his eyesight dimmed. There came an instant of mental lightning, when visions of his mother and Neda, Thasha and Neeps, Ramachni and the bright eyes of the murth-girl, all became beautifully distinct, like so many gorgeous playing cards fanned across a table. Then the visions began to wink out.

  'Nilus!'

  The voice shrieked, peremptory, commanding, from the crowded passageway. The captain jumped, relaxing his grip on Pazel's neck with an almost guilty haste. The voice was Lady Oggosk's.

  Her red cat preceded her, slipping among the ankles of the room's startled men. Sniraga went directly to the captain and rubbed against his leg. Then Oggosk herself appeared, elbowing a path through the Turachs, who looked twice as big beside the tiny crone. She wore a black shawl over her arms, and pointed at the captain with her walking stick.

  'What are you doing, Nilus? Get up, you look a perfect fool!'

  'Oggosk, how dare you interfere!' said the captain through his teeth. 'Get back to your quarters; we will speak when I am finished here.'

  'Pazel! Thasha!' cried Neeps from the passage. 'I came as fast as I could! She's just so blary slow on the ladderways!'

  'Quiet, you odious boy!' snapped the witch. 'Nilus, the Ormali must not be killed. Not yet, not while the girl is still — glaya, the way she is.' She gestured vaguely at Thasha, still held fast by Sandor Ott. 'Have the girl and Pathkendle taken to your quarters. Leave the rest to Haddismal. There are more urgent problems, Rin knows, such as the apelike Mr Uskins' blunders at the helm.'

  'Duchess-'

  'Nilus, he is fondling her! That lascivious spy is fondling Thasha Isiq, and snuffling at her ear! He has cut her belly, too! What sort of ship are you running? Get off her, you reptile.'

  She jabbed at Ott with her walking stick, but the spy only pressed his knife harder against Thasha's side. The hand on her neck had indeed slipped lower, inside her shirt. Thasha's eyes were blazing, her lips curled back in a look of consuming hate.

  Oggosk made a sound of disgust. 'I'll expect you in your cabin, Nilus. Bring the doctor to bind their wounds. You can stay here, Undrabust; try not to get killed.'

  She hobbled off into the passage. Sniraga, however, remained seated by the captain's knee, purring softly, the only contented being in the vault.

  Rose took his hand from Pazel's throat. He did not seem to know how to carry on. Pazel lay still, breathing like a rusty spigot.

  'Ott,' said Thasha quietly, 'I swear on my mother, if you touch me there again I'll kill you.'

  'I swear on your father,' said Ott, 'that you shall never again lift a hand against me, or presume to mention where I put my own.'

  'Commander Ott,' said Sergeant Haddismal, 'this is the daughter of Eberzam Isiq.'

  If such were possible in a Turach's voice, Haddismal sounded afraid. Ott turned slowly to face him, astonished and cold. 'I will pretend those words never left your mouth, Haddismal. See that they never do again.'

  'You are relieved, Spymaster,' said Rose suddenly. 'Unhand the girl, and be gone.'

  A twitch passed over Ott's face, and his scars stood out like veins in marble. Rose had not even looked in his direction. Sergeant Haddismal glanced sharply at his fellow Turachs, whose hands went to their weapons. Still Ott remained where he was, one hand in Thasha's shirt, the other fidgeting with his knife.

  'Pathkendle-' Rose began.

  He never got any further, for at that moment Sniraga gave a ghastly yowl. An ixchel man had burst from between two crates, sword in hand, copper eyes alight with hatred. Sniraga pounced, but the ixchel dodged her, leaped straight at Rose, and plunged his sword into the red beard with a cry. The captain roared and swatted at him as he might a giant insect. The ixchel spun head over heels across the room, and landed on Big Skip's ankle.

  The carpenter's mate kicked instinctively. Steldak flew across the room a second time, lost hold of his sword (which had drawn no blood), and bounded unsteadily to his feet. He was lithe and quick, for he was an ixchel, but he was no Diadrelu. He feinted this way and that, as if he could not decide which way to run.

  It's over, thought Pazel. Over for us, and the ixchel.

  Rose's fist smashed down. Haddismal stomped, missing Steldak by a hair. Ott gave a croaking laugh and pulled Thasha tight against him. And Steldak, quick as a spider, wriggled through a two-inch gap in the floor planks.

  'That's my poison taster!' said Rose. 'Gods of death, we have to dig him out of there! We need to learn if the little bastard's alone!' He shoved Pazel to one side, clawing at the plank, which was loose already. 'Help me, Haddismal!'

  'He'll be long gone by now, sir,' said Haddismal, squatting next to Rose.

  'Pull, damn you! There are baffles in the floor! He's crawled right into a box!'

  Sniraga growled and clawed at the gap. Rose squeezed her aside, jamming his toe under the board as it started to lift.

  'Those baffles are rotted out,' said Fiffengurt from the back of the room. No one heeded him. Rose and the Turach wrenched and pried at the board. Over the slop of bilgewater, a sound of scurrying could indeed be heard from beneath it. Was that a voice, too? Pazel pulled himself up against a cra
te, listening. The board was starting to give way.

  Steldak's voice rang out suddenly from beneath it. 'Not yet! Not yet! He isn't close enough!'

  Neither Rose nor Haddismal showed the slightest reaction to the voice — of course not, Pazel thought, he's using ixchel-speech.

  'Captain,' he rasped, his throat still terribly painful, 'you might want to stop that.'

  Rose looked daggers at him, and gave a monstrous heave. The board lifted some ten inches, ancient nails popping from sea-rotted wood. Rose bent down to peer into the dark space beneath.

  'There you are!' he cried.

  The board shattered. Something wet and furious struck Rose in the face. It was a huge white rat, twice the size of Felthrup, and its head was thrust into Rose's mouth. Human and rat fell backwards, the beast clawing, Rose flailing and bucking on the floor. At last he got a grip on the squirming animal and flung it away from him with all his might. The rat's head was a hideous, hairless knob, scarlet with blood, and even before it struck the wall behind Druffle it had begun to talk.

  'Glory!' it howled, from atop a crate some eight feet above the floor. 'Glory to the rats of Arqual! Glory to the Angel of Rin! Death comes to the false priest, the heretic captain who mocks the Ninety Rules and their Maker! Death to his godless crew, death to this temple defiled!'

  'That's Mugstur!' gasped Pazel.

  'Kill it!' screamed Rose, all but incoherent with blood.

  Two Turachs sprang at the rat, but it squirmed away, shouting in ecstasy. 'Victory! Victory for Arqual where the Angel reigns! Victory to Magad, our Rin-given emperor! The hour is come! Rats of Chathrand, come forth and fight!'

  And the rats came. Out of the shattered floor, the frothing bilge, they leaped and squirmed, eight, twelve, twenty, more struggling behind. Like a welling stain, they spread in all directions, and with them spread a chaos beyond anyone's control. The Turachs stabbed and stomped, killing many, but the creatures were entering the vault faster than they died, and the floorboard was in too many pieces to replace. The Turach with the lamp whirled, slamming it into Big Skip's chest and cracking the glass. The lamp sputtered, darkening.