by Paula Volsky
Oonuvu the stoker squatted there wolfing down a double portion of doubtless soggy hardtack. His body was sweat drenched and black with coal dust. His chest rose and fell rapidly, the obvious effect of recent exertion. Evidently he had paused in his labors for a little rest and refreshment. The boy had every natural right to eat his lunch in peace, Luzelle would have imagined, but the captain did not seem to see it that way.
Roupe Jhiv-Huze, his customary joviality transformed, was barely recognizable. His contorted face was purple behind the tattoos, and he was spewing Ygahri dialect at the top of his lungs. Luzelle did not understand a word, but the captain’s furious gestures spoke for themselves. The stoker was being ordered back to his post.
Oonuvu shrugged and muttered something with his mouth full. The captain barked a command. Oonuvu stared straight ahead and chewed on. Bending down, Jhiv-Huze snatched the hardtack from the other’s grasp and flung it over the rail. Oonuvu hissed, and his teeth showed. Jhiv-Huze roared and brandished a fist.
Luzelle’s breath caught. Her eyes flew to Girays, who stood not far away observing the scene. She must unconsciously have transmitted some question or appeal, which he answered with a brief, unequivocal shake of the head. Stay out of it, he was telling her in silence. Don’t interfere.
She could hardly have expected anything more of a formerly-Exalted v’Alisante, a hereditary seigneur at that. He had, after all, been raised in the firm conviction that his social inferiors were his inferiors in every sense. Intractable servants, lazy or refractory menials, rebellious peasants and laborers were unlikely to win the sympathies of M. the Marquis. Probably he believed that a sound hiding was just what the impudent Ygahri deserved.
But Luzelle Devaire carried not a drop of formerly-Exalted blood in her veins, and she was not about to stand idly by while a large Kyrendtish captain brutalized his native underling. If Jhiv-Huze actually struck the lad, she would—she would—
What? Complain? Protest?
She did neither, for at that moment Oonuvu himself resolved her dilemma by rising unhurriedly to his feet. He yawned elaborately and slouched off toward the companionway. Jhiv-Huze jabbered angry dialect. The stoker cast an indolent glance back over his bare shoulder. His black eyes touched Luzelle in passing, and he ran a slow tongue along his lower lip. Her sympathy for him instantly died.
Oonuvu disappeared below. The smokestack belched and the voice of the engine deepened. Roupe Jhiv-Huze loosed a grunt of satisfaction and resumed the helm. The Blind Cripple picked up speed and Luzelle returned to her interrupted reading.
In the late afternoon a second vocal explosion drew her back to the deck. This time Girays was not in evidence. But there sat Oonuvu—sweatier and filthier than ever—with a jug of xussi cradled in his lap. Above him loomed the noisily irate Jhiv-Huze. While his captain fumed and blustered, the stoker raised the jug to his lips and swallowed a leisurely draft. Setting the xussi aside, he turned his face to the sky, furrowed his brow in concentration, and spat Ygahri-style, launching a fat dollop of alcoholic saliva high into the air. The flying globule described a steep arc and splashed the deck inches from Roupe Jhiv-Huze’s sandaled foot. That same foot promptly lashed forward to strike Oonuvu’s ribs with a solid thud, flinging the stoker sideways. The xussi jug jumped, fell, and broke into pieces, spilling liquor across the deck. Snarling, Oonuvu grabbed a dagger-pointed pottery shard and sprang to his feet. A knife materialized in the hand of the captain. The two faced one another in chest-heaving silence.
Luzelle watched disbelievingly. Her mind seemed to have frozen. They were about to kill each other, this addled captain and his delinquent stoker, and there was nothing she could say or do to stop them. Their idiotic violence was certain to slow her down, perhaps ruining her chances, and she was powerless to prevent it.
No matter, the recently emerged, wholly purposeful portion of her intellect reassured her. With one or even both of them gone, Girays and I could still find a way to pilot this tub downriver.
The cold clarity of the thought surprised her. For a fleeting instant she wondered at herself.
Finding her voice, she commenced urgently, “Stop, stop right now. Captain, please—”
Jhiv-Huze ignored her. A fusillade of Kyrendtish curses drowned her entreaties.
Oonuvu’s black eyes glittered. He whispered something.
Jhiv-Huze flicked an expressive steel blade.
The stoker looked the other up and down, then carelessly tossed the pottery shard away. Oozing contempt, he turned and sauntered off. A violent kick from behind accelerated his departure. Oonuvu staggered, whirled, and regarded his captain with an expression that chilled Luzelle’s blood. Then he whispered something with a smile, which was worse yet. After a moment he glided noiselessly down the companion and disappeared from view.
Good humor instantly restored, Roupe Jhiv-Huze pocketed his knife. Turning to encounter Luzelle’s alarmed gaze, he advised with an air of whimsy, “Do not trouble yourself, Madame. Jhiv-Huze has educated his subordinate, that is all. Sometimes a small touch of kindly firmness is indicated.”
EARLY THAT EVENING, not long before sunset, the Blind Cripple entered the narrow, convoluted Ta’ahri Capillaries. The Forests of Oorex, hitherto distanced by the broad expanse of the Ygah, now crowded close, almost ominously immediate.
Luzelle and Girays were on deck. She had already described the second confrontation between Jhiv-Huze and Oonuvu, and he had pronounced the captain a sodden swine and the stoker a perverted urchin. Thereafter conversation paused while they stood watching the jungle flow by.
The forests were different when viewed at such intimate range. Bigger. Darker. More powerful. The channel just barely accommodating the Blind Cripple was so constricted that the arching branches of the tall trees that lined the banks met above the water to roof a shadowy tunnel. The dim air was very still, very dank, and unpleasantly redolent of fungus. Luzelle could imagine drawing assorted airborne spores down into her lungs and, in the rampant fertility of the jungle, picture them taking hold there, spreading and expanding throughout her body to cram every organ with triumphant mold. She shuddered.
“What’s wrong?” asked Girays.
“Nothing beyond an overactive imagination. I don’t like this place, that’s all,” she confided. “It may be exotic and wonderful in its own way, but I just don’t like it. I feel as if I’m being watched.”
“You very probably are,” he concurred unnervingly. “Here in the Ta’ahri Capillaries the Grewzian presence is almost negligible. Here the Blessed Tribesmen reign yet, and it’s more than likely that they keep close watch over the strangers in their midst.”
“They’re really out there, then?” Her searching gaze strained to pierce shadows, but the dark forest kept its secrets. Another thought struck her. “Do those Blessed Tribesmen ever attack travelers? Are they dangerous?”
“Partial to blowguns and poisoned darts, I’m told,” returned Girays, and very soon thereafter the two of them sought sanctuary belowdecks.
THE BLIND CRIPPLE DROPPED ANCHOR as the surrounding grey atmosphere deepened to the black of the darkest imaginable night. No straying beam of moonlight, nor the faintest glimmer of starlight, filtered down through the branches overhead. The waters of the Capillaries lapping against the hull could be heard but not seen.
They made a late dinner of stew that evening, and Oonuvu was not present to share it. Luzelle assumed that the stoker must be either exiled or sulking. She did not care enough to ask which. Roupe Jhiv-Huze partook hugely of xussi, regaled his audience with repetitive reminiscences, and presently fell asleep at the table. His snores filled the tiny galley, all but excluding the incessant hum of insects, the amphibious croaks, the avian hoots and bestial roars from the depths of the forest, the elusive trilling of flutes—
Flutes?
Thin, high notes tripping along the edge of her consciousness; audible for some time before she had quite noticed them, and now impossible to ignore. The music, if such it was,
struck her as intensely alien, the fruit of unknowable minds presumably belonging to the Blessed Tribesmen. She glanced across the table at Girays and saw that he heard it too. Their eyes met and he shrugged, minutely but with eloquence.
Leaving Captain Jhiv-Huze unconscious in his chair, they made their way back to the main cabin, where Luzelle composed herself for slumber in utter darkness. At length she climbed into her hammock and heard the ropes creak on the opposite side of the room as Girays did the same.
For a while she lay with her eyes wide open and sightless, her ears alert to the uncanny chorus of the jungle flutes. The sound was intermittent, unpredictable, and oddly compelling. Each time it paused she found herself waiting, breath bated in comfortless suspense.
Ridiculous. A little night music was nothing to fear.
Blowguns and poisoned darts, Girays had said. Had he really needed to mention that? And having destroyed her repose, was he now comfortably sleeping? She lay there wondering. The flutes wailed and the darkness pressed with a weight all its own. At last she could bear it no longer, and whispered very softly, “Girays?”
“Yes?” he answered at once.
“Did I wake you?”
“No. Are you all right?”
“Yes, of course. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have disturbed you.”
“You haven’t. What’s the matter?”
“Nothing. It’s only that it’s so dark in here, and I just wanted to check—wanted to be sure—”
“Of what?”
“That you’re still here.”
“I’m here.”
She could not see a thing, but knew that he smiled. An answering smile curved her lips invisibly in the dark. After that she dropped off to sleep almost at once.
15
THE BANG OF THE CABIN DOOR flinging wide woke her at the crack of dawn. Luzelle’s eyes snapped open and she sat up. Anemic grey light trickled into the little room. She saw that Girays was already on his feet and facing Roupe Jhiv-Huze, who stood in the doorway.
Jhiv-Huze—blear eyed, puffy faced, and still reeking of xussi—radiated intense agitation. His hands were jerking and his bloodshot eyes darted everywhere as he announced without preamble, “Passengers, we are in a state of emergency! Your services are required!”
“What emergency?” Wide awake, Luzelle scrambled from her hammock. “What services?”
“He is gone!” Jhiv-Huze declared. “The ungrateful little deserter has jumped ship. In a less indulgent age his captain would order him hanged!”
“His captain would have to catch him first,” Girays suggested. “You allude to the stoker, I presume.”
“Disappeared during the night, without a thought to spare for loyalty or duty. Over the side to join his fellow savages of the jungle, no doubt.”
“I cannot imagine what possessed him,” Girays murmured.
“Sir, your levity is misplaced,” the captain complained. “Allow Jhiv-Huze to remind you that laughter hardly fuels the boiler. Oonuvu’s desertion leaves us stranded here in the Capillaries perhaps for days to come. Laugh at that if you can.”
“Surely the Ygahri boy can be replaced,” Girays opined.
“But at what cost of time?” Jhiv-Huze gnawed his lower lip. “How many hours, how many days, do we languish here, far from Jumo and all civilized amenities?”
The captain, Luzelle suspected, was starving for his marukiñutu. Good. His desperation served her purposes admirably. Once again she was surprised and a little disturbed by the workings of her own mind, but there was no time to worry about it, for Jhiv-Huze was still talking.
“We can’t spare the time, we’ve no leisure to search the forests for a healthy and tractable native. At this juncture one remedy alone presents itself. It is you, my friend. You are our hope and our salvation. Master v’Alisante, you are the Blind Cripple’s new stoker. I trust you will serve well.”
Had the man lost his wits? Luzelle wondered. Did he not understand that he addressed a formerly-Exalted v’Alisante, master of Belfaireau, and possessor of several quarts of Vonahr’s bluest blood? Did he actually imagine it possible that M. the Marquis could or would stoop to shoveling coal?
“Right,” Girays returned without the slightest flicker of affront and Luzelle stared at him in amazement. “Fire survive the night?”
“Just barely,” the captain told him. “A few small embers glow yet, and Jhiv-Huze has already fed them.”
“Good. Let’s move, then.”
“Jhiv-Huze admires your spirit, sir.”
“Wait.” Luzelle found her voice, and both men turned to look at her. “Girays shouldn’t have to do all the work. I’ll help.”
Girays and the captain traded brief glances of unendurable amusement.
“Thank you, Luzelle. That’s kind, but I don’t think I’ll require assistance,” Girays replied with a courteous gravity that would have deceived anyone who did not know him well.
“Don’t you think I’m capable of lifting a few shovelfuls of coal?” she inquired, carefully suppressing any note of belligerence.
“I’m sure that you are, but it’s simply unnecessary.”
“But heavy exertion in these temperatures will take its toll, and you’ll need relief from time to time. While you rest, I can—”
“Madame’s womanly concern is charming, quite charming.” Jhiv-Huze beamed tolerance. “Alas that we have not the leisure to lavish upon her the admiration that her generosity merits.”
Condescending crackpot, thought Luzelle, and cast about for a politely annihilating reply.
“No more delay.” Girays’s decree cut her cogitations short. “Let’s go.”
The two men exited. Scowling after them, she thought, Very well, M. the Marquis, treat me like some foolish child if you will. You are welcome to your masculine pride and you are also welcome to drown in your own sweat.
She washed, breakfasted on cold stew, and ascended to the deck. The air was almost cool by local standards, but would not remain so for long. The sun was up, its low rays slanting through the leafy branches overhead to dapple the boat and water with quivery sunlight and shadow. Soon the humid atmosphere would heat to steambath temperatures, but for now she could stroll the deck in relative comfort. And why not? That was all her traveling companions deemed her fit for.
She made her slow way aft, pausing often to study the intensely hued flora glowing amid the deep jungle shadows, the jumping play of the morning sun on the ripples of the Ygah, the aerial acrobatics of the indigenous diurnal bats. A moist breeze cooled her face. The Blind Cripple had picked up considerable speed; down below Girays must be toiling devotedly. And he wasn’t used to such labor, he wasn’t born to it or for it, and it would be just like him to drive himself to the point of collapse.…
No he wouldn’t; he was smarter than that. She contained the impulse to rush down to the engine room. He had made it clear that he didn’t need or want her help; he would hardly relish her intrusion. Let him work himself sick, then, it was his own choice.
Frowning, she continued her promenade. Her mind’s eye focused on coal, shovels, flames, and steam; she no longer heeded her actual surroundings, until she rounded the stern to the starboard side of the boat and there found a couple of small foreign objects protruding from the rail. They did not belong there, and they caught her attention at once. She took a closer look and discovered a pair of delicate feathered darts with needle points well sunk in the wood. They were beautifully made, and must have been launched with a certain force.
Blowguns and poisoned darts, Girays had said.
Her eyes jumped to the forest, but failed to penetrate the green gloom. She saw nobody there, and it occurred to her then that she herself stood completely exposed and vulnerable to attack. A little late to be thinking of that. Anyone so inclined might easily have picked her off at any time during the past quarter hour or so. Just as anyone might easily pick off the captain, who stood on the bridge, protected from rain or killing sun by an awning of ragged canva
s, but otherwise fully exposed. Jhiv-Huze wasn’t worrying, however, and neither should she. There was no reason to expect hostility from the natives, she assured herself. On the other hand, the arrival of the darts should be directed to the captain’s attention.
Gingerly she plucked the two little missiles from the rail and, holding both at arm’s length, advanced along the main deck as far as the bridge.
“Captain,” she called, and he looked down at her. She held the darts aloft for his inspection. “Found these stuck to the railing.”
“Very fine.” Jhiv-Huze nodded equably. “A delightful souvenir of Madame’s voyage.”
“But what do you suppose they mean?” She let her arm sink.
“The Blessed Tribesmen remind us of their presence.”
“Yes, but why? What’s the message? Is it a warning? A threat? A challenge?”
“Who can say? Jhiv-Huze has piloted his vessel along this river for twenty-five years and more, and even he cannot claim perfect comprehension of the Ygahri mind. It is useless to speculate.”
“But don’t you think you ought to take some sort of precautions?”
“What sort?”
Good question. Her brow wrinkled. No practical solution came to mind.
Noting her expression, the captain rumbled a benign chuckle. “Madame need not concern herself,” he advised. “The natives are friendly, the weather is fine, and Jhiv-Huze is at the helm.” His gaze returned to the river.
She had patently been dismissed. For a moment longer she stood looking up at him, then shrugged and moved away. The two darts remained clasped in her right hand, and she wondered what to do with them. Dump them overboard, she supposed. They were probably poisoned, and quite dangerous. Still, they were so well crafted that it seemed a shame to throw them away. She studied them closely, noting for the first time the tiny designs incised into the polished shaft of each dart. Exquisite work, and curiously familiar. Something about the symbols, something she had seen somewhere, sometime.