Returner's Wealth

by Paul Stewart

  ‘But it’ll keep you good and dry for many seasons,’ his companion drawled, and the heavy oilskin cape he was holding out shimmered like a curtain of water. ‘And I’ll throw in a clutch of deadbait to seal the bargain …’

  ‘Those boots are past mending, but I’ve got a new pair if you’re interested …’

  ‘I’ll give you a pot of wyrmefat – good for greasing and for burning …’

  ‘Bone-handled staffs? That all you got? …’

  ‘Five wingbones and two teeth. That’s my final offer …’

  Eli made his way over to a rotund kith with salt-and-pepper­ stubble who was sitting with his back against the cave wall, chewing slowly and open-mouthed. Two tiny lamps were clamped to the brim of his hat, one on either side of his head, the flickering flames making it look as though his ears were on fire. On the floor around him were bottles, jars and amphoras of various sizes. The air smelled oily and sickly sweet.

  Eli leaned forwards. ‘Fixing to get me some wyrmeoil,’ he said.

  The oil renderer nodded. ‘Come to the right person, friend.’ He pushed himself away from the rock wall, tugged at the leather braces that held his capacious breeches up and leaned forward. ‘What have you got?’

  Eli unstrapped his rucksack, swung it from his shoulders and set it down on the ground. He unbuckled the top and pulled the bundle of wyrmebones from inside. He laid them out on the cavern floor. The man viewed them with disdain.

  ‘That it?’

  ‘Fine mistwyrme bones, most of ’em,’ said Eli.

  The man shrugged. Eli picked up one of the bones and turned it over in his hand.

  ‘Make buttons, toggles. Fancy bits of scrim-shaw …

  ‘Mistwyrme, you say?’ the man interrupted.

  ‘Skinned and boned it myself,’ Eli told him.

  The man picked up one of the bones, sniffed it, then ran the tip of his tongue along its length. ‘You got the pelt too?’

  ‘I do,’ Eli said. He stooped down and rummaged in the bag, before pulling the wyrmeskin out with a flourish and holding it up. The patina of skin swirled like liquid silver in the flickering lamplight atop the oil renderer’s hat as he reached forward. He nodded appreciatively.

  ‘I’ll give you a quart for the pelt and the bones.’

  ‘Two quarts.’

  The man’s eyes narrowed. His chewing eased. ‘One quart,’ he repeated slowly, his voice thoughtful and soft.

  ‘Two quarts,’ said Eli firmly.

  The man took the wyrmeskin and rubbed it up and down a stubbled cheek.

  ‘Two quarts it is, friend,’ he said, looping two fingers through the ring-handle of a stubby earthenware pot and hefting it up into the air.

  He held it out, but Eli did not take it. Instead, the cragclimber stared back at the oil renderer, his blue eyes narrowed and unblinking. The man held his gaze for a moment, before smiling slyly.

  ‘Two quarts,’ he said, replacing the pot and picking up one twice its size. He turned it over in his hands, then held it out to Eli, who took it and got to his feet.

  As Micah followed Eli further into the cavern, he saw two wyrmekith huddled over a small pit dug into the cave floor, from which sulphurous coils of smoke wisped.

  ‘Wyve collectors,’ muttered Eli to Micah as they passed.

  A score or more of newly hatched wyrmes, fragments of wyveshell still clinging to their heads and backs, squirmed about and clambered over one another at the bottom of the pit, as two wyrmekith prodded them with gloved hands and haggled.

  ‘Feed ’em right and they’ll be pelt-ready in a season.’

  ‘Too small – and they look to be sickly. Got anything bigger?’

  Eli stopped. In front of him was a wyrmekith in a stained apron and a thick belt bedecked in knives. He crouched down again. Strung to a large backpack behind the wyrme­kith were the preserved entrails of wyrmes – lungs, kidneys, gizzards, dried twists of bowel and twinelengths threaded with shrivelled objects that Micah realized, with a start, were eyeballs.

  ‘I have something that might interest you,’ Eli said, bringing forth the jar containing the scentsac from his pack and setting it down on the ground.

  The gutsman said nothing, but Micah noticed the involuntary twitch of interest that plucked at the pock-marked skin of his hollow cheeks. The man pushed back his hat, strands of lank hair flopping across his forehead, leaned forwards and placed his hands upon the jar.

  ‘May I?’ he asked.

  ‘Be my guest,’ Eli told him.

  The man unplugged the top of the jar, breathed in, then noisily exhaled, smacking his tongue against the roof of his mouth as he did so.

  ‘Quality stuff,’ he said, his voice nasal and harsh. ‘And excellently preserved.’

  Eli accepted the compliment with the briefest inclination of his head.

  ‘I guess you know the worth of such a thing.’

  ‘I guess I do,’ said Eli, and allowed himself a small smile. ‘I’m aiming to stock up.’

  The man nodded. ‘You stock up with everything you need,’ he told him, ‘and I’ll keep a tally. Tell you when we’re getting close to barterbalance.’

  Eli nodded. ‘I need wyrmesalt,’ he said. ‘And scalemilt …’

  ‘Wyrmesalt,’ said the man, picking up a cloth bag beside him. ‘Scalemilt …’ He measured out a ladleful of brown granules from a copper jar, poured it into a square of waxed paper, which he gathered at the points, twisted round and tied it off with a length of string.

  ‘Chokesalve, bladderlye,’ Eli continued. ‘And if you have some of them bone-needles, I’ll take a dozen – and a spool of gut-thread …’

  Just then, a small plaintive cry sounded from behind Micah, and he turned to see one of the tiny mottled wyrmes from the pit standing at his feet. He crouched down and, as the creature cocked its head to one side and looked at him askance, Micah mirrored its inquisitive posture.

  ‘Ek-ek-ek-ek,’ the wyrme cried, the muscles in its sinuous neck pulsing.

  ‘Ek-ek-ek,’ Micah echoed.

  The wyrme blinked twice. There was a thin leather leash around its neck.

  ‘Cute little critter, ain’t he?’ came a voice from behind him, and Micah looked up to see the leash was held by one of the wyve collectors, a lean powerfully built man with slick black hair and beady deepset eyes. ‘’Course, they get vicious when they get older. And strong with it.’

  The little creature looked up at Micah and cocked its head.

  ‘Ek-ek …’

  ‘It’s almost like it knows we’re talking about it,’ said Micah.

  ‘I’m sure it does,’ said the man. ‘They’re smart, stormwyrmes. Not as smart as a great whitewyrme, mind, but then nothing else is …’ He thrust out a hand. ‘Name’s Cleave.’

  Micah seized the hand, and shuddered. It was cold and moist as toadskin, but the grip was strong.

  ‘I … I’m Micah,’ he said.

  ‘Micah,’ said Cleave, smiling. ‘That’s a good name. Got a cousin by the name of Micah,’ he added. ‘I shall take that as an omen.’ He clapped an arm around Micah’s shoulder, and Micah found himself being steered towards the back of the cavern. ‘And tell me, Micah, boy, got anything you’re fixing to trade?’

  Micah smiled uneasily, and glanced back over his shoulder. Eli was still deep in business with the gutsman. Cleave’s grip on his shoulder increased, and he felt the man’s nails dig into his skin.

  ‘N … No, sir,’ he said.

  ‘Those are mighty fine boots you have on,’ Cleave commented.

  Micah looked down, and nodded.

  ‘Fact is, a lot of folks neglect good boots,’ Cleave continued, ‘and that can be their undoing. You need good equipment to survive up here.’ He paused and turned, and his dark deepset eyes bored into Micah’s. ‘You got good equipment to survive up here?�
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  ‘I … I got stuff,’ Micah said uncertainly.

  ‘Stuff,’ the man repeated, and his lip curled so that Micah caught a glimpse of the green hue to his scant collection of uneven teeth. He pushed his face close. ‘What stuff you got, boy?’

  Micah glanced round, his heart beginning to protest loudly inside his chest. The lamplight was dim back here and the air was shot with shadow. A little way off, other wyrme­kith were huddled over their trades, backs turned, and he could no longer see Eli at all.

  ‘I got a hackdagger,’ he said, patting the knife at his belt as he backed away. ‘Some birdhooks. Arrowheads. A tin of bollcotton for making fires …’

  Cleave nodded, but Micah had the feeling he wasn’t listening. He felt the cavern wall at his back. The sour odour of the man’s breath was in his face. Cleave reached up and pressed his left hand flat against the rock, just above Micah’s shoulder, and plucked at the chain around Micah’s neck with the other. Micah froze, shivers tingling at his chest as the smooth metal slid up over the skin. He glanced down to see his spyglass appear at the neck of his jacket.

  ‘Now that is a good piece of equipment,’ said Cleave. He pulled it free and cupped it in his hand. His eyes narrowed.

  ‘Thing is, I lost a spyglass just like this one,’ he said, his voice lazyslow. ‘Happen this is my spyglass.’ His eyebrows flicked upwards. ‘What do you say?’

  Micah shook his head jerkily. ‘No,’ he said, ‘it … it’s mine.’

  ‘I don’t think you understand me right, boy,’ Cleave said. ‘This is my spyglass.’

  Micah tried to pull away, but the man had a tight hold on the chain, and he could barely move. The breath in his face was gagging rank.

  ‘I … I found it,’ he gasped.

  ‘See?’ said Cleave. ‘That’s the issue. I lost it. You found it. But if you were now to return it to me, its rightful owner, I should consider the matter closed.’

  Micah swallowed hard, the chain grazing his Adam’s apple as he did so.

  ‘You all right, Micah, lad?’ came a gruff voice, and Cleave and Micah looked round to see Eli standing behind them both, his arms folded.

  ‘He’s fine,’ said Cleave, taking a step back. ‘Ain’t you, Micah?’

  ‘I was asking the boy,’ said Eli evenly. He unfolded his arms, and unsheathed the knife at his belt with his right hand.

  ‘Micah here was just showing me his spyglass,’ Cleave said uncertainly. ‘I believed it to be the one I had lost …’

  Eli slowly twitched the knife.

  ‘Though now I look at it more closely, I see I was wrong,’ Cleave admitted and raised his hands, palms up, unthreatening. His green teeth flashed a quick smile. ‘No hard feelings, eh, Micah, boy?’ He stuck his hand out to Eli. ‘Name’s Cleave.’

  Eli stared at the hand, then turned to Micah. ‘Come on, lad,’ he said. ‘Our business here is concluded.’

  Micah stepped away from the wall and followed Eli, who had turned and was walking away. He glanced at Cleave as he walked past. The smile had gone, and those deepset eyes of his were glaring at him, hard and vengeful.

  ‘I’m sorry, Eli,’ said Micah, as he fell into step beside the cragclimber. ‘I got distracted …’

  Eli shrugged. ‘Stuff happens in scrimshaw dens,’ he said, and paused. ‘Even to an old hand like me.’

  ‘You?’

  ‘That’s right, Micah. I too have learned a lesson,’ he said. ‘I fell prey to a filchthief …’

  ‘You did?’ said Micah. ‘What did he steal?’

  Eli smiled. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Nothing?’

  ‘That birdhook of yours nigh on sliced his thieving thumb off in the endeavour.’

  Twenty-Two

  The wyrmeling was hungry. That much it knew. Its empty belly was writhing.

  It had to escape. That much it also knew. It had to break out.

  It wriggled and squirmed, but in vain. Its legs were folded back on themselves, and its wings were crumpled and pinned to its sides.

  All at once, there came a soft cracking noise and a fragment of light penetrated the darkness.

  Its claws scraped frantically at the shell, which splintered and cracked, until one foreleg broke through, followed a moment later by the other. Grunting with effort, it butted forward with its head and kicked back with its hindlegs, and the whole wyve split apart.

  With a thin mewling cry, it straightened up as best it could and gulped at the air.

  The world smelled good.

  The wyrmeling blinked away the skin of rheumy mucus which slithered down its eyeballs, till its yellow eyes were left shiny bright and gleaming. It tipped its head back, and the rain washed away the wyvedregs both from the corners of its eyes where it had gathered, and from every other part of its fresh-hatched scaly body; and the shards of shell still clinging to its head and shoulders were dislodged and fell away.

  It belched, and a twist of smoke coiled from its angular nostrils.

  The smoke seemed to take it by surprise. It snapped its mouth shut and swivelled its head round, watching as the smoke drifted and dissolved.

  It shook its head, then raised its hindlegs, but too vigorously. It pitched forward and landed hard on its chin with a small cry and more coils of smoke.

  Then it tried again.

  This time it raised itself up on its forelegs, slowly, deliberately. When the front legs had stopped wobbling, it pushed up on its back legs and its body rose. It stood for a moment, its neck rigid. Then, head held high, it took a tentative step. Then another. And another …

  It scritched gingerly over the speckled rock, leaving the fragments of broken wyveshell behind it.

  Its gaze fell upon darting movement, and the wyrmeling jumped, pushing off the rock with its hindlegs and snapping with needlefang jaws. It flapped its wings, but seemed unable to flap and snatch at the air at the same time, and collapsed in a heap.

  It turned its head and its gaze fell upon a firebug, motionless in the air before it. It took a cautious step forward, head raised and nostrils breathing in the tempting sweet succulent fragrance.

  Food.

  Its neck lunged forward, and it seized the morsel in its mouth and started chewing, its eyes opening and closing with each movement of its jaw.

  The kingirl held out a second firebug, and the tiny wyrmeling snatched it from her fingertips and gulped it down. Then another, and a couple more, before the wyrmeling turned away and scuttled towards a smoking crevice in the surface of the speckled stack.

  It paused, raised a back leg and scratched its neck with its claws. Then it lowered its head and scritched down the crevice towards the redglow warmth inside.

  The kingirl stood up and pulled her heavy hood over her head, casting her face into shadow. Above her, a great whitewyrme circled in the rain-filled sky.

  Twenty-Three

  Micah’s backpack lay at his feet, bulging like a truffle-­stuffed hog.

  ‘Doesn’t do to rush a good pack,’ Eli commented gruffly, wrapping up a hunk of sechement in oilskin and carefully stowing it in his own rucksack, ‘for what starts as a burden becomes a necessity on the trail.’

  Micah frowned. Eli had given him half of everything, which suggested that this was to be a parting of the ways. His gaze fell upon Eli’s empty canteen, and he jumped to his feet.

  ‘I’ll get us some water,’ he said eagerly.

  He gathered up the canteen and his own watergourd, and before Eli had a chance to decline his offer, set off headstooped across the cavern. The murmur of bartering voices was absent now. Instead, it was regular breathing and the rumble of snores that filled the lampshot air. Micah picked his way carefully through the sleeping bodies and stepped outside.

  The early light was gruel-grey. The rainfall had eased up some, but was still falling steadily. He shucked his collar a
nd tugged his hat down low over his head, and proceeded along the canyon. A few twists and turns later, Micah stopped. He unstoppered Eli’s canteen and held it beneath a glistening rope of water that trickled down the canyon wall.

  ‘Micah, Micah.’ The voice was low and almost weary-sounding.

  Micah turned to find himself staring into a pair of dark deepset eyes. The taut brown skin grew tauter still as green-tinged teeth flashed; but the eyes were not smiling. It was the wyve collector.

  ‘Leaving already?’

  Micah nodded. ‘I have all the provisions I require,’ he said, and nodded towards the canteen. ‘I was just getting some water.’

  ‘Business concluded in the scrimshaw den,’ said Cleave, nodding thoughtfully. He reached up and dragged filthy fingernails through his slick black hair. The teeth flashed again, and Micah caught a whiff of the man’s rank breath. ‘Yet I would say our business remains unfinished.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Wouldn’t you agree?’

  Micah reached up and felt the spyglass through the folds of his jacket. His brow furrowed and his legs began to shake. He glanced round over his shoulder, and Cleave laughed unpleasantly, a hic-hic of sneering amusement.

  ‘Ain’t no one gonna come to your aid this time round, boy,’ he said. ‘It’s just you and me.’ He stepped forward, seized the front of Micah’s jacket and wrenched him closer. And as Micah stumbled forward, he felt the sharp point of a knifeblade press at his belly. ‘You and me.’

  Micah swallowed. ‘But I thought … ’

  ‘Don’t think, boy,’ Cleave butted in sharply. ‘It ain’t good for you.’ He pushed his face into Micah’s, his taut features twitching with wry satisfaction. Micah felt the knife jab harder. ‘Thinking can lead to a slit belly and spilt guts,’ he leered. ‘Just hand over the spyglass …’

  The canteen struck the side of Cleave’s head hard, slamming against his jaw with a hollow crunch. Cleave staggered backwards, a look of dazed surprise in his deepset eyes. A hand went to his jaw.