by R J Barker
And yet, while everyone on board covered their ears, Joron did not. He heard something in that noise. Heard some sense in it that was beyond his understanding. He felt a terrible melancholy. Then the creature’s head rose clear of the water on a long, thin neck, sheets of water splashing down into the sea, Its head bent forward, on the back of its skull was a pair of huge, swept-back, many-branching horns. The arakeesian dipped its beak back into the sea, sending up waves of water, and made its call again. The sea vibrated, the ship as well, but when the call was filtered through the water there was a strange and beautiful music to the sound.
“It is loud,” said Mevans, “I’ll give it that.”
“It is beautiful,” said Joron.
“Ey, it is,” said Dinyl from his place by him on the rail, and as he turned their hands touched.
Another shiver of colour ran down the creature, and Joron felt as if the ship and the arakeesian flew along the water in a bubble. There was an unnatural quiet between each hooting, singing call from the wakewyrm, a stillness, and though Tide Child ripped through the water it did not seem to disturb it; the rigging did not rattle or clink, the wings did not flap and clatter, the water did not hiss and gurgle along the hull. They simply existed in the same time and place as the arakeesian.
“We hunted these,” said Joron more to himself than anything. “How could we do that? Why would we do that?”
“We needed them,” said Dinyl. Joron moved his hand so they no longer touched.
The arakeesian shook its head, a movement that took place in slow motion, spraying water over the decks of Tide Child, and the movement continued all the way down its huge body, a complex wave of rainbow colours darting across its skin. From the back of its neck and down the keyshan’s body huge flaps of bright red skin rose up on spines, audibly cracking into place.
“It has wings.” Dinyl laughed and tapped Joron on the hand. “Look at it! They catch the wind.” He leaned over the rail. “And it has folded its flippers against its body.”
The wind around them strengthened – not markedly, not as it did when it responded to the gullaime, but in a way that was not natural. The waves of a choppy, grey, cold sea now slapped against Tide Child’s hull, but around the keyshan it was calm.
“It controls the weather,” said Meas quietly. “It flies across the sea just like we do.”
The wakewyrm sounded again, breaking the spell.
Tide Child awoke, and all the noise and action normal on a boneship returned. “Back to work,” shouted Meas “You would think you had never seen a keyshan before.” There was laughter at that, the mood aboard bright now. “I’ll have no slatelayers on my ship.” She took her place by the spine. “To work with you.”
“I must go water and feed the gullaime,” said Joron.
“Do that,” said Meas. “Then return here. I will hold station by the arakeesian for eight turns of the glass, then we make for Arkannis Isle.”
Joron made his way down to the underdeck, dipping his head to avoid the overbones of the ship as he made his way to the gullaime’s quarters. Outside the door he stopped. Lain by the door he found an assortment of oddments and he stooped to gather them. This had become normal. Though the crew never spoke of the gullaime, never asked how it was or acknowledged their interest in it, they knew it was special, and this was how they showed their regard – with gifts of carved bones, painted stones, strange shells and small objects. Most were of value only to those who had owned them, but they gave them freely and in doing so they made a quiet prayer to the Sea Hag for the windtalker’s recovery.
Joron went inside. Before he fed the creature he added the presents to the growing collection in one corner of the cabin. Then, without quite knowing why, he opened the bowpeek, allowing air into the cabin, dropping the temperature but letting him see the giant head of the arakeesian. One glowing eye seemed to stare straight into the cabin, the heat coming off it beating against his face, making him look away.
Had the gullaime moved?
Joron was sure that when he came in it had been curled into a ball, but now its head was pointing at the open hatch. He stared at it, waiting, expecting it to move again, for the beak to open and for it to rasp out his name.
Jo-ron Twi-ner.
But it did not. Nevertheless, when he sat to feed and water the windtalker he changed his position so that the gullaime remained looking out of the hatch while he poured water into its beak and forced dried fish down its gullet. All the time he waited for some subtle hint the creature lived. None came. Once he had fed the gullaime, he put it back into the nest of rags it had constructed before becoming windsick, arranging it so its head still pointed at the hatch where the huge eye of the arakeesian stared in. Then he set to his next task, weaving from oddments of rope he had scavenged around the ship a sort of basket he could wear on his back to carry the gullaime when they landed on Arkannis Isle.
There was a certain pleasure to this task. It was similar to weaving the nets he and his father had made and used when he was young. He had detested the job then, but now the subtle dance of the needle, down and round and up and under, let him drift away. Up and around, Joron. The skeer chases the kivelly around the spine. Do it with love, and do it with care, for it is our livelihood. For a moment he was no longer the deckkeeper of a ship of war, no longer a man condemned to death, no longer under threat. He did not think of the spikes and hooks that covered Tide Child’s hull, he did not think of curnows cutting into flesh and splashing out waves of red blood. He did not think of the fear within him when he fought and the other, deeper fear that others would recognise him as a coward. He did not shake and imagine the moment when a blade found his flesh and he added his own blood to the endless current that flowed between the Hundred Isles and the Gaunt Islands. He simply was. He simply existed in the moment and the heavy needle dragged the rope around and about as it created, from oddments and cast offs, the basket he saw in his mind. Through this, he was just a boy again, and he could imagine he might go up on deck and find his father at the oar, guiding him through life.
But then he was back in the cabin of a creature that he felt he could never understand, being stared at by something so immense he could barely comprehend it, on his way to kill or be killed on the orders of a man he hated. He glanced at the gullaime. The mask that should cover its blind eyes had slipped. Only a little, on the side nearest to him, exposing the roundel of grey feathers about the eye and the pink eyelid underneath with its long and thick lashes. Joron put down his rope basket and went over. It seemed wrong to leave the beast’s eye uncovered when he knew from experience how fussy the creature was about having its mask interfered with. He had never before wondered why this was so. Maybe they regarded their empty eyes as sacred, or maybe as something shameful? Maybe they simply did not want others to see their disfigurement. He had seen blind people before but never wondered about the gullaime. Did they really put out their eyes at birth? Now he was close up it did not look like it; the eyelids did not appear to cover hollows. So was some other method used? Did he even want to know what was done to them?
He was not sure he did. He shuddered, and a thought invaded his mind, an old, almost forgotten memory.
An island ridge where the varisk and the gion had died back and left bare rock. A grey sky swirling with the Northstorm’s anger. Skearith’s Eye a weak silver disc. In silhouette on the ridge, a woman, stick in hand, leading a line of gullaime from the lamyards, their heads bowed, robes flapping in the wind as they shuffled along, the clinking of the chain that bound them showing as a black, bellying line between them, filling the air like a warning bell.
“Look away, son.” His father’s hand, rough and warm on his neck, turning his eyes away from the bound windtalkers, back to the sea, where the waves rose and fell and crashed against the harbour walls, keeping the ships prisoner in the harbour as surely as those gullaime were held by the rope.
Joron blinked. Shook his head to rid himself of the intensity of the memor
y. Was it wrong, this thing they did? The gullaime were a gift from the godbird to the Mother. They were part of life, their fate as much ordained as that of the Berncast.
But was it wrong?
What if it was wrong?
He reached out to straighten the mask.
The gullaime’s eye flicked open, and Joron almost jumped backwards. Beneath its lid the eye was as white and hot as that of the arakeesian that cut through the water alongside Tide Child. Then, like a spiral on a spinning top, the pupil of the gullaime’s eye appeared from its internal fire.
“You live!” said Joron, but his words were barely spoken. His heart beat within his breast like a call to action. Just as he was about to turn, to run to the deck and tell Meas that the gullaime had recovered, its beak fell open and its spike-like tongue lolled from its mouth.
“Shhhh.”
Did it speak? Joron knelt nearer to it.
“Shh? Did you say ssh?” Did it nod? Did its head move the tiniest, smallest amount?
He could not be sure.
He sat back, stared at it.
He would say nothing.
He moved the gullaime a little, trying to make it as comfortable as possible. The pupil of the open eye spiralled shut and the lid closed, hiding its glow. Joron pulled the gaudily painted mask back into position. The nearer he got to the creature the more questions he felt he needed to ask.
“Deckkeeper!” The shout came from above. He left the cabin, trying to forget the gullaime and trying not to think about what might await him when they landed on Arkannis Isle.
The size of the Spine mountains made Arkannis look insignificant; they rose beyond seeing, steep sides vanishing into the clouds. Here and there flashes of bright colour marked where plants clung precariously to the rock. Birds, in multitude, swooped and darted, making homes on meagre ledges and in shallow holes and streaking the black rock with their guano. Even from so far away Joron could hear their calls over the ever-present hiss and jingle of Tide Child as the boneship made his way through the water.
Meas stood by him, staring though her nearglass.
“The island blocks my view of both its tower and the tower on the Spine,” she said, sounding as if the island had planned this just to spite her.
The nearer they came to Arkannis the more it looked unpleasant to Joron. At the sea’s edge a bright blue plant grew in abundance, a riot of waving branches. Above this were varisk vines, lurid pink and twisting up and up around the bruise-purple gion to nearly the height of Tide Child’s topspines. Higher up the jagged island earth had fallen away to expose the white rock beneath. The island looked like an ulcer: the blue of a bruise, angry purple and red flesh and dead white flesh within.
“Sickly, is it not?” said Meas.
“Ey, Shipwife.”
“Wait till you get on it. Arkannis is said to stink like a rotten egg. A lot of the Spine islands do. And they have hot springs that will boil a woman or man alive if they fall in.”
“It sounds delightful.”
“I am sure it is.” She closed the nearglass. “Now, look at the island. See how it rises and has two flat areas towards the top. You can just make out the higher one through the gion; the lower is behind it, over the ridge. That is where the tower is.”
“Yes, Shipwife.”
“The windspire is on the higher plain. You will take ten crew with you and get the gullaime to the windspire. Hopefully you will not be noticed. I will take twenty to assault the tower; that should be enough to deal with raiders. When you have delivered the gullaime to the windspire, bring your women and men to help me mop up.”
“What if they find the gullaime, alone and defenceless?”
Meas extended the nearglass again, putting it back up to her eye.
“We shall have to hope they do not.”
“Shipwife.” She turned. Coxward stood on the deck, naked apart from his loincloth, dirty bandages and toolbelt, his meaty body nearly as pink as fresh varisk leaves. A diadem of sweat crowned his forehead and he looked grim, like a man with a growth that had become too large for him to ignore, presenting himself to the hagshand for its removal. Meas turned, collapsed her nearglass once more and placed it within her coat.
“I can help, Bonemaster?”
“I would speak to you in your cabin, Shipwife.” He pulled his belly up with both hands, the way someone would ruffle up a shirt at the waist to make themselves look bigger.
“Very well,” said Meas. “Joron, the rump is yours. Have the flukeboats made ready to take us to the island. You, I and Coughlin will lead the assault; Dinyl will take Tide Child around the island to distract those ashore while we land.”
With Meas gone Joron busied himself with getting the flukeboats ready, filling them with wyrmpikes, bows, arrows, curnows and shields. To the weapons he added a supply of water.
“D’keeper.” He turned to find Farys before him, her scarred face pulled in to strange shapes by a smile. “Shipwife wants you, and she asks you bring the stonebound’s leader.”
“Coughlin?”
“Ey, that’s the one – the big fellow. Wants you both in her cabin.”
“Thank you, Farys.”
Coughlin stood as he approached, bending his arms at the elbow, making himself bigger and flexing the muscles of his biceps and chest as if to show how much stronger he was than Joron.
“The shipwife wants us.”
“For what?”
“Well” – Joron glanced towards where the island of pink and blue and white grew moment by moment – “as we are about to attack that island, I imagine it will be to do with that. It would not do to have you and your men running about without knowing your goal, ey?”
“No.” Coughlin narrowed his eyes. “No, it would not. I will come.”
Joron nodded to him. From the corner of his eye he caught Cwell watching as she braided together two ropes.
“Mind your head on the overbones,” said Joron. “You are a tall man and not well fitted out for a ship.” His words brought a chuckle from the deckchilder nearby, and Coughlin licked his lips as if he tasted the air to find out whether Joron mocked him or not. There was tension, but only for a moment, then Coughlin nodded.
“Lead on then. I would know what I take my men into on the land, for I know it is not your element.”
Joron let that small jibe go and led Coughlin down into the gloomy underdeck, hoping the man would crack his head on an overbone despite his warning, but like many warriors he had a keen awareness of the world around him. Joron suspected, that, even without the wanelights, he would have found his way without injury. Something Joron was not sure was true of himself.
In Meas’s cabin they once more entered a world of light. The desk sat in its ruts, Meas behind it and the bonemaster before it. On the desk was a hard round shiny brown thing about the size of a child’s fist. Both Meas and the bonemaster stared at it.
“You wanted me?” said Coughlin abruptly.
“Ey, I did.”
“To talk battle?”
“No,” said Meas, her voice quiet, “not yet.” Coughlin’s wide brow wrinkled questioningly. “I will ask you a question, Coughlin. And I ask you to give me a truthful answer. I will hold nothing against you.” He opened his mouth to speak but Meas held up her hand. “Wait. Just know, that before you say a word to me, I am shipwife. I know all that goes on within my ship.”
“You spy on those you should trust,” he said.
“Or those who I trust spy on those I cannot. It matters not. But I will ask you my question, so listen.” She let a brief silence settle before carrying on. “Cwell, as I well know, is Cahanny’s relation – niece, I believe.” Coughlin nodded. “Has she asked you to get her off the ship?” Joron saw Coughlin’s eye’s widen, only momentarily, but enough to give him away. “I know she has,” said Meas. “But I do not know where or when.”
Coughlin glared at her, and Joron wondered if he would go for the eating knife at his belt, but then he shrugged.
“She did not ask. Cahanny told me I was to get her off the ship at the earliest chance.”
“And now we have seen an arakeesian, maybe she is not so eager to leave. Maybe there is a betrayal planned at Arkannis?” said Meas.
“She liked that idea but was more interested in leaving the ship. You should let her if it is what Cahanny wants,” said Coughlin. He did not look worried or scared.
Joron wondered at how free he was with such information, and at the smile that crossed Meas’s face.
“Do you know what that is, Coughlin?” said Meas, and prodded the brown thing on the desk with the tip of her knife. It spun a little and Joron recognised it. It was a set of three-lobed serrated jaws. They were shut now and no longer attached to a body, and Joron thanked the Hag for that.
“No doubt,” said Coughlin, “it is some hagfilth from the depths that kills as soon as looks at you.”
“Well,” said Meas, and she sat back in her chair. “You are half right – the second half. It is not from the depths though. Deckkeeper, will you tell Coughlin what this is?” She tapped the object with her knife again.
“It is the mouth of a borebone,” Joron said.
“So? Some ship thing,” said Coughlin. “I do not see what this has to do with Cwell or me.”
“It is a small borebone, that one,” said Meas. “These jaws can grow as big your head, even yours, Coughlin. They live in ill-kept ships, eat through the bones of the hull, or the crew, if they come upon them unawares. They like the dark, see. Live in the bilges so they are seldom seen until it is too late, and suddenly your ship is sinking underneath you and the longthresh are gathering in the water to feast.”