Hardway
Page 15
The sea bucked and reared like a restless mount, as though it could sense the approaching violence, and the ship jerked, shuddered and rolled. He gripped the rail and looked towards that ominous, shadowy horizon. He found himself wondering again what his sister had summoned from the depths, and how. Born into his care, his flesh and blood, she was almost as tiny and helpless now as she had been the day she came writhing from the very same womb. She was the only thing that gave his life meaning, made him whole, made him valid. What was she?
He looked down at her pale face. It looked so unreal, dwarfed by the furs in which she was swaddled. Her eyes burned bright, brighter than ever they had in their squalid dwelling in the Sandpit, and they were fixed, opaque, unseeing and unblinking, on the seething wall of darkness that boiled inexorably towards them. He didn't know why, but despite his lifelong struggle to protect her and even more that she had summoned a monster to save them, she made him feel safe. As the wind picked up and the crew shouted over it, frantically preparing to weather the impending tempest, he kissed her on the forehead and took her below decks.
To his surprise, there had been a cabin ready for them. The monk, Brother Envy, seemed to have been expecting them and had greeted them with an unsettling, knowing look. Accompanied by the girl, Eva, and not so much as batting an eyelid at the presence of the puking artist, the monk had led them to their quarters, eager for them to get comfortable. This made Limpet uneasy. He didn't like surprises, but it was preferable to being thrown overboard.
The pair had been largely ignored by the soldiers, aside from a few sideways looks and mutterings of sorcery or witchcraft, as they had been preoccupied with the orders of Captain Storn. Now they were confined to their quarters as they waited for the storm to pass. Two were gravely injured and didn't seem likely to last the night. Rollo's hired killers had been more curious of Limpet and his enigmatic little bundle, but Brother Envy had been keen to usher him and Liss away into their cabin. The monk's chamber was next door.
The artist, Maximilian Shackle, had been taken to Eva's room and given a bucket. Somehow Limpet didn't think a bucket would be of much use if the ship was torn to pieces.
He lay on his bunk, cradling Liss, and pondered. Events had not gone as expected, though he had no plan other than to get away from Hardway, so much had happened since they'd crept aboard in the dark. He was tired, and the comfort of the bunk and the swaying of the ship made him drowsy. His questions could be answered tomorrow. If they survived the night.
* * * *
Limpet was woken by a heavy jolt which nearly threw him from his bunk. He had no idea how long he had been sleeping, but his slumber was mercifully black and restful. It was pitch dark in the cabin, and he realised with horror that Liss was no longer curled up in his arms.
The cabin rocked with increasing violence, lurching and rolling in great, swaying, nauseating movements, punctuated by sudden explosive shocks that threw Limpet in the air and coincided with the ear-splitting crack of thunder. He scrabbled around on hands and knees, searching for Liss, staring into the blackness, but he could not see the burning points of her eyes. Trying to rise to his feet, he was thrown again, this time flying backwards and hitting his head hard. A flash of blinding light and pain seared behind his eyes and he lay still, dazed.
As he recovered his senses he could feel something knocking against his side. Slowly, he reached out a trembling hand and caught a swinging wooden object—the cabin door. Brother Envy had locked the door earlier, citing their safety as the reason, but now it swung open, and Liss was gone. Panicking, Limpet stood groggily, and felt his way, stumbling through the doorway.
It seemed to take an eternity to make it on to the deck. Every time he took a step forward the ship would lurch again, and he would totter backwards like a drunken toddler, or be thrown bodily. By the time his head popped up into the open air, he had a bloody nose and a throbbing cut on the back of his head. Instantly receiving a salty blast of wind that took his breath away, he dropped onto all fours as the deck rocked to one side and a wall of water engulfed him. He desperately gripped the deck in vain with his fingertips as he slid towards larboard. Just as he thought he would be swept overboard, the ship lurched the other way. He gripped the rail and clung on with all his might.
As the larboard side rose into the air, he opened his eyes and stared into the heaving maelstrom. Stupefyingly vast black waves rose and fell like restless mountains, their summits lit periodically by forks of lightning. The clouds above them churned and roared in answer, as if the Gods of sea and sky fought for dominion of the World Apparent. But this was a battle that could never be won. Instead it would rage on with no victor, until one or the other grew weary of the contest.
The ship came over the crest of the wave, rolled back to larboard, and Limpet found himself staring down into the depths of a light-devouring abyss. The words Liss had spoken before the creature came to feast on pirate flesh sprang to mind, and he wondered if the gate to the void lay at its bottom.
The deck righted itself briefly, before plunging down the side of that towering wave, and Limpet saw a tiny figure near the forecastle. Liss stood with her arms by her sides, her head tilted back slightly. She remained perfectly still, seemingly unaffected by the ship's movement. Her eyes were wide open, staring calmly at the sky. Whether it was the lightning, he couldn't tell, but she seemed to shimmer and flicker, as though only half real. Her lips were moving but he could not hear her voice over the wind and thunder.
“Liss!” he cried her name but his words were whipped away from him like smoke on the wind. Even now she looked impossibly small, as though a gust of wind might break her in two. It wrenched his heart to see her so vulnerable, in the open, facing the elements. He began to inch his way along the rail as the ship shook and swayed beneath him. He held on, as he had held on to life, and rose and fell with the ship. One moment he was in the black sky amidst the howling wind, staring down at the boiling ocean far below, the next he was beneath the surface, the sea clawing at him like a thousand cold, dead hands trying to drag him down into the silent darkness.
Yet this was the world he understood. The icy, indifferent sea and its inexorable, indiscriminate embrace made sense to him. A simple black-and-white universe with one end and one means and one choice. Cling on. Protect Liss. Survive. He would not die while Liss lived. Dying was a reward he saved for the day he finally failed to save her. And he was damned if that day was today. He gritted his teeth and pulled himself, inch by inch, along the rail towards the bow. The crashing movement of the ship and his constant dunking beneath the surface did not afford him a good view of the deck, but the fleeting glimpses he caught showed the tiny black figure of his sister, still rooted to the same spot.
Finally he could see he had reached the forecastle, but he knew if he let go of the rail he would be swept away into oblivion. Each time he broke the surface and rose into the air, he reached out to her in vain, calling her name. She stood half way between him and the starboard rail, far out of his reach. In desperation, he let go with one hand, thinking to claw his way towards his sister.
As the larboard rail rose from the black depths, he launched himself towards her, landing on all fours, scrabbling for purchase. The driving rain stung his face and as he looked up he saw her delicate silhouette dwarfed by a vast wall of water. It towered over the ship and seemed to roar like a living thing, a monster come to sweep them away, to lay them to rest for eternity on its silent bed. He opened his mouth to scream but was taken before he could make a sound.
All was darkness, silence. Cold filled him, forcing its way into his eyes, nose and mouth. The gentle but insistent hands of the deep tugged him this way and that, they pulled at his hair and his clothes. They caressed him, lulling him, urging him to sleep, to drift into the watery abyss, to rest forever in their silty embrace.
His eyes were open, held so by the soothing water, and he gazed into an infinite void. Occasionally, barely discernible shapes seemed to move on the edg
e of his vision, and ghostly lights flickered and danced in the distance.
Somewhere in his mind a half-formed memory, a voice, seemed to echo very faintly. Something that must once have been important, as if it were an ancient belief that his ancestors had once held in the distant past that now was forgotten in the winds of time. As he sank gratefully into an eternal slumber, the voice tugged at him. A girl's voice, thin and reedy, not shouting and screaming, not rising and falling, but incessant, relentless, gnawing at his soul, giving him no peace. He tried to shake it off, to rest, but the more he tried the weaker the cold hands that caressed him became. Finally he could hear a distant rumble that gradually became an ear-splitting roar.
Suddenly he was dumped on a hard surface. He coughed and retched and water poured from his mouth and nose, his face pressed against the wooden deck. The sound of the storm shook his bones but the world seemed strangely still, as if he were in a bubble. Somehow finding the strength to roll onto his side, he gazed upwards and saw Liss standing over him. Her face was tilted towards the raging storm. The ship still rocked violently but he was held in place by some unseen force. As the waves washed over them he felt nothing. The power of the storm seemed to pass him by.
He looked down the length of the ship towards the stern and saw another figure. Brother Envy stood on deck, upright and impervious to the wind and waves. The monk stood still, his staff held vertically in his right hand, and stared grim-faced at Liss. Limpet frowned, confused. He wondered if he was dreaming. Then his strength finally faded, and he was lost to darkness.
* * * *
He could hear voices, even as the dream world dissipated like steam before his mind's eye, leaving a hazy gloom rimmed with a faint white glow, like heavy drapes drawn across a window. The voices were faint at first, and seemed to come from all directions. Some were close by and some distant, and they sounded distorted and confused.
Eventually the voices became clearer and the distortion took shape as the sound of waves on a beach. Too weary to open his eyes, he listened.
“Our objective was to drop anchor north of Glebes and meet Dusek's spy. We are lost. Everything is lost.” Limpet recognised the clipped but now tired sounding voice of Captain Storn.
“On the contrary, Captain Storn,” replied the familiar, calm and measured tone of Brother Envy, “I happen to know exactly where we are. I'm afraid the storm has taken us far to the north of Callisse.”
“Then the mission is a failure.” Storn sounded utterly defeated.
“You give up too easily,” declared the monk confidently. “Everything happens for a reason. We must take the path of least resistance.”
“Speak plainly,” Storn snapped, “I don't have the energy for puzzles.”
“The storm has blown us far away from our enemies—”
“And drowned seven of my men,” the captain interrupted.
“Two of whom were already mortally wounded,” the monk continued patiently, as though he were talking to a sullen child. “How many do you think the Grey Queen's men would have spared?”
“Glebes is a safe haven on the outskirts of Callistean territory. We would have landed there unseen.”
“Don't be so sure. The country is open and the Grey Queen's agents are everywhere. We would have been hard pressed to remain undiscovered. A band of this size moving west would be conspicuous, especially one so heavily armed.”
Memories of the storm returned to Limpet as blurred images and shadows punctuated by flashes of light. He let them play out in his mind, too exhausted to react or try to pick out details. He felt a sudden pang of panic as he was hit by the memory of Liss standing on deck in the middle of the storm. His eyes snapped open and he was relieved to see her face.
He lay on a shingle beach, his head in Liss' lap. His sister gazed blindly out to sea. Brother Envy sat nearby with Captain Storn. A ring of piled up pebbles surrounded a fire. The sun was low in a blue sky patched with white clouds and a soft, chilly breeze made the flames dance back and forth. They were in a small bay, the beach curved around on either side. Limpet slowly sat up and looked around. Surrounding them was dense forest. He gathered from the conversation between the monk and the captain that the surviving members of their motley fellowship had been sent to scout the surrounding area, with the suspicious Storn giving his men instructions not to allow the artist and his muse out of their sight.
“Where are we then?” continued Captain Storn. “What are our options?”
“This is wild country,” replied Brother Envy, “far to the north of so-called civilisation. This forest stretches far to the east, and our only option is to travel through it. There is no way our enemies will find us here. The forest will provide food and shelter and we can travel undetected. We must stay close together though. There are many dangerous wild animals and the tribes that dwell here can be hostile to strangers, as well as to each other. I suggest we camp here tonight and set off in the morning.”
“What of the stowaways?” Captain Storn looked at Limpet and Liss with a mixture of fear and suspicion.
Brother Envy turned and looked straight into Limpet's eyes. The monk's easy nature seemed to vanish for an instant and his gaze held Limpet in a grip as firm as any fist. Limpet suddenly remembered seeing Brother Envy standing on deck during the storm. His expression had been the same.
“Their paths have joined ours, whether by design or by chance,” said the monk. “Their destiny lies hand in hand with ours.”
15.
“Give me the fleet!” yelled Dusek, slamming his hands, palm-down, on Tamburlin’s writing desk. “You must give me those ships, now, before the chance is lost!”
Tamburlin stared coldly at the general’s hands. “I may be old,” he said quietly, “but I am still the Chief Father, and this is still my house. Lower your voice, sir, and step back.”
Dusek ground his teeth. This was no time to observe common courtesies, which was why he had barged his way into Tamburlin’s house, hammering on the front door with his iron-tipped cane and fighting a path through the outraged mob of servants who tried to eject him.
Despite his high status, Tamburlin preferred to live modestly. His house was solid rather than grand, with a slate roof and no more than two storeys. It wasn’t hard for Dusek, sweeping down the stone-flagged corridors, to find the old man’s scriptorium, hidden behind a thick door of tough blackened oak.
The door was unlocked, and Dusek booted it open to find Tamburlin sitting at his desk with a blazing fire in the grate, his red nose firmly dipped into some dusty old tome. More ancient books and scrolls weighed down the shelves lining the walls, most of them in a terrible state of repair, their leather covers rotting and spines on the point of bursting.
Mustering his reserves of patience, Dusek lifted his hands from the desk and took a slow, deliberate step backwards. His feet sank almost a full inch into the thick bearskin rug. The rug still had the bear’s head attached, jaws gaping in a soundless snarl, glass eyes blazing at nothing.
“Now then,” sighed Tamburlin, resting his aged back against the felt lining of his severe, high-backed chair, “let’s start again.”
He waved a hand at someone behind Dusek. “It’s all right, Leon,” he said. “Put that thing down. I’ll call if I have need of you.”
Dusek was aware of the bulky man-servant, Leon, looming in the doorway with a loaded crossbow. The extra senses he had acquired during his years of blindness had not left him.
There was a dissatisfied grunt from Leon, and the door creaked shut. “The fleet,” said Dusek, striving to keep the urgency from his voice. “I beg you, my lord, let me have command of Hardway’s ships.”
Tamburlin frowned. “What for?” he demanded, massaging his bony knuckles, swollen with arthritis. “So you can lead them out on some hopeless sortie? We have three war-galleys, none of which have put to sea in years, five dromons and a host of smaller vessels, most of them fishing boats. What do you hope to accomplish with our pinprick of a fleet?”
From outside there came the distant thump of artillery, as the ballistae and catapults of the opposing fleets hurled missiles at each other. The pounding of the war machines was echoed by the noise of screams, horns, trumpets and the clatter of steel, drifting into the streets of Hardway on a strong north-west wind.
“Everyone in the city has gone to watch,” said Dusek. “The harbour walls are crammed with people. You should be there as well.”
Tamburlin gave a little cough before replying, and wiped his spectacles with a silken cloth. “My dear General,” he said, puffing on the tinted lenses, “even with these on, I can barely see from one end of this room to the other. There would be little point in me dragging my old bones down to the harbour to watch a battle several miles out to sea. I have sent men to observe and report back. You have yet to answer my question.”
Dusek studied Tamburlin closely. The Chief Father was strangely calm, considering the battle raging outside, and his voice had none of its usual tired, whining quality.
There was a scent in the room, quite apart from the smell of tobacco and wood smoke and old leather. A familiar scent, spicy and exotic, and carrying a hint of danger.
His gaze fell on a small oblong box on the edge of the desk, beside Tamburlin’s left hand. The black lid was closed, but Dusek could guess what was inside it. Shredded murka. A pinch of that stuff, smoked or snorted, would pour a little steel into the most timid of men, as well as rob him of sleep and appetite.