The Night of the Swarm

At the mercy deck I lit a lamp. There were cargo jacks down in the hold, where the sabotage would have to be done. But why make it easy for him? I started aft towards the Abandoned House, that loneliest part of the ship, where the youths and I hatched our doomed plans for mutiny. There was a jack here, in a crawlspace. But there were many crawlspaces, and they all looked the same. A man could get confused.

The halls were narrow and black. Arunis (Uskins) grew twitchy. ‘What are you doing, maggot? This is not the hold.’

‘The jack,’ I whispered. ‘Just ahead.’

‘What was that noise? Who is down here?’

‘There’s nobody here,’ I told him. ‘But look: that’s the one.’

Except that it wasn’t. In fact I wasn’t exactly sure what was behind the crawlspace door at our feet, but I was blary sure it wasn’t a cargo jack. I was stalling, of course. I’d remembered that this particular door was triple- bolted, and the bolts stiff and rusted. But now I was seized with fear for Marila. Helping to sink the Chathrand wouldn’t save her, but how could I let him maim the girl?

‘Open it!’ Arunuskins hissed. ‘Any tricks and that little whore will know pain beyond reason, I swear it.’

I set the lamp down and knelt. The first bolt slid free easily (I cursed inside) but the second put up a fight. My hands were shaking. Marila’s face, Marila’s tears-

‘Chadfallow guessed,’ said Arunuskins.

I started, twisting about, and he cuffed me on the cheek. I turned back to the bolt.

‘Mr Uskins died of nerves,’ said the voice behind me. ‘Despite the plague, he tried to refuse my services. But before I left the ship I persuaded him to keep my scarf, just in case. It was my voice in his ear, that scarf. It stoked his terror as the plague advanced, until he could think of nothing else. And then he let me in, and I took over the house.’

‘And his soul?’ I asked, shaking. ‘Where are you keeping it?’

‘Nowhere,’ said the voice. ‘That coward’s mind was of no use to me. I forced it out through the window, and let the breeze carry it away. You should thank me, Fiffengurt. You despised the man. Didn’t everyone?’

The second bolt slid free, and I moved on to the third. Slowly.

‘I too am dead,’ said the voice. ‘Dead to this world, that is. But when the Swarm has lain it waste I shall inherit the universe. Then I shall need no more puppets. I will never stoop so low again.’

I popped the third bolt. The door fell open — on a thoroughly empty crawlspace. I winced, expecting to feel him cuff me again. But instead I heard the sorcerer lurch violently away. I whirled. He was writhing, both hands at his neck. Behind him, holding tight to a garrotting wire, stood Sandor Ott.

‘Don’t do it!’ I howled. ‘He’ll kill Marila!’

‘Unluckily for him, I could not care less,’ said Ott. ‘Keep still, monster! I can drop your head on these boards with a twitch of the wrist.’

A ghastly wheeze escaped Arunuskins’ throat. His eyes were locked on me. ‘But Ott!’ I pleaded, ‘He’s put some some vile thing on Marila’s forehead, he’s torturing her-’

‘Shut up. And stand clear, unless you want to be soaked.’

The mage’s cheeks had hollowed out; his eyes were bulging like grapes. The wire had already drawn a little blood. A thin sound, like steam from a kettle, came from Uskin’s throat.

Ott grinned. ‘You have some comment on the precedings? In fact I think we’ve heard quite enough from you. But if you care to bargain for this stolen body, you may try. Let me spare you some effort: we know already that Macadra has taken the Nilstone.’

Arunuskins twitched violently. The wire bit deeper into his flesh.

‘Careful!’ said Ott. ‘Yes, we have that on good authority. Your old sparring partner learned it, dream-walking. I’m speaking of Felthrup of course. Macadra has taken the Nilstone, and slain Pathkendle’s gang. And she is halfway here.’

Once again Arunuskins jumped. His face contorted with pain.

‘Beyond that, have you anything of consequence to say?’ demanded Ott. ‘If so, just raise a finger.’

Arunuskins hesitated, beady eyes swivelling. Ott clicked his tongue. ‘I thought not,’ he said.

His arm jerked fiercely. The wire slashed, the flesh parted. I slipped in the blood as I shoved past Ott and the gushing corpse, blinded by my tears. Ott called after me casually, as if to say, Don’t bother. I flew to the upper decks, smashed into sailors, incoherent with grief-

Marila was standing on the lower gun deck, unharmed. ‘What is it?’ she cried. ‘Why are you bloody? Mr Fiffengurt, are you all right?’

I fell on my knees, hugged her, weeping like a child. All lies. They were so good at it, these spies and sorcerers. And I am hopeless and always will be. I couldn’t seem to release her. I felt her heartbeat, and I felt that wee babe kick.

Wednesday, 4 Fuinar 942.

We found Dr Chadfallow in Uskins’ cabin, under a shroud of flies. I have no heart to write of my friend just yet. Not a word more, or I shall be unable to continue.

Let me write instead of the scarf. Captain Rose soaked it in lamp oil, applied a torch, and held it out over the sea on the end of a boathook. A crowd gathered for the grim little ceremony: the ones who had outlived the sorcerer. No one said much. It felt good just to stand there. As the cloth burned, Thasha’s dogs whined and pricked up their ears, and Felthrup asked if we didn’t hear someone moaning, very far, very faint?

Now in bed I am thinking of Sandor Ott. Did he have a spy watching Uskins — or watching me? It hardly matters any more. What does matter is this: that whore’s bastard didn’t know that Arunis was lying. About Marila, that is. He simply didn’t care. He’d lost a few hands of poker against the mage before, and wasn’t going to lose this one. Come what may.

Later, in Rose’s cabin, he all but crowed. ‘I enjoyed spilling that blood. There was no reason to question Arunis further. He was dead, and you can’t threaten the dead: there’s a lesson every prince ought to learn. Nor can you bribe a man who wants nothing you possess. All we could hope for was to learn what the mage didn’t know.’

‘You lied to him,’ I said.

‘Of course. Felthrup does not know if Macadra has the Nilstone, or that she is chasing us. But now we know that Arunis hated both ideas. The two mages were not in league; or if they were, Arunis was only pretending, and planning to betray Macadra. In either case he is unlikely to have been guiding her towards the Chathrand.’

‘But why did he try to sink us?’ growled Sergeant Haddsimal, enraged. ‘We’ve got the Shaggat Ness on board! Didn’t he want that fiend delivered to his worshippers? Ain’t that the whole mucking idea? ’

‘Fool!’ snapped Lady Oggosk. ‘It was your idea. Which is to say Arqual’s. Which is to say Ott’s.’

‘It was the sorcerer’s wish as well, for a time,’ said Rose. ‘But we all know better now. The Shaggat was a tool. So was the war between Arqual and the Mzithrin. Even the Nilstone, ultimately, was a tool. The end was something blacker and more immense.’

‘And maybe Arunis found another means to that end,’ I said. ‘Maybe the Shaggat just ain’t necessary no longer. But sinking the Chathrand is.’

‘Or prudent, at the least,’ said Ott. ‘But why prudent, I ask you? What can we do with this ship that worries him? Nothing that a thousand other ships cannot do — except cross the Ruling Sea. In the North that makes the Chathrand unique. And even here such ships are exceedingly few.’

‘That is so,’ said the captain. ‘The Behemoth that chased us was vast, but any tarboy could tell you it wasn’t seaworthy. The waves on the Nelluroq would have sunk it in a matter of hours. Macadra’s ship is rumoured to be a Segral like the Chathrand, but the prince made it clear that she was just one of a handful of such vessels left afloat.’

‘And only one of them is making for the North,’ added Ott. ‘That is what distinguished us, gentlemen. There was certainly a time when Arunis wished us to take the Nilstone to Gurishal. But now, in death, he has learned something that makes him fear what once he craved.’