‘There are no clans any more,’ said Rose. ‘It’s a theocracy. The nobles live like sultans, make the laws, talk to the Gods. The lower-downs just follow. And the lowest of the low-’ Rose shook his head. ‘Talag said he saw a man dangling from a noose by the trailside. He asked what the man’s offence was, and they said, “He was caught uphill from his betters.” Just
‘Gods of Death!’ said Haddismal.
Sandor Ott gazed out at the mouth of the bay. ‘Those two hundred, on the rock?’
‘All that remain alive,’ said Rose. ‘The islanders were prepared to grant Talag a higher status, because of the magic of the swallows. But not his people — they were unclean. Any outsider, ixchel or otherwise, is unclean. And when they tried to herd them into work sheds, under lock and key-’
‘Talag exploded.’
‘Of course he did,’ said Rose. ‘That last mobilisation was a rescue party. And a great defeat. Talag’s people are the better fighters, but there are tens of thousands of crawlies on that island. They rule every inch of her. That rock out there was the only place they could land.’
Ott gazed at him, unblinking. ‘Besides this ship, you mean. That is what he asked you for, wasn’t it? Safe return to the
‘That was his request,’ said Rose. ‘He doubts the swallows are strong enough to bear them to another island. Even the nearest.’
‘And in exchange, he told you how we might escape this Godsforsaken bay?’
Rose hesitated, and the other men saw his face darken. ‘Nothing of the kind,’ he said at last. ‘That was only a ploy to make me hear him out.’
He drew a deep, brooding breath, then turned and started lumbering towards the stern.
‘But Captain, what did you tell him?’ asked Haddismal.
Rose paused, looking back over his shoulder. ‘What did I tell him? That he had best hope the birds are stronger than they appear. Or else wait for a storm to wash them from that perch and end their suffering. That I would rot in the Pits before I’d welcome his ship-lice back aboard.’
Haddismal was speechless, caught between approval and horror. Sandor Ott too held very still, clutching the folded telescope and studying the captain minutely.
Once in his cabin Rose told the steward to pour him a generous snifter of brandy, then moved to his desk and began to write a letter. When he had his drink he set the steward to polishing the floor. But minutes later he glanced from the page and barked:
‘What are you doing there? Off your knees, and bring me that lamp.’
The steward lowered the walrus-oil lamp from its chain and brought it to the captain. Rose blew on the letter, folded it twice. From a desk drawer he took a stick of sealing wax and a spoon. As he melted a bit of wax above the hot lamp he gazed at the other severely.
‘How old are you?’ he said.
‘Forty-nine or fifty, sir. My parents weren’t much for dates.’
‘You are to leave the Merchant Service and learn a trade in Etherhorde. If you are not killed, that is. If you are killed, I submit that you must practise discretion in the afterlife. Tell no one you were a servant. You are well- spoken, and your table manners are fine. No one will guess your humble origins.’
‘Oppo, Captain,’ said the steward. He had been years in Rose’s service and was incapable of surprise.
‘This letter is for the duchess,’ said Rose. ‘Deliver it when she rises tomorrow. Until then keep it with you, safe and out of sight. Now go and eat.’
‘But. . your own dinner, sir-’
‘Go, I say. Come back at sunrise with my tea.’
Alone, Rose sat with both hands flat upon his desk. Not a sound, not a scurry. The ghosts had all stayed outside his door. He nodded to himself: their reticence was a sign, a threshold passed. Now there was nothing to do but wait.
He was still there at midnight, wide awake, the brandy untouched. He seemed gifted tonight with exceptional hearing. All the sounds of his vessel, the pounding, stumbling, swearing human machine, reached his mind like an incantation known by heart. At two bells past midnight there was a scratch at his door. He stood and walked to the door and opened it, and the red cat with the maimed tail looked up at him, questioning.
‘Come in, then,’ he said, and the animal did.
For the last hour he sat with Sniraga on the desk before him, purring. Then he passed a hand over his face (dry, flat, pitted, a face like an abandoned pier), and blew out the lamp. Now the room was lit by the stars alone, filtering dimly through windows and skylight. He stood up and took the cat to his bedchamber, shutting it within. Then he walked to the gallery windows.
The ship was as peaceful as it would ever be. Rose unlatched the tall starboard window, pushed it wide, then crossed the chamber to port and did the same. The chill night breeze slithered into the cabin, bringing with it the slosh of the bay against the hull, the creak of the mizzenmast stays.
Very soon they arrived. Soundless, as Talag had sworn they would be. A black river of birds, flying in at one window and out by the opposite. They never landed, never slowed. But as they passed, the crawlies dropped from their claws, landing on soft cat-feet, running for cover even as they touched the ground.
Of course, they had nowhere much to go. His cabin had no cracks or crevices, no bolt-holes by which they could escape. Quite a few were too injured to run in any event. The crawlies formed a circle in the middle of his rug, backs to the core — unarmed, pitifully vulnerable. The strongest lifted the maimed onto their backs.
Lord Talag was the last to arrive. From the windowsill, he made his people count off, their mouths opening and closing as they silently shouted. Then Talag flew to the rug and turned to face Rose. He made a curious salute, raising the sword he no longer had, then sank to his knees and pressed his forehead to the ground.
Rose scowled. He had not thought Talag capable of such a gesture, or that he, Rose, could ever find it sincere. It was sincere. ‘Get up,’ he hissed under his breath. ‘There’s your conveyance. Will you fit?’
He pointed to a battered sea chest by the wall. Talag nodded. ‘We will. There are breathing-holes, I trust?’
‘You’ll see them.’ Rose walked to the chest and tipped it on its side, holding the lid ajar. ‘Hurry, damn you,’ he whispered.
The crawlies flowed like ants into the chest. When they were all inside Rose slowly tipped the chest upright and closed the lid. Then he tested the weight.
Two hundred crawlies — and what, two pounds apiece? He flexed his hands, his shoulders. He walked to his cabin door and listened: no one about. He propped open the door and walked back to the chest, glaring at it like an enemy. In his youth he had carried a five-hundred-pound whisky barrel up a gangway on a dare. But his youth was a memory, a visitor who had come with dreams and promises. A visitor whose face he could no longer recall.
He lifted the chest. The crawlies shifted. He moved to the door, stagger-stepping like a draft animal. He pictured himself collapsing, spilling crawlies down the ladderway, found by Turachs with the stark evidence of madness and treason in his arms.
How he managed the descent he could not begin to say. Did the ghosts aid him; could they lend him bodily strength? Or was it merely his conviction that a path once chosen must be walked to the end?
On the threshold of the orlop deck he braced the chest against the wall and slid it to the ground. Pain like a knife in his back. Torn muscle. He raised the lid. Lord Talag, and the bleeding remnants of Ixphir House, looked up without a sound.
‘Run, you little bastards,’ he gasped. ‘Run for your lives, and don’t let me ever see your faces again.’
They vanished across the orlop, quiet as a sigh of wind through reeds. Not one of them failed to bow before they fled. Why had he done it? How had Talag compelled him to care?
Too late for such questions. Rose lifted the chest (so nearly weightless, now) and continued down to the mercy deck. His work not done. The greater test was waiting somewhere in the dark.
‘Kurlstaff,’ he whispered. ‘Come along, you old pervert. Spengler. Levirac, Maulle. Why are you hiding, tonight of all mucking nights? Come out, I say. I need your witness.’
They came, stumping along in the darkness. They were reluctant, gazing at him with uneasy respect. Only Kurlstaff, with his lipstick and his bangles and his battleaxe, dared to speak. ‘You’re the maddest of us all,’ he
