A dark recumbent form shifted to acknowledge them: Ash, lying on the sand on the other side of the fire, head resting on his pack. He grunted, forcing himself to sit up.
They had spent the day gathering driftwood into a pile on the sand of the little cove – or at least Aleas and Serese had, for the two Rshun were barely fit to stand. With care, Aleas now lay Nico's body on top of the pile, a few sea-smoothed logs tumbling loose. Ash limped over as he did so. Clumsily, the old farlander began to yank off the sacking.
'I think perhaps it's better left alone,' suggested Aleas, placing a hand on Ash's shoulder. Ash shrugged free of his grasp. He only stopped when the body was uncovered and he could gaze down on it by the light of the fire.
The old man drew in a sharp breath. He swayed for a moment, enough for Aleas to steady him.
Gently, Ash's fingers dabbed at the blackened flesh. They brushed against the end of the crossbow bolt buried in the boy's chest. Ash did not move for many minutes.
Baracha stumbled over with a burning length of wood. Without ceremony he stuffed it into the inner depths of the pile, twisted it as though stoking an already lit fire. The pyre began to smoke. They stepped back from it and after a time caught sight of the first sparkle of flame.
Baracha picked up a handful of sand. He cast it on to the newborn flames, reciting words beneath his breath. Aleas comforted Serese; both cried freely now, for the first time that day. The flames crackled higher, twisting through the crisscrossing of logs to take hold of the body on top. Colours danced amongst them: vivid blues and yellows and greens from the sea minerals that caked the wood. Fat spat from the pyre. A smell of burning meat came with a shift of the breeze.
After a while the pyre collapsed into itself, consuming Nico.
In the distance, far out to sea, the sun's first light leaked into the predawn sky. Shadows shafted across the horizon as the castings of unseen clouds.
Ash recited something in the farlander tongue. He repeated it in Trade, perhaps for the benefit of his young apprentice.
His eyes, though in shadow, were alive with two pinpricks of flame. He declaimed: 'Even though this world is but a dewdrop… even so… even so.'
*
Ash had instructed them to obtain a clay jar wrapped in leather to hold the ashes. Wearily, but with much presence, he raked the grey dust until it lay in a flat bed across the scorched sand. He paused. For a moment, he watched particles of dust playing in the remnants of heat.
For his mother, he thought, as he scooped ashes into the jar with the aid of the stick. Portions of bone lay scattered amongst it, and he scooped the smallest pieces up too. Once it was full, he stoppered it, and lay it carefully in his canvas pack.
He had a smaller jar too, a clay vial really, the length and thickness of a thumb, to which was fixed a loop of leather twine. Into this he scraped some more of the burnt remains and plugged it with its wooden stopper. He slung it around his neck, so that it hung there against his chest like a seal. It felt warm against his skin.
In standing up, a sudden pain flashed through his skull. Ash swayed. Someone was talking to him, though he could not see the owner of the voice. He teetered backwards, fell.
Sprawled on the ground, barely breathing, hands tugged at him. A voice asked if he was all right, could he hear them? The pain stabbed again, deeper than ever. Ash gritted his teeth, cried out in the harsh farlander tongue. And then unconsciousness took him.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Consequences There was no way out.
All the ports had been closed following the death of Matriarch Sasheen's only son. Checkpoints were set up on the city's main thoroughfares and in many of the lesser side streets. The city guards compared the faces of passersby with sketches they held in their hands. People gossiped that Rshun had come to the city – one of them a farlander – and killed the boy priest, and were still here amongst them. Some said it had been an act of revenge for the young Rshun burned to death in the Shay Madi. Patrols roamed everywhere. At night a curfew was enforced under penalty of execution. Squads of soldiers, led by grim-faced Regulators, crashed into hostalio rooms, or illegally open tavernas, brothels, private apartments, demanding answers by force, dragging away suspects, searching always for someone.
As though that wasn't enough to disturb the regular life of the city, speculation on the imminent military campaign began to pass freely amongst its populace. Soldiers had been flooding into the city for weeks now. Sprawling encampments had grown up on the northern and western edges of the city, along with shanty towns of hangers-on – pedlars, prostitutes, craftsmen, vagabonds – all massed on their outskirts. In the First Harbour a vast fleet was gathering. It was larger than anything seen in living memory: men-of-war in the main, but sloops and transports too.
Some said these were going to Lagos to replace the Sixth Army there, but they were considered fools and quickly shouted down as such – for all knew that only a token garrison would be needed on the island now. Lagos was a name spoken only in a hush these days. In the aftermath of its failed insurrection, it had been laid to waste at the personal command of Matriarch Sashseen herself. The stories that came from the island told of desolate killing fields without sign of life, dotted occasionally by mountainous funeral pyres where once towns and villages had stood – for every man, woman and child of the island had been put to the torch. New settlers from the Empire's crowded cities were being offered parcels of land there. They were emigrating in their thousands.
Wiser heads considered Cheem a more likely target for the forthcoming invasion. Perhaps the Matriarch had finally grown tired of her trading fleets falling prey to the inhabitants' piracy. A less likely option was the Free Ports, though that would be a risky undertaking, since their navy remained the finest in the world; it must be, for even outnumbered, it had held off the predations of the Empire for over ten years.
Perhaps, then, they were to attack Zanzahar, offered the obligatory jokers in such conversations. They joked about that because it would be the greatest folly of all.
Q'os was a city astir then with uncertainty and speculation, and while it may have been safe enough for those who claimed it as their home, its streets were treacherous for those who could not. Baracha, with his apprentice and daughter, and a still unconscious Ash, knew well that they were being hunted by their enemies. It was vital that they left, and sooner rather than later.
But the ports were closed.
With no other options available, they sought out a place to hide. They planned to wait for shipping traffic to begin again, a matter of weeks at most they believed. After all, the city relied on sea commerce for its survival. It couldn't choke its trade for long.
They found a deserted warehouse not far from the cove where they had cremated Nico's body. The wooden structure had been partly cremated itself in an old fire that had destroyed most of its north and west sides. But the parts of it to seaward were still roofed and, in amongst the blackened ruins, they found some corner offices that remained relatively intact.
It was there they holed up and waited, and looked after Ash as best they could.
The old Rshun was lost in some form of unconsciousness. His breathing was shallow but regular and he uttered no sounds, and did not ever move. Occasionally his eyelids flickered as though he dreamed.
Most days, Baracha sat within the warehouse staring through one of its gaping windows out to sea. When not doing this, he paced about the confined space of the inner office, swearing under his breath at the loss of his hand. Whatever pain he suffered, immense as it must have been, he covered up in his own Alhazii way. The stump, at least, appeared to be healing well.
He rarely even looked at Ash, lying lifeless and gaunt on his pallet. Instead he seemed to entirely avoid the old man in his present state of weakness, seemed somehow appalled by it.
'I hope I never fall ill when it's only you to look after me,' admonished Serese one morning, noticing his lack of concern, the old Rshun lying on one side of the room, Baracha sitting by the window on the other. She was dripping water into Ash's mouth from a sodden rag, so she did not see her father turn and regard her with eyes hooded by a frown.
