looked down into the sea of mist, but his quarry was long gone.
His hands were quivering uncontrollably. He held one up before him and stared as it shook.
Seven
The eastern edge of the Hookhollows was full of hiding places. Secret valleys, sheltered ledges. There were folds in the crumpled landscape big enough to conceal a small fleet of aircraft. Freebooters treasured these bolt holes, and when they found a good one they guarded its location jealously.
Nightfall found the Ketty Jay and her outflyers in one of Frey’s favourite spots, a long tunnel-like cave he usually employed when he was running from something bigger than he was. It was wider than it was high, a slot in the plateau wall that ran far back into the mountainside. A tight fit for a craft the size of the Ketty Jay, but Frey had brought them in without a scratch. Now the Ketty Jay hunkered in the dark, its dim underbelly lights reflected by the shallow stream that ran along the floor of the cave. There was no sound but for a rhythmic dripping and the relentless chuckle of the water.
Inside the Ketty Jay, things were not so calm.
‘What in the name of the Allsoul’s veiny bollocks were you aiming at, you shit-wit?’ Pinn demanded of his captain, who punched him in response.
Slag, the Ketty Jay’s cat, watched the ensuing scuffle with feline disinterest from his vantage point atop a cabinet. The whole crew had gathered in the mess, crowding into one small room, and the comical jostle to separate Pinn and Frey involved a lot of bashing into things and knocking chairs over. The mess was a cheerless place, comprising a fixed central table, a set of metal cabinets for utensils and a compact stove, where Slag warmed himself when Silo chased him out of the engine room.
Slag was an ancient warrior, a grizzled slab of muscle held together by scar tissue and a hostile disposition. Frey had brought him on board as a kitten the day after he took ownership of the Ketty Jay, fourteen years ago. Slag had never known anything beyond the Ketty Jay, and never been tempted to find out. His life’s purpose was here, as the nemesis of the monstrous rats that bred in the air ducts and pipeways. For more than a decade the battle had been fought, generations of sharp-toothed rodents versus their indestructible antagonist. He’d seen off the best of them - their generals, their leaders - and hunted their mothers until they were near-extinct. But they always came back, and Slag was always waiting for them.
‘Will you two stop acting like a pair of idiots?’ Jez cried, as Malvery and Silo pulled Pinn from their captain. Pinn, red-faced with anger, assured Malvery he was calm so the doctor would release him, then made the obligatory second lunge at Frey. Malvery was ready for it, and punched him hard in the stomach, knocking the wind out of him.
‘What’d you do that for?’ Pinn rasped weakly, wide-eyed with the injustice of it all.
‘Fun,’ replied Malvery, with a broad grin. ‘Now calm down before I club your stupid block off. You ain’t helping.’
Frey shook Silo off with a baleful glare and dusted himself down. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘Now we’ve got that out of the way, can I say something, nice and slow so everyone gets it? It - wasn’t - my - fault!
‘You did blow up the freighter, though,’ Crake pointed out.
‘If you knew anything about aircraft you’d know they always put the prothane tanks as deep inside as possible, well armoured. Otherwise people like us might be able to hit them and blow the whole thing to smithereens.’
‘The way you did,’ Crake persisted, out of malice. He hadn’t forgotten Frey’s behaviour when Lawsen Macarde had a gun to his head.
‘But I didn’t!’ Frey cried. ‘Machine guns couldn’t have penetrated deep enough to even get to the prothane tanks. Silo, tell them.’
