piss on you all,’ snapped Frey, then stormed off towards the door. ‘If you’re not on the Ketty Jay in half an hour I’ll leave you here to freeze.’
Eleven
On reflection, Crake had spent rather a lot of time in taverns lately. As a man who had once prized study and discipline it made him feel vaguely decadent. He was used to drawing rooms and social clubs, garden parties and soirees. During his university days he’d frequented fashionably seedy dives, but they were usually full of similarly educated folk eager for a taste of the low life. His drinking binges had always been disguised as evenings of intelligent debate. There was no threat of that with the crew of the Ketty Jay.
Nowadays, he simply drank to forget.
He sat at the bar, two mugs of the foul local grog before him. It was late afternoon in Marklin’s Reach, and a sharp winter sun cut low across the town. Dazzling beams shone through the dirty windows and into the gloomy, half-empty tavern. Slowly writhing smoke formed hypnotic patterns, unfurling in the light.
Crake checked his pocket watch and scanned the room. His new friend was late. He wondered if he’d overdone things last night by buying all the drinks. Maybe he’d laid on the flattery a bit thick. Tried too hard.
He thought they’d got on well, all things considered. He thought he’d done a good job bridging the vast gulf in intellect. Still, Crake was never sure with these simple types. He suspected they had a certain intuition. They sensed he wasn’t one of them.
But Rogin had seemed to take to him. He’d been happy to chat with anyone, as long as they were buying the drinks. At the end of the night, they agreed to meet up for a quick mug of grog the next day, before he went on duty. ‘It’ll help me ease into my shift, so to speak,’ he’d said. Crake had brayed enthusiastically and promised to have a drink waiting.
He scratched at his beard. He’d considered shaving it off, since the Century Knights would be looking for a blond-bearded man. But the others who were chasing him were looking for somebody clean-shaven, which was why he’d grown it in the first place. He feared the Shacklemore Agency just as much as the Century Knights, and so, all things being even, he decided the beard suited him and kept it. He thought it made him look pleasingly rugged.
He checked his pocket watch again. Where was that oaf? After all the effort he’d spent following the man home, tracking him to his local haunt and plying him with booze, Crake would be sorely annoyed if he got stood up now.
He was in a sombre mood. Memories of the past and doubts about the future flocked up to meet him. Was he doing the right thing, staying with the Ketty Jay? Wouldn’t he be better off cutting them loose, making his own way? After all, he didn’t exactly owe Frey a huge debt of loyalty after their run-in with Macarde.
But Frey had promised him they’d get to a big city as soon as it was safe. There, Crake could get the supplies he needed to practise his daemonism. He’d allowed himself to be placated by that. He could wait a little longer.
The need to practise the Art was nagging at him. After the accident, he’d imagined he’d never be tempted by it again. But he’d abandoned his studies out of fear, and that was a cowardly thing. Since university, his every spare moment had been secretly devoted to daemonism. It was the only thing that set him apart from the herd of over-educated, moneyed idiots that had surrounded him all his life. He thought himself better than that. He disdained them. He’d been brave enough to look into the unknown, to reach towards the arcane. He could do things that powerful men would marvel at. Shortly before they hanged him.
But no matter the dangers, he couldn’t give it up. To return to the grey unknowing, the humdrum day-to-day, was unimaginable. He’d tasted grief and despair and the highest terror, he’d made the most terrible mistakes and he bore a shame that no man should have to bear; but he’d stared into the fires of forbidden knowledge, and though he might look away for a moment, his gaze would always be drawn back.
You can start small. Start with the easy procedures. See how you go.
