‘I don’t like first mates who babble,’ Shurq Elalle said, straightening once more. ‘Get the others out. The vessels alone will make us rich for a month or two.’ She resumed her walk to the cabin.
The corridor was empty, the cabin door broken open and hanging from one leather hinge. As she made her way towards it, she glanced into the side alcoves and saw the layered bunks of the crew-but all were unoccupied, although dishevelled as if subject to searching.
In the cabin itself, more signs of looting, while on the lloor was spreadeagled an Edur corpse. Hands and feet had been spiked into the floorboards, and someone had used a knife on him, methodically. The room stank of spilled wastes, and the expression frozen on the face was a twisted, a^’ony-racked mask, the eyes staring out as if witness to a shattered faith, a terrible revelation at the moment of death.
She heard Skorgen come up behind her, heard his low curse upon seeing the body. ‘Tortured ‘im,’ he said. ‘ Tortured the captain. This one was Merude, damn near an Elder. Errant save us, Captain, we’re gonna get blamed if anyone else comes on this afore it all sinks. Torture. I don’t get that-’
It’s simple,’ she said. ‘They wanted information.’
‘About what?’
Shurq Elalle looked round. ‘They took the log, the charts. Now, maybe pirates might do that, if they were strangers to Lether, but then they’d have no need to torture this poor bastard. Besides, they’d have taken the loot. No, whoever did this wanted more information-not what you could get from charts. And they didn’t give a damn about booty.’
‘Nasty bastards, whoever they were.’
She thought back to that amphora and its grisly contents. Then turned away. ‘Maybe they had a good reason. Hole the hull, Skorgen. We’ll wait around, though. Blackwood doesn’t like sinking. We may have to fire it.’
‘A pyre to bring ‘em all in, Captain.’
‘I am aware of the risks. Get on with it.’
Back on the deck, Shurq Elalle made her way to the forecastle, where she stood scanning the horizon while Skorgen and the crew began their demolition.
Strangers on the sea.
Who are no friends of the Tiste Edur. Even so, I think I’d rather not meet them. She turned to face the mid deck. ‘Skorgen! When we’re done here, we take to the sweeps. Back to the coast.’
His scarred brows rose. ‘Letheras?’
‘Why not? We can sell off and load up on crew.’
The battered man grinned.
Back to Letheras, aye. And fast.
Chapter Four
The mutiny came that fell dawn, when through the heavy mists that had plagued us for ten days we looked to the east, and there saw, rising vast and innumerable on the cloud-bound horizon, dragons. Too large to comprehend, their heads above the sun, their folded wings reaching down to cast a shadow that could swallow all of Drene. This was too much, too frightening even for the more seasoned soldiers in our troop, for their dark eyes were upon us, an alien regard that drained the blood from our hearts, the very iron from our swords and spears.
To walk into those shadows would quail a champion of the First Empire. We could not face such challenge, and though I voiced my fury, my dismay, it was naught but the bolster demanded of any expedition’s leader, and indeed, I had no intention of demanding of my party the courage that I myself lacked. Bolster is a dangerous thing, lest one succeeds where one would not. And so I ceased rhy umbrage, perhaps too easily yet none made account of that, relieved as they all were as we broke camp, packed our mules, and turned to the west.
– Four Days Into the Wildlands Thrydis Addanict
Banishment killed most victims, when the world beyond was harsh, when survival could not be purchased without the coin of co-operation. No graver punishment was possible among the tribal peoples, whether Awl or D’rhasilhani or Keryn. Yet it was the clan structure itself that imposed deadly intransigence, and with it a corresponding devastation when one was cast out, alone, bereft of all that gave meaning to life. Victims crumpled into themselves, abandoning all skills that could serve to sustain them; they withered, then died.
The Letherii, and their vast cities, the tumult of countless faces, were-beyond the chains of Indebtedness- almost indifferent to banishing. True, such people were not immune to the notion of spiritual punishment-they existed in families, after all, a universal characteristic of humans-yet such scars as were delivered from estrangement were survivable. Another village, another city-the struggle of beginning again could be managed and indeed, for some, beginning anew became an addiction in its own right. A way of absolving responsibility.
Redmask, his life that of the Awl, unsullied for generations, had come to believe that the nature of the Letherii-his most hated enemy-had nevertheless stained his spirit. Banishment had not proved a death sentence. Banishment had proved a gift, for with it he discovered freedom. The very lure that drew so many young warriors into the Lether Empire, where anonymity proved both bane and emancipation.
Driven away, he had wandered far, with no thought of ever returning. He was not as he had once been, no longer the son of his father, yet what he had become was, even to himself, a mystery.
The sky overhead was unmarred by clouds, the new season finding its heat, and jackrabbits raced from one thicket of momentary cover to another ahead of him as he rode the Letherii horse on the herd trail on its northeasterly route. A small herd, he had noted, with few fly-swarmed birth-stains along the path’s outskirts, where rodara males would gather protectively until the newborn was able to find its legs. The clan guiding these beasts was probably small.
Redmask’s guardian K’Chain Che’Malle were nowhere to be seen, but that was not unusual. The huge reptiles had prodigious appetites. At this time of year, the wild bhederin that had wintered in pocket forests-a solitary, larger breed than those of the plains to the south-ventured out from cover in search of mates. Massing more than two Letherii oxen, the bulls were ferocious and belligerent and would charge anything that approached too close, barring a female of its own kind. Sag’Churok, the male K’ell Hunter, delighted in meeting that thundering charge- Redmask had seen its pleasure, revealed in the slow sinuous lashing Of the tail-as it stood in the bull’s path, iron blades lifted high. As fast as the bhederin was, the K’Chain Che’Malle was faster. Each time after slaying the beast, Sag’Churok would yield the carcass to Gunth Mach, until she’d eaten her fill.
Redmask rode on through the day, his pace leisurely to ruse the burden on the horse, and when the sun was descending towards the horizon, igniting distant storm clouds, he came within sight of the Awl encampment, situated on an ancient oxbow island between two dry eroded riverbeds. The herds were massed on the flanks of the valleys to either side and the sprawl of dome-shaped, sewn-hide huts huddled amidst the smoke of cookfires blankering the valley.
No outriders. No pickets. And far too large a camp for the size of the herds.
Redmask reined in on the ridge line. He studied the Bene below. Here and there, voices rose in ritual mourn- ing. Few children were visible moving about between the huts,
Alter some time, as he sat motionless on the high Letherii saddle, someone saw him. Sudden cries, scurrying motion in the growing shadows, then a half-dozen warriors set out at a trot towards him.
Behind them, the camp had already begun a panicked breaking, sparks flying as hearths were kicked and stamped out. Hide walls rippled on the huts.
Herd and dray dogs appeared, racing to join the approaching warriors.
The Awl warriors were young, he saw as they drew closer. Only a year or two past their death nights. Not a single veteran among them. Where were the Elders? The shouldermen?
Halting fifteen paces downslope, the six warriors began conferring in hissed undertones, then one faced the encampment and loosed a piercing cry. All activity stopped below.
Faces stared up at Redmask. Not a single warrior among them seemed bold enough to venture closer.
The dogs were less cowed by the presence of a lone warrior. Growling, hackles raised, they crept in a half- circle towards him. Then, catching an unexpected scent, the beasts suddenly shrank back, tails dipping, thin whines coming from their throats.
