The corporal grunted. 'That's a soldier's life for you. Too thick to know the difference…'
'Too drunk to care,' the crossbowman finished.
'You got it, Stormy.' Gesler's heavy eyes slid up to Felisin. 'Play your games elsewhere, lass. No offence, but we've done enough rutting to know when an offer's got hidden chains. You can't buy what ain't for sale, anyhow.'
'I told you about Heboric,' she said. 'I didn't have to.'
'Hear that, Stormy? The girl took pity on us.'
'He'll betray you. He despises you already.'
The boy named Truth sat up at that.
'Go away,' Gesler told her. 'My men are trying to get some sleep.'
Felisin met Truth's startling blue eyes, saw nothing but innocence in them. She threw him a pouty kiss, smiled as colour flooded his face. 'Careful or those ears will catch fire,' she said.
'Hood's breath,' Stormy muttered. 'Go on, lad. She wants it that bad. Give her a taste.'
'Not a chance,' she said, turning away. 'I only sleep with men.'
'Fools, you mean,' Gesler corrected, an edge to his tone.
Felisin strode down to the beach, walked out until the waves lapped her knees. She studied the Ripath. Flashburns painted the hull black in thick, random streaks. The front railing of the forecastle glittered as if the wood had been studded with a hail of quartz. The lines were frayed, unravelled where knives had cut.
The sun's reflection off the water was blinding. She closed her eyes, let her mind fall away until there was nothing but the feel of the warm water slipping around her legs. She felt an exhaustion that was beyond physical. She could not stop herself lashing out, and every face she made turn her way became a mirror. There has to be a way to reflect something other than hate and contempt.
No, not a way.
A reason.
'My hope is that the Otataral entwined in you is enough to drive away that insane mage,' Kulp said. 'Otherwise, we're in for a rough voyage.' Truth had lit a lantern and now crouched in the triangular forecastle, waiting for them to set out for the reef. The yellow light caught reflective glimmers in Heboric's tattoos as he grimaced in response to Kulp's words.
Gesler sat leaning over the steering oar. Like everyone else, he was waiting for the ex-priest. Waiting for a small measure of hope.
The sorcerous storm raged beyond the reef, its manic flashes lighting up the night, revealing tumbling black clouds over a frothing sea.
'If you say so,' Heboric eventually said.
'Not good enough—'
'Best I can do,' the old man snapped. He raised one stump, jabbed it in front of Kulp. 'You see what I can't even feel, Mage!'
The mage swung to Gesler. 'Well, Corporal?'
The soldier shrugged. 'We got a choice?'
'It's not that simple,' Kulp said, fighting to stay calm. 'With Heboric aboard I don't even know if I can open my warren—he's got taints to him I wouldn't want spreading. Without my warren I can't deflect that sorcery. Meaning—'
'We get roasted crisp,' Gesler said, nodding. 'Look alive up there, Truth. We're heading out!'
'Yours is a misplaced faith, Corporal,' Heboric said.
'Knew you'd say that. Now everyone stay low—me and Stormy and the lad got work to do.'
Although he sat within arm's reach of the tattooed old man, Kulp could sense his own warren. It felt ready—almost eager—for release. The mage was frightened. Meanas was a remote warren, and every fellow practitioner Kulp had met characterized it the same way: cool, detached, amused intelligence. The game of illusions was played with light, dark, texture and shadows, crowing victory when it succeeded in deceiving an eye, but even that triumph felt emotionless, the satisfaction clinical. Accessing the warren always had the feel of interrupting a power busy with other things. As if shaping a small fraction of that power was a distraction barely worth acknowledging.
Kulp did not trust his warren's uncharacteristic attentiveness. It wanted to join the game. He knew he was falling into the trap of thinking of Meanas as an entity, a faceless god, where access was worship, success a reward of faith. Warrens were not like that. A mage was not a priest and magic was not divine intervention. Sorcery could be the ladder to Ascendancy—a means to an end, but there was no point to worshipping the means.
Stormy had rigged a small, square sail, enough to give control but not so large that it would risk the weakened mast. The Ripath slipped forward in front of a mild shore breeze. Truth lay on the bowsprit, scanning the breakers ahead. The cut they'd come in through was proving hard to find. Gesler barked out commands and swung the craft to run parallel to the reef.
Kulp glanced at Heboric. The ex-priest sat with his left shoulder against the mast, squinting out into the darkness. The mage was desperate to open his warren—to look upon the old man's ghost-hands, to gauge the serpent of Otataral—but he held back, suspicious of his own curiosity.
'There!' Truth shouted, pointing.
'I see it!' Gesler bellowed. 'Move it, Stormy!'
The Ripath swung around, bow wheeling to face the breakers… and a gap that Kulp could barely make out. The wind picked up, the sail stretching taut.
Beyond it, the billowing clouds twisted, creating an inverted funnel. Lightning leapt up from the waves to frame it. The Ripath slipped through the reef and plunged directly into the spinning vortex.
Kulp did not even have time to scream. His warren opened, locking in instant battle with a power demonic in its fury. Spears of water slanted down from overhead, shredding the sail in moments. They struck the deck like quarrels, punching through the planks. Kulp saw one shaft pierce Stormy's thigh, pinning him shrieking to the deck. Others shattered against Heboric's hunched back—he had thrown himself over the girl, Felisin, shielding her as the spears rained down. His tattoos raged with fire the colour of mud-smeared gold.
Baudin had hurled himself onto the forecastle, one arm reaching down and out of sight. Truth was nowhere to be seen.
The spears vanished. Pitching as if on a single surging wave, the Ripath lurched forward, stern lifting. Overhead the sky raged, bruised and flushing with blooms of power. Kulp's eyes widened as he stared up—a tiny figure rode the storm above, limbs flailing, the fragments of a cloak whipping about like a tattered wing. Sorcery flung the figure around as if it was no more than a straw-stuffed doll. Blood exploded outward as a coruscating wave engulfed the hapless creature. When the wave swept past, the figure rolled and tumbled after it, webs of blood spreading out like a fisherman's net behind it.
Then it was falling.
Gesler pushed past Kulp. Take the oar!' he yelled above the roaring wind.
The mage scrambled aft. Steer? Steer through what? He was certain it was not water carrying them. They'd plunged into a madman's warren. Closing his hands around the oar's handle, he felt his own warren flow down into the wood and take hold. The pitching steadied. Kulp grunted. There was no time to wonder—being appalled demanded all his attention.
Gesler clambered forward, grasping Baudin's ankles just as the big man started to slip over the bow. Pulling him back revealed that Baudin held, with one hand, onto Truth, his fingers wrapped in the lad's belt. Blood streamed from that hand, and Baudin's face was white with pain.
The unseen wave beneath them slumped. The Ripath charged forward into dead calm. Silence.
Heboric scrambled to Stormy. The marine lay motionless on the deck, blood gushing in horrifying amounts from his punctured thigh. The flow lost its fierceness even as Kulp watched.
Heboric did the only thing he could, or so Kulp would remember it in retrospect. At that instant, however, the mage screamed a warning—but too late—as Heboric plunged a ghostly, loam-smeared hand directly into the wound.
Stormy spasmed, giving a bark of pain. The tattoos flowed out from Heboric's wrist to spread a glowing pattern on the soldier's thigh.
When the old man pulled his arm away, the wound closed, the tattoos knitting together like sutures. Heboric scrambled back, eyes wide wit
h shock.
A hissing sigh escaped Stormy's grimacing lips. Trembling and bone white, he sat up. Kulp blinked. He'd seen something more than just healing pass from Heboric's arm into Stormy. Whatever it had been, it was virulent and tinged with madness. Worry about it later—the man's alive, isn't he? The mage's attention swung to where Gesler and Baudin knelt on either side of a prone, motionless Truth. The corporal had turned the lad onto his stomach and was rhythmically pushing down with both hands to expel the water that filled Truth's lungs. After a moment the boy coughed.
The Ripath sat heavily, listing to one side. The uniform grey sky hung close and faintly luminous over them. They were becalmed, the only sound coming from water pouring into the hold somewhere below.
Gesler helped Truth sit up. Baudin, still on his knees, clutched his right hand in his lap. Kulp saw that all the fingers had been pulled from their joints, skin split and streaming blood.
'Heboric,' the mage whispered.
The old man's head jerked around. He was drawing breath in rapid gasps.
'Tend to Baudin with that healing touch,' Kulp said quietly. We won't think about what comes with it. 'If you can…'
'No,' Baudin growled, studying Heboric intently. 'Don't want your god's touch on me, old man.'
'Those joints need resetting,' Kulp said.
'Gesler can do it. The hard way.'
The corporal looked up, then nodded and moved over.
Felisin spoke. 'Where are we?'
Kulp shrugged. 'Not sure. But we're sinking.'
'She's stove through,' Stormy said. 'Four, five places.' The soldier stared down at the tattoos covering his thigh and frowned.
The young woman struggled to her feet, one hand reaching out to grip the charred mast. The slant of the deck had sharpened.
'She might capsize,' Stormy said, still studying the tattoos. 'Any time now.'
Kulp's warren subsided. He slumped in sudden exhaustion. He wouldn't last long in the water, he knew.
Baudin grunted as Gesler set the first finger of his right hand. The corporal spoke as he moved on to the next one. 'Rig up some casks, Stormy. If you can walk, that is. Divide up the fresh water among them. Felisin, get the emergency food stores—that's the chest on this side of the forecastle. Take the whole thing.' Baudin moaned as he set the next finger. 'Truth, you up to getting some bandages?'
His dry heaves having stopped a few moments earlier, the boy slowly pushed himself to his hands and knees and starting crawling aft.
Kulp glanced at Felisin. She had not moved in response to Gesler's orders and seemed to be debating a few choice words. 'Come on, lass,' Kulp said, rising, 'I'll give you a hand.'
Stormy's fears of capsizing were not realized: as the Ripath settled, the cant slowly diminished. Water had filled the hold and now lapped the hatch, thick as soup and pale blue in colour.
'Hood's breath,' Stormy said, 'we're sinking in goat's milk.'
'With a seasoning of brine,' Gesler added. He finished working on Baudin's hand. Truth joined them with a medic's kit.
'We won't have to go far,' Felisin said, her gaze off to starboard. Joining her, Kulp saw what she was looking at. A large ship sat motionless in the thick water less then fifty arm-spans away. It had twin banks of oars, hanging down listlessly. A single rudder was visible. There were three masts, the main and fore both rigged with tattered square sails, the mizzen mast with the shredded remnants of a lateen. There was no sign of life.
Baudin, his right hand now a blunt bandaged lump, joined them, the corporal a step behind. The one-eared man grunted. 'That's a Quon dromon. Pre-Imperial.'
'You know your ships,' Gesler said, giving the man a sharp glance.
Baudin shrugged. 'I worked in a prison gang, scuttling the republic's fleet in Quon Harbour. That was twenty years ago—Dassem had been using them to train his Marines—'
'I know,' Gesler said, his tone revealing first-hand knowledge.
'Young to be in a prison gang,' Stormy said from where he squatted amidst the water casks. 'You were what, ten? Fifteen?'
'Something like that,' Baudin said. 'And what got me there ain't your business, soldier.'
There was a long silence, then Gesler shook himself. 'You done, Stormy?'
'Aye, all rigged up.'
'All right, let's swim over before our lady makes her rush to the bottom. No gain if we end up all getting pulled down in her wake.'
'I ain't happy," Stormy said as he eyed the dromon. 'That's right out of a tavern tale told at midnight. Could be Hood's Herald, could be cursed, plague-ridden—'
'Could be the only dry underfoot we'll find,' Gesler said. 'As for the rest, think of the tale you'll spin in the next tavern, Stormy. You'll have them pissing their pants and rushing off to the nearest temple for a blessing. You could set it up to take a cut from the avatars.'
'Well, maybe you ain't got enough brains to be scared of anything…'
The corporal grinned. 'Let's get wet, everyone. I hear noblewomen pay in gold for a bath like the one we're about to take. That right, lass?'
Felisin did not answer.
Kulp shook his head. 'You're just happy to be alive,' he said to Gesler.
'Damn right.'
The water was cool, strangely slick and not easy to swim through. The Ripath settled behind them, its decks awash.
Then the mast leaned to one side, pausing a moment before sweeping down to the water. Within seconds it had slipped beneath the surface.
Half an hour later they reached the dromon, gasping with exhaustion. Truth proved the only one capable of climbing up the steering oar. He clambered over the high sterncastle railing. A few moments later a thick-twined hemp ladder tumbled down to the others.
It was a struggle, but eventually everyone was aboard, Gesler and Stormy pulling up the food chest and water casks last.
From the sterncastle, Kulp looked down the length of the ship's deck. The abandonment had been a hasty thing. Coiled ropes and bundles of supplies wrapped in sealskin lay scattered about, along with discarded body armour, swords and belts. A thick, pale, greasy dust clung to everything.
The others joined him in silent study.
'Anybody see a name on the hull?' Gesler asked eventually. 'I looked, but…'
'Silanda,' Baudin said.
Stormy growled, 'Togg's teats, man, there wasn't no—'
'Don't need one to know this ship,' Baudin said. 'That cargo lying about down there, that's from Drift Avalü. Silanda was the only craft sanctioned to trade with the Tiste Andü. She was on her way to the island when the Emperor's forces overran Quon. She never returned.'
Silence followed his words.
It was broken by a soft laugh from Felisin. 'Baudin the thug. Did your prison gangs work in libraries as well?'
'Anybody else notice the waterline?' Gesler asked. 'This ship hasn't moved in years.' He shot one last, piercing glare at Baudin, then descended to the main deck. 'Might as well be a pile of rock knee-deep in guano,' he said, stopping at one of the sealskin bundles. He crouched down to unwrap it. A moment later he hissed a curse and lurched back. The bundle's flaps fell away, releasing its contents: a severed head. It rolled crazily across the deck, thumping up against the lip of the hold's hatchway.
Kulp pushed past a motionless Heboric, scrambled down to the main deck and approached the head. He raised his warren. Stopped.
'What do you see?' the ex-priest asked.
'Nothing I like,' the mage replied. He stepped closer, crouched. 'Tiste Andü.' He glanced over at Gesler. 'What I'm about to suggest is not pleasant, but…'
The corporal, his face white, nodded. 'Stormy,' he said as he turned to the next bundle. 'Give me a hand.'
'Doing what?'
'Counting heads.'
'Fener save me! Gesler—'
'You gotta be cold to spin a tale like this one. Takes practice. Get down here and get your hands dirty, soldier.'
There were dozens of bundles. Each contained a head, cleanly severed. Most wer
e Tiste Andü, but some were human. Gesler began stacking them into a grisly pyramid around the main mast. The corporal's recovery from his initial shock had been swift—clearly, the man had seen his share of horrors as a Marine of the Empire. Stormy was almost as quick in casting aside his revulsion, although a superstitious terror seemed to replace it—he worked frantically fast, and before too long every head had joined the ghastly pyramid.
Kulp turned his attention to the hatch leading down into the oar pit. A faint aura of sorcery rose from it, visible to his warren-touched senses as waves rippling the still air. He hesitated long before approaching it.
Apart from the mage and Gesler and Stormy, the others remained in the sterncastle, watching the proceedings with something like numb shock.
The corporal joined Kulp. 'Ready to check below?'
'Absolutely not.'
'Lead on, then,' Gesler said with a tight grin. He unsheathed his sword.
Kulp glanced down at it.
The corporal shrugged. 'Yeah, I know.'
Muttering under his breath, Kulp headed for the hatch. The lack of light below did nothing to hide what he saw. Sorcery lined everything, sickly yellow and faintly pulsing. Both hands on the railing, the mage descended the encrusted steps, Gesler close behind him.
'Can you see anything?' the corporal asked.
'Oh yes.'
'What's that smell?'
'If patience has a smell,' Kulp said, 'you're smelling it.' He cast a wave of light down the length of the centre walkway between the bench rows, spun it sideways and left it there.
'Well,' Gesler said, dry and rasping, 'there's a certain logic, isn't there?'
The oars were manned by headless corpses, three to a bench. Other sealskin bundles crowded every available space. Another headless figure sat behind a skin drum, both hands gripping strange, gourdlike batons. The figure was massively muscled. There was no evidence of decay on any of the bodies. White bone and red flesh glistened at the necks.
Neither man spoke for a long time, then Gesler cleared his throat, to little effect as he squeezed out gravel words. 'Did you say patience, Kulp?'