Bellis rolled her eyes.
I can’t listen to this, thought Bellis, saying just enough to be in the conversation. She felt alone. Tawdry secrets and clichés. What next? she thought with contempt as Johannes rambled on through the passenger list and the officers of the Terpsichoria. Some trusty sailor actually a woman disguised to go to sea? Love and buggery among the ranks?
There was something pathetic about Johannes that night, and she had never thought so before.
“How do you know all this, Johannes?” said Bellis carefully, at last. “Where’ve you been? What are you actually doing?”
Johannes cleared his throat and stared into his glass for a long time.
“Bellis . . .” he said. Around him, the soft clatter of the restaurant seemed very loud. “Bellis . . . can I tell you in confidence?” Johannes sighed, then looked up at her.
“I’m working for the Lovers,” he said. “And I don’t mean I work in Garwater riding. I work directly for them. They have a team of researchers, working on a quite . . .” He shook his head and began to smile with delight. “A quite extraordinary project. An extraordinary opportunity. And they invited me to join them—because of my previous work.
“Their team had read some of my research, and they decided that I’d be . . . that they wanted me to work with them.” He was overjoyed, she realized. He was like a child, almost exactly like a child.
“There are thaumaturges, oceanologers, marine biologists. That man—the man who defeated the Terpsichoria, Uther Doul—he’s part of the team. He’s central, in fact. He’s a philosopher. There are different projects all being pursued. Projects on cryptogeography and probability theory, as well as . . . as the investigation I’m working on. The man in charge of that is fascinating. He was with the Lovers when we arrived: a tall old man with a beard.”
“I remember him,” said Bellis. “He welcomed you.”
A look somewhere between contrition and excitement overtook Johannes.
“He did,” he said. “That’s Tintinnabulum. A hunter, an outsider, employed by the city. He lives on the Castor with seven other men, where Garwater meets Shaddler and Booktown. A small ship with a belfry . . .
“We’re doing such fascinating work,” he said suddenly, and seeing his pure pleasure Bellis could see how Armada had won him. “The equipment’s old and unreliable—the analytical engines are ancient—but the work’s so much more radical. I’ve months of research to catch up on—I’m learning Salt. This work . . . it means reading the most varied things.”
He grinned at her with incredulous pride. “For my project, there are certain key texts. One of them’s mine. Can you believe that? Isn’t that extraordinary? They’re from all over the world. From New Crobuzon, Khadoh. And there are mystery books that we can’t find. They’re in Ragamoll and Salt and moonscript . . . One of the most important’s said to be in High Kettai. We’ve made a list of them from references in the books we do have. Gods know how they’ve got such a fantastic library here, Bellis. Half these books I could never find at home—“
“They stole it, Johannes,” she said, and silenced him. “That’s how they’ve got it. Every damned volume in Grand Gears Library is stolen. From ships, from the towns they plunder on the coast. From people like me, Johannes. My books that I wrote that have been stolen from me. That’s where they get their books.”
Something cold was settling in Bellis’ gut.
“Tell me,” she began, and stopped. She drank some wine, breathed deep, and started again. “Tell me, Johannes, that is somewhat remarkable, isn’t it? That out of an entire ocean—an entire fucking ocean—that out of that whole empty sea they should pluck the one ship that was carrying their intellectual hero . . .”
And again she saw in his eye that uncomfortable cocktail of apology and elation.
“Yes,” he said carefully. “That’s the thing, Bellis. That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”
She suddenly knew what he was going to say, a certainty that nauseated and repelled her, but she liked him still, she really did, and she so wanted to be wrong that she did not stand to go; she waited to be corrected, knowing that she would not be.
“It wasn’t coincidence, Bellis,” she heard him saying. “It wasn’t. They have an agent in Salkrikaltor. They receive colonial passenger lists. They knew we were coming. They knew I was coming.”
The paper lanterns swung as the door opened and closed. There was pretty laughter from a nearby table. The smell of stuffed meat cosseted them.
“That was why they took our ship. They came for me,” said Johannes softly, and Bellis closed her eyes, defeated.
“Oh, Johannes,” she said unsteadily.
“Bellis,” he said, alarmed, reaching out, but she cut him off with a curt gesture. What, do you think I’m going to cry? she thought furiously.
“Johannes, let me tell you there is a world of difference between a five-year, a ten-year sentence—and life.” She could not look at him. “It may be that for you, for Meriope, for the Cardomiums, for I don’t know who else, Nova Esperium meant a new life. Not for me.
“Not for me. For me it was an escape, a necessary and a temporary escape. I was born in Chnum, Johannes. Educated in Mafaton. Was proposed to in Brock Marsh. Broke up in Salacus Fields. New Crobuzon is my home; it will always be my home.”
Johannes looked at her with mounting unease.
“I have no interest in the colonies. In Nova fucking Esperium. None. I don’t want to live with a group of venal inadequates, failed spivs, disgraced nuns, bureaucrats too incompetent or weak to make it back home, resentful terrified natives . . . Godspit, Johannes, I’ve no interest in the sea. Freezing, sickening, filthy, repetitive, stinking . . .
“I’ve no interest in this city. I do not want to live in a curio, Johannes. This is a sideshow! This is something to scare the children! ‘The Floating Pirate City’! I don’t want it! I don’t want to live in this great bobbing parasite, like some fucking pondskater sucking its victims dry. This isn’t a city, Johannes; it’s a parochial little village less than a mile wide, and I do not want it.
“I was always going to return to New Crobuzon. I would never wish to see out my days outside it. It’s dirty and cruel and difficult and dangerous—particularly for me, particularly now—but it’s my home. Nowhere else in the world has the culture, the industry, the population, the thaumaturgy, the languages, the art, the books, the politics, the history . . . New Crobuzon,” she said slowly, “is the greatest city in Bas-Lag.”
And coming from her, from someone without any illusions about New Crobuzon’s brutality, or squalor, or repression, the declamation was far more powerful than if it came from any Parliamentarian.
“And you’re telling me,” she said finally, “that I’ve been exiled from my city—for life—because of you?”
Johannes was looking at her, stricken.
“Bellis,” he said slowly, “I don’t know what to say. I can only say that . . . that I’m sorry. This wasn’t my choice. The Lovers knew I was on the passenger list, and . . . That’s not the only reason. They need more guns, so they might have taken her anyway, but . . .”
His voice broke off. “But probably not. Mostly they came for me. But Bellis, please!” He leaned toward her urgently. “It wasn’t my choice. I didn’t make this happen. I had no idea.”
“But you’ve made your peace with it, Johannes,” said Bellis. She stood at last. “You’ve made peace. You’re lucky you’ve found something that makes you happy here, Johannes. I understand that it wasn’t your choice, but I hope you’ll understand that I can’t just sit here as if nothing is wrong, making jolly conversation, when it’s down to you that I’m without a home.
“And don’t call them the fucking Lovers, like it’s a title, like those two perverts are a celestial constellation or something. Look at you all agog at them. They’re like us; they have names. You could have said no, Johannes. You could have refused.”
As she turned to go, he said he
r name. She had never heard him use such a tone, stony and fierce. It shocked her.
He looked up at her, his hands clenched on the table. “Bellis,” he said, in the same voice. “I’m sorry—I’m truly sorry—that you feel kidnapped. I had no idea. But what is it you object to? Living in a parasitic city? I doubt that. New Crobuzon may be more subtle than Armada day to day, but try telling those in the ruins of Suroch that New Crobuzon’s not a pirate.
“Culture? Science? Art? Bellis, do you even understand where you are? This city is the sum of hundreds of cultures. Every maritime nation has lost vessels to war, press-ganging, desertion. And they are here. They’re what built Armada. This city is the sum of history’s lost ships. There are vagabonds and pariahs and their descendants in this place from cultures that New Crobuzon has never so much as heard of. Do you realize that? Do you understand what that means? Their renegades meet here and overlap like scales, and make something new. Armada’s been plowing the Swollen Ocean for damn near ever, picking up outcasts and escapees from everywhere. Godspit, Bellis, do you know a bloody thing?
“History? There’ve been legends and rumors about this place among all the seafaring nations for centuries; did you know that? Do you know any sailors’ tales? The oldest vessel here is more than a thousand years old. The ships may change, but the city traces its history back to the Flesh-Eater Wars, at least, and some say back to the godsdamned Ghosthead Empire . . . A village? Nobody knows the population of Armada, but it’s hundreds of thousands at least. Count all the layers and layers of decks; there are probably as many miles of street here as in New Crobuzon.
“No, you see Bellis, I don’t believe you. I don’t think you have any reason for not wanting to live here, any objective reasons for preferring New Crobuzon. I think you simply miss your home. Don’t misunderstand me. You don’t have to offer any explanations. It’s understandable you’d love New Crobuzon. But all you’re actually saying is ‘I don’t like it here; I want to go home.’ ”
For the first time, he looked at her with something akin to dislike.
“And if it comes to weighing up your desire to return against the desires, for example, of the several hundred Terpsichoria Remade who are now allowed to live as something more than animals, then I’m afraid I find your need less than pressing.”
Bellis kept her eyes on him. “If anyone were by chance to tell the authorities,” she said coolly, “that I might be a suitable case for incarceration and reeducation, then I swear to you I would end myself.”
The threat was ridiculous and quite untrue, and she was sure he knew that, but it was as close as she could come to begging him. She knew he had it in his power to cause her serious trouble.
He was a collaborator.
She turned and left him—out into the drizzle that still enveloped Armada. There was so much that she had wanted to say to him, to ask. She had wanted to talk to him about the Sorghum rig, that massive flaming enigma now in a little cove of ships. She wanted to know why the Lovers had stolen it, and what it could do, and what they planned for it. Where are its crews? she wanted to ask. Where is the geo-empath whom no one has seen? And she was sure Johannes knew these things. But there was no way she would speak to him now.
She could not shake his words from her ears. She hoped fervently that her own still troubled him.
Chapter Eight
When Bellis looked out of her window the next morning, she saw, over the roofs and chimneys, that the city was moving.
At some time in the night, the hundreds of tugboats that milled constantly around Armada like bees around a hive had harnessed the city. With thick chains they had attached themselves in great numbers to the city’s rim. They spread outward from the city, with their chains taut.
Bellis had become used to the city’s inconsistencies. The sun would rise to the left of her smokestack house one day, to the right the next, as Armada had spun slowly during the night. The sun’s antics were disorienting. Without land visible, there was nothing except the stars by which to gauge position, and Bellis had always found stargazing tedious: she was not someone who could instantly recognize the Tricorn or the Baby or the other constellations. The night sky meant nothing to her.
Today the sun rose almost directly in front of her window. The ships that strained at their chains and tugged at Armada’s mass cut across her field of vision, and she calculated after a moment that they were heading south.
She was awed by that prodigious effort. The city easily dwarfed the proliferation of ships that were pulling at it. It was hard to estimate Armada’s motion, but looking at the water coursing between ships, and the slap of breakers against the edges of the city, Bellis suspected that their passage was cripplingly slow.
Where are we going? she wondered, helplessly.
Bellis felt curiously shamed. It was weeks since she had arrived on Armada, and she realized that she had not wondered about the city’s motion, about its passage across the sea or its itinerary, or how its fleet, out engaged in their piracy, found their way back to a home that moved. She remembered with a sudden shudder Johannes’ attack on her the previous night.
Some of what he had said was true.
So was much of what she herself had said, of course, and she was still angry with him. She did not want to live on Armada, and the thought of seeing out her days on this mesh of moldering tubs made her mouth curl with anger so strong it was like panic. But still.
But still, it was true that she had locked herself off in her unhappiness. She was ignorant of her situation, ignorant of Armada’s history and politics, and she realized that this was dangerous. She did not understand the city’s economies; she did not know where the ships came from that sailed into the Basilio and Urchinspine harbors. She did not know where the city had been or where it was going.
She began to open her mind as she stood in her nightgown, watching the sun pour across the bows of the slowly moving city. She felt her curiosity unfurl.
The Lovers, she thought with distaste. Let’s start there. Godspit, the Lovers. What in the name of Jabber are they?
Shekel took coffee with her on an upper deck of the library.
He was an excited boy. He told her that he was doing something with one person, and something else with another, and that he had had a fight with a third, and that a fourth lived in Dry Fall riding, and she withered beside his casual knowledge of the city. She felt disgraced again, for her ignorance, and she listened carefully to his ramblings.
Shekel told Bellis about Hedrigall the cactacae aeronaut. He told her about the cactus-man’s notorious past as a pirate-merchant for Dreer Samher, and described to her the journeys Hedrigall had made to the monstrous island south of Gnurr Kett, to trade with the mosquito-men.
In turn, Bellis asked him about the ridings, the haunted quarter, the city’s route, the Sorghum rig, Tintinnabulum. She turned up her questions like cards.
“Yeah,” he said slowly. “I know Tinnabol. Him and his mates. Strange coves. Makler, Metzger, Promus, Tinnabol. There’s one called Argentarius, who’s mad, who no one ever sees. I can’t remember the others. Inside the Castor’s all over trophies. Gruesome. Sea trophies. Every wall. Stuffed hammerheads and orca, things with claws and tentacles. Skulls. And harpoons. And helios of the crew standing on the corpses of things I hope I never see.
“They’re hunters. They ain’t been in the city so long. They’re not press-ganged, exactly. There’s loads of stories, rumors about what they’re doing, why they’re here. It’s like they’re waiting for something.”
Bellis could not understand how Shekel knew so much about Tintinnabulum until he grinned and continued.
“Tintinnabulum’s got a . . . an assistant,” he said. “Her name’s Angevine. She’s an interesting lady.” He grinned again, and Bellis turned away, embarrassed by his fumbling enthusiasm.
There were printing presses in Armada, and authors and editors and translators, and new books and Salt translations of classic texts were brought out. But pap
er was scarce: print runs were minuscule, and the books were expensive. The ridings of the city relied on Booktown’s Grand Gears Library, and paid premiums to ensure their borrowing rights.
The books came mostly from Garwater riding’s piracies. For an unknown number of centuries this most powerful riding in Armada had donated all the books it commandeered to The Clockhouse Spur. No matter who ran Booktown, these donations had ensured its loyalty. Other ridings copied the practice, though perhaps without such stern supervision. They might let their press-ganged keep this or that volume, or would trade some of the rarest volumes they snatched. Not Garwater, which treated book hoarding as a serious crime.
Sometimes Garwater ships would prowl the coastal settlements of Bas-Lag committing wordstorms, and the pirates would rampage from house to house, seizing every book and manuscript they found. All for Booktown, the Clockhouse Spur.
The delivery of all this plunder was ongoing, so Bellis and her colleagues kept busy.
The khepri newcomers in their Mercy Ships, randomly intercepted by Armada, had taken over the Booktown riding in a gentle coup more than a century before. They had been wise enough to realize that despite traditional khepri lack of interest in written texts—their compound eyes made reading somewhat difficult—the riding relied on its library. They had continued its stewardship.
Bellis could not estimate the number of books: there were so many tiny old holds in the ships of the library, so many converted chimneys and bulkheads, stripped cabins, annexes, all stuffed with texts. Many were ancient, countless thousands of them long undisturbed. Armada had been stealing books for many centuries.
The catalogs were only partial. In recent centuries a bureaucracy had arisen whose function was to list the library’s contents, but during some reigns they were more careful than others. Mistakes were always made. A few acquisitions were shelved almost randomly, insufficiently checked. Errors slipped into systems and begot other errors. There were decades’ worth of volumes hidden in the library, in plain view yet invisible. Rumors and legends were rife about their powerful, lost, hidden, or forbidden contents.