I made arrangements. I spent my days in Tarmuth in the company of one Marikkatch, an elderly he-cray who had agreed to act as my tutor. Every day I would walk to the salt canals of the cray quarter. I would sit on the low balcony that circled his room, and he would settle his armored underbody on some submerged furnishing and scratch and twitch his scrawny human chest, haranguing me from the water.
It was hard. He does not read. He is not a trained teacher. He stays in the town only because some accident or predator has maimed him, tearing off all but one leg from his left side, so that he can no longer hunt even the sluggish fish of Iron Bay. It might make a better story to claim that I had affection for him, that he is a lovable, cantankerous old gentleman, but he is a shit and a bore. I could make no complaints, however. I had no choice but to concentrate, to effect a few focus hexes, will myself into the language trance (and oh! how hard that was! I have left it so long my mind has grown fat and disgusting!) and drink in every word he gave me.
It was hurried and unsystematic—it was a mess, a bloody mess—but by the time the Terpsichoria tied up in the harbor I had a working understanding of his clicking tongue.
I left the embittered old bastard to his stagnant water, quit my lodgings there, and came to my cabin—this cabin from where I write.
We sailed away from Tarmuth port on the morning of Dustday, heading slowly toward the deserted southern shores of Iron Bay, twenty miles from town. In careful formation at strategic points around the edge of the bay, in quiet spots by rugged land and pine forests, I spotted ships. No one will speak of them. I know they are the ships of the New Crobuzon government. Privateers and others.
It is now Skullday.
On Chainday I was able to persuade the captain to let me disembark, and I spent the morning on the shore. Iron Bay is drab, but anything is better than the damned ship. I am beginning to doubt that it is an improvement on Tarmuth. I am driven to bedlam by the incessant, moronic slap of waves.
Two taciturn crewmen rowed me ashore, watching without pity as I stepped over the edge of the little boat and walked the last few feet through freezing surf. My boots are still stiff and salt-stained.
I sat on the pebbles and threw stones into the water. I read some of the long, bad novel I found on board. I watched the ship. It is moored close to the prisons, so that our captain can easily entertain and converse with the lieutenant-gaolers. I watched the prison-ships themselves. There was no movement from their decks, from behind their portholes. There is never any movement.
I swear, I do not know if I can do this. I miss you, and New Crobuzon.
I remember my journey.
It is hard to believe that it is only ten miles from the city to the godsforsaken sea.
There was a knocking at the door of the tiny cabin. Bellis’ lips pursed, and she waved her sheaf of paper to dry it. Unhurriedly she folded it and replaced it in the chest containing her belongings. She drew her knees up a little higher and played with her pen, watching as the door opened.
A nun stood in the threshold, her arms braced at either side of the doorway.
“Miss Coldwine,” she said uncertainly. “May I come in?”
“It’s your cabin too, Sister,” said Bellis quietly. Her pen spun over and around her thumb. It was a neurotic little trick she had perfected at university.
Sister Meriope shuffled forward a little and sat on the solitary chair. She smoothed her dark russet habit around her, fiddled with her wimple.
“It has been some days now since we became cabin-mates, Miss Coldwine,” Sister Meriope began, “and I do not feel . . . as if I yet know you at all. And this is not a situation I would wish to continue. As we are to be traveling and living together for many weeks . . . some companionship, some closeness, could only make those days easier . . .” Her voice failed, and she knotted her hands.
Bellis watched her, unmoving. Despite herself, she felt a trickle of contemptuous pity. She could imagine herself as Sister Meriope must see her: Angular, harsh, and bone-thin. Pale. Lips and hair stained the cold purple of bruises. Tall and unforgiving.
You don’t feel as if you know me, Sister, she thought, because I haven’t spoken twenty words to you in a week, and I don’t look at you unless you speak to me, and then I stare you down. She sighed. Meriope was crippled by her calling. Bellis could imagine her writing in her journal “Miss Coldwine is quiet, yet I know that I shall come to love her like a sister.” I am not, thought Bellis, getting involved with you. I will not become your sounding board. I will not redeem you of whatever tawdry tragedy brings you here.
Bellis eyed Sister Meriope and did not speak.
When she had first introduced herself, Meriope had claimed that she was traveling to the colonies to establish a church, to proselytize, for the glory of Darioch and Jabber. She had said it with a small sniff and a furtive look, idiotically unconvincing. Bellis did not know why Meriope was being sent to Nova Esperium, but it must have to do with some misfortune or disgrace, the transgression of some idiotic nunnish vow.
She glanced at Meriope’s midriff, looking for swelling under those forgiving robes. That would be the most likely explanation. The Daughters of Darioch were supposed to forego sensual pleasures.
I will not serve as replacement confessor for you, thought Bellis. I have my own bloody exile to work out.
“Sister,” she said, “I’m afraid you catch me at work. I have no time for pleasantries, I regret to say. Perhaps another time.” She was irritated with herself for that last tiny concession, but it had no effect, anyway. Meriope was broken.
“The captain wishes to see you,” the nun said, muffled and forlorn. “His cabin, at six o’clock.” She shuffled out of the door like a bullied dog.
Bellis sighed and swore quietly. She lit another cigarillo and smoked it right through, pinching the skin above her nose hard, before pulling out her letter again.
“I will go bloody mad,” she scribbled quickly, “if this damned nun does not stop fawning and leave me alone. Gods preserve me. Gods rot this damned boat.”
It was dark when Bellis obeyed the captain’s summons.
His cabin was his office. It was small, and pleasantly outfitted in dark wood and brass. There were a few pictures and prints on the walls, and Bellis glanced at them and knew that they were not the captain’s, that they came with the ship.
Captain Myzovic gestured her to sit.
“Miss Coldwine,” he said as she settled herself. “I hope your quarters are satisfactory. Your food? The crew? Good good.” He looked down briefly at the papers on his desk. “I wanted to raise a couple of issues with you, Miss Coldwine,” he said, and sat back.
She waited, staring at him. He was a hard-faced, handsome man in his fifties. His uniform was clean and pressed, which not all captains’ were. Bellis did not know whether it would be to her advantage to meet his eyes calmly or demurely to look away.
“Miss Coldwine, we haven’t spoken very much about your duties,” he said quietly. “I will do you the courtesy, of course, of treating you like a lady. I must tell you I’m not used to hiring those of your sex, and had the Esperium authorities not been impressed by your records and references, I can assure you . . .” He let the sentence dissipate.
“I have no wish to make you feel uncomfortable. You’re berthing in the passengers’ quarters. You’re eating in the passenger mess. However, as you know, you are not a paying passenger. You are an employee. You have been taken on by the agents of the Nova Esperium colony, and for the duration of this journey I am their representative. And while that makes little difference to Sister Meriope and Dr. Tearfly and the others, to you . . . it means I am your employer.
“Of course you are not crew,” he continued. “I would not order you as I order them. If you prefer, I would only request your services. But I must insist that such requests are obeyed.”
They studied each other.
“Now,” he said, his tone relaxing a little, “I don’t foresee any onerous demands. Most
of the crew are from New Crobuzon or the Grain Spiral, and those that aren’t speak perfectly good Ragamoll. It’s in Salkrikaltor that I’ll first need you, and we’ll not be there for a good week or more, so you’ve plenty of time to relax, to meet the other passengers. We sail tomorrow morning, early. We’ll be away by the time you’re up, I shouldn’t doubt.”
“Tomorrow?” Bellis said. It was the first word she had spoken since entering.
The captain looked at her sharply. “Yes. Is there a problem?”
“Originally,” she said without inflection, “you told me we would sail on Dustday, Captain.”
“I did, Miss Coldwine, but I’ve changed my mind. I’ve finished my paperwork a deal quicker than I expected, and my brother officers are ready to transfer their inmates tonight. We sail tomorrow.”
“I had hoped to return to town, to send a letter,” Bellis said. She kept her voice level. “An important letter to a friend in New Crobuzon.”
“Out of the question,” the captain said. “It cannot be done. I’ll not waste any more days here.”
Bellis sat still. She was not intimidated by this man, but she had no power over him, none at all. She tried to work out what was most likely to engage his sympathy, make him acquiesce.
“Miss Coldwine,” he said suddenly, and to her surprise his voice was a little gentler. “I am afraid the matter is in motion. If you wish I can give your letter to Lieutenant-Gaoler Catarrs, but I cannot in truth recommend that as entirely reliable. You’ll have the opportunity to deliver your message in Salkrikaltor. Even if there are no New Crobuzon ships docking there, there is a warehouse, to which all our captains have the keys, for access to information, spare cargo, and mail. Leave your letter there. It’ll be picked up by the next home-bound ship. It won’t be much delayed.
“You can learn from this, Miss Coldwine,” he added. “At sea, you can’t waste time. Remember that: don’t wait.”
Bellis sat on a little longer, but there was nothing at all that she could do, so she thinned her lips and left.
She stood for a long time under Iron Bay’s cold sky. The stars were invisible; the moon and its daughters, its two little satellites, were unclear. Bellis walked, tense against the chill, and climbed the short ladder to the ship’s raised front, heading for the bowsprit.
Bellis held on to the iron railings and stood on the tips of her toes. She could just see out, across the lightless sea.
Behind her the sounds of the crew faded. A way off, she could see two guttering red pins of light: a torch on the bridge of a prison-ship, and its twin in the black surf.
From the crow’s nest, or from somewhere in the rigging, from some indistinct spot a hundred feet or more above her, Bellis heard a strain of mouth-music. It was not like the imbecilic shanties she had heard in Tarmuth. It was slow and complex.
You will have to wait for your letter, Bellis mouthed silently across the water. You will have to wait to hear from me. You’ll have to wait a little while longer, until cray-country.
She watched the night until the last lines of division between shore, sea, and sky were obscured. Then, cosseted by darkness, she walked slowly aft, toward the constricted doorways and stooped passages leading to her cabin, a scrap of space like a flaw in the ship’s design.
(Later the ship moved uneasily, in the coldest hour, and she stirred in her bunk and she pulled the blanket up to her neck, and she realized somewhere below her dreams that the living cargo was coming aboard.)
I am tired here in the dark and I am full of pus.
My skin’s taut with it, stretched till it puckers nor can I touch it without it rages. I’m infected. I hurt where I touch and I touch everywhere to make sure that I hurt that I’m not yet numb.
But still thank whatever makes these veins mine I’m full of blood. I worry my scabs and they brim I brim with it. And that’s a small comfort nor mind the pain.
They come for us when the air’s so still and black without not a seabird cries. They open our doors and shine lights, uncovering us. I am almost ashamed to see how we have surrendered, we’ve surrendered up to filth.
I can see nothing beyond their lights.
Where we lie together they beat us apart, and I wrap my arms around the spastic matter that twitches in my midriff as they begin to herd us.
We wind through tarry passages and engine chambers and I’m all cold to know what this is for. And I’m more eager, I’m quicker than some of the old ones bent double coughing and spewing and afraid to move.
And then there’s a swallowing up, I’m eaten up by the cold gulped down by darkness and gods fuck me blind we are outside.
Outside.
I’m dumb with it. I’m dumb with wonder.
It has been a long time.
We huddle together, each against the next man like troglodytes like myopic trow. They’re cowed by it the old ones, by the lack of walls and edges and the movement of the cold, by water and air.
I might cry gods help me. I might.
All black on black but still I can see hills and water and I can see clouds. I can see the prisons on all sides bobbing a little like fishermen’s floats. Jabber take us all I can see clouds.
Bugger me I’m crooning like I soothe a baby. That’s for me that coddling noise.
And then they push us on like livestock shuffling rattling chains, dripping farting muttering astonished, across the deck crippled under the weight of bodies and fetters, to a swaying rope bridge. And they hurry us along and over it, all our number, and each man pauses a moment in the middle of the low-slung passage between vessels, their thoughts visible and bright like a chymical burst.
They consider leaping.
Into the water of the bay.
But the rope walls around the bridge are high and there’s barbed wire hemming us in and our poor bodies are sore and weak and each man falters, and continues, and crosses the water to a new ship.
I pause like the others in my turn. Like them I’m too afraid.
And then there’s a new deck underfoot, scrubbed iron smooth and clean, vibrating from engines, and more corridors and clattering keys and after all another long unlit room where we collapse exhausted and changed over and raise ourselves slowly to see who our new neighbors are. Around me begin the hissed arguments and bickerings and fights and seductions and rapes that make up our politics. New alliances are formed. New hierarchies.
I sit apart for a while, in the shadows.
I’m still caught in that moment when I entered the night. It’s like amber. I’m a grub in amber. It snares me and damn but it does it makes me beautiful.
I’ve a new home now. I’ll live in that moment as long as I can, till the memories decay and then I’ll come out, I’ll come to this new place we sit in.
Somewhere pipes are banging like great hammers.
Chapter Two
Outside of Iron Bay, the sea was hard. Bellis woke to its slapping assault. She quit the cabin, picking her way past Sister Meriope, who was vomiting with what Bellis did not believe was just seasickness.
Bellis emerged into wind, and a great cracking as sails tugged like animals at their tethers. The enormous smokestack vented a little soot, and the ship hummed with the power of the steam engine deep below.
Bellis sat on a container. So we’re off, then, she thought nervously. We’re heading out. We’re away.
The Terpsichoria had seemed busy while they were moored: someone was always scrubbing something, or raising a piece of machinery, or running from one end of the ship to the other. But now that sense of activity was increased by a huge factor.
Bellis squinted out across the maindeck, not yet ready to look at the sea.
The rigging teemed. Most of the sailors were human, but here and there a spined hotchi raced along rope crawlways and onto crow’s nests. On the decks men lugged containers and wound huge winches, shouting instructions in incomprehensible shorthand, threading chains onto fat flywheels. There were towering cactacae, too heavy and ungainly to cl
imb rope but making up for that with their efforts below, with their strength, fibrous vegetable biceps bunching massively as they tugged and tied.
Officers in blue uniforms strode among them.
The wind blew across the ship, and the deck’s periscopic cowls crooned like dolorous flutes.
Bellis finished her cigarillo. She stood slowly and walked to the side, her eyes lowered, till she reached the rail and she looked up and out to sea.
There was no land at all.
Oh gods, look at it all, she thought in shock.
For the first time in her life, Bellis looked out across nothing but water.
Alone beneath a colossal rearing sky, anxiety welled up in her like bile. She wanted very much to be back in the alleys of her city.
Slicks of spume spread fast around the ship, disappearing and reappearing incessantly. The water moiled in intricate marbled surges. It shifted for the ship, as it would for a whale or a canoe or a fallen leaf, a dumb accommodation that it might overturn with any sudden swell.
It was a massive moronic child. Powerful and stupid and capricious.
Bellis cast her gaze about nervously, looking for any island, any jag of coastline. At that moment, there was none.
A cloud of seabirds trailed them, plunging for carrion in the vessel’s wake, spattering the deck and the foam with guano.
They sailed without stopping for two days.
Bellis felt almost stupefied with resentment that her journey was under way. She paced the corridors and decks, shut herself in her cabin. She watched blankly as the Terpsichoria passed rocks and tiny islands in the distance, illuminated by grey daylight or the moon.
Sailors scanned the horizon, oiling the large-bore guns. With hundreds of ill-charted islets and trading towns, with an unending number of ships supplying the insatiable commercial hole of New Crobuzon at one end, Basilisk Channel was plied by pirates.