Widow's Welcome

by D. K. Fields

  ‘The payment,’ she said over the rim of her cup, ‘also ends all obligations you may feel towards Dahey Carver. His family have been equally compensated.’

  ‘His sister?’

  ‘To hear her tell it, this was the first good turn he’d done her,’ the captain said without a hint of mirth. ‘I understand you have no brothers or sisters.’

  ‘That’s right,’ I said, though her tone wasn’t one of a question.

  ‘And your parents are both dead.’

  I shifted in the seat, almost spilling my drink. ‘Yes. My mother was a Casker. She died, as many did, in the winter flus.’

  The captain gave me the opportunity to say more, but I didn’t. We finished our coffee in a more comfortable silence than that of before. When she replaced her cup on the tray, I had the sense there was something more she wanted me to hear. So it was that when she said, ‘I have a proposal for you, Sanga,’ I was not particularly surprised by the sentiment, only the wording.

  ‘A proposal?’ I said. I routinely accepted requests, answered calls, and even responded to demands. Proposals were something new.

  ‘I would very much like for you to join my crew,’ she said, meeting my eye with an intensity that gave no room for humour or whimsy in my answer. That she had need of a sanga was obvious given the previous night, though for some reason it hadn’t occurred to me before that moment. That she would want me was impossible.

  ‘Captain, I thought you understood my position.’

  ‘I do.’

  I checked the door again with the feeling that something, or someone, was waiting to burst through and cast me out of the well-appointed study, out of the Commission’s building, and out of Captain Cope’s regard.

  ‘Your crew,’ I said, without looking at Perse, ‘they wouldn’t work a barge with me, let alone accept my help.’

  ‘They will work with you, Sanga, and they’ve already accepted your help once.’

  ‘Dahey was—’

  ‘Dying,’ the captain said. ‘I don’t care where your father came from, and neither will my crew. Of that, I promise you.’

  ‘And what of the Captain’s Concordance?’ I said.

  ‘You strike me as an observant man.’ The captain leant back in her chair. ‘Where we are can’t have been lost on you.’

  ‘Do the Concordance know?’

  ‘Know what?’ she said.

  I gestured uselessly, frustrated by how little I understood what was happening, what was being suggested. ‘They would never let me work a barge.’

  ‘Sanga, who said anything about a barge?’

  *

  I laughed at her. I am ashamed to say that was my first reaction and it was an all-consuming one. It was also a difficult reaction to recover, and then move on, from. What else could I do?

  To her credit she waited patiently until I was finished.

  ‘My crew and I will cross Break Deep,’ she said again, no different in tone or solemnity than before. But I had already laughed. Now, all I could do was stare at her in confusion and ask what I considered the most obvious of questions.

  ‘Why?’

  She smiled, for some reason pleased. ‘Most people start with “how”. “Why” is on one hand simple, another vastly complicated. Why not?’

  ‘Everyone who has tried to cross Break Deep has died.’

  ‘As far as we know.’

  ‘As far as we know,’ I conceded. ‘But no one has ever returned.’

  ‘No one has returned from the Audience, and yet we still tell them our stories. Still hold elections. Still build Seats.’

  The captain poured us both another cup, as if she was only now confident I wasn’t about to walk out of the study. After all, if you weren’t of a similar disposition, what was the point in staying to argue with someone who had just revealed they were unhinged? But my curiosity had its limits and I wondered again how many sangas the captain had sought to employ prior to finding me.

  ‘“Why not” is not enough,’ I said, referring to myself as well as expressing my disbelief that that was enough for the captain and her crew. ‘And don’t talk to me of the stories they might tell.’

  ‘Why not?’ she said, smirking at her own joke. ‘Wouldn’t they be glorious? Swashbuckling tales of adventure and discovery.’

  ‘Those stories rarely remember the sanga.’

  ‘Shall we play this game, then, where I run through the obvious and you deny their appeal?’ she said.

  I shrugged. ‘What else is there?’

  ‘Riches,’ she said flatly.

  ‘You cannot possibly know what lies beyond Break Deep: why assume there is anything of value there?’

  ‘Because it is more interesting than assuming there isn’t.’

  ‘And I would have my share of these assumed riches?’ I said.

  ‘My crew has always had an equal share.’

  Perse was nodding before I even fully turned to look at him.

  ‘I’m not a greedy man,’ I said.

  ‘If not the fame of the adventure, then the adventure itself.’ The captain stood and picked a scroll up from the desk, a map. She pointed to the hatched section that was Break Deep. ‘To see for yourself what lies beyond.’

  ‘I look forward to hearing the stories. I wish you good fortune, Captain,’ I said, collecting the stack of coins and rising from my chair.

  ‘Because the world is dying.’

  I stopped, arms still braced against the chair, and searched the captain’s face for any sign she was mocking me. She was quite sincere. I walked out of the study, down the carriage ramp and out of the building.

  *

  Three days passed relatively quietly. I had no patients beyond my normal rounds, which included the Merry Jig. I administered to the young men and women there without any particular incident: one draught of the typical kind given to a woman well versed in its effects; and a younger man showing signs of something more serious that made passing urine uncomfortable. But he had the sense to approach me straight away and I gave him a suitable tonic, under advice to seek me if the pain persisted. His relief gave me some cheer. Many men avoided my help until it was almost too late.

  Madam Wishful was out on an errand so a boy working the front-of-house paid me. He was too young to be put to work elsewhere in the establishment, but his rosy cheeks and long lashes indicated his future. I gave him back a penny from the little purse and he smiled with such radiance that my chest ached for what would become of him. I hurried out of the Merry Jig.

  The purse from Madam Wishful was embarrassingly light, even before my act of generosity. Despite my best efforts I couldn’t help but compare it to the heavy marks of the captain’s money; and not just the amount already paid, but the implication of more forthcoming. A share – albeit a share of a fool’s errand – had a draw that I was loath to admit, and therefore it weighed on me as all things do when we try to ignore them.

  Once back at my hut, I was restless. I ate a modest meal without enjoyment, fussed over my plants and looked up at every person who passed by my threshold. I ensured the curtain was well-pulled back and my sign on full display. I paced. Frustrated with myself, I set to making a stronger mixture and ointment, should the difficulties worsen for the young man of the Merry Jig. It was a silly thing to do – the herbs would lose some potency with time, as the Tout would have it – but I had to occupy my hands somehow. I resolved to take a walk after sunset, when the air might have lost some of its stifling heat and heaviness.

  When the soft knock came against my doorframe, I was deep in thought: imagining what kind of vessel, if not a barge, would attempt Break Deep. I stumbled off my stool, embarrassed by my whimsy, but the woman at the door mistook my bumbling for anger at being disturbed. She made a squeaking sound and ducked back into the alley. In my haste I somehow tangled a foot in my threadbare rug, which I carried with me beyond the hut. I called after the woman, pleading with her to come back. She was equally startled by my vehemence for her return and so we bo
th entered my hut with flushed cheeks and duelling apologies.

  ‘It’s my brother’s girl,’ the woman said, without preamble. ‘She won’t stop coughin’.’

  I began to gather my things, asking the girl’s age and how long she had been in difficulty. The woman answered in a distracted manner – seemingly more concerned with my filling my bag. I guessed at the reason why.

  ‘Don’t worry yourself over my fee,’ I said.

  ‘He’ll pay, my brother that is, he just don’t have much. He ain’t worked a barge since his wife passed, that’s all.’

  ‘Show me the way,’ I said.

  For the second time in less than a week I was walking the steady incline of the east hills of Bordair. We passed roughly where I judged the Barge of Good Hope to be and continued to climb. I hadn’t thought it possible but the streets grew narrower and more warren-like. The air also thinned, or so it felt, and there was a faint smell of ash, and underneath sulphur, which tickled the back of my nose and throat. It was darker here. When given the opportunity I looked back to the shores of Bordair below to see sunlight on the water. The sun still had some hours before it sank below the peaks that circled the city.

  ‘Is the air usually this poor?’ I said, unable to contain my wheezing.

  ‘Worse of late,’ she said.

  We stopped for a moment, not that she needed to. The ash may have gone some way to explain her niece’s cough, but when I suggested this the woman made noncommittal noises and wouldn’t meet my eye.

  Her brother’s hut was a single room, like my own, but one that had to cater to a whole family’s demands. There was a curtained area where I assumed the parents slept, a pallet where the girl now lay and a small cooking pot, which hung over a blackened patch of earth. The man was kneeling with the girl’s hand in his. I could see the glistening tracks of tears on his cheeks, though he answered my greeting soberly enough. I set my bag down and took the other side of the pallet.

  The girl was, to my surprise, carrying more weight than either of the adults – and not just in the way that young children do. Regardless, her complexion was wan and she was shivering with fever. A damp cloth beside the father indicated they had attended her during the heat of it.

  ‘Has anyone else seen to her?’ I said.

  The father shook his head.

  ‘But my hut is so far from here.’

  The girl coughed violently; her whole body shook and her eyelids fluttered.

  When the fit subsided I felt beneath her jaw, finding the lumps I’d expected for a fever of this kind. I opened her mouth and saw no sign she had been coughing blood.

  ‘This is good,’ I said, ignoring the look the bargeman gave me. ‘No blood.’

  ‘No bleeding, Sanga!’ the father said, mistaking my meaning. If it were up to me, my profession would have changed its name a long time ago; the memory of bargemen could be as long as it was selective. He clutched his daughter’s hand.

  ‘Hot water,’ I said to the woman. She did nothing until the father gave her a brief nod.

  ‘But—’

  ‘Just do it!’ the father said.

  She crossed the room and slipped behind the curtain. After a few confusingly tense moments, she returned with two short logs. I wondered if these were the last they had. There was a pail of water, half full, by the fire. I told her to heat it all and get more.

  ‘The girl needs to drink as much as she can,’ I said.

  The woman left with the pail.

  ‘That – that will help?’ the father said, looking at the herbs I was working in a mortar.

  ‘With the fever. What she’s really battling, I can’t say. But she’s like a river in mid-summer: the danger comes if the water gets too low.’

  He grunted at that, as if to question whether I’d ever seen a river run dry.

  ‘I’m sorry about your wife,’ I said, changing the subject. But I had judged poorly. The man flinched bodily, as if I had struck him.

  ‘That was different,’ he shouted. ‘You have to help my daughter!’ He stood and, across the prone body of that beloved girl, grabbed me by my collar. He hauled me to my feet as easily as if I were a child and brought me close enough to see the veined whites of his eyes. I looked down at the girl, just to be free of that gaze.

  ‘I’m here to help,’ I said.

  There was a moment in which I feared he would strike me; his arms and neck muscles tensed, and I shied away as much as his grip would allow. My cowardice may have moved him, I couldn’t say, but he released me and fell back beside his girl, drained. He began to sob quietly. I turned to the water, which was almost boiling now, and gave the man what privacy I could.

  The woman returned just as the water boiled. Experience has taught me to always have someone, usually of the family, watching what I do for a patient. She may not have recognised the herbs but she at least could be drawn on to dispute any wild claims of black sorcery, which weren’t unheard of in Bordair, especially this far from the shore. She found a bowl and took to the task of helping the girl drink. The father watched mutely.

  ‘The infusion is best kept hot,’ I said, but neither were listening. Thinking to be helpful, I crossed the room and drew back the curtain a little – expecting to find a wood pile. Instead, I found a body laid on a funeral raft.

  ‘Sanga, no!’ the woman said. She was beside me in an instant, guiding me away from the curtain and over to the door. The father was wailing now: a guttural and animalistic sound that I normally associated with dire physical pain.

  I stood in the street, the nearby huts pressing in on me despite their odd silence, as the woman retrieved my bag. She pressed a penny into my palm, and I nodded.

  ‘Keep her drinking,’ I said.

  The noise of the father followed me down the street. I made sure I was always walking downhill, towards the shore, but I was soon lost among the twisting maze of bigger buildings. The sun was setting ahead of me, on the far side of the lake, and I stood in its last rays and simply enjoyed the feel of them on my face. Two children, a brother and sister, ran past me playing a game only they could know. They ran along the street, neither of them wearing shoes.

  My breath caught in my throat.

  The funeral raft, a common practice in Bordair, had been covered by a white sheet – not too unlike the kind I used. The mother lay beneath that sheet. I had been too surprised to realise, to properly see it, at the time.

  Her feet were blackened.

  *

  I cast around, trying to retrace my steps to the family’s hut, but all I managed was to lose myself more completely. Few candles or lamps were lit and in the growing darkness I couldn’t distinguish one street from another. I gave up. I turned downhill once more, but I was unable to avoid thoughts of the father and his likely dying daughter. I tried to lie to myself, to believe that it was just a regular fever and not the beginning stages of… of whatever this was. Whatever had killed Dahey and the girl’s mother. I had never been a good liar.

  I kept walking until I found a bar. Being in Bordair I didn’t have far to go. Ducking under the low mantle, I entered a steamy room half full of inked bargemen and women. A couple of bored whores nursed drinks. The barman didn’t look like the talkative type, so I took a small table near the back and drank until I couldn’t smell the boneset that lingered on my fingertips. Which meant I was three tankards the worse when the woman sat down opposite me.

  Initially I thought she was old. I was still young enough to consider grey hair the realm of the elderly despite finding them in my own mirror if I looked closely. Hers was long and wavy, held back with an ornate band. She wore a lot of rings and more than one scarf. I swore – a coarse word I won’t repeat here – and went to leave. But she took my hand with a strength that caught me off guard, and almost off balance.

  ‘Sit,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t need my waters read.’ I grabbed my genitals for emphasis. I was never good with ale.

  ‘I think you do, but I’m not here for
a reading.’

  My outburst had not gone unnoticed: the whores sniggered sloppily into their glasses. ‘Charging you extra, is she? Experience costs,’ one of them said, cackling.

  I sat down quickly, but the whore wasn’t finished. She rose, unsteady on her feet, and came towards our table. The water-reader turned to face the girl, who stopped dead as she realised, through her drunken haze, just what the woman really was: a lecanomancer.

  ‘You’re not wrong,’ the water-reader said.

  ‘Sorry, sorry, I didn’ know,’ the girl said. She made the sign of the Tear, bowed her head, and then gathered her companion to leave. The bar settled back to its anonymous hush.

  ‘Always gratifying to see respect from the younger generations,’ the water-reader said.

  ‘Respect and ignorance make for good bedfellows.’

  ‘Shall we fence a little more, or do you want to have a real conversation?’ she said.

  ‘By all means,’ I said.

  ‘You saw it again tonight, didn’t you?’ In a very deliberate manner she placed her hands flat on the table, as if she were attempting to divine something from the scuffed wood. Or, perhaps, from the wet ring my tankard had left there.

  ‘I’m sorry, just who are you?’

  ‘Mona,’ she said, with an air of finality that suggested I would need no more to place her.

  ‘And?’

  She made a tutting noise. ‘I crew with Captain Cope.’

  ‘Good day,’ I said, trying to leave for the second time.

  ‘Black feet,’ she said. ‘You saw it again, didn’t you?’

  ‘What of it?’ I rounded on her. ‘What do you know?’ I was yelling at the older woman. Nearby, bargemen put down their drinks and stopped their conversations.

  ‘The captain told you what was happening. She sent me to find you.’

  ‘She spoke madness,’ I said, lowering my voice.

  ‘It will only get worse.’

  ‘And whose piss did you stir to see that?’ I hissed, the effect slightly ruined by my nervous glancing at the big-handed men to my left.