The Bone Ship's Wake

by Rj Barker

  On the slate of Tide Child it was as if the storm had never been. Farys stood on the rump and the wings were full, for a brisk wind pushed the black ship merrily through the water. Stinker coats were gone, instead the crew wore lumpy cold weather coats stuffed with down, lethal in high seas as when soaked they became heavy quickly, but warm and perfect for a clear day when the winds were cold.

  They flew south on winds Aelerin called the dancers, promising all would remain clear and fast for at least a week. Joron found himself forgetting the seriousness of their situation. On their second day a call went up, a call once heard often, then not at all and now becoming more common once again.

  “Keyshan rising!” A thrill went through him at that, and he tried not to notice how the crew looked to him at those words. How smiles were exchanged, how deckchilder nudged one another and he tried to pretend he knew nothing of their belief that the keyshans came to him, though he knew he had not called this one. But the childish excitement within him was the same as that felt by every other member of the crew. Up the rigging he went, past the booming and cracking black wings until he found himself in the tops with Bearna.

  “Where is it, Topboy?” She pointed off to seaward, four points off the shadow and Joron followed her gaze. Seeing the first chunks of floating ice out in the blue, blue sea. He didn’t see the keyshan at first, a matter of scale more than anything. The keyshans he’d seen before had been huge, as big as islands. This one was smaller, the smallest he’d seen though still far larger than Tide Child. Maybe three or four times as long as the ship, and thinner than the larger keyshans. Even from here he could see the burning white eyes on the long thin head as it breached, not jumping from the water, only lazily breaking the surface, head first, jaws open. It was a deep and luminous blue colour, like the heart of an ice island. He watched it as it rolled, a flipper out of the water in an arc of white froth, bright blue belly showing, colours flowing down it, second flipper out the water and then, as if pleased to have showed off for him, the keyshan vanished beneath the waves.

  “Sea sither happy.” He turned to find the Gullaime next to him.

  “A young one, do you think?”

  “All sea sither old.” The Gullaime hopped across the tops, catching on to the rigging with a wing claw and hanging there. Opening its predatory beak. “Some not big old.” From the deck below he heard a squawk of outrage and looked down to see Madorra spinning round on the slate. Snapping at any deckchilder that came near. “Bad windshorn,” said the Gullaime quietly, then let itself drop, catching a rope on the way, swinging to another and seeming to almost float its way down to the deck where Madorra screeched and chattered and snapped at it before chasing it to the hatch and into the belly of the ship.

  “There’ll be an extra tot of shipwine for you, Topboy,” said Joron. “Keep your good eyes open.” Then he made his way carefully down the rigging, the stump of his leg aching where it met the bone of his spur.

  He had taken the sighting of the keyshan to be a good omen, though maybe it was presumption. They flew on undisturbed for three weeks until a cry from the topboy came. He was in his cabin, rubbing one of Garriya’s foul-smelling salves into the stump of his leg while Mevans cleaned the socket of his spur and Cwell sharpened his sword.

  “Ship rising!”

  “Hag’s breath,” said Joron. “I would pay my other leg for that to be Brekir, or some other friend to us.”

  “Given how you complain about having one leg, D’keeper,” said Mevans, “I am not right sure anyone else would agree with that.” Cwell supressed a laugh and Mevans pushed the cushioning more securely into the spur. “Now, let me strap you up.” The strapping done, his warm coat on, Joron went up to the deck and found Farys and Jennil on the rump, talking with Solemn Muffaz.

  “Report, Farys,” he said. She turned, gave a brief salute and passed him his nearglass.

  “Ship rising, D’keeper,” she said. “Almost directly behind us, three spines of a four-ribber.”

  “Keyshanpike, you think?”

  “I reckon so, D’keeper,” said Jennil. She had a new cut on her cheek, deep and sewed neatly with black thread by Garriya. Had taken the wound during the storm and he knew it must hurt when she spoke but she did not seem to care. “Either that or we are fair unlucky to find a different Hundred Isles ship.”

  “Hag’s breath,” he said. “I had thought we lost him in the storm.”

  “Well, he still has a lot of water to cover to catch us.”

  “Ey,” said Joron, raising the nearglass to his eye and tracking along the horizon until he found the ship. “But if it is the same ship that chased us before then we know he flies well.” He closed up the nearglass and passed it back to Farys. “Keep watch on it, let me know how quickly he gains.” He looked around and did a mental tally of what they had left in the hold. “I will need to speak to Aelerin but there is no great hurry yet. I’ll do a round of the ship first.”

  “I’ll have the map table set up,” said Cwell quietly from behind him.

  “Did it not go over the side?”

  “Mevans says he forgot all about it and Hedre claims to have never even seen it before.” Joron nodded.

  “Probably for the best,” he said. “I will see you in my cabin.” Though of course he rarely truly saw her, she was simply always there. His shadow, as much a part of him as his hand. A thing he only gave thought to when he needed her and sometimes he thought it strange, that this once rebellious woman, so eager to stamp out her place in life, had found some measure of peace in barely existing at all. Stranger still how completely he had come to trust her.

  So he did his rounds, found all was as good as it could be: the smashed rear rail had been fixed by his bonewrights, a small miracle considering how few supplies remained, and the gallowbow, Savage Arrin, had been returned to its customary place on the deck. He complimented those he saw working well, frowned a little at those he thought slacking – it was rare that more was needed – and finished his walk around the ship in slow order, better to give Mevans and Cwell and Aelerin time to set up the map table. When he no longer had any reasonable excuse, and began to think his presence there may affect the authority of Jennil, he went below into the darkness, navigating sleeping bodies by wanelight, to think about his next course of action.

  In his cabin – the windows back in place, light streaming in – if he squinted, he was sure he could see the boneship following them as a dot on the horizon. Farys, Mevans and Cwell waited patiently behind the map table while Aelerin bent over it, their small models of ships set out.

  “Do you have good news for me, Aelerin?” he said.

  “Maybe,” said the courser. “The weather dreams true for the next few weeks, blue and clear.”

  “Benefit to them, not us,” he said, glancing out of the window at the barely perceptible dot between sky and sea. Did he really see it, or just feel it as a pressure between his eyes?

  “We could turn and fight,” said Farys. “One on one there are none on the sea can match us.”

  “True,” he said quietly, felt Mevans’s eyes on him. “But Tide Child suffered in the storm and our mainspine is still weak, Farys, we all know it. Mevans has a list of repairs longer than a keyshan and we take on water more quickly than I would like. Colwulf says the bonewrights struggle to keep up with the leaks. And, of course, most of our spares and supplies went over the side.” He looked around the table at those gathered. “We must run, like it or not.” Farys nodded, stepped back, disappointment on her face. “Aelerin, can we make Wilson’s Cut before we are caught?”

  “If our pursuer was damaged by the storm, maybe. But if he weathered it well and can make the same sort of speed he kept before? Then he will catch us.”

  “Well, Farys,” said Mevans, “seems you may get your fight.”

  “It’ll not go well,” said Cwell. “We have precious little ammunition for the gallowbows.”

  “We cannot fight,” said Joron. “It is that simple. We need ano
ther option.”

  “There is another option,” said Aelerin, “but none will like it.”

  “What is it, Courser?” said Joron.

  “Spantonnis Bank.” They pointed at the map table. A moment of silence in the cabin. He heard feet on the deck above, the brushing of the slate as it was cleaned, women and men shouting to one another.

  “Bank is haunted by the Hag-cursed,” said Farys quietly. “All know it, none will want to go there.”

  Aelerin nodded.

  “That is what is believed,” said Mevans, “’tis what all aboard will say, but they will follow you there if you tell ’em to, D’keeper, like it or not.”

  “It will be a near run thing anyway,” said Aelerin, and they touched the map, a line of blue in the south. “We’ll run from him; it’s three days at least with the wind as it is. We’re making poor speed with all the water we take on and even if we slow no further we may still have to push the gullaime until they’re good for nothing but crying in their nests.”

  “D’keeper,” said Farys quietly, “I do not want the ghosts to take me.” Then she spoke even more quietly. “Can you not sing that keyshan we saw to our aid?” She looked up, and he saw fear in her eyes like he had not seen since she faced fire for him, long ago now.

  “I cannot bring the keyshans, not the way you think. And if I could, then to do it would put the shipwife’s life in such danger that it must be the very last thing I do.”

  Farys stared at him, her burned skin tight across her face, fear in her eyes.

  “I heard tales of the bank, D’keeper, ships vanish. Others float out but with nothing living on board. They say those taken will never know the warmth of the Hag’s fire, ’tis well known.”

  Joron’s words stuck in his throat; he knew what he wanted to say but the same fear that gripped Farys squatted in his damaged vocal cords.

  “It is not ghosts, Farys,” said Aelerin gently. “The bank is where the cold water meets a warm current coming from the east, the same current we ride now. That and the air brought with it creates a fog bank that never moves.”

  “Ey, well, I do not know what coursers know,” said Farys, “but what then of these ships that vanish, or come out with none left alive on ’em?”

  “I know why they vanish,” said Aelerin, more forcefully. “Behind that bank of fog, and hidden within it, is where the ice mountains start. Great floating islands of ice. Ships go in under full wing, too fast to stop and then wreck themselves as they are not fully prepared. Too afeared of ghosts to go slow they try and speed through and pay the price.”

  “Don’t their coursers warn them?” said Farys.

  “Not all shipwives listen,” said Aelerin, but Joron could tell Farys was not placated, she wrapped her arms around herself, staring at the line of blue-painted bone that represented Spantonnis Bank.

  “And what of the ships that come out empty, ey?” she said. “What of them?”

  “I do not know,” said Aelerin quietly, and Joron wondered whether this course they set was just too much for Farys, so brave and true in the face of so much.

  “I know,” said Mevans, smiling but strong and sure in voice.

  “You do?” said Farys.

  “Ey,” he said, “and so do you.”

  “I do?”

  “Ey, you who would charge a line of deckchilder armed with wyrmpikes and think nothing of it. You who will balance on the tip of the mainspine and laugh at those who fear heights. You, who will fight your way across a deck awash with fearsome water simply to tie a needed rope, ey, you know why those ships come out empty. For you show us right now, and you shame yourself with it, lass, for I thought you better.” She stared at him, and Joron thought that if she had a curnow at her side she would have drawn it. She reminded him so much of Meas in that moment that it made his heart ache. Not just the desire to answer an insult with strength, but that she took that extra moment to think it through, to follow Mevans’s line of thought and come to her own conclusion.

  “You think,” she said slowly, “it is fear emptied those ships?”

  “Ey,” said Mevans. “For not all are as strong in heart as you, Farys. A fearful crew throws over its shipwife ’cos it thinks the ship haunted by a bit of fog. Takes to the boats in frozen seas and becomes prey for every longthresh that ever swum the bloody waters.”

  “Ey,” she said, and swallowed, “I can see how that could happen. But not to a ship like Tide Child, ey?”

  “Never,” said Joron, “and not with women and men like you aboard him, Farys.” She nodded.

  “Well then,” she said, and stood a little straighter, “if the courser plots a course I will go let the crew know where we head, for I reckon there will be some soft hands need held, and some heads need knocked together when they find out, and I am just the officer to do it.” She nodded. “And you can spray a little paint on that, ey.”

  “Ey Farys, that would be time well spent,” he said and watched her leave. When she was gone he turned back to the map, stared at the blue mark of Spantonnis Bank.

  “Let us plot our course, then,” he said, and did not speak a word of ghosts, for like every deckchild he feared that to mention them was to invite their attention.

  15

  In the Deeps, the Most Blue Ice

  He dreamed of the cold.

  He dreamed of it enveloping him as he moved through the deep darkness.

  He dreamed of the songs of his sisters from far away, a haunting melody that echoed around him, surrounded him, informed him. He heard the counterpoint roar of his massive heart as it spread fire throughout his body and chased away the icy touch of the deep water.

  He dreamed of a hundred thousand hurts, all over his body from the cruel oceans and all that lived within it, all shaken off with barely a thought and a flip of his powerful tail.

  He dreamed of a terrible hunger that gnawed within him, a hunger that only grew. That filled him with cold the same way his heart filled him with heat, and in the song of his sisters he heard that hunger sated, of hunts completed, of wounds taken, of joy in battle, of flesh in jaws.

  He dreamed of a warmth to come. Of fire and change and warm oceans. He had dreamed for so long that nothing was clear any more; his dreams were memories of other’s dreams, and theirs memories of others, and he half remembered a time when the water was not full of hate and the sithers moved in vast schools through air and water alike.

  He woke to the damp and the cold of his cabin and a vague sense of disappointment in his own small and broken body. A moment of confusion, of worry that his mind was going. Then who he was asserted itself. There was a duty to be done, tasks that must be carried out, a truth that must be confronted. He rubbed his face. Carefully slid himself over the side of the hammock, feeling that familiar disappointment when he saw his missing leg.

  Mevans had left out water and a rime of ice covered the surface. He hopped over to it, using the walls of his cabin to balance, never looking out the windows. He splashed water on his face – shockingly cold, making him gasp, then gasp again with pain as the cold water set the sores around his mouth aflame. When the pain had receded he reached for his bone spur, lovingly cleaned and maintained by the steward, found Cwell already there with it. She helped him strap it on. He felt more whole then. More himself. Then he dressed, one boot on, his tunic and fine fishskin jacket. Cwell shaved him and wrapped the scarf around his face that hid the marks of the rot. One-tail hat upon his head. Only then did he feel ready and whole enough to turn and look out of the windows.

  There he rose, Keyshanpike, white as fear with corpselights dancing around his rigging. The shipwife on the beak, leaning into his direction of travel, pointing at Tide Child as the ship smashed through the waves.

  “You fly your ship well, shipwife,” Joron said to the figure. “But I hope to fly mine better.”

  He went up on deck. Never once letting his eyes stray past the rump of Tide Child. The cold air bit, bringing a flush to his dark skin, and all around h
im deckchilder were busy salting and brushing the slate to keep it free of ice. They had crossed into climes where ice became a real problem, a creeping, slow weight that hampered the running of the ship, that solidified ropes, snapped wings, made fingers numb and climbing the rigging dangerous. Tide Child sparkled with it, icicles hanging from spars and rails, and the clearing of the ice was a constant job, unpleasant and tiring. A thin line of smoke escaped the galley to be whipped away by the wind. A welcome sight for most on deck as it meant there would be warmed shipwine to hold in freezing hands and to fire the body from within.

  A call of “D’keeper” came from behind him and he turned, careful not to acknowledge the chasing ship, not yet. Yerffoeg, one of the wingwrights, held out a cup of steaming shipwine in hands wrapped in rags against the cold. “I thought you may need this to warm ’ee up a little, ey?”

  “Thank you, Yerffoeg,” he said. She was shivering, and no doubt needed the drink more than him, but to reject this act of kindness would be to insult her and he recognised that. Besides, he was truly thankful as he closed his hands around the warm stone cup. “Been up the rigging this morran?”

  “Ey, ’tis foul slippy up there, we been chipping ice all night and it won’t stop until we’re well north of this place.”

  “Well, get you to the galley for another drink, and spend some time before the fire to warm yourself through.” Yerffoeg nodded, though it was difficult to tell – like them all she was a strange-looking human now, her body a series of ungainly lumps where clothes had been stuffed with whatever rags could be found to keep away the cold. “Solemn Muffaz!” he shouted, and the deckmother made his stately way down the deck, to stand before him.

  “Your orders, D’keeper?” Joron stared out over the sea before him, Skearith’s Spine to landward, a distant line of black teeth on the horizon. Before it a hundred smaller teeth of ice, all white as bone and all sharp and hard enough to tear the hull from beneath them. Each one floating, directionless, and far bigger below than above. On the horizon before them he could see a line of white fog, the edge of Spantonnis Bank. He tried to estimate how far away it was and how long it would be before they breached the ghostly mist, but knew how confusing it could be to judge distance by eye. Better to wait for Aelerin. Joron turned his gaze back to Solemn Muffaz.