Call of the Bone Ships

by Rj Barker

  There had been no song under the sea at the bonefire. The dead knew no tunes and he had felt bereft, as if some part of him had been amputated.

  “Long enough now, Joron.” Meas’s voice from behind him, gentle. The merest touch on his shoulder. He turned to find her huddled into her stinker coat.

  “I do not need to be coddled, Shipwife,” Joron said, and pointed at the sandglass. “I have served barely half my watch.”

  “You should not be on watch at all, Deckkeeper,” she replied. “But I wish to talk to you in my cabin. I have a task for you that your wounds have you well suited for.”

  “Oh,” he said. Then he followed her through the ship. Across the ever-shifting deck, boots crunching on strewn sand. Down the stairs into the dark where the wanelights glowed and past the gullaime’s cabin door, slightly ajar, the latest of the crew’s offerings outside, a jumble of oddments piled on the deck.

  In her white cabin under the rump of the ship Meas sat before her wide desk and gestured for him to sit opposite. He did, shifting in the seat, trying to find a comfortable place on it.

  “We rescued one hundred and fifty-seven, as you know. The rest were taken by a brownbone named Toothless Longthresh. It made two trips, each one taking it away for two to four weeks. It also had gullaime aboard.”

  “It could have gone anywhere,” said Joron dolefully.

  “Ey, it could.”

  “We should have waited for it to return.”

  “I have given Coult that job, but he must also play kivelly and sankrey with the two-ribber which escaped Safeharbour. I have told him not to sacrifice his ship under any circumstances.”

  “I have never seen a man as fierce as Coult.”

  She grinned at him. “Ey, he is something to see, right enough. Condemned for striking a hagpriest, I believe. But that matters not. If what Toothless Longthresh does is secret, there’s a good chance it does not know the cargo’s final destination. It may simply meet another ship and offload to them.” She tapped the desk. “It is what I would do.”

  “Then our people are lost?” he said quietly.

  “Something terrible awaits our people, Joron, do not doubt it. Something terrible is happening.” She placed a hand flat in her desk. “The answer must be in Bernshulme.”

  He was about to tell her she was wrong, that Bernshulme was too dangerous after Safeharbour had been raided, but Mevans interrupted. He carried three drinks on a tray – two of alcohol for Meas and him, the third was Garriya’s foul concoction of old bread and water that she had demanded he continue to drink to keep his wound fresh. He knocked that back in one, let it slide down his throat and fought the urge to vomit as it was not considered polite or fleet to vomit all over your shipwife. Once the medicine was down he sipped at the alcohol to take away the taste, and he found the outrage that would have been in his voice at the thought of going to Bernshulme had fled somewhat and he could speak more calmly, think his words through a little more.

  “We should not go to Bernshulme, Shipwife, not if your mother knows you have betrayed her.”

  Meas sat back, ran a hand through her iron-grey hair.

  “I do not think my mother does,” she said. “None of our people I spoke to mention being asked about me, or about Tide Child. It may be my mother does not know or, at least, is not sure.”

  “Or does not want to admit,” said Joron.

  “Well,” Meas smiled across the desk at him, “I am glad to see the sword cut did not take your wits. No, it would be a blow to her authority to admit her daughter has turned full traitor, rather than just being a . . . well, a let-down.” He nearly asked it, at that moment, nearly let the words out of his mouth – What did you do? Why were you condemned to the black ships? – but he did not. Only waited on what Meas would say next. “But whether she knows or not does not matter, my mother does not trust me. I will be watched when we dock at Bernshulme, every step I take will be monitored.”

  “But mine will not?” he said.

  “Oh, you would be, but you will not be if you are ill and confined to the officer’s hagbower, up by the Grand Bothy.”

  “But I am not so ill, and I am deckkeeper on a ship of the dead, I will hardly be welcome . . .”

  “Of course you will not be welcome. But all officers have access to the hagbower, Joron, and as for not being so ill, well, you will just have to play-act a little. I will send Farys, Hastir and Anzir as your servants, and Mevans also.”

  “How will I get out of the hagbower without attracting attention?”

  “Well,” she said, “that is for you to work out once you get there. Mevans has plenty of contacts within the town. You will have to meet with Indyl Karrad. I know you would rather not, but it is necessary. If anyone can put us on the right track it is him.”

  “So, I must play the invalid, and at the same time be sprightly enough to escape the hagbower?”

  She nodded, a playful smile on her face. “I never said your life would be easy, Joron. But I expect you can use your people to do the running around, then you can handle anything that is truly important. I want you to meet with the crime lord Mulvan Cahanny too – little that happens at the docks gets past him – and try and get into the basement of the Grand Bothy and meet Yirrid, the chartmaster. If people are being taken somewhere then charts will have been needed. See if you can find out if there are areas my mother has been especially interested in. That may give us some sort of clue.”

  “Are there are any other well-guarded places I should not be that you would like me to get into, Shipwife?” he asked.

  “Not at the moment, Joron,” she smiled, “but when I think of them you will be first to know.”

  18

  The Invalid

  Joron watched Bernshulme coming into view from the rump of the ship where he sat, swaddled in warm clothes, as the pilot ship guided Tide Child to his berth. Their welcome had been as cold as ever, deckchilder and officers of other ships turning their backs on the condemned of the black ship. A note was delivered to Meas from the harbourmaster that made it plain none from the ship were to come ashore except the gullaime, which would be allowed to visit the windspire; lists of what they required would be taken and delivered (if possible) and, should Meas wish, her deckchilder could be put aboard the prison hulks. Meas showed it to Joron.

  “So, it seems my mother suspects,” she said, passing him the note. But lists of much-needed stores and supplies she always had on hand, and made sure she claimed a dire shortage of all things and requested far more than Tide Child required in the hope of getting half as much as was needed – such was the lot of a ship of the dead.

  But among those requests and notes was the important one, the one that had been closed with Meas’s seal and addressed to her mother. She doubted it would see her mother’s eyes, not once some low-level spy in Indyl Karrad’s service to the Thirteenbern had opened it and found it to be of no importance – only a request that her wounded officer be allowed access to the officer’s hagbower with his servants. And then, from there it would be passed on and stamped and an order returned – far more quickly than it would have been if Meas had put in the request normally, where low-level officers and administrators took great delight in making life difficult for those they saw as below them. Simply by skipping that one level with her seal Meas saved time, and that was time she so desperately wanted, needed.

  Joron had never thought of her as sentimental – if anything he thought of her as the opposite, as hard and as cold as a glacier – but that brownbone full of the dying had appalled her, and the idea that people she thought of as hers could be in a similar position gnawed at her. She was desperate to act, and he knew her infuriated that her mother’s power kept her on this ship and made her use proxies, though she fought not to show it. Meas stood beside him, almost vibrating with energy, with need, and unable to do anything but trust in Joron. In turn he knew that whatever came, whatever happened, he would die before he let her down.

  When had he beco
me this person?

  It had been hours since the lists and requests had gone in, sent well ahead of Tide Child who had sat at his seastay outside the harbour while ships and boats, of much less importance than a fighting ship, were let in and out of Bernshulme. As Joron watched, a boat left the quay – four hagpriests in the front, being rowed by a set of strong women and men straight for Tide Child. He felt another presence at his side and turned. Garriya, the old woman stared hard at him.

  “I don’t trust them, Caller,” she said. “You should not trust ’em either.” She produced a kivelly-skin flask from within the filthy folds of her clothes. “Take this, whatever filth they give you throw it away. One mouthful of my brew every day. Do that and you will continue to heal well and not die in the hagbower.”

  “You think they will poison me?”

  “Not intentionally” – she sniffed, spat on the slate – “but few who go into a hagbower come out.” She turned and watched the priests in the approaching boat. Black Orris fluttered down and landed on her shoulder.

  “Arse,” said Black Orris.

  “My thoughts too, bird.” Garriya turned, making her way down the deck toward the hatch and back to her place in the depths of the ship.

  “Make sure you look ill, Joron,” said Meas as the hagpriest’s boat bumped against the side of the ship.

  “I cannot help but do that, Shipwife,” he said.

  “I mean really ill,” she whispered. “They must not suspect.”

  He nodded but did not reply, as now the hagpriests stood before them, harsh-looking women. Generally they were women from among the Bern who had not had children, not been desperate enough to risk the dangerous gamble of childbirth in exchange for power, so the priesthood was the next best option. Each had a bone knife at their hip, as if they could be called upon to sacrifice a life for a ship at any moment.

  The leader of the four pointed at Joron. “This one is ours?”

  “Ey, he is my deckkeeper, Joron Twiner. A good officer and one I want back.”

  “That is for the Hag to decide. Can he get in the boat on his own?”

  Meas shook her head. “He took a bad sword strike to the back.”

  “The back, aye?” said the lead priest and her mouth curled up, making her look like a woman who had bitten into fruit only to find it rotten. “Well, I should not be surprised one of yours was running away.” Meas ignored the insult, though Joron saw Farys, stood behind the priests, stiffen and her hand went toward where her curnow would usually be hooked; he was glad she did not wear it that day.

  “We have rigged a crane to get him into your boat and, I say again, I want him back.” The priests ignored Meas. Then ignored him as he was lifted aboard their ship, ignored him as they rowed back to the quay, ignored him as they placed him in a cart and as they moved up through the town, and if they had wanted to make him feel unwelcome they could not have done better if they had used harsh words and beatings. In turn Joron ignored them – they were stonebound after all, what did their opinion matter?

  He studied the town. Bernshulme was different. It was as if the whole town was hungover, and more than that, it was like it had not only made itself ill through drink but spent the last of its wages on it and now wondered how it would eat. Flags were everywhere, coloured rags strewn between buildings – but they had clearly been there a while and were no longer bright and gay; instead they were dirtied, filthy, some missing from the strings so they looked like broken teeth in the slack jaws of the last fish in the market. In one square they passed through he saw what he imagined was meant to be an arakeesian but it had none of the wakewyrm’s majesty; it was a sad thing, made of once-fresh varisk and gion which, together with the forests around the town, was now slowly melting. The people that thronged the streets of Bernshulme, as they always did, moved out of the way of the priest’s cart and the strong men pulling it, but they had the air of people lost, broken, sad.

  He wanted to ask why, but was sure these sour-faced and cold hagpriests would not answer. So he sat back and watched the dejected town as they passed through it. Had there been some huge loss of ships and deckchilder? Had the Gaunt Islands taken the upper hand somehow?

  He did not know, could not. But curiosity burned within him and he would find out, he was sure of that. He was going to an officer’s hagbower – there would probably be little else to do during the days but gossip.

  Bernshulme’s hagbower stood next to the Grand Bothy, and was an easy building to miss as its more glamorous sibling stole the attention of all those approaching on the Serpent Road. Where the bothy was tall and flashy in its architecture, its dome rising far, far above, the hagbower was the opposite, low and old, its intricate stonework almost overtaken by green moss and white bird guano. Seagrass sprouted across the top of the hagbower and its roof was slowly being grassed over, helping to keep the heat in the long, low building. Meas had sketched out a map, showing how the hagbower was built into the island, and vanished within the rock. The rear of the building emerged around the curve of the island where its loading and unloading bay was out of sight of the town. “Better to hide the corpses coming out,” she had said. “Hagpriests hate to admit failure.”

  His stretcher was pulled from the cart and taken inside, which was dark and thick with the scent of sickness; that sweet stench, uncomfortable and cloying, filling his nose with thick and sickly purple and yellow scents. It was hot too – a fire burned at the far end and wanelights had been placed along the walls.

  The building was designed as one long corridor with rooms off each side. In the centre of the building it opened out into a larger space, lit with oil lamps, where a number of deckkeepers and deckholders lay around on couches. Each of them waxen or grey faced, depending on the colour of their skin – not one of them looked healthy or showed any interest in the new arrival. Then Joron’s group were back in the corridor on the other side of the space and he was hauled past three closed doors before arriving at an open one where they stopped. The seaguard who had been dragging Joron helped him up, efficiently, if not kindly, and showed him into the room. Two beds, one occupied by a woman who stared sightlessly at the ceiling above her. Between the beds was a bath for cold water treatments.

  “This is your room. Your companion is Deckkeeper Ashand, of the Storm’s Egg.” The hagpriest stared down at the woman. “She will not be your companion for long though. I would be surprised if she makes it through the night.” Turning back to him, the hagpriest continued, “If she survives there will be a cold bath for you both at first light and one at last light, to drive the sickness from you and promote healing. You may sleep or use the lounge if you feel able. Meals are provided, you must eat nothing else outside of what you are given. Your people will be made aware that they may not bring you food from outside. If they do then visits will no longer be allowed. Should you die, the fleet will cover your funerary costs, even though you are from a black ship.” With a glance, the hagpriest managed to ensure he knew his presence was a terrible affront to her. “By the head of your bed is a locker, please place your clothes in there and put on the gown folded on your pillow. Do you have any questions?” Joron shook his head, doing it slowly and managing to make it look like it took every last bit of energy he had. The hagpriest sighed. “Get his clothes off and redress him,” she said to the seaguard. Joron shook his head.

  “No,” he said, “I must do things myself if I am to ever improve.” He thought he sounded ridiculous, like the worst slatelayer trying to get out of an unpleasant duty, but the hagpriest did not seem to pick that up,

  “Well, if you are prepared to work for it then the maybe the Hag will not take you.” She stepped away from him. “May the Mother see you well and the Maiden grant you luck.” With that she shut the door and left him with the glow of the wane-light and a dying woman. A chair stood by the foot of each bed and he lifted his foot, undid his boots then carried them to the other end of his bed and the small cupboard that could be locked and unlocked with an iron k
ey. He opened it, put his boots in, removed the flask that Garriya had given him from inside his shirt and placed it in his left boot. No doubt the hagpriests that ran this place had keys to the lockers; he hoped they were not in the habit of searching them and that if they were that hiding the flask in his boot would be enough to stop it being found. Then he changed out of his clothes. Even in the dim light of the room he could see stains on his gown from the previous owner.

  “Death is hard to wash away,” he said to himself as he sat on the bed, staring at the shape of the woman under the blankets opposite him. She had lost a foot and he felt sorry for her, she was done in the fleet now. If she was lucky and her family had money maybe they would look after her; if not then whatever she had saved from her time as deckkeeper may keep her from the street for a while, but not forever. Life was hard in the Isles.

  Her lips moved. He went to her.

  “Water?” he said, finding a jug by the bed and pouring some into a cup. Her head rolled from side to side on the pillow.

  “Don’t,” she said, “don’t . . .” Sweat stood out on the dark skin of her brow and her hand fell from beneath the blanket that covered her. He took it. Held it.

  “I am here,” he said. “My name is Joron.”

  “Don’t,” she said again, and she turned her face toward him though she looked into somewhere else. “Don’t.”

  They were interrupted by a hagpriest, much younger than the one who had brought him here. She carried a jug and two cups with her, smiled at him, and though she was young and showed no scars of birth, she was still attractive.

  “Deckkeeper,” she said, “I am glad you had the energy to dress yourself, we do not have as much help here as we may wish.” He bowed his head, so she could not see his eyes and prick the lie from them.

  “It was a struggle, but I fear my room-mate struggles more. She seemed in some distress.”