“Creesjie?”
“My husband said he’d never…” She faltered. “He claimed he’d never killed anybody. He said the rituals were enough to drive Old Tom out.”
She took a fortifying breath and plunged onto the next name.
“‘Tukihiri was a master shipbuilder from foreign lands whose boats were lighter, swifter, yet stronger than our native Indiamen. An inspection by Christian shipwrights confirmed that only devilry could have kept them afloat, and sure enough, we found foul magics inscribed upon the hull. Tukihiri denied our accusations and died under questioning. His soul could not be saved.’”
Creesjie sat up abruptly and went to the porthole, her hand covering her mouth.
Sara finished her inspection of Isabel. “This child is lucky to have you as her mother,” said Sara, smiling at the girl. “Everything appears to be going well. We’ll keep watch on you throughout the voyage, but if you become uncomfortable, I have some tinctures that might help.”
Sara went to the desk and peered at the daemonologica.
The entries were written in English—a clumsy language stitched together from too many disparate parts to be elegant. Sara could speak it but uncomfortably, and she found herself mouthing certain words out loud.
She struggled to keep her temper as she read through accounts of interrogations and confessions, dry recitations of the horrors the witchfinder had seen and the horrors he’d perpetrated in response.
“He didn’t need a great deal of convincing, did he?” said Creesjie, who was hugging herself. “Have you reached the account of how he convicted Emily de Haviland simply because she denied being a witch? She was just a girl, Sara!”
Sara’s eyes found the account. “‘Naught but duplicity was to be found in her testimony, a lie atop a lie, disguising the devil within,’” she read out loud. “‘An exorcism was ordered and Emily freed of the demon, but it was too late. Hearing of the de Havilands’ dark deeds, a mob of villagers stormed the house, burning and killing, bringing a once great family to ruins.’”
Two more names followed: Hector Dijksma and Gillis van de Ceulen. Hector and Gillis had apparently survived their ordeals and went on to live happy lives.
Creesjie was shaking, tears rolling down her cheeks.
“I don’t recognize my husband in those pages,” she said, when Sara had stopped reading. “That wasn’t the man who came home to me. My Pieter could never have done those things. Not to Bastiaan Bos, or Tukihiri, or Emily de Haviland, or any of the others. My husband wasn’t a murderer.”
47
Captain Crauwels stared out the great cabin’s windows, his hands clasped behind his back, his fingers dancing in impatience. It was midmorning, but the Saardam, along with the rest of the fleet, remained at anchor.
The sea was growing rougher by the minute, the sky black above them. Rain was tapping the glass as lightning danced malevolently on the horizon. They couldn’t be at anchor when it fell on them. They’d be torn apart before they could get the sails up.
By rights, they should already have been trying to outrun it, but van Schooten was adamant they were returning to Batavia. For that, they needed the governor general’s wave, but he’d evidently decided to sleep in. The situation was so unusual, Chamberlain Vos had poked his head into his bedchamber a few times to make sure there was breath in him still.
The other captains had reacted with predictable fury to the order. Aside from sighting the Eighth Lantern, the rest of the fleet hadn’t reported any strange occurrences since departing Batavia, and they were eager to be on their way. They earned what they delivered to Amsterdam, and if they returned to Batavia, the cargo would spoil.
From behind him, Crauwels heard Vos cross the great cabin to knock on the governor general’s door, but it opened before he got there. Jan Haan emerged, blinking, into the light. He looked awful. Only four of the six leather buckles had been fastened on his breastplate, which hung crookedly over a shirt that hadn’t been tucked in. His bows were uneven, his hose rode up, and sleep sat in the corners of his red eyes.
“My lord.”
“Governor general.”
“Sir, we need to—”
Holding up a hand, he pointed to Vos groggily.
“Summarize,” he demanded in a voice that still hadn’t risen from bed.
“Captain Crauwels and Chief Merchant van Schooten wish to return the ship to Batavia, my lord.”
“No,” said Haan, yawning. “Have some breakfast sent up, Vos.”
“My lord,” interjected van Schooten. “Last night, the Eighth Lantern appeared again. When we tried to put a yawl in the water as you ordered, it slaughtered all our livestock.”
He spoke quickly but clearly. He was sober for once, realized Crauwels. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen van Schooten without a jug in his hand. Must have been about a week before they departed, when Guard Captain Drecht came aboard to do his inspection. Van Schooten was normally a lively sort of soul. Irritating, but often charming. Crauwels wondered what had happened to sour his disposition so.
Haan dropped into a chair, rubbing the bald patch on the top of his head. He still looked half asleep. “How were the livestock killed?” he asked.
“The leper, sir,” said Crauwels. “It slit their bellies open. Lieutenant Hayes found an altar it had built in the cargo hold yesterday. It’s already recruiting followers among the crew.”
“And how does returning to Batavia help us battle it?”
“We need to empty the ship,” said Crauwels. “Search every inch of—”
“If we do as you suggest, our cargo will spoil and this entire voyage will have been for naught,” interjected Haan. “I return to Amsterdam to join the Gentlemen 17, and I will do so in triumph. Not with an empty hold and a surplus of excuses.”
“Surely, sir, there are times when—”
“A few dead chickens and you’re ready to fly back to the nest?” interrupted Haan contemptuously. “From our past exploits together, I would not have believed you so fainthearted, Captain Crauwels.”
Crauwels bridled, but Haan tapped the table with his fingertip, ignoring him.
“If there is a demon stalking this ship, Arent will find it.”
The ship lurched beneath their feet, knocking Haan out of his chair and sending Crauwels and van Schooten banging into the table. No sooner had they picked themselves up than it happened again, but Crauwels was already stumbling toward the windows.
The ocean was choppy and white tipped, black clouds roiling across the sky.
“What’s happening?” demanded Haan angrily, as if his authority was being disrespected.
“It’s the storm I’ve been warning you about,” growled Crauwels. “It’s bearing down fast.”
“Then I suggest you raise sails and point us in the opposite direction, Captain,” Haan said.
Seeing the argument was lost, Crauwels strode out into the helm, snuffing out the candle in the alcove with his thumb and finger.
“Douse every light,” he commanded as Larme barreled through from the opposite direction. “Last thing we want is a fire needs fighting while we’re trying to keep the ship afloat.”
“What’s your order, Captain?”
“Full sail. We’re going to try and outrun the storm.”
48
The tempest stalked them like a wolf.
All day long, the Saardam tacked and jibed before hoisting full sail to career recklessly forward. So erratic was their course, Larme compared their route to a tangle of string, carelessly thrown down on a chart. But no matter their efforts, the storm was always at their back, its black mouth agape, lightning crackling.
The seas were rough and the weather foul, and even the sailors struggled to keep their footing. The nobles were ordered into their cabins and told to remain there until they were safely beyond the bad
weather. The passengers on the orlop deck were banned from coming on deck for fear the sea would drag them over the side.
One day became another and another. Crauwels was skilled enough to keep them just out of the storm’s jaws, but he couldn’t put it distant.
For two weeks, the tempest chased them with such an unerring fury that the crew began to see malice in it. Exhausted after their exertions, they would slump against the rigging at change of watch, fingering their charms, hoping this was the day they lost sight of the storm, as they’d lost sight of another ship in the fleet.
Their trepidation was felt in every corner of the Saardam. In the orlop deck, deadlights blinding the portholes, the passengers pressed themselves together and murmured prayers, while the nobles fretted in their cabins, their chests tight with worry.
On the quarterdeck, Captain Crauwels hurled curses into the wind, his anger growing in proportion to his fear. No matter how reckless the seafaring, no matter how brave the course taken, their pursuer was always at the same distance.
It was as if the storm had their scent, he raged.
The old sailors recognized it as something called down upon them. A curse that wouldn’t be satisfied until the whisper had its pound of flesh.
No wonder Sander Kers had been taken, they claimed. They had no love of holy men, but it couldn’t be a coincidence that he’d vanished moments before the storm hit. Arent Hayes had searched for him for three days, even as the unsteady ship knocked him over and hurled him into walls, but still he searched.
He could find no sign. Kers had disappeared as surely as if he’d never boarded.
The sailors thought the whisper had offered somebody a fortune to hack the predikant into pieces and give him to the ocean. Almost everybody had heard its jagged voice by now, offering its bargains in the night. Their heart’s desire for a favor, it promised. They were simple things for some. More dangerous for others. There seemed no pattern to what was asked and what was offered.
When they spoke of their offers in the morning, a few gripped tight their charms, warding off evil, but others went thoughtful, their eyes full of dreams. Why not? they wondered under their breath. What cost could be greater than what this life already asked of them?
From their duty stations, they stared at the aft of the ship, to the cabins where the nobles slept. What had they done to earn such plenty? They didn’t know how to stitch a sail or tack the ship. They were rich because their families were rich. Their children would be rich because they were rich. On and on in an endless loop.
By contrast, they were poor because they’d always been poor. They had nothing to look forward to and nothing to pass along. Wealth was a key and poverty was a prison, and they’d been born shackled through no fault of their own.
It was senseless and unfair, and mankind could withstand almost anything except unfairness.
Back and forth, they complained, stoking one another’s ire.
If this was God’s plan, then maybe Old Tom was worth listening to, because it couldn’t ask a greater sum for less reward than this. Besides, they might not have a choice.
It had called the Eighth Lantern to torment them, and now this storm was roaring at their backs. Even if they could outrun it, a leper roamed the cargo hold endlessly, scratching his mark into the crates. They’d caught glimpses of it. Tattered robes and bloody bandages. A solitary candle that would lead sailors through the labyrinth to an altar at the heart of the ship. No matter how many times the captain ordered it destroyed, the leper would rebuild it.
It was Bosey, they said. Others spat at that. Bosey was dead. They’d seen him on the docks. Watched him catch flame and be run through by Arent Hayes. But didn’t he drag his leg and smell of the privy? Didn’t he have business with this ship after what they’d done to him? After what Johannes Wyck had done to him?
Bosey or not, everybody was agreed that bad fortune followed in their wake. A cabin boy, an apprentice sailmaker, and a hornblower had already died in the dark. The cabin boy tumbled off a ladder and snapped his neck. The sailmaker and the hornblower died bloody. Slashed to pieces by each other’s daggers. Their hate had simmered for a while, but it was all coming out now.
Sailors spent too long down there came back different, they claimed. Distant somehow. Odd.
Of course, some had boarded like that. Not that it mattered. Rumor twisted tight around them all the same. It said they’d knelt at the altar and spoke their devotions.
Nobody would go near them.
Something was stirring in the dark water, the old sailors claimed. Something that called itself Old Tom.
49
“Two weeks like a damn fish on a hook and we’re finally being reeled in,” hollered Crauwels as the storm finally fell upon them.
His crew were exhausted. The fight was over. They’d tried everything, strained every muscle and sinew, but the storm had been unrelenting. He was proud of them, could ask no more. He wanted to say as much, but he couldn’t raise his voice above the wind.
Emerging onto the quarterdeck, Crauwels tipped his head to the sky. He was hard pressed to tell whether it was day or night. Gusts swirled and the rain battered down, bouncing ankle high off the decking.
“Can’t see a damn thing,” he complained to Larme, squinting through the sheets of rain at the blurred sails of the other ships in the fleet. Only three had managed to stay close to them during their maneuvers. Now he wished they hadn’t.
“Get down to the helm and point us wherever they ain’t,” he hollered. “If we hug each other in this storm, the wind’s going to smash us together.”
Larme took off like a fox, but as Crauwels tried to follow, the ship bucked beneath him, snatching the ground away. Flinging himself at a nearby railing, he managed to wrap his arms around it, watching as two sailors were tossed into the air, then slammed into the deck.
From amidships, the bell rang desperately.
Stumbling forward, Crauwels hauled a scared cabin boy from the nook he’d wedged himself into. “Get that bell muffled,” he screamed at him over the crashing waves. It was bad luck to let a bell ring by itself, everybody knew that. Should have been the first thing tended to when the sea got wild.
“Boatswain!” Crauwels yelled over the howling wind.
Johannes Wyck staggered onto the waist, clinging tight to a rope. “Captain?”
Crauwels put his mouth to his ear. “Any sailors not on duty are restricted to the orlop deck,” he ordered, wiping away the rain lashing his face.
Nodding, Wyck grabbed the two nearest sailors by the neck, shouting commands at them, then pushing them toward the hatches.
As white-tipped waves pummeled the deck with foamy water, Crauwels staggered into the great cabin where Arent was securing a deadlight that had come loose, revealing the churning water pressed flat against the glass outside. All the passengers had been confined to their quarters these last two weeks, but that was no use with Hayes. He came and went regardless of what was said. Crauwels knew for a fact he’d been between Sammy’s cell and Sara Wessel’s cabin with fair regularity, though he didn’t have much to say on either matter.
The ship tilted precipitously, crockery smashing.
“Hayes, I’ve a use for you,” said Crauwels, bracing himself against the wall. “I need strong arms on the bilge pumps. We’re taking on water quicker than we can rid ourselves of it.”
“I have to fetch Sammy first,” he hollered.
“The governor general said—”
“If he stays in that cell during the storm, he’ll be pulverized, and you know it.”
Crauwels tried to stare him down, but there was no use in that.
“He can wait on the orlop deck,” conceded Crauwels grudgingly. “Keep him out of the governor general’s sight. After that, the bilges.”
They departed the great cabin together. They’d only made it into th
e compartment under the half deck when the ship nearly toppled them. Using a workbench to get back on his feet, Crauwels stared past Arent toward the archway that led outside. Sara Wessel was staggering inside, Lia following.
He blinked, words deserting him. Sara had changed into peasant’s garb, her usual finery hacked away, replaced with a simple brown skirt, apron, linen shirt, and waistcoat. A cotton bonnet covered her head, and there was a dagger hanging on her waist.
She was soaked through. For the beautifully attired Crauwels, there could be no greater act of self-harm than dressing like a peasant.
“It’s too dangerous for you to be out of your quarters, my lady,” he yelled, having to shout it twice to be heard above the waves pounding against the deadlight.
“It’s dangerous everywhere, Captain, and I can help,” said Sara, bracing herself against the archway. “I’m a skilled healer, and people will need that skill before the day’s out. I’m going down to the sick bay.”
Arent stumbled toward Sara and handed her the key to his trunk. “Sammy’s alchemy supplies are inside. There’s a salve that smells of piss that’s good for healing.”
She touched his arm affectionately, tipping her mouth toward her ear. “Put Pipps in my cabin if you wish.”
He met her green eyes.
“How did you know I was going for Pipps?”
“Because he’s in danger,” she said simply. “Where else would you be going?”
“Keep your dagger in your hand,” warned Arent, holding her gaze. “There’s always somebody ready to take advantage of confusion.”
“I’ll be safe,” she said. “You try doing the same.”
The Devil and the Dark Water Page 27
