by Dan Abnett
On the eighth day after the test, Guido had taken the Demiurge out for the first time, into the sound, for trials and sea-drills. Newly cleaned and painted, with clean sheets as white as the clouds, it made a splendid sight as it swept majestically out of the harbour. No longer was it the dark hulk, the false Kymera, that had faced them down at Angel’s Bar.
Sesto had kept himself to himself, spending time in the library of the palacio as the Marquis’ guest, studying almanacs and waggoners and other rare volumes concerning the nature of the sea and all that is in and under it. His escort was Captain Hernan, who proved to be a man of immense wit and fine learning. Hernan eagerly assisted Sesto in his endeavours to discover if any clue to the nature or sorcery of the Butcher Ship might be contained in the marquis’ priceless collection.
Only once, as they paused in their scholarly work and took a glass of jerez, did Hernan raise any protest.
“My lord,” he said to Sesto, “how can you sail with a bastardo like Silvaro? You seem to me a gentleman of fine manners and noble birth. Yet you consort with the Hawk himself.”
“Luka is a dangerous man, captain,” Sesto conceded, “but this is dangerous work. What is the saying… I’m sure you have it here… ‘Set a reiver to catch a reiver’?”
Hernan nodded. “And a daemon to catch a daemon?”
“I understand your animosity, captain. Gods know, it is justified. But it has been my experience that to know Luka Silvaro is to know an honourable man.”
“He is a pirate, sir.”
“Yes, he is a dog of Sartosa. But if all pirates were like him, they would not have earned the name of dogs.”
Spending his days at the palacio, dining with Hernan, or the marquis, or both, Sesto returned to the Rumour only to sleep. The marquis had offered him accommodation for his stay, but Sesto had developed a strange yearning to sleep on the water within the oak embrace of the ship.
On the seventh night after the test, late, after the midnight watch-bell, he had started up from his cot at the sound of screams. Grabbing up a cutlass, he ran down the lamplit companionway in his night shirt. The screams were coming from Roque’s quarters. Men had gathered, sleepy and alarmed, Ymgrawl amongst them.
“Stand thee back,” Ymgrawl said.
“Get to my heel,” Sesto ordered firmly, and opened the door himself.
In Roque Santiago Delia Fortuna’s small cabin, a lamp was still lit. By the light of it, Sesto could see the lean Estalian on the floor, wrapped in his sheet, twitching and clawing at the deckboards as if gripped by some terrible nightmare.
“Roque?” Sesto hissed, shoving back the men who crowded in behind him. “Roque Delia Fortuna?”
Roque screamed again, and the scream turned into a gurgle. He fell limp, then looked up at Sesto blearily. “What? Who comes here?”
“You cried out, sir,” Sesto replied.
“I did?”
“Aye, loudly, as if a sea daemon had thee in his red-hot pincers,” Ymgrawl said.
“Get back to your berths,” Sesto ordered. “You too, Ymgrawl. Go dream of sugar-dusted pastries.”
The men shambled away. Sesto closed the door, and poured two glasses of rum from a flask on Roque’s table, as the master-at-arms clambered back into his crumpled bedding. Sesto handed one to Roque. The Estalian was rubbing his left shoulder, where the daemon’s talon had punctured it on the Isla Verde.
“Bad dreams?” Sesto asked.
“Bad dreams, sir,” Roque replied, sipping his rum. “Every night, it seems, though tonight must be the first wherein I have cried out and woken the company.”
“What do you see, in these dreams?”
Roque shook his head. “I have not the words, Sesto. No words to do it justice. Blood, there is blood. Pestilence. I see the future, I think. Fire and sword, fire and sword. Wholesale war. And darkness. Such suffocating darkness. Is that what is to come, Sesto? A grim darkness of the far future where there is only war?”
“I know not,” Sesto said.
Roque shuddered. “Worst of all, there is a dryness.”
“What?”
“In my nightmares, a cloying dryness of sand and dust and desiccated life. Like the dry soil of an old tomb. It pours into my mouth, my nose, my ears, burying me, burying me for untold centuries. I wizen and shrivel, my sinews crack like hearth wood. I… thirst.”
“Bad dreams indeed. The worst of mine usually involve me discovering I am stark naked in the middle of the Grand Summer Dance in front of a thousand grandees of Tilea.”
Roque sniggered. “I would not wish my dreams on anyone.” He rubbed his shoulder again. “Sesto,” he said, “I believe I may be cursed.”
“Cursed how?” Sesto asked innocently.
“By the daemon on the Isla Verde. By the thing that was Reyno Bloodlock. The Butcher Ship had transformed him, and in turn, he left his mark upon me, deep in my flesh.”
“Tende cut it out…”
“The talon, not the curse. I am damned, Sesto. Every night, the dreams haunt me, dragging me into the sand and the dry dust. I sometimes wonder if it would be for the best for Luka to shoot me dead, or maroon me on some barren atoll where I might harm no one but myself.”
Sesto refilled their glasses. “Ymgrawl says every man of us is cursed. He says that it is the natural state for men of our breed.”
Roque peered at Sesto in the golden lamplight. “The boucaner says that? Well, he’s an old dog and a knave, and I would take a pinch of both snuff and salt before I believed any of his words.”
“He’s not seen me wrong yet,” Sesto said quietly.
Roque sat up straighter on his bolsters. “So, you think I’m cursed?”
Sesto shook his head. “I’m just saying, Ymgrawl believes we all are, in our particular ways.”
“Like Belissi, with his mother mine?” Roque laughed. “Our lives are tormented by superstition and charms, Sesto. If Belissi feels better about a voyage just because he tosses a false leg over the taffrail at embarkation, good luck to him. Some men favour gold in the ear, others a garnet worn on the trigger finger and—”
“I know, I know. Perhaps, then, some curses are worse than others.”
Roque stared at him. “What do you know?”
“I don’t know if I should tell you this,” Sesto said. He paused. “No, in fact, I think I must.”
“What, sir?”
“At Porto Real. That horror we endured at the governor’s mansion.”
“What of it?” Roque asked quietly.
“You were drugged, sir, and you did not witness it. But the monster preyed upon you too, as it had done on our brothers at arms. It meant to drink your blood.”
“It… bit me?”
Sesto nodded. “It did.”
“I wondered. I had a raw wound in my throat. I thought it was from the swordplay.”
“No, sir. Gorge bit you and… and he rejected you. He howled that your blood was tainted, spoiled. It made him vomit.”
Roque rose to his feet and poured another glass with a shaking hand. “Who knows this?” he snapped.
“Myself, and Sheerglas. Only the two of us, and we have not spoken of it to any man.”
“My blood is so foul a vampyr would not drink it?” Rogue said, distantly.
“Or too noble, perhaps?” Sesto suggested.
Roque smiled at the effort, but the smile was thin. “I’ll sleep now, Master Sciortino. Go back to your rest. Please, I implore you, speak of this to no one. I will find the measure of my curse and decide what to do. Luka, especially, don’t tell him. I need his trust.”
“I understand.”
Sesto put down his glass and moved to the door.
“Sesto?”
“Yes, sir?”
“In it all, in the midst of it, the hack and cut, if you see me… wavering. Wavering or hesitating. Please, make you strike sure and clean.”
“I will, Roque,” Sesto promised, and let himself out.
On the tenth day after the test, Sest
o rose and dressed, and considered taking a carriage up to the palacio. But he knew Silvaro was due to return, and thus lingered on the quayside, watching the city armorers load cannon, shot and powder kegs onto the Demiurge.
And that was how he came to encounter Guido Lightfinger, face to face.
“We have not yet had the opportunity to become acquainted, Master Sciortini,” the voice said.
Sesto turned and found himself facing Guido and his entourage of senior crewmen, who had been promenading on the dock.
“Master Lightfinger,” Sesto bowed.
Guido waved his men on and remained with Sesto. He held out his claw of a right hand and Sesto took it gingerly.
“My brother sets a great store by you,” Guido said, conversationally.
“Yes, master.”
“Guido, please. We’re all of the company here. I understand you are our passport to amnesty and reward?”
Sesto shrugged. “I serve my duty, as given to me by the Prince of Luccini. I am merely the witness to the bond of the letters of marque and reprisal. I am no one special.”
Guido laughed. “I beg to differ, Giordano Paolo. Ah, the look on your face! Secrets don’t remain secrets long amongst a company of pirates, princeling. It pays to have spies everywhere. These things you will learn if you consort with Sartosans long enough. But, be assured. I mean you no hurt. Why, you are the very mascot, the trophy of our endeavours. Without you, we Reivers will not be able to claim our grand reward! Master Sesto, look not so abashed. I, and the men under my command, will guard your life with our very blood, if needs be.”
“I thank you for that, sir.”
“So you do, so you do. Well, ‘Sesto’, what think you of the Demiurge?”
Sesto regarded the great barque hauled up at the quayside, the armorers hoisting powder kegs up into the waiting arms of the deck crew.
“A very fine fighting man-o-war, sir,” Sesto said.
“Isn’t it?” Guido smiled. “I do so like to show it off. I’d enjoy parading it to you, sir. Would you take supper with me this evening, aboard? I have retained a rather fine cook from the kitchens of the Palacio, and he promises to serve a fine lamb stew, wafer bread and blackened lobsters, set in their cases with cream.”
“Well, that’s very tempting, sir.”
“I insist!” Guido said. “I absolutely insist. We dine at the end of dogwatch. Please, I hope you’ll come.”
“Then I will come too,” Ymgrawl said.
“No.”
“No? Why no?”
“Because he’s invited me as an honoured guest and you—” Sesto’s voice trailed off.
“I’m but bilge-dregs. I understand that, right enough.”
“It’s not like that,” Sesto protested. “I can take care of myself.”
Lamps were twinkling in the dusk all along the quayside as Sesto walked to the Demiurge’s boarding ramp.
The sound of jigs and reels issued forth from the taverns along the dockside, and riotous laughter dribbled out like the last bubbles of air from the lips of a drowning man. The night air was scented with pork fat, roasting mutton, paprika and ale.
At the foot of the ramp, Curcozo was waiting for him. The big man executed a little bow.
“Come aboard, sir,” he said in low, mellow tones. “The master awaits.”
Sesto followed the master mate up the ramp and into the belly of the Demiurge. Voices were singing drunkenly from down below, and the smell of stove smoke drifted down the low From the brow of the road, Luka had a good view of the Aguilas harbourside, glittering with lights. Even from this distance, he could make out the faint refrains of tavern music on the hot night wind.
Something was wrong. He could taste it. He could—
Down below, in the harbour, there was a sudden bright flash, a huge wash of orange flame. A moment later, the thump of the blast came to him on the air.
Luka cried out and spurred his tired horse on down the roadway, urging it into a gallop. Behind him, Casaudor and the marine guardsmen did likewise.
Flames lit up the dockside below him, flames that were suddenly quenched. Luka saw his precious Rumour foundered against the quay, half-sunk. Steam and smoke came boiling out of its underside, flaring white in the evening sky. There were only two ships at the quayside. The Safire, and the ailing Rumour.
Luka glanced east, and saw the Demiurge making fine sail out of Aguilas Bay, past the anchored Fuega, out into the sound with full sheets, heading towards the setting moons.
“Guido!” Luka yelled. “You bastard! Guido! I’m going to follow you to hell for this! To hell and back!”
XXII
A powder charge had been used to hole the Rumour below the water-line. Scuppered, she slumped in the water at an angle, beside the dock. Steam still rose from her hatches. She would not be going anywhere for a good while.
Luka dismounted, threw his reins to Duero, and walked slowly towards the Rumour, ignoring the commotion and the figures dashing around him. Bells were ringing, and the city guard had been raised. Members of the Reivers company, summoned from taverns and stews, joined their captain to stare in disbelief at the crippled brigantine.
This was infamy. Guido had surpassed himself. To steal the Demiurge and fly was crime enough, but Guido Lightfinger, knowing his half-brother would come after him, had purposefully wounded the Rumour so she could not sail.
Luka was shaking with rage, and there was worse to come.
“He hath taken Sesto,” Ymgrawl said. The gnarled boucaner was clutching a bloody wound on the side of his head.
“What?”
“Sesto was aboard the Demiurge,” Ymgrawl replied. “I could not stop him.”
“What happened to you?” Silvaro asked.
“That bastard Curcozo happened,” the boucaner said bitterly.
“Silke! Silke!” Silvaro yelled into the smoky darkness. The master of the Safire appeared, clearly agitated by the night’s events.
“Make the Safire ready to sail. At once, you hear me?”
“Yes, Luka,” Silke nodded, and began shouting orders to his men.
“You’ll take the Safire after Guido?” Roque asked.
“It’s a damn fast ship. With luck, I might catch the Demiurge up, despite its lead.”
“And then what?” Roque asked. “The Safire cannot take on a barque that size alone.”
“It can and it will,” Silvaro snapped. “I’ll find a way. Roque, with the fury I have inside me right now, I could take the Demiurge with just a longboat and a pistol.”
Roque raised his eyebrows. “I don’t doubt it, Luka,” he said.
Luka turned away and began to pace, his mind racing. What truly troubled him was not Guido’s treachery—he knew what the man was capable of. The hurt Luka felt was the mystifying betrayal of the sea itself. They had conducted the test, and the sea had judged Guido trustworthy. Had the sea lied, or had Guido found some way to cheat even the rolling, eternal waters? And if the former was true, then the sea and King Death had deserted Luka Silvaro entirely.
“Assemble a company of men-at-arms, under your command,” Luka said to Casaudor. “You’ll come with me aboard the Safire. Roque, take charge of things here. See what you can do to get the marquis’ help in making swift repairs on the Rumour.”
Roque nodded, though he knew such work would be a serious undertaking. Their beloved Rumour might even be beyond saving.
“I will come with thee,” Ymgrawl said to Silvaro. It wasn’t a request. It was a statement of intent. “I have business with Curcozo.”
It was another three hours before the Safire cast off and sped away into the night. There was a good wind, and Silke ordered the crew to rig not only the main sail, but also the great lateen, which ran off the long bowsprit.
Making great speed, the water hissing off her white bows, the Safire shot out into the open sea like an arrow from a longbow.
The next day was half over when Sesto awoke. His head hurt so badly he hardly dared to move for a
few minutes, and when he did, he was sick.
He was on an unmade bunk in a small, dark cabin. It was cold, and there was such a tang of salt in the air that he didn’t need the motion of the deck and the constant rheumatic creaking of the timbers around him to tell him he was at sea. At least the rolling sensation was real and not just a symptom of his malaise.
Sesto couldn’t remember where he was or what he was supposed to be—
Suddenly, it all came back. He rose up, was sick again, and then sat in silence trying to clear his head, a cold sweat on his body. Guido, the dinner aboard the Demiurge…
He was on the Demiurge now, he knew that at once. Despite the aromas they had in common—salt, tar, smoke, grease—all ships had their own distinct scents. The Safire had a clean, waxy smell with a hint of camphor and linseed. The Rumour had a much more robust odour, a musky flavour of gunpowder, turtle meat and spice, undoubtedly because of the permeating smells of Fahd’s pungent cooking. This was the Demiurge. It stank of dirty bilges, cloves and onions.
Sesto knew he had been drugged, and supposed he had been kidnapped. His pistol and his sword had gone. But he was not tied up or restrained, and the door to his cabin was not locked.
He went out into the dark companionway and made his way up onto the deck, his legs automatically compensating for the heavy roll of the deck. There must be quite a swell, Sesto thought.
On deck, he narrowed his eyes against the harsh light. It was a bright, blustery day, cold, with a great white sky. The grey sea, foam capped, was rolling hard, and the Demiurge was crashing through it, full sailed. There was rain in the air, and Sesto closed his eyes and let it wash his face.
He looked around. There was no sign of land. Just the raging sea.
“Did you sleep well, master?”
Sesto turned. Handsome Onofre, ropes across his shoulder, was grinning at him.
“Where is Guido?” Sesto asked.
