Salvation's Fire

by Justina Robson

  “Freebooters are pirates,” Captain Vakloz said. “So no. But free traders. That we can call them. They’re more used to dealing with the Varkadians.” He gave a little shudder.

  “And by dealing with you mean fighting,” Celestaine said, taking a sip of the fortified wine gingerly. It was sweet, almost sickly, and was horrible with the fish but it was something all the crew apparently wouldn’t eat without. They also drank it hot, mixed with some kind of warming spice which was considerably worse.

  “I think that tends to be the case unless you want to be filleted,” he replied. “On that note, do you have any words for me to convey back to Ilkand and beyond?”

  “How should we signal you for a return journey?” Celest asked.

  “I come by every six weeks until the winter. So I’ll be back twice more. After that you’ll be waiting a few months until the weather turns and if that happens you should stay on the central islands. They’re larger and they have more shelter.”

  It was already cold and they had got used to wearing all their gear two days before, and never taking it off. The air below decks was fuggy and rank but it beat sitting outside. The wind could be raw and the rain made it painful on exposed skin. Celestaine already hated the north. “When will your ally be here?”

  He glanced at the Ystachi who were seated together. A kind of glow of satisfaction had surrounded them since the appearance of Lysandra’s creature. Their spiky scales glinted with fresh oil and they had repainted themselves daily with the bright coloured marks of their unfathomable faiths.

  “Within the hour,” the oldest one said. His scale was worn and had thinned off entirely in places but Celestaine had seen him climb foot and hand up a single rope to the top of the mizzenmast, so either age hadn’t withered anything significant or they were all fearsomely agile. “I hear the songs.”

  “All this singing,” Heno murmured to Celest. “They keep mentioning it. What are they talking about?”

  “Something we can’t hear, I assume,” she said. “I’ve never met one before. I’ve no idea.”

  “It is in the water,” the younger one informed them archly. She had a frill of raised scale above both eyes, pierced and riveted with small gold rings. Her hand on the cup was heavily webbed and her blunted claws tapped lightly against the wooden bowl. “We favour southern weather but she will not allow the cold to stop her.”

  “She’s Ystachi?” Celestaine asked, ready for anybody at this stage.

  “One of the Seekers. Kalliendra,” the young one said proudly and with a fierce admiration. “As if it is not enough she treats with the sea and its beasts, she has also mastered the northern ocean. She is a terrible heretic.” She glanced at Murti, as though still somewhat unconvinced of his provenance but obviously well filled in on all their stories. “One of the Wanderer’s chosen.”

  Celestaine turned to Murti. “Is there something I should know?”

  “The difficulty of the task requires many hands,” he said after a hesitation.

  The Captain frowned. “I hadn’t believed you were genuine about this mission until I saw that beast—did it come from the drowning pool? Should we fear more of them?”

  Celestaine said nothing, didn’t even look around. It was better that nobody knew if they didn’t all want to go over the side or worse.

  “If we can close the hole no more will come,” Murti said, quietly, gently, as though it was a simple thing requiring only the kind of steady farmhand determination to gather and pile a few rocks and then spade down some earth.

  All the hair on Celestaine’s neck went up, slowly, as if it was trying to alarm her, but not too much. “Close it… you mean, from the other side?”

  “That is the only side from which it can be done,” he admitted.

  Celestaine put down her fork and sat up straighter, connecting with the bulkhead on her sore spot. “So this jaunt to see the gods one more time, that was all a ruse?”

  “No, I wouldn’t call it that. We will see them if we manage to reach our destination.”

  Celestaine glanced at Lysandra, against her own will, and saw that she and Kula were too busy counting fishbones and comparing who had found the most in their dinners to pay attention to the talk. The task seemed to thoroughly occupy them. Up on deck the rain was abating. A light patter, accompanied by various heavy percussion from drips and gulleys, was signalling the passing of the storm. The ship rolled softly against its anchor. The crew were deep in thought, the Ystachi muttering quietly in their own tongue, the rest focused on playing out their ration of the filthy brew to stretch their rest time as long as possible, and to stretch the present, lest it become a future full of unfortunate encounters with monsters.

  “And after that we’ll go home,” Bukham said into the quiet. “Then I’m done, right? I can go back to Taib Post and this whole thing will be over.” He hadn’t kept anything down since they’d been aboard other than oats in water. He nursed a mug of it now.

  “Yes,” Celestaine said firmly before Murti could get in with some more cryptic nonsense that would be hiding the fact that going home was a very unlikely option indeed. “That’s right.”

  “Home,” Nedlam grunted, cramped and uncomfortable, head down because it was already touching the ceiling. “I’ve never understood the appeal.”

  “You’ve never been to the Post,” Bukham offered.

  “That’s true,” she said. “I’ll go back with you and see it then. Though I doubt anywhere is as good as something to do.”

  Celestaine agreed with her. Home was always full of people who wanted things to stay the same. It was full of the past and it didn’t want strange new things in it, like Heno. She couldn’t imagine a place that did want them, but a trading post probably saw a lot of stranger things. It might almost be as free as the open road.

  “Are you sure you want to be taking extra people with you?” the Captain asked, nodding slightly in the direction of Lysandra and Kula. His meaning was clear—women and children should not be going in the direction of danger. His gaze flitted briefly to Bukham, the deadweight. He seemed mildly befuddled by their obvious unsuitability.

  “They’re with us,” she said, for want of a better way of describing it. “Everyone comes as a package.”

  “Only, there’s a high bounty on certain… types… of people right now.”

  Celestaine felt the atmosphere turn suddenly icy. She flexed her arms enough to feel Heno’s stiffened form, Bukham’s uneasy shrinking and absolutely no way out of the room, wedged in as they were cheek by jowl. “What types of people are you talking about?” Closest to the stair Nedlam had put down her bowl and was clenching her spoon in her hand.

  The crew were looking calm but alert, which was the most disconcerting. All their weapons were on deck where now all rain had stopped, leaving enough space to be able to hear the soft tread of feet above them.

  The Captain was looking at them all, each in the face, one at a time, patiently. “The types of people who played on the losing side of the war,” he said. “Who else? Not you, of course, Slayer. For you there are other possibilities in places more exotic than mere Ilkand.”

  “I suppose offering you the last of our treasure in return for our freedom is out of the question?” She listened hard, figuring at least six moving above and guessing they were the friendly ally that he’d been discussing, and her own crew.

  “You suppose right,” he paused, another hesitation she didn’t quite figure. He was waiting for something, filling in time. “It will be ours anyway.” He kept his most acute looks for Murti. “Wanderer? Nothing to say? Your passivity was legendary, always. I counted on your lack of action and it seems you don’t disappoint.”

  Celest glanced over Heno at the old man himself for a response. He was staring into the middle distance as if fuddled by drink. And then she realised. The food was drugged, but of course—then again, she felt perfectly well.

  It was just at that moment that the older of the two Ystachi went down face first
into the last of his grog.

  “Very unlucky to get the bowls mixed up like that,” Murti mumbled quietly, clearing his throat.

  Two more of the crew, bold, brash Kellick and greasy Piperand went next, slumping sideways onto each other like drunks. The Captain’s hand went to this throat, he started to gasp.

  “And to get them all the wrong way round smacks of some kind of plot,” Murti added. “Nedlam. Could you drag these fools out of the way? We have business awaiting us aloft, I fear.”

  Nedlam slammed the spoon down into the table and left it there, handle sticking up, bowl wedged halfway into the hardwood. She got up, bent nearly double, and began to haul unconscious bodies with her, two at a time, back into the half empty galley. As she moved out of the way of the galley door the cook was clearly visible as two feet pointing skywards, askew amid a basket of loose onions rolling gently back and forth with the swell.

  The Captain’s face now was purple, his lips turning blue.

  “I didn’t think we were going to kill them.” Murti said, glancing at Lysandra.

  “It’s all right,” she said calmly, looking up, fishbones dancing off her fingers down into her bowl as she discarded them. Beside her the Captain frothed and pounded the table with his hands, pulling at the silver gorget around his throat. She ignored him completely. “They meant to have Kula’s head and mine for medicine. Tzarkomen cast long shadows in the worlds of dark magic. You and the boy they would merely murder. The rest were for other ends.”

  The Captain’s gestures were weaker now. His eyes—staring wildly at Lysandra, baffled—began to soften their fury. His thumps turned to a grasp as he clutched at the table’s gently swinging boards, and then he slid to the side and came to rest against the first mate, Ghar, the Yogg, who was in a deep sleep and beginning to snore. The Captain did not snore. A couple of bubbles popped at his lips and then he was quiet. Nobody had any doubt he was dead.

  Lysandra looked across at Celestaine and Heno, gestured with a nod towards the stairs up to the deck. “Save the leader. She will be useful.” Then she looked at Bukham who was staring at her, rigid with shock. “You can thank me later,” and she smiled, a small and merciless smile.

  Heno went first into the light, preparing the way with a blast of white lightning that scattered the expectant party awaiting the appearance of the Captain. They staggered back, hands to their eyes, and Celestaine and Nedlam came rushing up the gangway to Heno’s sides, hoping to grab their weapons on the deck. But although they had an advantage the boarding crew were wily and used to fighting their way out of tight corners. They did not give ground, but stood, sabres and clubs at the ready, their sharp needle teeth bared. Long whiskers covered their cheeks and drooped down like sombre moustaches. They were part furred, with dark brown human faces stretched forwards into snouts, small ears tucked close to their heads and long, heavy tails held awkwardly aloft. They were…

  “Valuti!” Bukham said from the back in astonishment, although there were some ordinary humans among the otter people, their various heritage stamped across features and in their skins, accessorised with a bizarre collection of beads, trinkets and tattoos. This ragtag motley unified them. And the colours they had chosen—blue and yellow—reflected the scale tones and the skin sheen of their obvious leader, the only Ystachi.

  Scaled and crested like the two Ystachi crewmen they had grown used to seeing, this one was taller and leaner than they, her neck frills and head crests taller. They were coloured a most vivid and lustrous collection of blues and violets, which contrasted sharply with the white and yellow sand colours of her underbody and the middle of her face. Her large eyes were a reptilian green, rich in colour and texture, the central slit sharp as a shadow blade as she pushed past her flankers and came to meet them, swords raised in both hands. Her voice was throaty with fear and aggression but she held herself well, Celestaine noted, good enough to judge her a seasoned soldier. Her boots were cut off at the ankle, revealing long, clawed and webbed feet, the toes ringed in gold.

  “Who in hell are you?”

  “Celestaine of Fernreame.” The title tripped out as if it meant something here. “Slayer,” she added, and then, in the continued silence, “Kinslayer’s end.”

  The Ystachi captain pulled her head back and cocked it in one move, so quick it was nearly comical. She blinked. “Reckoner’s reckoning?” She chuckled. “You don’t say.” She didn’t put up her blades though.

  “It doesn’t sound good no matter how you put it,” Celestaine said. “But there it is. Surrender your weapons and stand down. The crew of this ship are not in a position to fulfil your bargains.”

  The Valuti bristled visibly, fur rising at their napes, crouching and brandishing their alarmingly sharp harpoons. Barbed hooks glinted in the weak sunlight. The human pirates stood fast.

  “Don’t speak of bargains,” the Ystachi said. “Valuti cannot trade, only take or conquer. Are you not claiming this vessel, then, Reckoning? Or are you expecting Captain Vakloz to return?”

  “He returns only if I say so,” Lysandra appeared at Celestaine’s shoulder, her ragged and dirty dress not much improved by its recent seawater baths. From its luxurious sleeving and skirts her arms and legs stuck out like twigs but there was nothing weak about her manner. At her side Kula looked out curiously without the faintest trace of concern.

  “Deathmasters!” The shriek went up from one of the human boarders. “Kill them!” A hissing war ululation followed this, instantly taken up by all the pirates, immediately followed by an attack. Within seconds Celestaine, Heno and Nedlam had formed a kind of wall and were repelling a vicious assault of spears and blades. Although they were not taken off guard the ferocity of the attack was something not felt since the last true battle they had been in and their surprise added a sudden spurt of intensity which they all felt as one, a moment of joy that had not been evident this entire journey until now.

  KULA FELT IT and clapped her hands to show her approval. A barbed lance from one of the Valuti sheared past Heno’s leg and was knocked to the side, missing her by a hair’s breadth. She felt the crackling agitation of his magic build and then the clear shock of it as it burned around the spear’s shaft and back to the hand holding it.

  The spear fell down, shivered to bits before it landed. Bukham was there suddenly, his enormous form blotting out the sky as he bent to pick her up and rush her below. She kicked crossly, not wanting to lose sight of the action, but then she felt the fall of a life ebbing away and let herself be carried, her ankle bashing the door frame for good measure.

  In the dimness of the hold the pile of drugged crew were slumped all over one another, but none in danger of leaving life behind. Murti sat in the corner, the glow of his energy deceptively soft, like a fire behind an iron door that was never opened. She felt the furnace, though, and beyond that, a hint of the fire that fed it. She found herself staring at him and then the shift as he stared at her in return, the first time they had ever really examined one another, mage to mage.

  Bukham bumbled about, attempting to tidy away the dinner’s leavings as he recovered and organised every kitchen implement that was or could be considered a knife while the fighting went on upstairs, and between Kula and the Guardian a long pause stretched out.

  His lips moved with talking and although she couldn’t hear it she understood what he was asking—“What do you see?”

  She put her finger to her lips in the way she’d seen them do when they weren’t going to talk—don’t ask, not telling, it’s a secret.

  He smiled. He had only meant to be friendly because he wasn’t afraid of her or anything she might do. He was puzzled. He didn’t understand what he had seen entirely and that didn’t surprise her. In her family nobody had been sure what she was. She didn’t know how to think of it herself, but now she knew him and, if she had to remember him, she would be able to do so well enough for Lysandra to make another. That was just how it was. But he didn’t interest her.

  His thought
s were preoccupied with the ever-thinning link to his life-force, trapped in the other world, and they soon regained all his attention as hers were taken up with dumping out the contents of one of the blue and white porcelain cups and hiding it away in her pocket because she really loved it and didn’t want to leave it behind. It had a picture of a rabbit on it.

  So that it was not stealing she took out a twig that Ned had whittled for her in the shape of a snail and put that in its place. It was more like a rock than snail to the untrained eye, but it would keep looking out for her and be lucky for whoever found it. Especially if they wondered where their cup had gone. She would have taken the Captain’s but his was florid red and decorated with gold in the house mark of the bad Lady and she didn’t care for it. She did like his little owl skull though. So she took out her knife when nobody was looking and cut that braid from his hair and put that in her pocket too. He would have approved, because he was a pirate and now she was one also and that felt good. If he had not tried to kill her she would have felt sorry he was gone.

  She looked up at the deck above her. She felt Heno’s pain, and Nedlam’s concern, and Celestaine’s thumping headache and the glee of a fight turning to the angry exhaustion of having to kill those who wouldn’t see sense and back down.

  She pulled a little on a certain vibrating line, with the skill of an expert fisherman.

  “Hold, hold!” the Ysatchi captain called suddenly, feeling her death rise up to meet her unexpectedly, apropos of nothing, but certain and sure; an old carp from the depths coming to the surface of her, hideous and cold, breathless, unending. “Stop!”

  Kula went to find if there was something nice to drink she could put into her rabbit cup and to help Bukham because he was afraid and might soon cut himself on the sharp things.

  CELESTAINE LOOKED AROUND, her left foot braced against Heno’s right, her sword ready to strike the crouched figure that had just released its grip on her leg where it had been attempting to gnaw through her mail. To her right Nedlam was pointing at her target, a big man with a huge sledge who was nearly her equal in size. His swing had gone wide and hers was ready to unleash but they had halted, awkwardly. A couple of bodies of the Valuti and other raiders lay at their feet. Blood ran freely out of Nedlam’s nose and from a gouge on her arm. Celestaine felt Heno vibrating with too much adrenaline to feel pain, the white fire swarmed up his arms. Two Valuti were in a shivering, smoking heap a short way off. Harpoons studded the deck. The Ystachi woman who had issued the command stood tall, her short hook blade and longer scimitar raised high.