Prescott shakes his head again. “The Merry Margaret capsized and split in two, right at her midsection. Most of the men were cut off, trapped in her guts as she went down. We searched as we could, but we found no one else, alive or dead, but these you see.”
“Who else survived?”
“Sound off,” he calls out.
“Grafton, wright's mate.”
“McNeill, boatswain's mate.”
“Humbaker, rigger.”
“Tillsby.”
I wait a moment. No one else replies. Of course Tillsby survived while Hollins did not and plenty of other good men did not. Bowen, Higginbottom, Aaron....even the one with the long nose whose name I never learned, the others I never knew, all were better men than Tillsby. Once more the gods are chortling.
“Seven of us in a lifeboat built for ten,” Prescott says. “At least we are not overloaded, and we are well supplied. It's the one bit of good news.”
I am anxious to know if they have seen the boat Ceridwen loaded with the salvage, but I do not wish to appear callous. They have just lost their captain and seven of their number, not to mention the ship and likely all their belongings. Besides, we should find the salvage readily at daybreak.
What concerns me more is that the leviathan which destroyed the Merry Margaret is still out here.
“Do we know what hit us?”
Prescott nods and looks past my shoulder. I twist my aching body around to follow his gaze.
Beyond the burning debris from the Merry Margaret is what looks like an odd sort of long rounded barge facing away from us, with only a scaffold or tower on it. I have never seen its like, and in the darkness, her grey bulk looks ghostlike and strange. But of course it is no ghost ship. A man stands on her scaffold for just a moment, perhaps looking through binoculars or a spyglass of some sort. But he is looking along his own ship, if that is what it is, and not at us.
“Surveying her for damage, most like,” offers Grafton. “We hit her as hard as she hit us.”
Then the man on the deck of the great ship is gone, as if he melted right into the floor, and no sooner does he disappear, but I see the great hulking thing start to move, turning herself around towards the southwest, toward us.
“This lifeboat has oars, yes?”
“Aye, sir,” says Humbaker, handing oars to each of the men.
“Start rowing,” I say, taking one of the oars myself. “Now!”
Prescott shouts to me, “Which way, sir?”
“Forward! Away from that thing!”
“Aye, aye!”
We strike a rhythm and row eastward, and like a bad dream, the boat does not move fast enough, no matter how hard we row. The strange ship, meanwhile, comes completely about and is heading right for us.
“She's going to hit us, sir.”
“Keep rowing, Grafton.”
“But––“
“Keep rowing!”
The strange ship––for a ship it clearly is, made all of metal plates and rivets––crashes almost maliciously through the last of the Merry Margaret, dashing the last of the boat apart and sending burning embers and twists of metal hissing into the sea. She does not slow but continues towards us, bearing down on us so that we can feel our boat being pushed south, crossways against our rowing by the outer edge of her bow wave.
“The monster is sinking,” offers McNeill in his slow way.
“What?” I take the luxury of looking up whilst I row to get a glimpse of the great hulk's prow, or what I might better call a snout, since it looks so whale-like. McNeill is right. She has dropped low in the water now and continues to sink. I note that she has no windows in her and no obvious way for her crew to see out. So it is likely she collided with the Merry Margaret entirely by mistake. But what is even more remarkable is that, while the ship is indeed sinking, it seems it was created to do exactly that.
Bubbles blow out at her sides, and her bow dips smartly below the water with the rest of her following. As she slips beneath us, I see a deep crease across her back and a great tear in her tail where the Merry Margaret's propeller cut into it, right through the painted French flag. But for all that she destroyed our boat, her wounds are cosmetic. She seems little the worse for wear. I row harder, spilling off my rage. Eight more good men die at Norman hands, and this beast and her pirates slip away scot-free.
Her wake continues to pull at us, dragging us southward, but the water soon settles, and we row our way back to what's left of our ship, our only point of reference through the smoke.
“Well, Prescott,” I say. “We may not have found any documents for you, but I am certain the admirals will want to know about that ship.”
The boy nods, a bit shaken. “I have heard of such things in stories, but never have I seen one.” He looks up at me. “What is it?”
“It's a devil ship,” screams Tillsby. “The devil of the sea, who comes because you have that woman on this boat. Just like he came for the Merry Margaret. Women are evil. Women make you feel funny, get you trouble.”
“Tillsby, avast!” bellows McNeill.
The little man falls silent, picking at invisible fleas on his shirt.
“The sailors in Toulon call it a sous-marin,” Humbaker shrugs. “Get 'em drunk enough, speak a bit of French, guess they lose all sense of what they're meant to keep quiet. I thought they were having me on.” He looks with contempt on Tillsby. “Devil ship. You're as daft as a brush. Get on that oar and pull your weight.”
“Oh no,” cries Ceridwen. She points past the wreckage to where the other lifeboat lies, but it is sitting very low in the water. It is the boat with the salvage, and the men want to ignore it, but I point out to them that on that boat lies our best chance of getting home. So we row closer, and as we near, we see that the boat was damaged, perhaps as the sous-marin behemoth burst through the Merry Margaret. She will not stay afloat for long.
We draw alongside, and I jump across to it, splashing boot deep into the cold water. The boat is quite full of crates and boxes, and I know that we cannot fit even a quarter of it into our boat with us, not if we would stay afloat. Thus everything I touch either goes to our boat or over the side to buy myself more time. The boat does not regain buoyancy, but at least it sinks more slowly. Ceridwen starts to climb over to help, but I stop her. Even as light as she is, her weight will make the boat sink faster. Instead, she points out which items she would keep. We take all of the crates of equipment and weapons, two footlockers which look to have belonged to officers, the various ornate keepsake boxes, jewellery for its value and the rete from the astrolabe. The boat has only a few inches left before it sinks below the water when I start to climb out.
“Wait!” She looks back over the articles we pulled out. “Did you find that piece of bogwood? I know it's there. We should save that, as well.”
With a curse on my lips, I splash back into the sinking boat and feel about amongst the crates that are still there. My hands are going numb with cold, and I despair of even being able to feel it.
“Briton,” Prescott calls. “The boat is sinking! Let it go!”
“Just one more!”
I choose one last crate to try. My heart sinks. It is full of soaked bits of uniforms. The boat is now almost completely under, and one end is starting to dip down. As I position to jump to the other ship, my boot kicks something. Beneath me, the boat is sinking faster, and I have to dive down to catch it in the freezing water.
There it is, the engraved bogwood. I grab it and swim to the surface, and the others pull me onto the boat. I feel their fingers digging into the bites where the dogs pulled at me in my dream, the bites which did not bleed. But when I look, there are no wounds. It is only the cold.
I hand the bogwood to Ceridwen, and the men wrap me up with McNeill in the blankets, being that he is both the largest source of warmth and the least likely to mind being used so. Tillsby rocks back and forth in the corner praying whilst he glares at Ceridwen, though she is preoccupied with the engraved rock
and does not notice. I notice, and so does Prescott. The boy looks at me and subtly lifts the corner of his coat. His holster is empty.
McNeill keeps me warm enough that I doze off. When I wake, the sun is high, and the French coast is near enough that I almost believe we could swim to it. We must have been carried by the currents since everyone but Prescott has fallen asleep. I have no charts, no compass, nor even the rest of the broken astrolabe by which to navigate. I have no idea where we might be on the French coast, but once we get our bearings...
Once we get our bearings, what? We are in a lifeboat with a handful of items which might buy us all passage back to England. We have gone from the height of fortune to the depths of desperation in the space of a few hours. My first concern should be with seeing these men safely home. It is what the captain wanted, and it is what I promised. Yet I cannot have come so close to finding the Aethelfrith only to give up now.
“I am your relief, sir,” I say to Prescott, who is so engrossed with watching the coast that my voice startles him. I disentangle myself from McNeill's embrace and stretch my limbs. The air is still quite brisk, but I need no more than a single blanket to keep me warm now. “You should get some sleep.”
The lieutenant nods and rubs his eyes. “I am glad you woke when you did,” he said. “I was beginning to hallucinate in my fatigue.”
“I should have relieved you sooner.”
He shakes his head. “It was nothing. But it seemed so real. On the beach at sunrise, I could have sworn...” He laughs at himself. “This is how people come to believe in absurdities. Trauma, cold, lack of sleep, and the mind plays pranks upon the senses.” He looks up at me. “I suppose it is only because I wish Mr. Aaron might have survived.” He glances darkly towards Tillsby. “I enjoyed his company, sir. So I suppose it is not so very odd that I should think I saw him on the beach.”
I understand. I, too, am disappointed that as good a man as Mr. Aaron is lost whilst a creature like Tillsby survives.
“Where did you see this apparition?”
His eyes widen. “It was no apparition, sir. I am quite sure I simply mistook a very real French gentlemen out for a stroll with his dog for Mr. Aa––”
I crouch beside him. “A dog? What did the dog look like?”
I have startled him again. “I...”
“Was it a large dog?”
“Yes, sir, but––”
“And black? Or white?”
My agitation alarms him. “Sir, it was but a black shape on the horizon, bouncing to and fro. It could have been either. I only know that it was a dog because it moved like one, much like the man with it moved like Mr. Aaron. When I blinked, they were gone. But I must admit, to my shame, it is possible that the blink lasted longer than it should have. I may have dozed, sir, and dreamt the whole thing.”
“Very well. But humour me. Where on the beach did you see them? Where exactly?”
He rubs his eyes and looks out at the sandy coastline, then points out a spot that bows gently out from the rest of the beach. “Just there, sir.”
“Then 'just there' is our goal.” I wake the others. “Take up your oars, gentlemen. We are heading for that bulge on the beach. Just there.”
They take up their oars and join me in rowing without question. I am, after all, their acting captain.
Ceridwen, meanwhile, has awakened to all the commotion, and she comes to sit beside me. She dips her hand in the sea water and makes a damp circle in the bottom of the lifeboat. Then she pierces her finger and dips her hand into the sea again. The drops of sea water, mingled with a drop of her blood, fall near the centre of the circle. She looks up at me and smiles. We are very close.
“I saw that!” Tillsby cries. He stands, raising his oar above his head. “I knew it! I knew it! All women are witches in their hearts. I loved you,” he whines, “but you are like all the rest. Don't you see? She casts a spell on this boat and dooms us all!”
“That will be all, Tillsby,” says Prescott calmly, so calmly that I should think he still has his sidearm with him. He pats his holster through his jacket. “Back to your post.”
But the maniac advances on Ceridwen, who is backing away from him. He looks down at what was a circle but now looks like just a damp spot on the floor of the boat. Behind him, the other three are watching. “She's bleeding,” he says, grabbing her hand and showing them her finger. He cocks his head. “She uses her own blood to damn us all.”
“Her blood?” Grafton frowns. “That's some dark magic, that.”
“This is absurd,” she says, pulling her hand out of his grip. “Why would I damn a boat in which I, too, must travel? Tillsby, you make no sense.”
His eyes blaze and he claps his hands over his ears. “You speak, but I hear only the howling. The terrible howling!” He turns. His eyes close and he drops like a dead thing to the deck of the boat.
Ceridwen looks up at the other men in terror. “I swear, I did nothing to him. You must believe me.”
The other three men watch her for a moment, and I am not certain what they are thinking. “Come,” I say to them. “You've seen him fall asleep like this before.” I have no idea if they have, but I consider it very likely. “You know he gets excited, and then he falls asleep.”
“Aye, he does,” says Grafton, turning away with a laugh. “And every time, we have to convince ourselves not to pitch him overboard and leave him to God.”
They rest chuckle and turn back to their oars. “We's off balance now,” says Humbaker. “With him out, the lady will need to take an oar, or one from your side will need to sit.”
“I will take an oar,” she says with gratitude.
The beach is deserted in every direction when we land our boat, but as soon as I step onto the sand, I hear the yipping and barking of a dog.
“There he is, sir,” whispers Prescott, nodding along the beach. “That is the very man I saw. The resemblance is uncanny.” He squints and looks around him. “His house must be somewhere on the beach.”
By the time the man is perhaps a hundred feet away on the beach, he is near enough that I have no trouble recognising him. I approach, and he touches the brim of his flat cap and smiles. “Sir.”
“Mr. Aaron!” I shake his hand in happy greeting, relieved that he is solid flesh. “What a miracle, sir! How did you survive?” I look around the beach, but I see no raft, none of the other missing lifeboats. “We had six men rowing, yet you beat us here. When the boiler room exploded, we feared the worst.”
“Ah, I had some warning for that. A lucky current, and a bit of help from my friend, and here I am.”
At his heel, a handsome black Alsatian capers lovingly, yipping at him, begging him to throw the great stick of driftwood he carries. At last he indulges the dog and throws the twisted black stick like a spear, sending the happy creature running gleefully into the surf after it. The dog picks the wood up from the surf and looks up at me, its gold eyes flashing in the sunlight.
“Your friend?” I ask. The Cŵn Annwn is no man's friend, regardless of how or why he disguises himself, yet I am at a loss to explain this to this man in a way that will sound sane. I suppose the larger question is why would the Harbinger of Death spare him, of all the crew?
I look to my wife for help, but she only smiles serenely.
He takes her hand and bows over it. “My lady.”
“Filthy animal!” Tillsby shrieks. “Disgusting creature, I told you not to lay your filthy murdering Jew hands on her!” He has in hand a blade or a sharp bit of wood or stone, I cannot tell which, and he runs screaming at Aaron. “I will kill you, you eater of Christian babes, you horned monster!”
Prescott recovers himself first and gives chase, but he is too far behind. The others stand frozen in confusion, too slow to react, too far away to stop Tillsby. I am the only one.
I would save Mr. Aaron, but to my sick horror, I cannot. I have no fear of death, save that I will never see Annwn. Many times I have stood at the precipice, ready to take my own
life and embrace oblivion.
I broke this world with one rash act of selfishness. Do I dare desert it to its fate now with another? After all, should I die, my crimes will never be undone, and the world will still be broken.
Or am I wrong, and is it rather that my selfishness holds me back? After all, my redemption and all I have lived for would be lost to oblivion to save one man. A good man, but just one man.
My king was just one man.
The scabby patchy-haired madman is Death, coming for this Aaron, just as the Normans came for my king. That twisted diseased creature would destroy this honourable man of a different faith who innocently plays with the Cŵn Annwn. Perhaps this is why the hound of the Afterlife saved him, to taunt me with this choice. But if saving my chance to fix this world means that I must let this one good man die, is it truly worth saving? And if I'm willing to let him die when it is in my power to save him, am I?
I shut my eyes. I cannot help myself. I know what I must do.
I throw myself between Tillsby's shiv and Aaron, bracing myself against the pain of the maniac's blade sinking into my flesh and my dissolution into nothingness. I will be lost, and the world will go on in its broken way, but I cannot desert again. I cannot watch another good man die for my cowardice.
The blade cuts through my coat and cuts a deep gash down my chest, scraping against a couple of my ribs as it does so, and then simply falls away. I land on the ground face to face with Tillsby, who has dropped into his curious sleep. I gasp in pain and shock, surprised and relieved to be alive.
A furious snarl of black fur brushes across my face, and when it is gone, so is Tillsby, dragged away by the beast's fangs. Amidst a whirl of fur and growls punctuated by hysterical shrieks, in only a moment, Tillsby is gone. No one moves to save him, and only blood remains on the sand where he fell.
“Briton!” cries the lieutenant. He and Ceridwen are at my side at once, but I am already rising.
“I'm all right,” I say, more to my surprise than theirs. “It looks a fright and will likely bleed a bit, but he missed anything important.”
Heroes: A Raconteur House Anthology Page 19
