Hard Mettle

by John Hook

  “See what I mean?” I said and sat down at the table in front of us. Zara joined me and we just stared back.

  A man came over from behind the bar. He was middle aged with a white shirt and suspenders. I took him to be the barkeep.

  “Can I get you something?” he asked without much enthusiasm. He was only the second barkeep I had met in Hell and the other one wasn't very enthusiastic about me, either.

  “You have steaks?”

  “No. Just fish.”

  “How hard is it to make glamour steaks?”

  The barkeep acted like I had hurled an insult. “Sir, we don't serve glamour food. We eat real food. We catch fish; fish is what we have.”

  “How about a boat?” Zara cut in, looking around the room.

  A large man at a table across from us cleared his throat.

  “You planning on staying here? You need to see the Harbor Master.”

  “So we heard,” I tossed back.

  “We aren't staying, but we need a boat and someone who knows these waters.”

  “You want a boat, then you need to see the Harbor Master. You want to hire a guide, you need to see the Harbor Master.”

  “So I guess you'll need to tell us how to find the Harbor Master.”

  The man moved his eyes over our heads and amusement played over his features.

  “I was told of you and thought I should come down and take a look at our newcomers.”

  It was a voice in my head. That made me immediately spin around because it meant the Harbor Master was a demon. Sure enough, he was a large green demon. Not as large as the Demon King, who had been a very large Gray, but still larger than the usually diminutive green demons. Zara remained facing away from the door and acted like nothing important had happened.

  The demon walked up to Zara and reached toward her bright red hair.

  “Oh, I don't think you want to do that.” I kept my face a neutral as possible.

  “Are you telling me what I can and cannot do?”

  “Oh, heavens no. Just making a suggestion.”

  “Good. I was afraid you didn't know your place.”

  I spread my hands.

  The Harbor Master peered over her shoulder. He opened his mouth, revealing the several layers of needle-like teeth. I could see where his hands were going.

  “Good luck with that.”

  His hands never made it. He suddenly found himself yanked over her and slammed on the table, breaking it. Zara was up on her flaming carpet hovering over him. She shot her flame-like energy at him and he screamed in pain. Everyone got up from their tables and backed away.

  “Do you know who I am?”

  “You—you are a Shade?”

  “The Manitor is very unhappy with you.”

  Zara was pouring it on thick. It was almost as if she was believing what she was saying even as she made it up. It was a clever con.

  “The Manitor is so unhappy he sent two Shades.” I let my tattoos glow for emphasis.

  “The Manitor is not supposed to interfere!” the demon seemed to be shouting in our heads. “The deal—”

  The demon screamed as Zara gave him another blast of her energy.

  “I think we need a new Harbor Master. I think a human this time.” I looked at Zara. She gazed around the room. The man who had first engaged us when we walked in was walking forward, smiling. I had the feeling he had gained much under the demons at the cost of others. He had seemed just way too happy with everything going to the Harbor Master.

  “I'm the leader of the humans. I'll be Harbor Master.”

  Zara ignored him, focusing on a figure hunched over in the far corner, sitting completely in the dark. I could barely make out the figure as I followed her gaze.

  “I want to talk to her,” Zara said. I followed her back. Seated at a corner table was a woman wrapped in a brown cloak. Her hair was black and cut short, her face angular and thin, and her eyes ice blue.

  “What is your name?”

  “Kate, if it's any of your business.”

  “Do you have a boat?”

  Kate looked at us both and laughed. “I have a ship, not that I ever get to use it.”

  “Why not?” I asked.

  “Because every time a demon tries to rape me I cut something off.” She had pulled a very sharp blade out from under her cloak. It was polished bone and pretty finely made.

  “She's crazy,” someone shouted from behind us.

  “Are you?” I asked.

  She laughed. “Only way to be in this place.”

  “You said you don't get to take your ship out much. So you don't know the waters very well?”

  “I used to sail all the time. Then I got stuck in this place.”

  “We’re looking for an island where an ancient race of purple-skinned people live.”

  “The Dreamers.”

  “You know this place then?”

  “I know of this place. It’s a place of legends. It’s where the sky was supposed to have shattered when the Angels showed up.”

  I walked over to the large demon who had been Harbor Master and pulled him up rudely.

  “Take your demons and go far away. Otherwise, on the Manitor's authority we will hunt you down and kill everyone. If we find your birth caves, we will burn them out.”

  Terrified, the large demon ran out of the Kraken.

  I turned to the others. “Kate is the new Harbor Master.”

  The man who had tried to claim being Harbor Master marched over to me angrily. “You can't just walk in here and disrupt the rules of this village.”

  “I think I just did.”

  “It's not right. I served the demons faithfully.”

  “I wouldn't advertise that if I were you.”

  Zara walked up to him, her face inches from his.

  “If you serve the demons so well, maybe you should share their fate.”

  She grabbed his face and energy flowed from her body into his. He started screaming.

  “Zara, stop!” I shouted. She let go. The big man collapsed to the floor, scrambled back up and ran. Several others who had been sitting with him ran after him, looking back at us fearfully.

  Zara turned around.

  “Is anyone else going to have a problem with Kate as Harbor Master?”

  Kate walked up and looked at Zara and then the others.

  “I don't want to be Harbor Master. People should just do what they want to do with their own boats.”

  Kate looked back to Zara and me. “If you want my boat, come and talk to me. I'll be down at the docks.”

  Kate left. So did everyone else, except the barkeep, who looked heartily annoyed.

  I turned to Zara. “If we replace the bullies by becoming just another bully ourselves, it’ll be hard to get people on our side.”

  “You don't tell me what to do.”

  Zara stormed out.

  “I guess not.” I sighed.

  13.

  “Zara didn’t look too happy.” Saripha had a bemused look on her face. Saripha, Izzy, Kyo, Anika and Blaise had just found me as I exited the Kraken. Zara had stormed out moments before.

  “Turning on the charm again,” Izzy teased good-naturedly. I knew it was friendly, but I was frustrated. I couldn’t imagine what Saripha was going through. That, and Zara was getting on my nerves. I decided to change the subject.

  “How did you find me?”

  “We passed demons heading out of town in a hurry. This place seemed to be in the middle of the exodus.” Izzy nodded at the Kraken.

  “The Harbor Master was a demon.”

  “I notice you said ‘was.’”

  “We had a change in management.”

  “I take it Zara had a hand in that.”

  “Useful sometimes to have a Shade. The demon wasn’t ready for that.”

  “So why was she in a snit?”

  “She doesn’t have much sense of moderation.”

  Saripha looked at me. “Which you know doubt pointed out to her.�
��

  “I might have said something.”

  “I suspect she only recently escaped her captors. We really don’t know what all she suffered. You of all people should understand impatience.”

  I looked at Saripha. She was right. I was lucky enough to fall in with this group when I first arrived. Maybe it would work for Zara, too.

  “It’s just that she’s unpredictable. Hard to see her as a reliable partner.”

  “You think she’ll turn on us?” Izzy asked.

  “No. I think she wants the same things we do. She just has a different way of going about it.”

  “Oh, so she is a lot like you.”

  “She’s not a thing like me,” I protested.

  “See how fast you whipped that out?”

  “Must have been saving that up for a while, huh?”

  Izzy shrugged.

  “Okay, let’s drop it for now. I think we may have ourselves a boat. Have to head down to the docks and look for Kate.”

  “Kate?”

  “I know. Shouldn’t all the names in Hell be exotic with too many consonants?”

  “Probably someone who hasn’t forgotten her name. A good sign.”

  “Zara made her Harbor Master. Not sure she wants the job.”

  “Another good sign.” Blaise winked.

  We made our way down to the docks. It was a single walkway made up of wooden planks with slips for tying up boats. It was crude compared to a modern marina. Most of the boats were small and didn’t look all that seaworthy. They were filled with nets and crude handmade fishing gear. There were wooden poles with string. I had to guess gut string since there weren’t any materials here like nylon. There were also some wood shafts that were sharpened as spears. Some of the slips were empty. Some of the boats had just come in and fish were being offloaded into crude barrels. Honestly, I didn’t know one fish from another in a New York fish monger stall, so I had no idea how these were the same or different than in life. However, the fish were real, flopping around, shiny scales catching the sun, tails slapping. Had these people been fishermen in life and found their way to the sea out of a need to reconnect to what they had? They even ate the fish, despite having no need for food.

  The boat in the last slip was startlingly different. It was larger than the other boats, though it didn’t look any more seaworthy. It was a single mast sailboat with a cabin entrance on the upper deck. The wood was sun-bleached except for a few patches, repairs that must have been made recently. Low on the hull, where it sat in the water, a sharp crust of some sort had formed. It might have been something like barnacles, but it was hard to tell. In front of the boat was a gate, although it looked pretty flimsy. However, knowing that Kate had been prevented from using her boat, the gate pretty much confirmed this was hers.

  “Up here!”

  Kate was standing at the top of a plank that ran down to the dock. Without even waiting to see if we were coming up, she turned and walked away from the plank. We made our way up. The sails were rolled up. Mounted at the very front of the deck was what appeared to be a crude harpoon. It was carved out of wood and, although weathered, Taka would have been proud to claim it. There was a thick wooden shaft inserted into it with a very sharp end. I couldn’t tell what it used for propulsion, but I nodded in the harpoon’s direction for Izzy. His eyes lit up.

  Kate was nowhere to be seen and the cabin door had been left open. I motioned to Kyo and Blaise to keep watch and Saripha, Izzy and I went inside. The door opened on a set of narrow steps that descended below. At the bottom was a low, short hall and a second door into the main cabin.

  Kate sat behind a desk. On the wall were what appeared to be maps and charts. There were a couple of hammocks to sit on, which were a little awkward, but we got ourselves arranged.

  “Tell me why you want my boat.” Kate wasn’t wasting time.

  “We need to find someone. We told you before. She is called Adaxa the Ancient.”

  “Ah, yes, the Dreamers.”

  “You said you knew ‘of’ them.”

  “They are told about in stories. At one time it was said they held people in fear as much as the Angels. They are said by some to be powerful sorcerers.”

  “Do you know where they are? Their island?”

  “I know where it’s reputed to be. We were always told to stay away from that area of the ocean.”

  “Who’s ‘we’?” Saripha asked. “You don’t seem to belong here.”

  “I don’t. Wandered in to this port during a storm. The Harbor Master wouldn’t let me leave.”

  “Where’re you from?” I asked.

  “No place in particular. There is a large diaspora of people who take to the sea, in spite of its dangers, in order to escape the demons. Some started out in border towns near the ocean, but some were just running and ran out of land.”

  “You run this boat by yourself?”

  “I used to have a small crew, but when they found they couldn’t fight the Harbor Master, they fled. All except me.”

  “Because you won’t leave your ship.”

  Kate gave me a hard stare. It was all the confirmation needed.

  “Why are you seeking the Dreamers? Even if they aren’t as dangerous as the stories say, they’re still pretty powerful. You run into people who have been here since before the Angels and they will tell you the Dreamers were ruthless in how they ran things.”

  “Explains a lot about Lazitar.”

  Saripha sighed. “We have a friend who is trapped by a dreaming spell. Adaxa is the Dreamer who created the spell when she was a captive of the Angels.”

  Kate thought about this for a minute and then shrugged.

  “She might be motivated to help you. They certainly hate the Angels. The Angels were rumored to have nearly wiped them out. So they enslaved some?”

  “They enslaved her, to use her power, I presume,” Saripha added.

  “Trouble is they may not have the strength left to go up against the Angels.”

  “We have to try. If we can’t get their help we’ll have to try ourselves and that will most certainly fail.”

  Kate was silent again for a while. Then she rose up and crossed to one of the charts on the wall. Saripha and I joined her. The chart was hand drawn and the greater part of it was blue-green. At the lower edge and corners were the shore line of land masses. Most of it was depicted as rocky and treacherous like we had seen at the Mountain. Only occasionally was this broken up by small inlets of calm water. At various points on the map were areas of darker colors that looked like an attempt to sketch something under the water. In the upper left of the map was an area where there were a lot of these deeper-colored patches, arranged in a rough circle with only narrow patches between them.

  “Nice drawing,” Izzy said admiringly. “Yours?”

  “Only in the sense that I made it, but it is based on many old maps. Those of us on the seas pass these down from generation to generation by having each new sailor copy the maps of the elders.”

  “Generations?” Izzy’s expression showed puzzlement.

  “That’s how we think of newcomers. Generations in terms of how long one has lived on the sea. We don’t age, of course, although you will find some old sailors who look quite grizzled. They looked that way when they died and they still think of themselves that way. They are also the most fiercely independent.”

  “So what are we looking at here?” As usual, I was getting impatient. Saripha put her hand on my shoulder to calm me down a bit.

  “This is the Great Ocean, as we call it. It is called the Great Ocean because no one has ever succeeded in finding land on the other side.”

  Izzy interrupted. “You mean sailing towards the top of the map?”

  “Yes, roughly northwest. Admittedly not many have tried and a few were never seen again.”

  “Maybe they found something better and didn’t want to come back?” I was ever the optimist.

  Kate shrugged. “Then good on them, but there are also plenty
of dangers out there even in the part of the ocean we know. There are demon races unique to the ocean and there are creatures that mostly stay to the depths, but surface occasionally. You don’t want to be there when they do.”

  “That’s what the harpoon is for.” Izzy nodded.

  Kate grinned. “Sure, but it’s better if you never have to use it.”

  “What about these markings?” I pointed to the deeper colors that looked like something under the surface.

  Kate pointed to the coastline. “As you can see, navigating the shore is tricky. There are very few places to land and some are hostile, like this one was. Most of the coastline is treacherous and given the odds, most seafarers will stay out to sea and weather all but the worst storms.”

  “When you say ‘seafarers,’ you are talking about something different than the fishermen of this village?”

  “I’m talking about former humans who have chosen the dangers of the sea so that they can live independently of demons and Angels.”

  “Like Citizens,” Izzy said to no one in particular.

  “What I was starting to point out is that not all the dangers are on shore. These areas of murky color represent subsurface reefs. Their locations are not exact, but rough approximations. They are much rougher and stronger than coral reefs where we came from and they will do serious damage.”

  “How do you avoid them?” I asked. I was guessing, knowing that might be pretty important.

  “Currents flow in peculiar patterns around them. It’s subtle, but if you pay attention you can see it.”

  “I think we know what Blaise will be doing.” I looked at Izzy.

  “He’ll probably want a crow’s nest.”

  Kate continued, ignoring us. She pointed to the area in the upper left where there were a lot of those indications. “This part of the map represents an area most of us avoid. It is riddled by these reefs arranged in rings with narrow passages between them. However, within this chain there are rumored to be islands. What you are looking for is either there or beyond the known waters, off the top of the map. If the latter, your search is probably hopeless. If the former, it’s just dangerous.”

  Saripha looked at Kate with an intensity that was commanding but not pleading. “Will you take us to find the island?”