Dow couldn’t say, but it all seemed to place Nell further away from him, when already it felt as if she was slipping from his grasp. He needed to talk with her about it – about so many things. But she had not returned with him to her cabin after the meeting, pleading that she must speak with Uyal, and would join him later. But when Dow had woken, she was not there. He had enquired of his guard, waiting outside the door, and the man had answered that she was still in Uyal’s chambers – and added that entrance to those chambers was strictly forbidden to all but Nell. And there she had stayed all afternoon.
That worried Dow too – that amid all this confusion, she had sought not his company, but Uyal’s.
He waited, leaning on the rail. The light faded and the Barrier darkness gathered. The call went out to cease the day’s towing and to recall the boats, and the ships settled into their fixed places for the coming night – the Chloe, Dow saw, positioned somewhat nearer than normal to the New World. Trepidation grew in him, shared, he could feel, by everyone in the fleet. It took no foresight to know that this evening of Uyal’s exposure was destined to be portentous, one way or another.
Finally, there was a stir at the foot of the stern castle, and a procession emerged. First came Diego and an escort of marines, then came the wheeled chair – its canopy intact, the curtains drawn – pushed by a new attendant to replace the one dead, and lastly came Nell.
This party advanced solemnly across the main deck, then climbed to the foredeck, the marines lifting the wheeled chair up the stairs.
Diego paused a moment to study the scaffold built at his command. Satisfied, he turned to Uyal. ‘You are prepared then, Scapegoat, to perform your duty of protecting your ship and your prince?’
Uyal’s reply was proud. ‘It would scarcely matter if I was not, for how could I prevent you? But understand, it is not I who will be demeaned by this act, exposed though I shall be – it is you who stand revealed. Moreover, you are wrong if you think this will daunt the Sunken. On the contrary, I think you have set in motion wheels of my Great Prophecy that may not have turned until later, and then in different fashion. But so be it. Have your men set me upon your scaffold.’
Diego nodded in cold determination to the marines. ‘You heard our scapegoat; take the chair, raise it up and fasten it upon the height.’
Nell said, ‘I too will ascend, and stand watch at Uyal’s side.’
‘What?’ Diego faltered for a moment. ‘No . . . that I won’t permit. Uyal must sit there alone.’
‘I’m not asking your permission. Oh, you can prevent me at gunpoint, no doubt, but do you really want to be a captain who goes against two scapegoats in the one act of perversity? I’m going up there.’
Uyal’s laugh came. ‘Save your breath, Highness. I tried myself to convince her otherwise, and failed.’
Diego thrust out a stubborn chin, but then only nodded. ‘Stand where you will – but don’t block Uyal from sight. The whole purpose here is that those things in the sea behold our scapegoat in plain view.’
‘You need not fear on that score,’ Nell said, and turned her back on the prince – to find herself, unexpectedly it seemed, facing Dow. Her face flushed, and two emotions battled there – apology and defiance – as if anticipating that Dow too would disapprove.
Dow indeed disapproved. It seemed so fraught an act, to expose herself at Uyal’s side upon the height. But he knew there was no use arguing her decision now. So he gave a single nod of silent support.
The marines raised the wheeled chair between them; with much effort and careful balancing they carried it up the scaffold stairs, set it down, and then locked the wheels into brackets built there for the purpose. Lamps had been strung all about the platform, and these were now lit. But when all else was ready, the men hesitated.
‘Get on with it,’ Diego urged. ‘Remove the canopy.’
Reluctantly, the men began to fuss with the curtains. Suddenly Dow was aware that Nell was at his shoulder, her gaze intense on him as all other eyes were focussed on the wheeled chair. She whispered, ‘There are things we need to talk about, even more than you know – but it will have to wait until morning. I must stand with Uyal tonight.’
Dow held his voice low. ‘Why? How does it help?’
‘I don’t know – except that it will be worse if I don’t. Uyal must not be left alone. Or all will fail. The expedition, the New World, none of it will come to be. And anyway,’ she added, ‘it’s the only decent thing to do.’
Above them, the chair’s upper frame was lifted away and the curtains billowed free, exposing the scapegoat for the second time to the open air; naked, for how could garments ever be made to fit such a form? Unlike the night before, there was now leisure to observe the limbs that could never bear weight, the sexual organs that were neither male nor female, the eyes, so aware of the indignity. The marines descended with the canopy, gazes averted, and Uyal was left alone, helpless in the light.
‘They will not like this,’ Nell hissed, but before Dow could ask what she meant, she was climbing the stairs.
Diego gave a last command to his marines. ‘Make sure no one attempts to bring Uyal down before dawn.’ Then he turned and marched away.
And so the watch of the night began.
It had not needed to be said, of course: Dow would stand with Nell and Uyal, below on the foredeck, at least – he sensed strongly that Nell did not want him with her on the scaffold. Nor was he alone; aside from the guards, many of the New World’s crew were gathered on the foredeck as well, some in support perhaps of the scapegoat, others in fear of what the night would bring, and in hope that proximity to Uyal might protect them.
The evening deepened to its usual heaviness – but even heavier tonight with threat. An hour passed. The lights about Uyal burned hot, and the platform stood out preternaturally against the blackness, for Diego had ordered the rest of the ship darkened, all the better to focus attention upon the scaffold. Less than thirty yards away across the water, the Chloe had been darkened likewise, the vessel barely to be guessed at in the night. Fidel and Jake and Boiler would be waiting anxiously on the high deck, Dow knew, staring over the sea at the strange pale shape on the scaffold, thrust so high and bright.
Nell, meanwhile, began the watch standing stiffly behind Uyal, as if she was the wheeled chair’s attendant. But after a second and third hour passed, she relented and sat cross-legged on the platform, just to one side of the chair. Uyal remained all but motionless, yet subtle tremors in the scapegoat’s bent limbs spoke of an immense discomfort held at bay only by an iron will.
Midnight approached, and nerves upon the foredeck drew out agonisingly. These were the Sunken’s hours. But the water about the ships gave no clue of them, the lamplight from Uyal’s platform only mirroring off the sea and revealing nothing of what lay beneath.
No bell rang out on either vessel to mark midnight itself – they had been ordered silenced – but the news from the timekeepers passed around in whispers. Another hour went by, and still Uyal’s ordeal continued. No one spoke, but all thought was as one. Was it working? Were the Sunken creatures even now observing the wracked figure in the chair, and in fear and awe of it, holding back from any further assault?
Then came a hiss from above: the lookouts, warning as loudly as they dared. ‘Lo! Off the bow – something approaches!’
Everyone on the foredeck peered ahead into the blackness. On the platform, Nell rose to her feet. For a time Dow could see nothing – but then a deeper darkness in the night could just be made out, flat on the sea, advancing slowly. Dow narrowed his eyes in confusion. The shadow was large, as wide as a ship, but what was it? And how could it be moving? It crept only at the pace a floating thing might drift upon an ocean current – but there were no currents here in the Doldrums. Closer it came, and then lamplight glinted dimly on a tangle of green fronds, and suddenly Dow understood.
It was one of the floating islands, creeping silently across the dead ocean. Propelled by . . . there was n
o visible means of propulsion. Nor had any floating isle ever before been witnessed to move of itself.
It could mean only one thing. Beneath the isle, the Sunken themselves must be propelling the great mat of weed. But to what end? Not for shelter, surely. They needed none. Nor could it be for camouflage, for it was the very motion of the island that betrayed their approach.
Helpless dread seized Dow; a fear rooted in his utter ignorance of the enemy, of how their minds worked. How could one defend against something one could not know or understand? All he and everyone else could do was watch as inch by inch – so slow it did not even create a ripple in the sea – the island slid between the New World and the Chloe. The helplessness was infuriating. Why did no one launch a mine? And yet, what good would it do? All their weapons were useless here.
The island came to a halt. The night was again without movement or sound. And yet, beneath the sea, who knew? Were the Sunken even now gathering below the hulls of the ships? Or had they departed, leaving their enigmatic gift behind? Was it not an attack at all, but some sort of gesture? A wild thought came to Dow, that the Sunken were indeed in awe of Uyal, and so had brought this isle as an offering and tribute!
Upon the scaffold, Uyal groaned, a terrible sound of pain and foreboding. Nell bent to the wheeled chair.
Dow felt a strange tremor beneath his feet, in the deck.
Then, all about the ships, the sea erupted.
11. THE SACRIFICE
The Sunken may as well have been a great wave.
In their scores, their hundreds, they swarmed up the hulls of both ships, irresistible, and came crashing over the rails. The two crews were helpless before the deluge, muskets firing uselessly, swords flashing in vain, people screaming and flailing and dying as the invaders swept fluidly among them, as unchallenged in their killing as reapers striding through a field of wheat.
On the New World’s foredeck, Dow was engulfed in the flood along with everyone else, the Sunken a storm-whirl of dark, gleaming limbs, and fathomless eyes glaring, and claws glinting as they raked the flesh of their victims, the stench overpowering of saltwater and decay.
He reeled back before the onslaught, defenceless, for he had been permitted no weapon. Then his ever-present marine guard went sprawling, blood spraying from a wound, and the man’s musket dropped at Dow’s side. Its shot was spent, but the bayonet was still attached.
Dow swept it up and turned towards the scaffold in search of Nell. Horror! The Sunken were already ascending the stairs. Nell had moved to block their approach at the uppermost step, sheltering Uyal behind her, but she was a wisp against the gale.
Dow cried her name, leapt to the foot of the stairs. One of the Sunken was there, turned heedlessly away from him, its back exposed. But even as Dow stabbed in all his desperation, the creature slipped aside, whirled easily, and clawed a savage swipe across his face.
It was a blow as heavy as cannon shot; Dow went tumbling away, agony igniting. His eyes! It felt as if his eyes had been ripped out! The world was black and he scrambled in terror on the deck, climbing finally to his knees. He wiped at his face, blood welling through his fingers, then – thank the deeps – his vision cleared. But no, only in his right eye. His left remained dark. He tried to stand, but only staggered and fell sideways again.
He found he was staring up at the scaffold, far away in his single-eyed sight. Horror again! One of the Sunken held a wildly struggling Nell in its grip and was pulling her down the stairs. Another two of the creatures were hauling Uyal from the wheeled chair.
In rage and terror Dow heaved himself to his feet once more; Nell would be killed if he did not help her! But then a second blow – delivered almost as an afterthought, it seemed, by a dark shape slipping by – caught him across the back of the head and slammed him to the deck. When he opened his eyes again he was lying on the blood-slick timbers. Only a moment had passed, for the din of battle from the main deck went on. But the scaffold above was now deserted, the wheeled chair empty.
Nell and Uyal were gone.
Panic reached even through the dazzling agony of his head. She was gone! Not killed, but stolen away. Dow rose to his knees, fighting dizziness, and wiped more blood from his eyes – and still the left was blind; to his questing fingers the orb felt ragged and wrong. But there was no time to worry about it now. He stood at last, leaning on the scaffold for support. Staring about, he could locate no Sunken anywhere on the foredeck – only human bodies – and even from the main deck the sounds of battle were diminishing now, as if the attackers were done with their slaughter. Did that mean everyone else was dead? And where had they taken Nell, and Uyal with her?
Suddenly Dow was swaying again, but it wasn’t his balance failing, he realised, it was the ship. A tremendous hammering vibration was coming up from below through the timbers. The whole vessel lurched and rolled, as if tossed by a wave – an impossibility here in these hideous Doldrums. The deep hammering came again – then cries rose, faint, from many decks down, but a growing tumult. ‘Holed! We are holed! Beware! We flood!’
Holed? This was disaster upon disaster – the Sunken had pierced the New World’s very hull! But how? With what tools? It didn’t matter: more cries confirmed the awful truth, the ship was flooding. Dow could already hear, over the terrified shouts, the deadly inrush of water.
But still all he cared about was Nell. Where was she, where had the Sunken taken her? Off the ship, seemingly . . . to the deeps then, to be drowned? No, no, he couldn’t abide that thought.
Then it struck him. The island! Why else would the creatures have brought the floating isle so close to the ship, if not to provide a secure place to hold captives who could not survive in the sea?
He lurched towards the rail, balance all awry. Across the water the Chloe loomed in a strange light: it was on fire. Flames raged amidships, and dark shapes ran to and fro before the conflagration. But it was someone else’s problem. Dow gained the rail, and looked down.
The isle was there – and it was moving. Slowly, but unmistakably, it was withdrawing from between the two ships. And visible in the firelight from the Chloe were two wretched figures sprawled pale against the dark matting – Nell and Uyal, alive, but surrounded by a dozen of their Sunken captors.
Dow did not hesitate; he climbed atop the rail and let himself topple forward into the sea.
The fall seemed to take an eternity, and he hit the surface so hard he blacked out again, waking to the warm embrace of water and weeds, and to the taste of salt in his throat, invoking memory of the last time he had drowned. Galvanised, he lashed out, surfaced in a splutter, then stared about desperately. To one side the New World reared as an enormous wall, but already it was listing, leaning out over him, and from within the hull came terrible sounds. Off to the other side the Chloe burned. And there between – not yet fully withdrawn into the outer darkness – crept Nell’s floating isle.
Dow struck out after it, wary of an attack from below, of grasping claws that would drag him down to his death, for surely the ocean all about must be teeming with Sunken. But no such attack came. At last he neared the isle, and clutching a vine-like tendril that trailed behind, he pulled himself to the edge of the living platform, and hauled himself up. The surreality of the night now reached its peak. He could not stand, for his head still spun from its injuries; his left eye was still sightless, while his right was blurred and blotted; and he crawled on a floor of living plants intertwined so densely as to be as solid as dry land beneath him.
It was madness all. But there! At the centre of the island huddled Nell and Uyal.
Even as Dow set his gaze upon them, however, he was sighted in turn by the many Sunken that crouched about the pair. Before he could move, two of the creatures rose and stole swiftly across the matted surface towards him. Seizing his arms, they hauled him brutally upright. Pain flared, and he heard Nell cry out, and Uyal too, the child voice strangely piercing. But to no effect. Helpless, Dow saw a clawed hand rise before him, no doubt t
o tear out his throat and end the farce.
He closed his eye to wait. But then came a barked cry, and his captors stiffened. After a further moment, Dow opened his eye to see that the fatal hand had been lowered. Over by Nell and Uyal, another of the Sunken had risen to full height and was staring at him.
Dow blinked dazedly. Was it the same one? Was it the individual who had exposed Uyal the previous night, and then ordered its fellows to withdraw? Dow could not be certain, but he felt somehow that it was . . .
The creature beckoned with a taloned finger, and Dow’s two custodians hauled him forward to the middle of the island. Nell, on her knees, stared up at him distraught, and beside her Uyal was a sprawl of useless limbs. The Sunken chieftain, if that’s what this particular creature truly was, stood as a barrier in front of them, and now thrust its face close to Dow’s.
For a few heartbeats, Dow’s one eye stared into two focus-less black orbs, in which he recognised nothing other than a cold scrutiny. And even though it was the Sunken that came from the ocean, and humans that came from above, just then Dow felt very much that he was the hapless sea creature hauled up by a fisherman to be studied in idle curiosity – and who at any moment could be killed without hesitation or regret.
Yet still no lethal blow came.
Instead, the thing – its head now cocked as if in enquiry – turned slowly from Dow to regard Uyal splayed upon the matting.
‘Yes,’ breathed the scapegoat, pain-filled eyes shining, ‘this one matters to us, more than all the others. You must not harm him further.’
The creature turned again to study Dow, its inhuman stare somehow disapproving. Then its interest in him seemed to fade. The thing moved away a step, and gazed across the water to the ships.
The Ocean of the Dead: Ship Kings 4 Page 25
