The Night of the Swarm (Chathrand Voyage 4)

by Robert V. S. Redick

  ‘Vermin.’

  Felthrup sat back on his haunches. ‘There is a great deal more, but you must earn it.’

  ‘I shall skin you alive, each of you. I shall roast you on a spit.’

  ‘You will answer my questions,’ said Felthrup, ‘or we will depart.’

  The maukslar roared. It threw itself against the bars again, with even greater violence. The charmed door held fast. Twisting, screaming, the demon changed its body: suddenly a tall, savage-looking man with a red beard took its place, eyes fixed on Captain Rose.

  ‘Nilus!’ the man thundered. ‘Free me at once!’

  Rose’s eyes went wide. The man in the cell bellowed again, and the captain flinched, as though expecting a blow. Then his eyes narrowed again, and he looked at the figure squarely. ‘You are not my father,’ he said.

  ‘Worthless cretin! I order you to open this door!’

  ‘But I wish you were,’ Rose went on, ‘that I might stand here before you, and lift not a finger on your behalf.’

  The figure gaped at him – and then, in an eyeblink, it changed again. Within the cage there suddenly appeared Neeps Undrabust, dressed just as he had been the night before he left the Chathrand. The night Rose had married him to Marila. Neeps turned to his young wife, eyes brimming with emotion, and reached out a trembling hand.

  ‘It’s me,’ he said. ‘It’s truly me. Come here, let me touch you. Let me touch our child.’

  ‘Marila, leave at once!’ cried Felthrup. But Marila’s eyes remained fixed on her lover; she stood as though turned to stone. Fiffengurt closed one hand tightly on Marila’s arm. She started and shook her head.

  ‘I’m dying, you know,’ said the thing that looked like Neeps. ‘The same way Rose is dying. Of the plague. I don’t want to die without touching you again.’

  Tears streamed down Marila’s face. Then she placed two fists over her eyes, and began to shout in Tholjassan. Felthrup could not understand the words, but he knew curses when he heard them, and so did the maukslar. The figure of Neeps disappeared, and was replaced by a perfect replica of Marila herself.

  ‘Your man does not love you,’ it said, in Marila’s own voice. ‘He’s found another lover. A finer one, a beauty.’

  ‘Liar,’ said Marila calmly. ‘You don’t know him. I do. Besides, he’s in a land without human beings.’

  The false Marila laughed. ‘And you think that has stopped him? You are the one who does not know the man, or the soul of men writ large. No depravity is beyond them.’The creature touched its bulging stomach. ‘What do you think is growing, here? A healthy baby, from his seed? Shall I tell you the truth?’

  At that Fiffengurt suddenly came to life. Spitting out a few choice curses of his own, he lifted Marila from the ground and ran with her down the passage. In the cell, the maukslar laughed and clawed at its belly. ‘A grub, a flesh-eating grub! It is gnawing you, gnawing its way to the light!’

  Felthrup heard the quartermaster’s voice at the distant doorway, and a croaking reply from Oggosk. Moments later Fiffengurt returned alone. He had torn open his pouch. Before Felthrup could stop him he poured out a shower of golden coins upon the floor of the cell. The few that rolled in the maukslar’s direction he stamped flat under his boot.

  ‘Fiffengurt, Fiffengurt!’ cried the rat. ‘That is not the procedure!’

  ‘It is now,’ snarled Fiffengurt. ‘Go on, bastard, eat your muckin’ fill.’

  The maukslar resumed its true form. Its small bright eyes fixed on the gold, and a moan came from its chest. It dropped to its knees and stretched out its jewelled hands as far as it could go. The nearest coin was barely an inch out of reach.

  Crack. Mr Fiffengurt brought the broken end of Oggosk’s staff down on the fat, squirming knuckles. The maukslar’s hand jerked back. It sat up, wings half-spread, its eyes flickering between their faces and the gold.

  ‘Give me some,’ it hissed.

  ‘Answer the rat’s blary question!’

  ‘One coin first. Just one.’

  Fiffengurt shook his head. ‘Two, when you talk.’

  The maukslar was gasping with want. Set free, it would tear them all to pieces; of that Felthrup had no doubt.

  ‘Arunis is banished,’ it said. ‘He trapped Uskins through the white scarf, which was his soul’s portal. Without it he cannot return, until the Swarm completes its work, and Alifros lies dead and cold.’

  The quartermaster glanced at Felthrup. ‘Well, Ratty?’

  Felthrup shook his head. ‘That answer does not merit two coins.’

  Before the maukslar could howl again, he raised a paw. ‘It merits twenty.’The maukslar started, eyes ablaze with doubt and hunger.

  ‘Yes, twenty coins,’ said Felthrup. ‘If you will swear that what you say is true.’

  ‘Wretched animal. I spoke no lie!’

  Felthrup told Mr Fiffengurt to count the money out. The quartermaster looked dubious, but he bent to the floor and gathered twenty coins, and stacked them at Felthrup’s side.

  ‘Now swear,’ said the rat.

  The demon’s eyes were locked on the coins. ‘I swear that what I have said of Arunis is true.’

  ‘And that everything you say to us henceforth shall be true.’

  ‘Yes, yes – I so swear! Give me the gold!’

  ‘Now repeat after me. “I shall speak no word of falsehood to those gathered here before me.” ’

  ‘I shall speak no word of falsehood to those gathered here before me.’

  ‘ “Nor seek to harm them, or their friends, or their just interests.” ’

  ‘Nor seek to harm them, or their friends, or their just interests.’

  ‘ “To this I swear by my name—” ’

  ‘To this I swear by my name—’

  ‘ “Kazizarag.” ’

  The maukslar’s eyes snapped up. Then he exploded in horrible wrath, flying about his cage wreathed in yellow flame. Felthrup and the two men waited for a time, then gathered the coins and made to depart. Only then did the creature relent, and swear by his true name.

  ‘Very good, thing of evil!’ squeaked Felthrup. ‘I knew you were no Tulor. And since a promise from your kind is binding only when witnessed by the living and the dead, I thank you for confirming the presence of ghosts in this chamber. Now feed him, by all means! We keep our promises too.’

  Fiffengurt tossed the coins by twos and threes, and the maukslar snatched them up and devoured them like a starved zoo animal. When it had eaten all twenty it sat down in the middle of the cell, closed its eyes and crooned with pleasure.

  ‘Kazizarag,’ said Rose. ‘The spirit of Avarice. How did you deduce this, Felthrup?’

  Felthrup almost choked on his answer: the captain had never before used his name. ‘I know more of the history of this ship than you might suppose, Captain,’ he said. ‘There are long passages in the Polylex, along with many words on the art of extracting oaths from things demonic. I even learned why Avarice here was imprisoned, and by whom.’

  ‘Then you know I have served my time,’ said the maukslar, still glowing with contentment.

  ‘If that’s a bid for freedom, you can choke on it, blubber-pot,’ said Mr Fiffengurt. ‘We’ll never in a thousand years let you—’

  ‘Fiffengurt!’ shrieked Felthrup.

  The maukslar’s eyes opened wide. ‘I should have known,’ it hissed. ‘You decided my fate in advance. Well, rat, I am sworn to speak nothing but truth. But I took no oath to speak at all. What is more, I can wait you out. That meal was my first taste of gold in centuries. It will hold me for … some time.’

  ‘How long?’ asked Rose. ‘A day, a week?’

  The maukslar grinned; flecks of gold shone in its teeth. ‘Longer than you have, Captain,’ it said.

  Felthrup rubbed his paws together. Blast Fiffengurt to the moon’s cold backside!

  ‘I also did not swear to hold my tongue,’ said the maukslar. ‘Here is a dainty just for you, rat. You’re a child of the plague. The same twisted spe
ll that created you is killing Captain Rose, and others. And if the spell should ever end there will be no more woken creatures born. You will be alone in Alifros, and in a generation or two most will doubt that you existed at all.

  ‘But in fact there will be no more generations. For here is another truth I am free to tell: Macadra is coming. She has staked her very soul on the winning of the Nilstone, and when she has it she will never give it up.’

  ‘But why is she coming?’ cried Felthrup. ‘Does she believe we have the Nilstone? Or is she chasing someone who does? Is that it? Is another ship coming our way?’

  The maukslar looked at him with loathing. ‘Whether Macadra finds you first or the Nilstone does not matter. You will die at her hand, or die when the Swarm takes Alifros in its black embrace. Macadra may try to stop the Swarm, but she will fail. No sunrise will end that night, little rat. Life itself will perish, blind and frozen. Only we deathless ones will remain, feeding on the corpse.’

  ‘Demon,’ said Captain Rose, ‘do you know where the Stone must be taken?’

  ‘I know,’ said the maukslar, smiling, ‘but that is not all. I could tell you of the crawlies’ secret power. I could plot a true course for you across the Nelluroq, since the one you have is nonsense. I could help you pass safely through the Red Storm. I could tell you the fate of those you left behind.’

  ‘We are prepared to bargain further,’ said Felthrup. ‘We have another sixty coins—’

  The creature made a sound of disdain.

  A pause. Then Captain Rose said, ‘We have more than sixty – far more. There is a great hoard secreted upon the Chathrand. We can bring you ten thousand.’

  The maukslar rose on its bird-feet and pointed at Rose. ‘You could bring me far more than that,’ it hissed. ‘I have seen the gold – and the pearls and gemstones – hidden all over this ship. Under the stone ballast, inside false stanchions on the mercy deck, sealed in iron shafts between the hulls. I saw you bring the hoard onto the ship in Arqual. I watched Sandor Ott remove a part of it for the son of the Shaggat Ness, saw another fraction discovered and seized by the shipwrights of Masalym. What remains you mean to give to the fanatics on Gurishal, to finance the Shaggat’s uprising and destabilise the Mzithrin. I have seen them, Rose. They tortured me, shining there, just out of my reach.’

  ‘We can still liberate a great many coins,’ said Rose. ‘if we take care not to alert Sandor Ott, or Sergeant Haddismal, or any of their informers. We can bring you gold by the sackful.’

  ‘And taunt me as you have done today? I think not. You see, I had not eaten in decades – not since Captain Kurlstaff’s day. I was starving. You fed me. Now my agonies have ceased.’

  A rush of despair came for Felthrup, then. He is not lying. We can no longer make him talk. And we learned almost nothing! Not even whether our friends are alive. You proud fool, Felthrup! To think you could match wits with such a beast!

  ‘Why speak of agonies?’ he tried, desperate. ‘We can feed you in the finest style. Gold and more gold! Why settle for enough, O Avarice, when you can be replete?’

  ‘Replete, replete, that’s the word!’ said Fiffengurt.

  ‘Shut up, Quartermaster! Demon, you were born to be – capacious. How long since you knew the satisfaction of gluttonous excess?’

  The maukslar’s jewelled hands caressed its belly. ‘I shall know it again without your help. Kazizarag was born to eat, not to suffer mockery and jibes. I shall wait out your doom. And your doom is coming, insects. Whether Macadra brings it, or the Nelluroq storms, or your own limitless folly. I need only wait for the Chathrand’s spine to snap. When it does, every spell laid down by selk or mage or murth-lord will be sundered. These bars will melt away, and I shall be free to swallow that hoard, all of it, though it lie on the bottom of the sea.’

  They filed back down the passage, watched by the silent denizen of the brig. Marila and Lady Oggosk were waiting outside the Green Door. When Felthrup and the two men had all clambered out into the mercy deck, the witch made a sound of disgust and prepared to slam the door.

  ‘Wait!’ said Marila. ‘You haven’t given up, have you? If you close that door the blary thing will vanish, and we’ll have to start hunting it all over the ship again.’

  ‘You’re right, Marila!’ said Felthrup. ‘Dr Chadfallow’s study of its comings and goings is not foolproof. It might be days before we find it again.’

  ‘Days we don’t have to spare,’ put in Fiffengurt, ‘and who knows? Maybe that tub of grease really can help the ship escape.’

  Oggosk scowled at him. ‘What, then? Leave it open? You saw that monster’s cunning, Nilus. He knew just how to attack you.’

  ‘He’s not Arunis, though, is he?’ said Fiffengurt. ‘We had him furious enough to dice us up for soup. But he didn’t use one charm that reached beyond his cell.’

  ‘He cannot,’ said Felthrup. ‘If he could, that cell could not have held him for centuries.’

  ‘He has a mind infernal,’ said Oggosk, ‘and he will use it against any guard we place here.’

  Rose stared at the door. ‘Find Tarsel, Quartermaster,’ he said at last. ‘The door swings outward. We will fasten a plate to the floor to prevent its closing fully. Also thick chains, and padlocks, so that it may not open more than a few inches. You yourself shall hold the keys.’

  ‘Him? The idiot?’ cried Oggosk. ‘Why not keep them yourself? Or pass them to Gangrüne? Keys are the purser’s duty.’

  ‘Mr Gangrüne is somewhat addled of late,’ said Fiffengurt.

  ‘And you were born addled, you old salted sea-rat! Nilus, choose someone else, this cross-eyed bungler will only drop them down the heads, or throw them—’

  ‘Oggosk, be silent!’

  Something in his voice made Felthrup look up in alarm. Rose was pressing his temples. His eyes were closed and his face was clenched with an expression of painful effort – or perhaps simply pain. The others noticed as well. Mr Fiffengurt and Lady Oggosk exchanged a glance – the first without rancor that Felthrup had ever witnessed.

  Then Rose opened his eyes, and he swept them all with a furious glance.

  ‘That creature has knowledge that could save this ship. Get it out of him, you four. Nothing else concerns you. Quartermaster, your duties will pass to Mr Byrd. Consult your Polylex, consult the Quezan harpooners, consult the mucking stars if you like. But bring me something to try by sundown. That is all.’

  But it was not all. Captain Rose was lumbering up the Silver Stair, brooding and stiff, when the shouting of his men pierced his thoughts. He raced up the ladderway, past the orlop and berth decks, bellowing for a report. The crawlies, Skipper! men were shouting. The crawlies are coming back!

  ‘Beat to quarters, fools!’ he shouted.

  His command raced ahead of him. Drums sounded, the ship roared to life. When Rose burst out upon the main deck he found the crew staring up at the sky.

  A flock of birds was winging towards them from the island: the same oversized swallows, bearing the little people in their claws. A large flock, but not as large as the one two days ago that had spirited Talag’s fighting force off the Chathrand. Rose made a quick estimate: some two hundred crawlies were returning to the ship.

  What in the Nine Pits for? Can they possibly mean to attack?

  A voice at his ear whispered suddenly: ‘There’s been blood on the wind for days, Rose. Crawly blood. We’ve smelled it.’

  The ghost of Captain Maulle, almost invisible in the crisp morning light.

  ‘Turachs to the deck!’ Rose howled. ‘Bindhammer, Fegin, get your men aloft – don’t concede the rigging to those mucking lice! Fire-teams to the chain pumps. Haddismal, send that sharpshooter of yours to the main top! The rest of you – stand by, stand by.’

  Sandor Ott stood on the roof of the wheelhouse, bow in hand. The flock was swift approaching. Marines boiled from the hatches like armoured ants.

  But this time the birds did not swoop down on the deck. Instead they flew straight and le
vel across the Chathrand’s waist, parting around the top of the mainmast and flapping on, with the crawlies still held tight in their claws. A moment later the crew amidships was pelted with tiny objects, raining in their hundreds from above. ‘Take cover, lads!’ Fegin was shouting, but a moment later he added: ‘Belay, belay. What in Pitfire, Captain Rose?’

  The bombardment ceased. Rose gaped in wonder at the objects littering the deck: tiny swords, tinier knives, bows and arrows fit for dolls’ hands. The ixchel had thrown down their arms.

  ‘Stand by!’ he shouted a second time, though no one would dare to move without his consent. The swallows turned eastwards, sailing out towards the mouth of the bay. They stayed far from the cliffs, as though the ixchel themselves feared assault from that quarter. Rose shouted for his telescope. By the time he had the birds in his sights they were descending again, upon one of the larger rocks beyond Stath Bálfyr. As he watched they came in for a gentle landing on the barren stone, just a few yards above the lashing of the sea.

  ‘What’s that about?’ cried Sergeant Haddismal. ‘What in Rin’s name would make them want to come to rest out there?’

  For several minutes nothing else happened, save that the dawn grew brighter, the air slightly less chill. Then the lookout cried that a single bird was flying back their way from the rock.

  Rose found it with his telescope. The bird was carrying a crawly, and as it drew near he saw that it was none other than Lord Talag. As before, the swallow stayed high above the deck. But this time as they drew near, Talag shook himself free of the bird’s claws and flew on his own, in the swallow-suit, in a circle about the ship. His flight was laboured, and brief: he flew only as far as the tip of the main topsail yard, some four hundred feet above the deck. There he landed, folded his legs, and sat. Now Rose could see that the swallow-suit was in tatters, and stained with dark blood.

  Fiffengurt was right. They’ve been fighting the island crawlies. And those two hundred – are they all that remain of his clan?

  Commotion aloft: Talag was shouting to the topmen. They relayed the message at once down the human chain. Rose made them say it twice, as he could scarcely believe his ears. Talag was asking Rose to climb the mainmast, near enough for a private talk, ‘between men who care for their people’.