The Bands of Mourning (35 page)

“Don’t be dense,” Wax said, grabbing the ladder below him and climbing. “I’m trying to pace myself. What if we reach the top and have to fight?”

“You can throw your wooden teeth at ’em,” Wayne said from above. “Do some cane waggin’ as well. I’m sure you’re cross about stayin’ up so late.”

Wax growled softly and climbed up onto the next tier, but in fact he was winded to the point that arguing was taxing. The younger man seemed to realize it, and had a wide grin on his face as they climbed up the final two tiers to the bottom catwalk.

“I should deck you right in your grin,” he grumbled as he joined the still-smiling Wayne on the catwalk. “But you’d just heal.”

“Nah,” Wayne said. “I’d fall over and groan. Considerin’ your age, it’s more important to make you feel you’ve accomplished somethin’ in a day.”

Wax shook his head, turning and stepping to the side along the catwalk. The board under his foot immediately cracked. His leg slipped through, and though he caught himself and yanked the foot out, for the first time in ages he felt a little of what others must feel at being up so high. That ground was far, far below, and he didn’t have any metals in him at the moment.

He growled and stepped around the hole. “That was
not
my fault. The board was weak.”

“Sure, sure,” Wayne said. “It’s okay, mate. Most folks put on a little weight as they hit their twilight years. ’S natural and all.”

“If I shot you,” Wax said, “nobody would blame me. They’d probably just say, ‘Wow. You lasted that long? I’d have shot him years ago.’ Then they’d buy me a pint.”

“Now, that hurts, it does,” Wayne said. “I—”

“Who are
you
?”

Wax froze, then both he and Wayne looked upward toward the person leaning out over the railing of the upper catwalk, staring down at them. An engineer, by the looks of it, in a white coat over vest and cravat. He frowned at them, then seemed to recognize Wax, his eyes widening.

“Rust,” Wax swore, raising his hands as Wayne moved immediately, jumping up. Wax gave him a boost, and he kicked off and grabbed the railing of the upper catwalk. The engineer started to cry out, but Wayne snatched the man’s ankle, toppling him with a thump.

Wayne swung up in a heartbeat, and another thump sounded. Wax waited, nervous. Moments passed.

“Wayne?” he hissed. “Are you up there?”

A moment later, the engineer’s unconscious face appeared over the side of the catwalk, eyes closed.

“Of course he’s up here,” Wayne said from up above, imitating the voice of the unfortunate engineer and wiggling the head like a puppet’s. “You just tossed that bloke up here, mate! You’ve forgotten already? Memory loss. You must be gettin’
real
old.”

*   *   *

Technically, every person in the world was dying—they were merely doing it very slowly. Irich’s curse was not that he was dying. It was that he could
feel
it happening.

As he shuffled down the hallways of the enormous wooden ship, he had to keep close watch on the floor, because the slightest dip or cleft could cause him to trip. When he gestured toward the wall where they’d found the burned maps—explaining to the other scientists—his arm felt as if it were strapped with a ten-pound weight.

His left hand barely worked anymore; he could grip his cane, but he couldn’t stop his hand from trembling as he did so—and he practically had to drag his left leg with each step. The shortness of breath had begun. His physician said that one day, he simply wouldn’t have the strength to breathe.

On that day, Irich would suffocate alone, unable to move. And he could feel it coming. Step by excruciating step.

“And what is this, Professor Irich?” Stanoux asked, gesturing toward the ceiling. “Such a fascinating pattern!”

“We aren’t certain,” Irich said, leaning on his cane and looking upward—a task that was surprisingly difficult. Rusts. He hadn’t had trouble tipping his head back before, had he?

Step by step.

“It looks like a ship,” Stansi said, cocking her head.

Indeed, the golden pattern on the corridor ceiling
did
look something like a small ship. Why paint it here? He suspected it would take years to sort out this vessel’s many secrets. Once, Irich would have been content to spend his entire life picking through these oddities, writing about each and every one.

Today however, his “entire life” seemed far too short a period to be spent on such endeavors. Suit and Sequence wanted their weapons, and they could have them, for Irich desired only one thing.

A miracle.

“Please, continue with me,” Irich said, walking down the corridor with his latest gait. He had to develop a new one every few months, as more of his muscles grew too weak or refused to function. Step, cane, shuffle, breathe. Step, cane, shuffle, breathe.

“What marvelous woodwork!” Stanoux said, adjusting his spectacles. “Aunt, do you recognize what kind of wood this is?”

Stansi stepped up beside him, waving over the guard with the lantern so she could admire the strange hardwood. Irich had shown similar interest in the ship’s details at first, but each day his patience grew more strained.

“Please,” Irich said. “You shall have all the time you wish to study, prod, and theorize. But only
after
we have solved the primary problem.”

“Which is?” Stansi asked.

Irich gestured toward an arched doorway ahead, guarded by a soldier with another lantern. She saluted as Irich passed. Technically, he was an Array—a rank of some influence within the Set. Suit and his people had a high regard for scientific thought. The power and prestige, however, were meaningless to him. Neither could grant him additional breaths of life.

Past the doorway, he waved for his group of five scientists to gaze upon the grand machinery that filled the hold of the strange vessel. It was like nothing he had ever seen, without gears or wires. It looked more like a
hearth,
only constructed of a lightweight metal with lines of other metals running away from it along the walls. Like a spiderweb.

“This ship,” Irich said, “is filled with enigmas. You have noticed the odd patterns on the ceilings, but questions like those are barely the
beginning
. What is the purpose of the room hung with dozens of black hoods, like those worn by an executioner? We have found what appear to be musical instruments, but they seem incapable of making any sounds. The ship has an ingenious system of plumbing, and we have identified facilities for both men and women—but there is a
third
set of rooms with an indecipherable marking on the doors. For whom were these built? People of the lower class? Families? A
third
gender? So many questions.

“One question tops them all, and we feel that answering it will provide the very linchpin. It is why I have called for you, the most brilliant minds of the outer cities. If you can answer this, we will gain the technological might to secure our freedom from Elendel oppression once and for all.”

“And what question might that be?” Professor Javie asked.

Irich turned back to them. “Why, how this thing
moves
of course.”

“You don’t know?”

Irich shook his head. “It defies all scientific knowledge available to us. Some mechanisms were undoubtedly damaged in the crash, but as you can see, the vehicle is mostly intact. We
should
have been able to ascertain its method of propulsion, but so far it eludes us.”

“What of the navigators?” Stanoux asked. “The crew? Did none survive?”

“They have been uncooperative,” Irich said.
And somewhat fragile.
“Beyond that, the language barrier has so far proven insurmountable. That is why I invited you, Lord Stanoux, as one of the world’s foremost experts on ancient, anteverdant languages. Perhaps you can decipher the books found on this ship. Lady Stansi, you and Professor Javie will lead our engineers. Imagine the power we would have with a fleet of such ships. We would dominate the Basin!”

The scientists shared looks. “I don’t know that I want
any
group having access to such power, Professor,” Lady Stansi said.

Ah, right. These were not politicians. He should not employ the same rhetoric he had used when Suit sent him to gather funds from the wealthy. “Yes,” he admitted, “it will be a terrible burden. But surely you can see that this knowledge is better off in our hands, rather than in the hands of those at Elendel? And think of what we will
learn,
what we could
know.
”

They took that better, nodding in turn. He would have to speak with Suit—these people must not see themselves as serving a totalitarian army, but a benign freedom movement seeking knowledge and peace. That would be difficult, with all these rusted soldiers marching about and saluting everyone.

He prepared for an explanation of what they knew, intending to divert the scientists with promises of knowledge, when he heard a voice echo down the hallway. “Professor Irich?”

He sighed. What now? “Excuse me,” he said. “Lady Stansi, perhaps you will wish to inspect this fixture, which appears to provide some kind of power to the ship. It does not have electricity, so far as we can discern. I would value your unbiased opinions before I tell you what we have concluded. I must go deal with something.”

They seemed amenable to this—enthusiastic even. He left them and limped down the hallway.
Too slow, too slow,
he thought, both of his walk and the possibility of progress from the scientists. He couldn’t wait upon research, experimentation. He needed answers
now
. He had thought that on the train, they might find …

But no, of course not. An idle hope. He should never have left this project. Back in the hallway, he found no sign of the person who had called to him. Frustrated, he made it all the way back to the doorway before turning and searching down one of the side hallways. They should know better than to call for him! Could they not see the difficulty he had in traversing even a short distance?

He started back up the hallway, but hesitated as he noticed a small storage compartment that had popped open on the wall. There were hundreds of these scattered throughout the ship, containing ropes or weapons or other items. But this one had dropped something to the floor. A small, silvery cube.

His heart leaped in excitement. Another of the devices? Such luck! He had thought all these compartments searched by now. He struggled to pick it up, going down on his good knee and fishing for it, then lurched back to his feet.

A plan was already forming. He would tell Suit that it had been recovered by one of his spies in New Seran. His punishments would be lifted, and perhaps he would be allowed to move to the second site, perhaps join the expedition.

Excited, he sent a soldier to watch the scientists, then hobbled out of the ship, glad that something was finally going
right
for him.

*   *   *

Marasi cracked a closet door within the strange ship, then looked after the man called Irich, who limped through the gaping hole in the wall. MeLaan slipped out of a closet across the hallway from her and held up a warding hand to Marasi, then snuck to the opening to watch where Irich went.

Marasi waited, anxious. Though her duties as a constable usually related more to analysis and investigation, she’d gone on her share of raids in Elendel. She’d thought herself hardened, but
Harmony,
this mission was starting to rub her nerves raw. Too little sleep, and so much sneaking about, hiding, knowing that at any moment someone could turn a corner and find you there, looking guilty as sin.

MeLaan finally waved her forward, and she scrambled out of the closet and knelt beside the kandra at the entrance.

“He went into that room,” MeLaan said, pointing at a door along the wall. “Now what?”

“We wait just a bit longer,” Marasi said. “And see if he comes back out.”

*   *   *

Wax prowled along the wooden planks of the interior scaffolding. MeLaan’s spyglass let him get a good look at the ground floor, though he’d have much preferred binoculars. He scanned the whole area, noticing with interest as Marasi and MeLaan entered the ship.

That ship … something about it bothered him. He hadn’t been on many boats, but the decks atop the enormous thing seemed off to him. Where were the masts? He’d assumed them torn down, but from above, he could see no broken stumps. So, was this ship propelled through the water by a steam engine, perhaps? Gasoline?

After rounding the entire building on the catwalk, he saw no sign of his uncle.

“Still nothing?” Wayne asked as he lowered the spyglass a last time.

Wax shook his head. “There are some rooms built into the north side of the structure. He could be in there. He might also be inside the ship.”

“So what do we try next?”

Wax tapped the end of the spyglass against his palm. He’d been struggling with the same question. How did he find his prey without alerting the guards camped outside?

Wayne nudged him. Down below, the limping man came back out of the boat. Wax focused the spyglass on him, watching as he crossed to one of the nearby rooms.

“Did he look anxious about somethin’ to you?” Wayne asked.

“Yeah,” Wax said, lowering the spyglass. “What did those two women
do
in there?”

“Maybe they—”

“I don’t want to hear your guess,” Wax said. “Really.”

“Fair enough.”

“Come on,” Wax said, leading the way back around the shadowed catwalks toward the ladders.

“You have an idea?” Wayne asked.

“More of an impression,” Wax said. “Suit doesn’t like talking to minions. Everyone we’ve interviewed indicates the same thing—he chooses underlings with some power and repute and lets them handle things. Miles, the Marksman. My uncle loathes being bothered.”

“So…”

“That man with the limp,” Wax said, “probably has a similar role here. He’s an Allomancer, and I heard him referenced in Lady Kelesina’s mansion; he’s an important underling, though perhaps not in favor right now. Either way, he likely reports directly to my uncle.”