The Great Rift (24 page)

The creases of a subtle insult crinkled her eyes. "Do you consider us baggage?"

"Baggage?"

"Bulky objects to be set aside whenever you plan to put your hands to use."

He frowned. "I consider you flags. Conspicuous things to be waving around when I'm worried about being found and flayed by the agents of a wealthy lord."

She regarded him for some time. "You won't learn to wholly trust us until you put us to use."

"We'll see about that as soon as we're out of increasingly hostile territory. For now, trust
me
and go wait by that damn fountain."

Sailors and stevedores hollered back and forth. Once more, the four of them pitched in to help unload, sweating in the chill breeze. The last of the lumber touched the dock an hour before the sun would touch the western hills. Packs shouldered, Dante and Blays thumped down the planks to the relatively dry land beyond the docks, a sodden square of wide-spaced cobbles choked with mud, sand, manure, and well-trampled grass. Taverns, public houses, and tailors fronted the square. Blocky warehouses rose behind them.

Mourn and Lira entered the crowds and crossed toward the fountain with the salmon. Beneath his hood, Dante scanned the throng, easily distinguishing the sailors in their tight leggings from the locals in their knee-length fur coats. No one seemed to be paying any special mind to the norren and the woman.

By the time Dante turned away, Blays had already flagged down his first sailor and asked which ships were Narashtovik-bound. The sailor chewed his beard a moment, and then, his breath smelling of yeasty beer, rattled off the names of three vessels that would depart the next day.

"Where are they docked?" Blays said.

The sailor scowled. "Seems to me anybody who knows that would be some kind of expert. You know the thing about experts?"

"They have expertise?"

"And they don't give it away free."

Blays' brows muddled, then he laughed. "They sure don't. For your time and trouble, most honored bosun."

He passed the bearded man an iron two-penny. The sailor ran his thumb along its clipped rim.

"The
Boon
's at Pier 15. The
Vanneya's Song
's at Farry's Punt. Can't miss it," he said, pointing downstream to a dock that bent from the shore like a misshapen Y. "And the
Bad Tidings
is berthed at the Westlong Docks." He gestured further downriver, then squinted between Dante and Blays. "Might not want to hop ship just yet, though. Hear bad things are coming Narashtovik way."

"Like what?" Dante said.

The man shrugged, gazing off to sea with weighty significance. "Arawn's own dead. Sent to right the heresy of that old man in the tower." He shrugged again. "Anyway, that's what they say."

"Zombies?" Blays said, hushed. "My goodness. I'm going to need a bigger sword."

Pier 15 was just a short ways down the muddy banks. The
Boon
was a large longboat bearing a single square-sailed mast and a high bank of oar-holes, but one of its mates informed them it was all booked and refused access to either of the ship's quartermasters. Marine-green kelp swirled in the cold estuary. They thumped down the salt-whitened planks toward the bent protrusion of Farry's Punt. There, sailors dangled on ropes over the railings of the
Vanneya's Song
, gouging barnacles from its high hull with flat iron chisels.

"Taking passengers?" Blays hollered from below.

Without turning, a soldier jerked his thumb at a rope bridge bobbing softly in the low swells. Dante frowned, waiting for more explicit permission. Blays strode forward and threw himself onto the ladder.

From the ship's deck, Dante had a clear view of the longboats, galleys, barges, caravels, and sloops snarling the docks between them and open sea. Inland, a seaborn breeze dragged chimney-smoke across the steep roofs of the city. Blays rapidly learned two of the
Song
's quartermasters were ashore in taverns unknown, but the third remained in his cabin. Blays knocked on his well-cleaned door without hesitation. A middle-aged man opened it a moment later, his scowl deepening the heavy creases around his eyes, one of which was clamped tight around a thick glass lens.

"We'd like passage to Narashtovik," Blays said. "We have—"

The man's lens flashed. "Four rounds and four pennies per body."

"Well, you see. We don't have that. But we do have someone in Narashtovik who would happily—"

"Four rounds and four pennies per body. To be paid before your boots hit the deck."

Dante bared his teeth. It was easily three times what they had on hand. "Perhaps we could strike a bargain for other services."

The man's vowels were flat with an eastern accent Dante couldn't quite place. "Four rounds and four pennies per body."

Blays' spine stiffened. "You, sir, have just lost a customer!
Four
of them!"

He turned before the quartermaster could inject another word. They descended to the dock, which was suddenly chilly and thick with the scent of overripe fish.

"They don't leave until tomorrow," Dante said. "That gives us plenty of time to locate a few pockets heavier than our own and relieve their owners of their burden."

Blays nodded, distant. "I don't know. That could attract attention."

"Since when did you consider that a bad thing?"

"Since legions of soldiers might be on our heels. Not to mention the grumbling we'd face from Lira."

Dante waved his hand. "She's so high on her horse I doubt we'd hear a word of it."

"Anyway, just because crimes are fun and easy doesn't mean I always want to do them." Blays gestured downstream in the vague direction the sailor had indicated for the Westlong Docks. "Besides, we've got at least one legit chance left."

Dante considered him a moment, then headed down the docks, swerving around an inborn oxen team and the spittle flying from their driver's lips. A quarter-mile walk took them to a rather less-peopled stretch of warehouses and half-paved streets. Grains of wheat and corn speckled the muddy alleys. Planks lay between the stone streets and the doors of the blocky lofts and silos. Broad, flat barges wallowed in the waters beside the thick piers. Mussels and dark green slime coated the pilings.

The
Bad Tidings
was one of the few sailboats at the Westlong, with one high mainmast and two smaller and well-mended sails snapping in the steady offshore wind. Blays hollered more than once before a sailor in a knit cap popped up on its deck. The creman let them aboard to see yet another quartermaster, a man in his early 40s with a beard thick enough to raise robins in. His name was Mart and he was blunt but reasonable; over the course of a few minutes, Dante and Blays bargained him from a fare that outstripped the official on the
Song
and down to a mere three rounds and change apiece—still more than double what they had on hand.

"I'm sorry, but that's as low as reason allows." Mart reached for a much-scribbled scrap of paper. "If you change your minds, we'll be here until tomorrow afternoon."

Dante sighed through his nose. "I hope by then to be able to take advantage of your generosity."

Blays glanced out the porthole. Sunset's last red spark trickled through the bubbly glass. He leaned from his chair and slapped the wooden floor. "What are you hauling here?"

Mart glanced up, eyes sharp. "Barley. A whole lot of barley."

"Got rats?"

"Does the king's mistress have crabs?"

"That would explain the pettiness of some of his recent policies. Maybe we can offer you something besides money." Blays tipped his head toward Dante. "My friend here is the finest rat-catcher in the land. Possibly in all the lands."

Mart smiled indulgently. "Is that so?"

"So they say," Dante played along.

"Here's my proposal." Blays leaned forward conspiratorially, patting Dante on the shoulder. "My friend Blegworth goes down into your hold and goes to work on your rats. If he clears them all out, we get free passage. Us and our two companions. But if he leaves a single rat alive, we go on our merry way, and you still have a whole lot less rats in your hold."

"I'll need complete solitude," Dante said. "The presence of others might scare the rats into their dens."

Mart jutted his lower jaw. "So you can steal the rum? Or set fire to the entire hold? What then?"

Blays held out his hands. "Then you and your crew stab us until you feel justice is served."

The quartermaster laughed for the first time. "I can't tell if you're arrogant or insane. But it sounds like I win either way. If you can get rid of all the rats, the trip is on me."

They squared off the details; the crew was still in the midst of relocating goods, refreshing supplies, and patching sails, but Mart claimed he'd have them cleared out belowdecks by 11th bell of the evening. Dante climbed down to the deck and headed offship.

On their way to meet Mourn and Lira, Blays stepped over a grassy pile of manure. "So can you actually do that?"

"I have no idea."

"Fantastic. Do you
think
you can do it?"

Dante slowly shook his head. "I have an idea. I can't say whether it's a good one."

"If it were I would be highly skeptical it was yours."

"Thanks for volunteering me, by the way. If I can't pull it off, I expect you to sell your body for the cause."

Blays snorted. "If I did that, we could buy our own boat."

"Then get to work." Dante detoured around a ring of hooting bystanders. In their middle, two men swayed and postured, throwing more insults than punches. "What did you call me back there?
Blegworth
?"

"You look like a Blegworth."

Lanterns sputtered from plaza poles and the cabins of boats. Blays waited at the plaza's edge while Dante rendezvoused with the others. Water sprayed from the mouth of the stone salmon on the fountain. They accepted his explanation with little comment. Mourn looked tired, Lira stiff. For whatever help it would be with their lodgings, Dante passed over his comically light purse.

"Meet back here at dawn," he said. "I'll be the one who smells like rats."

Lira tilted her head. "What exactly are you doing out there?"

"What I do best: exterminating."

They parted ways. With several hours to kill, Dante and Blays meandered the nearby streets, eventually settling in at a thriving tavern. Rather than tables, deep shelves stood at rib-height along all four walls. A vaulted ceiling with naked beams allowed space for a sort of shack in the center of the room, where men lined up to step through a curtain, spilling a fan of bright green light across the tavern floor. They emerged a minute later with mugs in hand. At intervals, smoke jetted from the pipes protruding near the top of the shack, smelling of kelp and orange rind and bitter larret root.

Blays pressed iron into Dante's hand. "Go buy us some drinks, will you?"

Dante frowned at the hissing shack. "Why me?"

"Because I'm paying. And because I'm bigger and I'll shove you around if you don't."

Dante joined the roped-off line. It moved quickly. Each time a man came and went through the curtain to the shack, green light washed the floor. Soon, it was his turn. Inside the shack, green light gleamed from bottles of all colors of the sea—blue, gray, green, and black. A very average-looking man tapped his fingers behind a short bar. Dante stared at the source of the light, an unwinking stone suspended a few inches from the ceiling.

"Is that a torchstone?"

The man didn't glance up. "That doesn't sound like any drink I've ever heard."

Since they were within spitting distance of the Houkkalli Islands, Dante bought two anise-flavored kaven and found Blays parked at one of the drinking-shelves. Past the gritty glass windows, the bustle of daily labor shifted to the whoop of nocturnal play.

"What do you think?" Blays asked once they'd drained their second mugs. They'd been talking around the war for the last few minutes. "I mean, what do you
really
think?"

"What do
you
think?"

"I think everyone's full of shit. Hot, windy shit. Wait, that's pretty gross." Blays tipped back his mug, dislodging another couple drops of rosy liquor. "I think Setteven gins up an ultimatum, the clans huff and puff for a couple weeks before backing down and accepting their demands, and Cally plays it as dumb as he can to continue the illusion we're keeping our noses clean. Nobody
wants
a war."

Dante gazed out the greasy window. Low clouds had encroached with the night and a misty drizzle dewed the cobbles. "I think Setteven's growing increasingly displeased with the unruliness of the eastern branches of their kingdom. I don't think they'll discard the opportunity to put us in our place."

Hours plodded by in that bovine way time takes while waiting on an unwanted task. Dante sipped his way through his third cup. 10th bell rang from the spires of Taim. A half hour later, he cut Blays off and started back for the
Bad Tidings
. The ship was so quiet you could hear every wave rippling against its hull. Thousands of pounds of sealed wood creaked and popped. Up top, Mart waited for them, flanked by four sailors armed with straight swords.

"The hold is all yours." He gestured to his men. "If you try anything funny, you're all theirs."

"Just them?" Blays said.

"And I'll require your swords."

"Ah." Blays reached for his buckles. "Well, that might even it out."

Dante passed over his sword and his two larger knives. Mart nodded to a crewman as tall and thin as the mainmast, who moved to pat Dante down. Dante clung to his last blade, a pick as short and slender as his little finger.

"I'll need this one."

Mart chuckled, expression unchanging. "That's how you'll be rid of them? We leave tomorrow. Of this year."

"See you at dawn." Dante smiled with half his mouth. He nodded at Blays. "Cover the top of the stairs. No humans are to come down nor rats to come up."

Blays crossed his thumbs in the salute of the Bressel armsman's guild he'd never actually been fit enough to join. "Of course, my liege."

Dante stepped over the rim of the hatch and clumped down the stairs. The main chamber of the lower deck was a square roughly thirty feet to a side, lit by a single smokeless catchlamp at both ends. Barrels lined most walls, blocked and chinked in place. It smelled of fresh beer and stale water and the acrid stink of small mammals. Barley gritted underfoot. Something small rustled from the gloom. Large serving-tables took up the remainder of the room. Small cabins filled the aft with a galley and chain locker at the fore, the iron links of the anchor lying heavy on the floor.