The Ruling Sea (80 page)

Pazel walked in the opposite direction, as quickly as he dared. Like every deck, the mercy had a large central compartment, surrounded by cabins, passages and storage areas. But on the lower decks, where no cannon could be placed, these central compartments were smaller, and the surrounding chambers more extensive. Pazel’s escape route wound through a maze of crates and pass-throughs and dividing walls. There would not be a single soul on duty at this hour; the trouble, if it came, would be from men who were
not
on duty but there for other reasons, such as buying or selling deathsmoke. Some said that addicts would kill anyone who stumbled across them, lest their names be reported to the captain.

So easy to get lost. His fingers read the walls: old tar, bent nails, cool brass of a speaking-tube. Time and again he had to stop and feel the pitch of the ship. Several times he heard gasping exhalations in the dark: addicts tended to hold the smoke in their lungs as long as possible, wanting every last iota of pleasure from the drug that was killing them.

Then at last he caught the faint mix of smells he had been sniffing for: woodsmoke, ham, salted fish. His fingers touched a door: the smells were stronger when he pressed his nose to the crack. Pazel sighed with relief: it was the smoke cellar, where meat was cured and kept for lean times far from land. That meant the ladderway was just ahead. He could scurry up it to the orlop, slip across to the Silver Stair, and race straight to the upper decks. No one would see him, and if they did he could just say he was making for the heads, which come to think of it, wasn’t a bad idea—

“Stop right there,” someone whispered.

Pazel froze. He gave a silent but very passionate curse. The voice was Jervik’s.

The big tarboy stood right in front of him. Pazel could hear his breath, though he could still see only a slight perturbation in the darkness where he stood, arms spread wide across the passage.

“Don’t you blary move,” said Jervik. “I’ll make a scene, I will. I know where you’ve been, and what you’ve all been doing. Your mates have been bumping around here for twenty minutes. I watched ’em all go by.”

We’re dead
, Pazel thought. But his new training did not fail him: before Jervik could move Pazel had sprung back two steps, and his hand, almost of its own accord, had drawn his father’s knife. The knife Jervik had stolen once, and threatened to use on Pazel himself.

“What are you waiting for, Jervik?” said Pazel acidly. “Run off and tell Arunis. Get yourself another gold bead. Maybe two, if Rose actually executes one of us.”

He crouched, waiting for the attack. To his great surprise Jervik neither moved nor spoke. It occurred to Pazel that the big tarboy must actually have heard very little: they would all have known better than to talk, while still so deep in the ship. Jervik was sneaking and spying, that much was obvious. But he’d hardly be standing here, confronting Pazel in pitch blackness, if he knew what had happened in the liquor vault.

With the thought, a great rage boiled up in Pazel’s chest. Always Jervik. Every time things started to go right.

“You’re fishing for clues, aren’t you?” he said, barely able to keep his voice down. “You didn’t hear us at all, and now you’re hoping I’ll cough up something Arunis will pay you for. No matter what he can do with that something. No matter what he’s trying to do to us all. The world can burn on a stake, can’t it, Jervik? You’ll still have your gold.”

“Muketch
—”

“My name is
Pazel
, you useless sack of slag. Pitfire, I’m sick of you. Go on, get out of here. You want to
make a scene
, is it? Right here?”

“Put your muckin’ knife away. I want to switch.”

“I’ll put it away in your gods-damn—
what?”

“Switch,” whispered Jervik, his voice barely audible. “I want to switch sides, is what. Rin slay me if I’m lyin’ to you.”

Pazel had to steady himself against the wall. “Jervik,” he said, “are you ill?”

Jervik was silent, and when he found his voice again it was as tight as a backstay.

“Arunis was goin’ to let me hang. He told me to watch you there on the bowsprit, but he never said you was stiff as a corpse. He wanted me to take the blame when you fell into the sea. He’s unnatural bad.”

“You’re just figuring this out?”

Jervik leaned closer; Pazel felt his hot sapwort breath on his face. “He tries to get inside my head,” he whispered. “To reach inside and take the wheel, you understand?”

“Maybe, yeah,” said Pazel, retreating a step.

“I won’t let the son of a whore. He can’t make me. But it hurts, Pathkendle. He
pick-picks, pick-picks
at me. Day and night. Sleepin’, wakin’, eatin’. I don’t let
no one
use me that way. He’s a beast from the Pits and I wish him death.”

Jervik was halfway to tears. Pazel wished he could see the older tarboy’s face, although he feared what he would see there was madness. But mad or not, Jervik had never come closer to sounding sincere.

“I’ve been a pig,” said the older boy, wringing the words out of himself. “A stump-stupid pig. I been tearing you down for years. Woulda knifed you back on the
Eniel
, with your daddy’s own knife. No Arquali on that boat had such a fine knife, my own was rusty trash. You didn’t even know how to use that knife. You shouldn’t have owned it, nor been such a clever-skins. Arqualis own things, Ormalis get owned. You shoulda been a slave, not educated, not booklearned and special. I was boss of that ship until Chadfallow put you aboard.”

“I know that,” said Pazel.

“Couldn’t get you to blary
respect
it,” said Jervik with a sour laugh. “You fought like a wee girly, but you always fought. I hated you. Rin’s liver, I hated you so. It got to where I thought I’d kill you, in some dark place like this, the way a coward would do it, and—you’re better, Pathkendle, better than me.”

“Jervik,” said Pazel, “I’m not special. Things just keep happening to me. Ever since I was small. It’s not me, mate. It’s just—what happens.”

Jervik pulled himself up straight. “I don’t know what the blary hell you’re talking about.”

“Well, look,” said Pazel, “I—Pitfire, Jervik, what do you want to do now?”

“Told you already,” said Jervik. “Switch sides.”

“Right,” said Pazel, thinking in a desperate rush, glad the dark was hiding his panic. There was no question whatsoever of trusting Jervik with their secrets. But he had to say something, and fast.

“Right, Jervik, here’s the thing. We have this—circle, that’s true. But there’s so few of us, and if they catch us talking, they’ll just stab us dead, or lock us in the brig and torture us until we snap.”

“That’s plain as piss,” said Jervik.

“Exactly,” Pazel agreed, “so you can bet nobody wants to get caught. That’s why we made this little rule, Jervik. We have to all come together and talk it through, you see, before we bring anybody else into the circle. One mistake and we’re dead, after all. You understand?”

“Yeah,” said Jervik, his voice abruptly subdued, “I’m hearing you, loud and clear.”

He’d blown it. He’d said the wrong words, talked down to him a little too much. Jervik had risked everything to trust his old enemy. He’d never be able to stomach the humiliation of not being trusted in turn. Pazel braced himself. Jervik always fell silent like this, before he went off like a bomb.

Then Pazel started. Jervik was poking him in the chest. “Tell me when,” he demanded.

“W-when?” Pazel echoed.

“When I can help. What needs doing, who you want out of your way. That’s all I need to know, see? Just what you want done—you or Undrabust, or the Isiq girl. Now tell me if
you
understand.”

Pazel was utterly stunned. “Yes,” he said after a moment, “yes, I do.”

“All right then.” The shadow that was Jervik straightened and turned away. Pazel listened to his footfalls. Then, on an impulse, he hissed: “Jervik! Wait!” and rushed up to him again.

“Well?” said Jervik.

“Listen, please,” said Pazel. “If we’re going to stand a chance, there’s something I have to ask you. It’s important, so don’t take it the wrong way. Arunis chose to come after you—why you, and not somebody else? Do you have any idea?”

Jervik nodded at once. “That’s an easy one. But I won’t tell you, ’cept you swear on your mum’s heart not to repeat it to nobody.”

“I swear it, Jervik. I swear on her heart.”

Jervik paused, then made a sort of grunt of acceptance. “It’s like this. Arunis thought I weren’t afraid.”

“Of him?”

“Of nothin’. And it’s true, I ain’t afraid of that much. Spells and sorcerers, aye—those spook me, and the Vortex would scare any man who ain’t plum crazy. But that’s just it. He hoped I was crazy-brave, inhuman like. Maybe—” Jervik hesitated, his voice suddenly strained. “—because of how I act. Fightin’, talkin’ proud. But soon enough he found out I weren’t crazy, and he stopped payin’ me so much attention. I been wondering why that is. Do you know?”

“No, I don’t,” said Pazel. “But … maybe he can only have his way with crazy folks. Maybe he can’t get inside your head unless it’s already a little cracked.”

Jervik said nothing. Suddenly he gave a violent shudder, as if shaking off some cold and clammy touch. Then he laughed under his breath. “You’re smart,
Muketch
. Smart enough to beat these bastards. I knew it when I followed Dastu down here, and when I waited in the dark. I knew this one blary time I was choosin’ right.”

Hercól lay on his side, his left hand tucked carefully beneath his cheek. The first pale glimmers of day were seeping down the light-shafts, distilling absolute black to nimbus gray, carving shapes out of a void.

On the muscle of his upper arm lay Diadrelu. She had fallen asleep there, just minutes ago. He was wide awake, and frightened. He could not catch his breath.

When she woke, her hand clutched for a sword that was no longer there. Remembering, she turned over and embraced his arm with her body. Trembling with wonder. How the world had changed.

“This is what was happening,” she said, still holding him. “Why I fought with you, why I kept seeking you out. I didn’t know it was possible. I didn’t know it could happen to me.”

“Possible?” he said.

“You’re afraid. Don’t be, love. This is a victory. This is why we’re here.”

Hercól was silent.

“You’re warm,” she said.

He kissed her shoulders, timidly, certain he was appalling her, that his lips and beard were grotesque in their hugeness. Dri shivered, and her arms tightened around him, and for a time he was less timid. Then his eyes felt again the pinprick of light.

“Dawn is here,” he said.

She moved in a flash, sliding from his arm to the floor, gathering her things in a swift whirlwind. In a few seconds she was herself again, the sword and knife buckled in place, the pack strapped tight across the spot his lips had brushed. He struggled into a sitting position, keeping his wounded hands out of the dirt. She ran up his chest like a short slope and threw her arms about his neck.

“I will keep nothing from you, nothing.”

“Nor I you,” he said, breathless. “But you must go, my dearest, my heart.”

“We came aboard to steal the ship, Hercól. To wreck it on Stath Bálfyr, our Sanctuary-Beyond-the-Sea.”

“Yes,” he said, “I had begun to think so.”

“That chart in Ott’s hand, that Pazel was made to read? We forged it. Do you see the sin of it now? You may have been pawns in Ott’s game, once. But he remains a pawn in ours. We’ve depended on his machinations and his madness. We needed him to succeed.”

“Hush, Lady—hush, and go now. There will be other nights.”

“No end to them,” she said, and breathed into his ear. Hercól closed his eyes, and for a moment the sound she made was enormous, larger than the envelope of wind about the
Chathrand
, stronger than the gales they had survived.

Then she fled. Hercól caught a glimpse of her, a running shadow as she passed through the bars.

“Dri!” he whispered.

The shadow stopped, and turned. Dri stepped back inside the cell and looked at him.

“I killed them,” he said. “The princes, Judahn and Saromir, Maisa’s boys. I didn’t refuse Ott’s command, I obeyed it. I murdered those children, for Arqual. It was me.”

“I know,” she said quietly. “I have known for some time now. It is plain as a scar upon your face.”

“My great change of heart, of which I boast to other children, like Thasha who reveres me: it came only
after
those two boys lay dead at my feet. I tried to tell the Empress, before she put Ildraquin in my hand. I could not do it. I have never told anyone but you.”

Dri came forward and touched his ankle. “Thasha is not a child,” she said. “And she does not revere you, Hercól. She loves you. It is a love well earned.”

Hercól looked away, as if regretting his confession.

“Hear me,” she said, “There is a path out of the Ninth Pit, the Pit of self-torture, the bottommost. But you have only begun to seek it. This truth needs telling to other ears than mine. Will you stand before their mother, one day, and tell her all?”

At first Hercól made no answer. Then, stiffly, he replied, “I will tell the Empress, if the chance should come.”

“Pray it does. For I fear the lie will gnaw at your good heart—gnaw like a parasite, until you tear it away.”

“Go now,” he said, “while the darkness protects you. Let us speak of this no more.”

Still her hand remained on his ankle. “It is you who sit in darkness. I would take it from you, if I—”

“Go!” he said, more sharply than he intended.

And with a last flash of her copper eyes, she went. Hercól sat alone with his knees drawn to his chest. The air was motionless and heavy, as though he were entombed in wax. The light grew slowly. Magritte, the whaling captain, gave a low moan in his sleep.

The ship’s bell rang in the morning, his thirty-seventh in the brig. It was time for his exercises, but for once he did not move. He had finally spoken of it. Dri would not love him long.

A man’s laugh floated down from the orlop. Someone hacked and spat. In the corridor, a rat crawled out of the gloom. Hercól watched its approach, indifferent. The rat’s step was oddly slow.