The Rats and the Ruling sea tcv-2 Read online

  Bolutu was an even stranger case. A veterinarian much favoured by the Imperial family, he was also a student of the Rinfaith and had taken the vows of a journeyman monk. He was a black man, and there was even a rumour that he was a Slevran, one of the savage nomads of the northern steppe — but yesterday Pazel had heard him speak Mzithrini. Surely, then, he was an enemy spy? But what good was a spy whose looks, acts and voice drew so much attention?

  Pazel winced. Not his voice, not anymore. Yesterday, enraged at the man's interference, Arunis had magically forced Bolutu's mouth open and set a live coal upon his tongue. Ramachni had stopped the burning with a counter-spell, no doubt saving the veterinarian's life. But nothing could be done about the tongue. Already Pazel had noticed Bolutu communicating through scribbles in a notebook.

  Another happy roar from the city. Pazel looked towards the port and saw men dashing, leaping from one tethered boat to another, making for the city centre. 'It's too weird,' he said to Dastu. 'What've they got to cheer about?'

  'See that boat!' cried a sailor on their left. 'Ain't that Dr Chadfallow in the stern?'

  And so it was. The doctor was seated in a long skiff, helping out with the oars. Pulling away on his right was Arunis. Uskins, the first mate, was also aboard. They were nearing the Jistrolloq, the White Reaper, fiercest warship of the Mzithrinis' White Fleet. She was anchored less than half a mile from the Chathrand: close enough for Pazel to see the enemy sailors gathering at her bows.

  'They look like old shipmates,' growled Dastu. 'He's as much a villain as Arunis himself, that doctor is.'

  Pazel's hands tightened on the rail. We won the first round, he thought. We smashed Ott's prophecy to pieces. So what was Felthrup afraid of? And what on earth was keeping Eberzam Isiq?

  Now the little boat drew alongside the Jistrolloq, and Pazel saw Chadfallow stand to speak with a Mzithrini officer, possibly the captain himself. What the doctor said he could not hear, but the sailors clustered at the warship's rail greeted his words with astonished cries. After a moment the doctor sat again, and the skiff turned towards the Chathrand.

  'By the Tree,' said Dastu. 'The Sizzies are running a new flag up their mainmast! Not their Imperial banner, either. What is it?'

  All the Mzithrini ships were doing the same. There were cheers as the pennants rose.

  'It's a coat of arms,' said Pazel softly. 'It's Falmurqat's coat of arms.'

  'Falmurqat?' said Dastu. 'The prince who was supposed to marry Thasha? Why?'

  At that very moment the fireworks began to pop. Whistlers and crackers, bomblets and boomers, followed by the neighs of frightened horses and the barks of hysterical dogs.

  Pazel watched the skiff approach. Dr Chadfallow was grim, his face hardened against the rancour virtually everyone on the Chathrand felt for him. But Arunis was smiling: a smile of triumph, or so Pazel imagined. Mr Uskins just looked afraid.

  Neeps appeared beside them. He looked at Pazel, ashen-faced.

  'Felthrup has this horrible idea-'

  'Chathrand! Urloh-leh-li! Ahoy ship Chathrand!'

  It was a shout from the Jistrolloq: a Mzithrini officer on her foremast was hailing them through a voice-trumpet. On the Chathrand 's own maintop the officer of the watch put a hand to his ear.

  'Felthrup's right,' said Pazel.

  Dastu looked from one to the other. 'What are you talking about? Who's Felthrup?'

  'Admiral Kuminzat begs the honour of serving Captain Rose, Admiral Isiq and such officers as you choose,' boomed the Mzithrini. 'An hour past sunset, aboard this his flagship. Seven dishes and a puff pastry, with Mangali cordials to follow.'

  On the skiff, Arunis put back his head and laughed.

  'I think I'm going to be sick,' said Neeps.

  'A soldier's daughter.' Pazel ground his fists against his forehead. 'Damn him. Gods damn that man.'

  Dastu was at a loss. 'Who, damn who?'

  'They're chanting her name,' said Neeps.

  'Whose name, blast it?' said Dastu. 'Thasha's?'

  'No,' said Pazel. 'The other soldier's daughter. The one Sandor Ott had in his pocket all this time. The girl Prince Falmurqat just married. Pacu Lapadolma.'

  Without another word he and Neeps turned and headed aft. All night the circle of friends huddled in the stateroom, conspiring anew but feeling checkmated. All night the fireworks exploded over Simjalla, gold and green and silver, and when the wind blew right they heard the chanting, even to the hour of dawn: Pacu, Pacu, Queen of Peace!

  5

  From the Editor: A Word of Explanation

  I will ask you very plainly: has anything, ever, been more absurd, more whimsical, more devoid of probability and good sense? That I should be given to witness these events and record them, here in my palace of books and meditation and cold unsalted soup? That with an iron stylus I should scribble away the fair days and the foul, write past the stroke of midnight under a lamp burning the ooze of a giant beetle, gaze like a bird hypnotised by the sway of the cobra's hood at the events that shaped my life — their lives — all lives in unlucky Alifros?

  Do I deserve this honour? By no means. I invite the reader to observe that I have never stated otherwise. So many deaths on the Chathrand, so many days of agony and despair, so many forms courage took, the sword through the fangs of the flame-troll, the gangrenous leg under the saw, the war in the brine-reeking darkness of the hold. But there are more fundamental questions. Who killed? Who refrained from killing? Who shielded reason, frailest blossom ever to open in the soul of man, from the hailstorms of violence and revenge?

  Not me. Not this poor editor to whom the angels lend their vision for a time. I read, I write, I drink my cave-shrimp soup and pour my energies into a task for which I know I am unfit. No more can I offer history. No more do I covet for myself.

  It seemed essential to me to clear this matter up. Now we may proceed.

  6

  Conversation by Candlelight

  7 Teala 941

  The horses were strong, and the driver whipped them without mercy, so that the carriage flew heaving and rattling down the cobbled streets. Eberzam Isiq set his back against the wall and kicked until his bare feet bled. The door held. He shouted, but no one answered his cries.

  Soon the voices in the street began to fade, as if they were leaving the city centre behind. Stone became wood under the horse's hooves: they were crossing a bridge. He tried to recall the king's chatter, where the river lay, how many crossing-points. Isiq could not even recall its name. Then blackness fell. A tunnel, the driver's shout echoing along its length, the crash of an iron gate closing behind them.

  The carriage door opened. Isiq looked out into a large stone chamber. The light was dim; the clammy air was like depths of a hold. Before him stood a trio of young men. They were neatly but not elegantly clothed, and apparently unarmed. Bowing, they apologised for the rough ride. But Isiq knew military manners when he saw them, and military eyes. These men watched his hands as he climbed stiffly to the ground.

  'You're Arqualis,' he said.

  It was not a question, and they made no denials, but merely turned and led him across the hay-strewn chamber. He passed an open doorway, heard the flutter of some large bird in the shadows. He wondered vaguely if he could ask for shoes.

  'Mind the step, Admiral.'

  'Am I to be killed?'

  The men looked at him, and one of them shrugged. 'We're not given to waste,' he said.

  Then something caught his eye. Quick as a snake, he plunged a hand into Isiq's waistcoat vest and removed the bronze flask.

  'Not much of a weapon, that,' said Isiq.

  The man smiled slightly, opening the flask. 'The Westfirth,' he said, sniffing. 'Fine brandy, that.'

  'Stay in the service long enough and you'll be able to afford it. Ah, no. Your kind don't live that long, do you?'

  A change came over the young man's face. It was Isiq's last memory, for a time.

  'Wake up, Admiral.'

  'Kill you… damn a
nd blast.'

  He was slouched against a grimy wall. Searing pain, like the worst moments of brain fever induced by Syrays' poisons. His hair stank of spirits and blood. The lad had clubbed him down with his own flask.

  'There is shaved ice in the bucket beside you, and a rag.'

  His mind was clearing. He knew that voice, and loathed it like no other. He raised his eyes.

  Sandor Ott stood before him. The spymaster's arms were crossed; his gaze was calm, but he looked even worse than Isiq felt. The tapestry of old scars that was his face was overlaid by fresh ones: the raking claw-cuts of Sniraga, Lady Oggosk's cat, who had mauled Ott two days before in Ormael. There were other gashes, made perhaps by the stained-glass window through which he had hurled himself to escape arrest. The wounds were field-dressed, but ugly all the same.

  'When you became a spy,' said Isiq, fumbling at the bucket, 'did you seduce many powerful women? For I'd say those days are through.'

  'When I became a spy I found I could murder any number of people who displeased me a tenth as much as you have over the years.'

  'What I mean is that you're an ugly dog.'

  Ott shook his head. 'Displeasure and anger are not the same thing, Isiq. You cannot anger me. I hope, however, that you will not waste my time.'

  'I was tortured during the Sugar War,' said Isiq. 'I revealed nothing. And I have less reason to fear you than I did those rebels with their whips and scorpions.'

  Ott sighed. 'More reason, in fact. You simply haven't been briefed.'

  He sat down beside the admiral, hands on knees. Only then did Isiq realise that they were completely alone. A few yards away stood a mean little table, two chairs and a candle, the only source of light. Beyond the table he saw a vague metallic gleam, possibly a hinge or doornob. He could not see the other walls.

  'Before the Oshirams came to power in Simja,' said Ott suddenly, 'there were eight King Ombroths, who were in turn preceded by a century of rule by the Trothe of Chereste. And before the Trothe this island was ruled by a demonic queen, a madwoman with a crab's claw where her left hand should have been. She had congress with spirits, and unnatural long life: one hundred and twenty years she sat on the throne. An age the Simjans would rather forget.'

  Isiq looked at the man on his right. He was close enough to touch. One of his eyes was grotesquely bloodshot: the cat must have sunk a claw there. He had no visible weapon. Not that it mattered. Sandor Ott was the most notorious killer in the Empire. He could kill Isiq in seconds, any number of ways.

  'She outlawed funerals, this queen.'

  'Did she.'

  The spymaster nodded. 'When a citizen died she sent men for the bodies at once. She injected them with preservatives, bandaged them, soaked them in sesame oil, and lastly encased them in clay. Before the clay dried she would arrange the corpse in some lifelike position — the farmer with his hoe, the smith at his anvil, the child bent to tie a shoe — in a specially built dungeon beneath her chambers. Quite creative: the dungeon was constructed around a coal furnace, so that it might be heated like a kiln. In this way she baked the corpses hard as stone. Not as quickly as young Pathkendle dispatched the Shaggat, but effective nonetheless.'

  He knows what happened yesterday, thought Isiq. He still has spies aboard!

  'The queen had the idea that the ghosts of the dead made her powerful, and that they would linger so long as the bodies themselves did not perish. She became known as Queen Mirkitj of the Statues. She was hated and feared beyond description — even before she modified the practice for use on the living.'

  'You will be remembered as her soul's kindred,' said Isiq.

  'I will not be remembered at all. Oh, there will be rumours — for a generation at the most — rumours of an old spy who was behind Arqual's triumph. But no histories shall name or describe him. My own disciples will see to that. Your memoirs, for instance, will not be published, or archived, or even left in private hands. Your letters will be retrieved and burned.'

  'Why have you kidnapped me, Ott?'

  The spymaster ignored the question. 'When Queen Mirkitj died at last, the palace was razed, and the upper levels of the dungeon with it. But the queen had made thousands of these statues, and the dungeon ran nine levels deep — one for each Pit of the Underworld. In any case, only the first three levels were discovered, until rather recently. We are in the seventh.'

  'Now I see,' said the admiral. 'You will subject me to this ancient torture unless I do your bidding. What can be left for you to want, though? What but your bidding have I done these many years, although I knew it not?'

  'Not the least thing,' agreed Ott, smiling. 'But you're wrong again. I will inflict no pain on you if I can avoid it. For many years it was necessary to poison you — necessary, not especially pleasant — but that time is done. I merely intend to prepare you for the next phase in your service to the Emperor.

  'Your daughter is dead. My cause is defeated. Gloat if you will. You are retired, and need not show a soldier's dignity any longer.'

  'You lie. You haven't given up at all.'

  'I never give up — that is true. But my great plan is thwarted. The Shaggat Ness is a block of stone, and the wedding cancelled, and the prophecy I spread in Gurishal among his worshippers cannot come true.

  'Gloat then, but listen: you have some years of service left in you, Isiq. But they cannot be spent here. You have insulted the king of Simja. It is unthinkable that you should serve as ambassador.'

  Isiq pressed ice to his temple. He studied Ott. A corner of the iris of the man's wounded eye was clouded by blood. Opaque, as of yesterday. Blind.

  'In the drawer of that table,' Ott was saying, 'is a letter of writ from the lord admiral, countersigned by the Emperor himself. It appoints you to a lectureship in the naval academy at two hundred cockles a year.'

  Isiq snorted. 'Does it come with directions to the almshouse?'

  'What nonsense. That mansion on Maj Hill should fetch you enough to live out your days in comfort, albeit in tighter quarters.'

  'I still own, it then? Free and clear?'

  Ott was silent a moment. 'There may be certain duties owing, taxes-'

  'Ha!' said Isiq. 'Who have you promised it to, Ott? Have you plucked another girl out of the slave school on Nurth? One who just happens to have reason, like Syrarys, to take a dried-up old murderer like you to bed now and then — as part of her service to the Emperor, of course.'

  To Isiq's infinite satisfaction he saw Ott's mouth betray a certain tightening. He was getting through to the man.

  'We should trade stories, don't you think?' Isiq pressed. 'Did she give you the same sort of massage I was used to, starting at the nape of the neck? Did she whisper the same words to both of us, in the same intimate moments?'

  'You are reckless,' said Ott quietly.

  Blary right I am.

  'Which of your men was she grooming to kill you?' he pressed. 'You must have some idea. Why should she stay with you? A broken-down, gap-toothed butcher with rhinoceros skin and nothing to live for but conspiracies and lies. You must have guessed she'd try to dispose of you soon. Did you kill her yourself yesterday, before she could admit that she hated you?'

  'I would dodge it,' said Ott.

  'What?'

  'Your fist. When you think me entirely distracted by rage, you are, I suspect, planning to strike out with your right fist as hard as possible, hoping to smash my head back against the wall, leaving me stunned. Then you would lift me by the shirt and slam me down over and over, perhaps pausing first to stuff that rag into my throat. You noticed my eye. But I have never let that arm of yours slide into my blind spot, Admiral, and I should merely have dodged it, and dealt with you.'

  Isiq felt naked. Ott had described his intentions almost perfectly.

  'Anger, like fear, hones the senses to a razor's edge,' the spymaster went on. 'You'd have done better to raise some intellectual point. Abstract thought slows our defences. Even I am not entirely immune.'

  He arched
his back against the wall, at his ease once more. 'Shall I tell you what fascinates me at present? The Nilstone. I did not believe it existed, and I laughed at Dr Chadfallow, who did. But as we both know, the Stone is terribly real. And it seems that long before Arunis took the Red Wolf from the depths, and melted it to reveal the artefact, someone else aboard the Chathrand knew as well.'

  Ott took a scrap of parchment from his vest pocket, unrolled it, and passed it casually to Isiq. 'That came from the ship's hold. My man took it from the jaws of a rat, if you can believe it. Probably getting set to make it his dinner.'

  Isiq tilted the parchment towards the candlelight. The scrap was crumbling, and burned on two sides, but he could still make out a spidery hand.

  '-call't it DROTH'S EYE, or en Arqual fe NIL-STONE, a cursed fing t'be sure, es it slays whoms'ever shel touch it, with a swiftnef hideous to bihold, all save fe littlest vermin, who furst suffer grotesqueries of change.

  Fis stone yur Wizardess hath entombed in fe WOLF OF SCARLET IRON, lately taken by fe arch-heretic NESS, and lost in fe havoc of his fall.

  'The language is a mystery,' said Ott. 'Almost Arquali, but not quite. One might think it simply an antique variant, except that it speaks plainly of the Shaggat's theft of the Red Wolf, just forty years ago. It is not Arunis' hand: we have samples of that in the purchase-orders he wrote out as Mr Ket; nor is it like the sorcerer to commit any of his secrets to writing.

  'Here we have the strangest of circumstances, no? Someone aboard the Chathrand knew what was to come — not only that we were bound to find such a thing as the Red Wolf, but also that said Wolf contained a horror called the Nilstone.' Ott gave him a sudden direct look. 'You wouldn't have any thoughts as to who such a person might be, would you?'

  Isiq returned the parchment. 'Now you wish me to bargain for the liberty you will never grant.'