A bat wing, maybe.
31
Sara flung open her door before Isabel had time to knock, having heard her approaching steps.
‘Dorothea said you wanted to see me,’ said Isabel, her eyes roaming over the opulence of the cabin.
‘Is there anything in the daemonologica that describes how Old Tom is summoned?’ she asked.
Isabel removed the book from her satchel, then found the page quickly.
‘Here,’ she said, tapping a block of ornate words.
Sara read it out loud.
‘To summon Old Tom three things are required: the blood of a loved one spilled on to a blade. The blade used to sacrifice somebody hated, and a dark prayer read aloud in his honour before the body cools.’
Sara blew out a breath, ruffling the corner of the page.
Arent’s father must have been the hated one, she thought. He was the only one who’d died in that forest. Arent had been the loved one. She continued reading.
‘Once summoned and bound, Old Tom is compelled to offer a boon in return for his freedom. He will bargain, wheedle and deceive, but those who see through his tricks can ask for anything. The price is knowing that they are releasing a terrible evil on to this world to wreak havoc as it pleases, something they will pay dearly for come Judgement Day. Once this initial boon is granted, the summoner must pay a tithe for any further favours. The cost is usually high. Old Tom does not like being made to look foolish.’
Sara clutched Isabel’s hand in thanks. ‘You’ve done me a great service. Have you seen Arent Hayes?’
‘He was going down to the orlop deck a few minutes ago.’
Sara darted from her cabin and out into the sunshine, almost colliding with Captain Crauwels who was watching a large sandglass, while Larme let a knotted piece of rope through his hands into the water. It was tied to a log, bobbing behind the ship. The sandglass emptied.
‘We’re making 10.2 knots, Captain.’
‘Let’s hope it’s enough to put us beyond the reach of this storm.’
Manoeuvring around them, she made her way to the orlop deck, finding the stairs rammed with passengers returning reluctantly from their exercise. Pushing through the throng, she saw Arent disappearing into the cargo hold beneath. Ignoring the strange looks she was given, she went to the edge of the staircase he’d descended, a foul stink rising into her nostrils. It stretched much further down than she would have imagined, the steps disappearing beyond sight. He must have already been at the bottom, because she couldn’t see him.
‘Arent,’ she called out in a hushed voice, wary of being overheard.
There was no reply. Straining her ear, she heard the distant sounds of the search, as trunks were tipped over and casks ripped open. The sailors had already been through the aft of the ship and uncovered nothing; now they’d moved into the bow sections.
She put a foot on the first step down, then hesitated, imagining how her husband would react. Even now, she wasn’t sure what had possessed her to sit and drink with Arent and Jacobi Drecht last night. It had been foolish. Drecht wouldn’t say anything, but gossip carried itself straight to her husband’s ear. Everybody wanted to ingratiate themselves with a powerful man.
If he found out … she shuddered to imagine it. Even so, she couldn’t hold on to what she’d heard any longer. She had too many questions.
She gave herself to the darkness of the cargo hold. It was oily on the skin, stinking of bilge water and sawdust, spices and rot. Drops fell from the ceiling, pattering against the crates. It was as if every wretched thought conceived on the decks above was seeping through the ship, collecting here.
She found Arent inspecting a gouge on the bottom step, by the light of a brass lantern. Sara recognised this technique from the reports she’d read. By Pipps’s reckoning, every object could tell you a story if you understood its language. A broken cobweb betrayed somebody’s passing, while the sticky silk on their shoulder told who it was.
‘Arent.’
He squinted at her through the fog pouring out of the lantern. It was burning fish oil. The smell was unmistakable. ‘Sara? What are you doing down here?’
‘My husband summoned Old Tom, I overheard him telling Vos,’ she blurted out. ‘He murdered your father as part of the ritual, and gave you that mark on your wrist.’
It took his thoughts a few seconds to absorb what she’d told him, his expression changing from bafflement to disbelief, then anger.
‘My uncle …’ He couldn’t finish. ‘Why would he do that?’
‘Power, wealth … The person who summons Old Tom can ask for anything, so long as he agrees to release the demon.’
‘Where is my uncle?’
‘In the great cabin.’
Arent put a foot on the stair, only for a growl to sound somewhere deeper in the cargo hold. Arent immediately swung his light towards the labyrinth of stacked crates. They rose up like walls, his light clawing vainly at the wood.
‘What was that?’ asked Sara nervously.
‘Wolf?’ guessed Arent.
‘On an Indiaman?’
‘Did you bring your dagger?’ he asked.
Sara tugged at her gown. ‘My dressmaker hates pockets, remember?’
‘Go back to the orlop deck.’
‘Where are you going?’
‘To see what made that sound.’ He strode off towards the maze of crates that filled the cargo hold. His lantern seemed very tiny amidst all that wood and darkness.
Sara turned her body towards the staircase. She was trained to obey. Her entire life she’d been told what to do, and she’d done it. It was part of her conditioning and yet, for some reason, the thought of him going alone felt wrong.
It was as if she were abandoning him.
Instead of departing, she stepped off the staircase, putting her foot straight into the freezing bilge water. It was ankle-deep, already creeping up her skirts, sloshing left and right as the ship listed.
‘Arent,’ she called out. ‘Wait.’
‘Go back,’ he hissed.
‘I’m coming,’ she insisted, her tone putting an end to the argument.
Narrow alleys had been left between the stacks to allow sailors to cross the deck, but their arrangement was dictated by the placement of the crates. There were no straight lines, and no obvious paths. The passages narrowed and widened, leaving orientation to their sense of smell. The hold had been packed according to cargo, such that one minute they were sneezing on pepper and the next they were gagging on thick clouds of paprika.
Following Arent through the passages, Sara stared at his huge back and massive slouched shoulders, the lantern light running down them.
Her nerve momentarily deserted her.
He could do anything he wanted to her and she’d have no way of fighting back. If she was wrong and Sander Kers was right, then she had delivered herself to Old Tom without anybody knowing where she was – and she’d have done it thoughtlessly, recklessly, indulging the very qualities her husband so despaired of in her.
‘Stay close,’ said Arent.
How could she have been so stupid? She didn’t know this man. Not underneath. She’d seen his kindness on the docks and assumed that’s all there was. Now, she’d allowed herself to be led into this precarious position.
She gritted her teeth and put a rod of iron through her thoughts.
This fear wasn’t hers, she realised angrily. It belonged to Sander Kers, but she’d caught it like the plague.
She did know Arent. She knew exactly what was underneath. She’d seen it when he rushed to help the leper, while everybody else stood and gawped. She knew him from his fiddle playing, and the pleasure he took from it. She knew him from the dagger he’d given her after the leper appeared. She knew him from his loyalty to Samuel Pipps, and the fire that burnt behind his eyes when he spoke of him. She knew him from this very search. If Arent Hayes was a demon, then he had disguised himself so completely he had accidentally become a good man.