They didn’t want to come back.
There were twelve more bodies, but he and Lucius cleared them away like men springing traps. He offered double-shares to the oarsmen and they finally came – slowly, but they came – and backed him as he cut corpses down.
Even after a day of horror, de Marche was capable of making a profit. He took the ship’s papers for their masters – there was no need to offend the men in Ruma and Gennua and Venike with whom he traded, and they would want to know what had happened to their spring fleet. Fortunes would have been lost, as well as lives, with these ships.
He took the trade goods out of the two smaller ships and put them in the larger after hearing the same tale from Ser Hartmut, and they threw all the dead over the side. His own sailors, having survived the Eeeague, were cocooned in their own fears – throwing dead men into the deep didn’t trouble any of them. And every man knew he was richer by a share or two as they counted the trade goods – bales of good velvet, and fine woollens.
And bows. Bales of fine mountain yew from Iberia, carefully split and roughed into shape.
Nothing the Etruscans carried tallied with the items his sources had told him to bring for trade.
They lay to in shallow water at dark, in a small cove with a shelving rock beach. As the moon rose high and full over the greasy sea full of kelp, and the water roiled like a living thing, de Marche sat on the sterncastle as Lucius spread olive oil on his burns.
‘Wasn’t fucking silkies as did for the Etruscans, was it, Cap’n?’ he asked.
‘No, by God and all his saints, Lucius.’ He winced as the man’s rough fingers pressed too hard on a burn.
‘How come these things live out here, and not at home? Eh?’ Lucius was talking to hear himself.
‘I don’t know, Lucius. The King’s magisters probably have something to do with it – and the power of the Emperors. And God.’
‘Does that mean God’s writ don’t run here? Or in the Nova Terra?’ asked Lucius.
‘I don’t know that, either.’ De Marche felt himself drifting into sleep, despite his fear and pain.
‘But the whales is on our side, ain’t they?’ asked Lucius.
‘Why do you say that?’ de Marche asked. ‘Leviathan almost sank us all standing. Carpenter still hasn’t come at the leak. If we didn’t have good land under our lee-’
‘I saw him,’ Lucius said, with absolute assurance. ‘You put that fucking thing, that Satan’s spawn, over the rail, and that big fish took him in his mouth and ate ’im. And then went deep. I saw it.’
De Marche took a deep breath. ‘My Etruscan friend told me that the mermen were the herders of the whales.’
‘He told you to bring cheap red cloth an’ crossbows, too,’ Lucius growled.
‘Good point,’ murmured de Marche.
‘What killed the Etruscans, then? Cap’n?’ asked Lucius.
He thought of the man with his lungs pulled through his back. ‘I have no idea,’ he admitted. ‘And I wonder where they are?’
‘Ser Hartmut’s coming up the side,’ Lucius said.
The Black Knight paused to look at the horrific ruin of the dead Etruscan. His handsome face did not change expression.
De Marche tried to stand straight.
‘Silkies?’ Ser Harmut asked.
De Marche shook his head.
Ser Hartmut looked around. ‘They would make valuable allies,’ he said.
De Marche’s expression made the Black Knight smile.
Beaver Lakes – Nita Qwan
The same full moon that rose over the lonely cove on the rock-bound north coast of Nova Terra rose a little later over a grassy clearing, far to the west, where Nita Qwan stood guard for the second night. He took the middle watch, because Ota Qwan played no favourites, and everyone took turns – bad watches and good.
Again, he smoked at the end of his watch – he was becoming quite fond of the smoke – and when he fell asleep, Ota Qwan was looking out into the darkness, his face just barely illuminated by the coal in his pipe.
In the morning they left their weapons, which troubled many of the men.
‘We won’t be able to carry honey across the swamp as well as our weapons,’ Ota Qwan insisted.
After a handful of pemmican, Ota Qwan led them to the edge of a huge beaver swamp – as wide as a small lake, with beaver houses the size of men’s houses.
‘Tick Chuzk,’ Ota Qwan said, pointing at the nearest beaver castle. ‘We call it the Beaver Kingdom. Sometimes they come, and sometimes they do not. Great beavers are touchy and proud and very fierce. Do not posture. In fact, do not speak!’
Men bridled. No Sossag liked to be told what to do, even when the advice was good.
A great stream almost the size of a river flowed through the meadow, and after carefully crossing the treacherous grass – it might look like lawn, but the unwary human would find himself in water to his hips – they stood on a sandy bank looking at a crossing as wide as two boats tied end to end. Not that they had any boats.
Staka Gon, one of the youngest, plunged into the ford – where he stumbled, gave a choked scream, and fell backwards.
Ota Qwan caught him before he fell. ‘Idiot,’ he said. He lifted the young man, who gave a long moan.
He had a sharpened stick right through his moccasined foot. Ota Qwan pulled it out, ruthlessly, and then used his own cloth shirt to bandage the boy. ‘Every tree and plant the beaver eat becomes a trap and a weapon,’ Ota Qwan said. ‘You know that.’
Nita Qwan had been told too, but he had forgotten. He looked at the stick – just a hand’s breadth long and red with blood. He looked away.
Later, when they had crossed, leaving Staka Gon at the ford, they stripped to keep their leggings dry and crossed a long stretch of wet marsh, carrying their buckets over their heads. The mosquitoes were ferocious, but Sossag warriors didn’t show irritation at such things.
Nita Qwan did his best to keep up appearances, but he hated insects.
After a painful league of walking and swimming across the great meadow, they climbed a low, fir-covered ridge, and lay on a great slab of limestone to dry. The smell of the honey was overpowering – almost rotten, and yet perfectly sweet.
Ota Qwan had waved into the bush. ‘Easier than last year. There’s a pool right here.’ He pointed across the swamp. ‘Gwyllch. Look – there and there. And there.’
Nita Qwan was tired. ‘Gwyllch?’
Gas-a-ho lay flat. ‘We have no weapons!’ he said. And indeed, they had none – the spears and bows and swords had stayed in camp so that they could carry their buckets when full.
Ota Qwan crouched, unperturbed. ‘Without weapons, we will simply have to be careful. Which is wiser than a pointless fight anyway.’
Nita Qwan gave half a smile. ‘Who died and left you all this wisdom?’ he asked.
Ota Qwan shrugged. ‘Tadaio. Those are boggles, Nita Qwan, my brother. See them?’
He did indeed. They were moving like an army. And they were between the men and their weapons.
It took long minutes to fill the buckets. Wild honey was seldom pure – the great bees who made it often fouled it themselves, and the sugary stuff gave off a mighty odour of organic decay – sweet organic decay. Animals became trapped in it and died; insects became stuck and perished by the thousand – plant mould, sugar fungus, and whole dead trees fell in the honey deposits.
Gas-a-ho was expert at filling them, though, and he crouched on a sticky rock with Ota Qwan’s arms around his belly and scooped each bucket full. The cleaner the bucket was at delivery, the more it would fetch in price. And the more honey a man fetched the richer the profit.
Nita Qwan heard a sound like a trumpet, and the Sossag all stiffened as one.
‘Bee!’ Gas-a-ho said.
Ota Qwan looked at the sky. He sprang to his feet, ran back up onto the limestone outcrop, and stared east under his hand. In Alban, he said, ‘Shit.’ He came back to the nervous warriors.
‘Hurry,’ he said. ‘We need to get young Gon out of the ford before he becomes someone’s lunch.