The River of Shadows Part 23

"Honor," said Taliktrum. "But not honor alone. The key to a successful duel is this: that neither side agrees to play until they have spied on the other clan for a sufficient time. We are excellent spies, Mr. Fiffengurt."

"Hats off to you. But I'm not interested in crawly games. First, because I wouldn't share the secret of a good cup of tea with the man who'd drug a s.h.i.+p's crew in the middle of the Nelluroq. Second, because I don't know anything that could possibly-"

"The prisoners will soon begin to die," he said.

I drew a shaky breath. "You cur."

"This is not blackmail," he added swiftly. "Fiffengurt, we are running out of the berries that keep them alive. During the battle with the rats half our stockpile was destroyed. In the forecastle house, we burn two ounces per day: any less and the prisoners will not have enough vapor to breathe. They will crowd around the smudge-pot, fighting one another. Those pushed to the margins will suffocate, after great pain."

"How much do you have left?" I asked, heart in my throat.

But Taliktrum shook his head. He tossed his copper coin my way.

"Aha," I said. "We're playing already, is that it?" Still he did not speak. I thought again about my right foot. But instead of murdering him I asked what he wanted to know.

That caught him off-guard. He chewed his lip a moment, then said, "The old witch, Oggosk. Is she Rose's mother?"

"What?" I nearly shouted. "You're the most twisted nail on this blary s.h.i.+p! Where'd you get that notion?" I nearly shouted. "You're the most twisted nail on this blary s.h.i.+p! Where'd you get that notion?"

"By watching them. We keep the forecastle house under the closest scrutiny, for obvious reasons. The witch doted on him, when they were imprisoned together. She would comb out his beard-in the dark, when they thought no one saw. And she has a superior knowledge of Rose's family, his childhood, although he tries to prevent her from speaking of it. And there are those insane letters he dictates-addressed always to his father, but with a respectful nod to his mother-although everything we learned of Rose before the voyage suggested they were dead."

I shut my mouth. He knew more than I did. But why did he care what Oggosk was to Rose, or Rose to Oggosk? How could it possibly matter? Unless- I went suddenly cold. Unless they're trying to reckon who Rose will fight for, and who he'll allow to die Unless they're trying to reckon who Rose will fight for, and who he'll allow to die.

"You've sailed with him before," Taliktrum was saying. "You've sat through more meals with him than anyone aboard, except the witch herself. Wasn't she always along on those voyages? Did they never never reveal the truth?" reveal the truth?"

I'd quit my gambling years ago as a promise to Annabel-& to stop her dad from quoting Rule Thirty each time we met.8 But the old instincts came back to me in a flash. You don't reveal what you know, & even less what you But the old instincts came back to me in a flash. You don't reveal what you know, & even less what you don't don't know. Mind your voice, mind your eyes. Starve the opponent for knowledge any way you can. That was know. Mind your voice, mind your eyes. Starve the opponent for knowledge any way you can. That was my my kind of dueling. kind of dueling.

"Rose had no use for family stories," I said, "no matter how long a voyage we were on. I couldn't rightly say."

"He found a use for such stories when he was our prisoner," said Taliktrum. "Never mind: it is still your turn."

When I sat there, stone-faced, he added spitefully, "This was an invitation. No one is forcing your hand. But if you refuse me, or attempt to fob me off with a lie, you are spurning a chance that will not come again. Think, man. Help me help us both."

"Help you to do what what?"

"What do you think?" he snapped. "To save us all from evil. Your people and mine. What else can we hope for, at this stage?"

"You're hoping for a great great deal more," I growled. "You're hoping-" deal more," I growled. "You're hoping-"

I stopped myself. I'd almost said, You're hoping this voyage ends on Sanctuary, your island; you'll do anything to get there You're hoping this voyage ends on Sanctuary, your island; you'll do anything to get there. But that would be breaking my own rules. Besides, I didn't really know. That old yarn, the ixchel's Sanctuary-Beyond-the-Sea, was just a suspicion I'd nursed since I learned his people were aboard. "You're hoping I'll betray my friends," I ended vaguely.

He just looked at me. "Are we finished? Are you so unable to give?"

I closed my eyes. He was right, I did did want to play. I wanted to take something back to my friends, something they could use. But I wasn't going to get it for free. want to play. I wanted to take something back to my friends, something they could use. But I wasn't going to get it for free.

"Thasha has a book-" I began.

"The thirteenth Polylex, Polylex," he interrupted. "We've been aware of that for months; so has everyone aboard who knows what the thirteenth edition means. That won't do, Fiffengurt. Try again."

I was on unsafe ground. This was a delicate business, handing knowledge to Taliktrum-a fool & a proven killer. This was the wretch who'd spiked our water with a sleeping drug, after all.

But he'd also fought the sorcerer with commendable courage.

"Pazel," I heard myself say, very softly, "has just one Master-Word left, and I don't think it will be any use in a battle. It's a word that blinds to give new sight blinds to give new sight. We haven't a clue what that means, but Ramachni chose the word especially for him, so it must be worth something. Will that do?"

Taliktrum nodded slowly. I tossed him a copper whelk: we were matched again. Then he said, "We have seen the mage-name him not; he has sharp ears for the sound of his own name!-walking of late on the mercy deck. He appears without warning, and slips quickly away. We have been unable to follow him to his lair-but he has killed five of our guards."

"You little b.a.s.t.a.r.d," I hissed, furious now. "You mucking swore swore he wasn't in your part of the s.h.i.+p." he wasn't in your part of the s.h.i.+p."

"Nor is he!" said Taliktrum. "There is not a chamber, not a crevice or a crate, that we have not explored. He has not made his lair in the lower decks, I say. He has merely pa.s.sed through them like a shadow, gazing upward, as though to pierce the floorboards with his eyes."

"Up at the Nilstone," I ventured.

"Of course," he said, & tossed his golden coin my way. "Your turn again."

I took a deep breath. "Hercol's sword-"

"Is called Ildraquin, Earthblood, Breaker of Curses," he said. "Put in his hand by Maisa, the deposed Empress of Arqual, whose children Hercol murdered when still in the pay of Sandor Ott."

His bad news was beginning to feel like a hammer striking my skull. "Stanapeth?" I said dumbly. "Hercol Stanapeth killed Maisa's children? Personally Personally?"

"Impersonally, I would imagine. Go on, you must find a better secret."

"It's not my blary fault," I said. "You've spied out everything I know."

"If that were true we would not be playing," said Taliktrum.

My stomach was in knots. What was I doing? I could betray them all with my urgency to help. Then in a flash it came to me. "Sniraga's alive," I said. "Undrabust and Marila both swear they saw her on the upper gun deck."

He didn't take the news well. The cat was particularly hated by the ixchel; apparently she had eaten a few. "We should have fed that creature poison the day Oggosk brought it aboard," he said. "My father wanted to. My aunt disagreed. She argued the witch would guess that ixchel had done it. But in truth it was just her softness, again. Dri always blinked when the moment came to kill."

"If she argued against poisoning a p.u.s.s.ycat, it was for a good reason," I said. "Your aunt never cared for anything, not even Hercol, as much as she did your clan."

He snorted: "What rubbish is that? She chose him-chose all of you, and turned her back on her people."

"She was ready to kill herself, Taliktrum. She told Stanapeth she'd rather die than see the clan break into factions, some with you, others with her."

"Anyone can make such a boast," he replied.

"You'll believe what you want to," I said, & tossed him my gold coin. "All the same, it's your turn."

He set the pearl on the floor & turned his back, hands in fists. This talk of Diadrelu had rattled him. Still burning with guilt, I imagined, as well he should be. When he looked at me again his face was a mask.

He set his foot on the pearl. "If you take this and depart, sharing nothing, I will be your enemy forever."

"I'm no cheat, Taliktrum."

He kicked the pearl in my direction. Then he said, "I am leaving."

"What?"

"Leaving the s.h.i.+p. My people, the clan, everyone. I am going ash.o.r.e, tonight. I...I cannot wait."

"You don't mean that."

"After I leave this room, I will return to my people's stronghold one last time. I will write a letter telling them that I have gone ahead of them, to the land we are destined to repossess, and that they must follow Lord Talag once more, until we are all reunited"-he laughed miserably-"in paradise. Then I'll slip ash.o.r.e. The cables around the s.h.i.+p are many. I'll have no difficulty there."

"Taliktrum, stop. You're their commander."

"I am their demiG.o.d," he said, with acid on his tongue. "My soldiers are carving little statues of me, and carrying them about like idols. Two brothers fought yesterday over which of them I favored more, and one stabbed the other in the leg. A woman came to me tonight and said that our ancestors had told her she was to have my child. They are insatiable, Fiffengurt. And I am the one who made them that way." He put his hands in his hair. "This cult of He-Who-Sees. It should be He-Who-Is-Seen He-Who-Is-Seen-seen, followed, imitated, aped. I live in a prison, a prison of their adoring eyes. You cannot imagine what it took to elude them long enough to come here."

"But you'll be all alone, man! You don't even know if crawlies-if ixchel exist exist in this part of the world." in this part of the world."

"Unless they have gone the way of human beings, they exist. We came from this side of the Nelluroq, you fool."

"Ixchel came...from the South?"

"Centuries ago. In human s.h.i.+ps, human cages." He paused, suddenly struck. "Do you mean that Diadrelu did not even tell you why our people boarded Chathrand Chathrand?"

I shook my head. "There were things she never would talk about. She wasn't a traitor, I tell you."

He was shocked. It was a long time before he found his voice. "There is a traitor in our midst today, however," he said at last. "The person who switched the antidote pills."

"Do you have an idea who that person is?" I asked.

"I know who he is with a certainty," said Taliktrum, "because that person is me."

I gaped at him. Taliktrum smiled, but it was a smile of self-loathing. "Once a person takes the antidote," he said, "the least whiff of the poison vapor warns them off. The captain, Undrabust, and Marila would have balked at the door of the forecastle house, even if Rose had not guessed that they were cured. I did not release them as a humanitarian act. Hercol's suggestion merely gave me an excuse to thin the ranks of the hostages, thus buying us a few more days. But I was clumsy. I should have foreseen that Oggosk might give her pill to the captain. He and Sandor Ott were never, under any circ.u.mstances, to be freed."

That didn't surprise me. "So, you've made some mistakes," I said, "and now you're running away from them."

"Now I am accepting the consequences," he said. "There is no other path for me. We are the rose that prunes itself: We are the rose that prunes itself: so states a motto of my people. And it is the simple truth. When an ixchel knows that his presence in a clan is irredeemably harmful, he must choose exile, or death. But I wanted someone to know the truth about me-that I did this not for the clan, but for myself. I cannot tell anyone of Ixphir House, for like divided leaders.h.i.+p, the truth would destroy them." so states a motto of my people. And it is the simple truth. When an ixchel knows that his presence in a clan is irredeemably harmful, he must choose exile, or death. But I wanted someone to know the truth about me-that I did this not for the clan, but for myself. I cannot tell anyone of Ixphir House, for like divided leaders.h.i.+p, the truth would destroy them."

"Are you so sure of that?"

He ignored my question. "My father promised to take them to paradise," he said, "to Sanctuary-Beyond-the-Sea. I do not believe they will ever arrive."

"Not on this boat," I agreed.

"But if that day should somehow dawn, when the swallows come for my people, tell Lord Talag before he departs. Tell him he was wrong to break my flute across his knee. Can you remember that?"

I nodded slowly. "I'll remember. But you should tell him that yourself, you coward. Running away's no good."

"Neither is talking. Some problems can't be solved."

"What about your woman?"

"Who, Myett?" He looked genuinely surprised. "That girl was...an entertainment. A prophet's plaything, though my father thinks all prophets should be like those of old, chaste and ragged."

"She's lovely," I ventured.

At that he glared, as if to say, Not you as well Not you as well. "She makes a spectacle of her charms-such charms as she possesses. No, Myett was never a suitable match. She is unstable. She took to following me, picking fights with any woman I chanced to look at. My father even thought she might have been the one who switched the antidotes."

"I'll bet you played along," I said (his woman problems were intensely irritating). "You'd probably even accuse her of the crime, although you did it yourself."

"I would," he said without hesitation, "if I determined that to do so was for the good of the clan."

"If you were my size I'd fight you here and now," I said. "It's blary unforgivable. You'd make love to her one day and destroy her the next."

"Unforgivable?" The familiar, belligerent gleam was back in his eyes. "The game isn't over, Fiffengurt. You hold both pearls. You must give me a secret to match my own. Do not speak! I will tell you the secret I want."

He crossed the tool room-& leaped in one swift movement onto a sawhorse, so that our eyes were on the same level. "Here is what I would know, Fiffengurt: can you choose between life and death?"

"What in the Pits does that mean?"

"We cannot keep all the hostages alive. Some will die. All will die eventually, if they remain in the forecastle house. But I am willing to free two more tonight. Not the spymaster or his protege, Dastu: they are simply too dangerous. And not the witch. Even if she is not Rose's mother, he loves her. That makes her too precious to give up, now that Rose himself walks free.

"Two more, then. Name your choices, and I will send my Dawn Soldiers to deliver the antidote this evening-my last act as commander. But you you must decide who is to be saved. Dr. Chadfallow, surely? Or perhaps the two gang leaders, on the condition that they swear a truce? Or Elkstem, your sailmaster, the man whose hand on the wheel has saved the s.h.i.+p more than once already? Or the remaining tarboy, Saroo, with so many years to live?" must decide who is to be saved. Dr. Chadfallow, surely? Or perhaps the two gang leaders, on the condition that they swear a truce? Or Elkstem, your sailmaster, the man whose hand on the wheel has saved the s.h.i.+p more than once already? Or the remaining tarboy, Saroo, with so many years to live?"

I couldn't believe my ears. "You swine," I said.

"Of course an ixchel would never choose the tarboy," he went on. "The question of who might deserve deserve life the most never occupies our thoughts as deeply as that of who is the most life the most never occupies our thoughts as deeply as that of who is the most useful useful. If you look at things our way, you might do best to free the pair of soldiers. Their return would improve morale for the entire battalion."

"You can take a leap off those cliffs," I said. "I don't make choices like that."

"You don't, because you have not had to," he said. "Name them, Fiffengurt. Otherwise I will free no one at all."

I slammed both pearls down beside him. "Not a chance. You're the monsters who took 'em in the first place."

"Rose would have killed us if I hadn't. Now I'm willing to reduce our advantage, and you will not even choose?"

"I can't, and I won't. It's inhuman."

I must have been screaming. In the pa.s.sage, two or three anxious men called my name, clearly afraid I was in danger. I wrenched open the door & yelled at them to keep their distance. When I turned back to the room I could not see Taliktrum or his pearls.

"What if you had enough antidote for them all?"

His voice came from near the ceiling. I looked up but could not spot him on any of the shelves or cabinets.

"That's a stupid question, ain't it?" I snapped. "I'd free every one of them."

"And guarantee that my people would be hunted down, murdered, exterminated in a matter of hours?"

"Pitfire," I sputtered. "Not...necessarily. I don't hate you-I mean, I haven't blary thought about it!"

"We have thought about it, Mr. Fiffengurt," he said. "Never fear; I gave the order before I came looking for you. The doctor & the sailmaster are already free. Listen, you can hear them shouting." have thought about it, Mr. Fiffengurt," he said. "Never fear; I gave the order before I came looking for you. The doctor & the sailmaster are already free. Listen, you can hear them shouting."

And it was true, when I fell silent: high above, & at the other end of the Chathrand Chathrand, I could just catch the cries: Chadfallow! Elkstem! Hurrah! Chadfallow! Elkstem! Hurrah!