Chapter 7

Song had asked well in advance to borrow the room, which was the only reason the quartermaster did not manage to deny her the use of it. Between the garrison men being rotated in and the fresh batch of students, the Timely Dispatch was packed to the brim and its crew had grown increasingly irritable as the journey from Concordia ran long from the lacking winds.

Still, there really was no way to deny a request that had been made to and approved by the captain more than a month ago no matter how much the quartermaster resented having to wake up in the early hours of the morning to unlock the trap door leading down into the sail hold. The middle-aged Someshwari eyed Song with antipathy before passing her the key and leaving her to climb down a short ladder into the room. The sail hold was usually meant to stock replacement sails, but Timely Dispatch had none so the squat space beneath the gun deck was empty save for two crates of ballast.

Lantern in hand, Song locked the trap door from the inside, checked that it was locked and then forced herself not to climb back and check a second time. Descending to the bottom of the gently rocking ship, she set down her two bags and hung the lantern on a wall hook. From the first bag she produced her wooden bowl and a waterskin, setting them aside in the corner near the crates, then she crouched in the middle of the sail hold and undid the strings on the green silk pouch. She canted it only ever so slightly, as it was quite full, and poured out a salt circle on the floor.

Only when it was clean enough to satisfy her did Song tie up the pouch, fetching the bowl and the waterskin. The simple wooden piece, a gift from her father, had grown so warped and blackened that every time she purged nowadays she feared it would finally crack open – yet she was reluctant to use another. She filled up the bowl with the water from the skin but it was an imprecise business and she cursed harshly when some spilled on the ground, wiping the trickle with her boot so it could not reach the salt and spoil everything.

Breathing in, mastering her temper, she corked up the skin and tossed it in the corner before stepping into the salt circle with the bowl in hand. Song sat cross-legged, lowering the bowl to the floor on her left and dipped the tips of her fingers into the lukewarm liquid. Song Ren closed her eyes, breathing in and out, and let her senses ease away as she smothered her own sense of self. Emptied her mind, let herself become one with nothing.

As always, it was the smell that brought her out of the trance.

Gods, but the reek of it. Like rotting offal, as if the bowl of water was an incense burner for the poisonous loathing of all Tianxia. Her eyes fluttered open, glancing to the side and with a hiss of fear hastily withdrew her fingers from the bowl. Purging should leave nothing behind but blackened wood, the water evaporated, but instead at the bottom of the bowl was a small splash of boiling black tar. It bubbled, or so Song thought, but then in the feeble lantern light it seemed to her that some of those bubbles might instead be eyes. Empty but watching. Hungry.

Swallowing, she pushed down her exhaustion and rose to fetch the waterskin – she drowned the muck in water, covering her mouth and nose when a foul black vapor wafted from the contact.

“Its strength grows.”

Song was halfway through drawing her knife when she saw there would be no point. No knife she possessed would let her cut Luren, and the god looked unusually serious besides. He was crouched by the edge of the salt circle, pilgrim’s staff resting against his shoulder while his left hand kept his straw hat in place on his head. His monk’s robes were still stained and unkempt and he smelled of liquor, but the eyes Song could not see appeared to be considering the still faintly smoking bowl.

“The curse?” Song asked.

“The curse is only silk, spun by men,” Luren replied. “Beware the silkworm, Song Ren.”

“The god, then,” she grimly said. “It is beginning to think.”

And the curse had been even worse at the estate. The pond gone, turned to cracked black earth. The creek by the hill full of floating dead things, even running water struggling to hide the poison. Her fingers clenched. And still they insisted, damn them. She reached for one of the two objects she kept stashed in her cloak pocket, the small ox bone by Uncle Zhuge’s letter. Song ran a finger against the carved script displaying the sequence of twelve Luminary cycles preceding Aihan Ren’s date of birth, feeling out the faint cuts. It had been a petty thing, stealing it. Mother would just have another made by the astrologer.

She did not regret taking it.

“I won’t let it take her,” Song swore.

“When a door is slammed in a fool’s face, that fool seeks revenge on the door,” Luren chided.

Her jaw clenched. The implication there was plain.

“They have their reasons,” Song forced herself to say.

“So does the door,” the false monk noted. “Someone swung it.”

And like that he was gone, leaving Song alone with her salt and wooden bowl and anger that was like a hiltless sword: it could not be wielded without carving into her hand. Her eyes flicked to the bowl, which still held despite the accursed sludge that had boiled inside it. Blackened as it was, the world had not broken it yet. She had already found a remedy, Song comforted herself. Uncle Zhuge came through and found it for her: the Book of the Lofty Mountain. All she needed was to get her hands on a copy, and Tolomontera counted more than a few influential officers. It was just a matter of paying the price.

Breathing out, she set to cleaning up the mess.

There was always a mess to clean.

—

The Timely Dispatch sailed into port smoothly, its captain an old hand and the crew well trained. They had been making Watch transport runs for years now, the galleon itself refitted for it – lighter on cannons than a fighting ship should be, an entire gun deck turned into dormitories and a second larder. Song waited on the main deck with the wind in her hair, her uniform freshly cleaned, as the ship made to dock. The wait might have been boring, if not for what her eyes let her see ahead in port.

Never before had Song seen Port Allazei so full, its docks a riot of exotic vessels surrounded by a crowd behaving like a freshly kicked anthill. There was even of those infamously fragile Izcalli skimmers – flowship, flyship? – that she recognized from the eye-catching crocodile stone sheath. And to think there were still two days before classes began. She spared an appreciative look for the caravel they were headed to share a dock with, a slender ship with elegant brass railings that looked fresh out of the shipyard. The make of it was modern, with a fore and sterncastle as well as one of the four sails being square.

Song’s gaze moved to the docks as the black-clad sailors on the deck began shouting and preparing the ramp, standing first in the long line of students waiting to be disgorged onto the city. She had sent a letter with the mail ship while waiting in Concordia for the Timely Dispatch to arrive, so barring mishap her brigade should have been warned of her arrival.

That was how Song knew something had gone wrong before she even got off the ship.

She had not been sure how many of her brigade she should expect at the docks, but she had been confident at least one would be there. Instead she was presented with the sight of a grim omen: Captain Wen Duan sitting on a barrel, which he overran on both sides, and wantonly tormenting an orange. Song was the first student off the ship, only moments behind the sailors that leaped down onto the pier and secured the ramp, but her steps stuttered halfway down.

Blood on the stone of the docks. To eyes like hers, there was no mistaking it. By the way it had sprayed… one throat slit from behind, one shot in the head, one heavily bleeding head wound and the last death had come in two parts. A limb first, likely arm, and then decapitation. Both blows in quick enough succession that the blood splashes were very close. The number of people on Tolomontera capable of taking a limb and then a head in two succeeding blows was remarkably high, given the amount of Skiritai running around, but there was a picture being painted here. Dagger, pistol, sword and what could easily be the work of a mace.

The favored weapons of most the Unluckies have taken lives on these docks, and recently enough that the blood had not finished drying.

Song kept her face calm, untouched, even as her stomach clenched. Already? Classes had not even – hand on the chisel, she ordered. They might have been the ones being attacked, despite what looked to be an overwhelming victory. You need favors, the ugly part of her whispered, and troublemakers do not get favors. Song pried open her jaw anyway, made herself breathe and even smile. Her brigade was not trying to sabotage her, they could not know. Serene as Sangshan snow, she resumed her walk down the ramp before the student behind her could get impatient. Her steps the rest of the way to Captain Wen were slightly choppy, but perhaps he would not notice.

Wen Duan took one look at her, a small filament of pulp staining the edge of his spectacles, and even as she resisted the urge to tell him to clean it up he finished swallowing his mouthful and let out a low whistle.

“Saltless Gods, I owe Mandisa silver,” he said. “She was right: it took a year to unwind you but a little Ren time was all it took to wind you back up twice as hard. Nothing fucks you like family.”

Song stonily stared back, filling a moment with her anger and releasing it into the breeze. There was no point in fighting him: smacking a fire with a branch only made more fire, and a fool besides.

“How bad?” she asked instead.

Captain Wen slid off the barrel, popping another piece of orange into his mouth and slurping it down noisily. She did not flinch. She refused to give him the pleasure.

“Walk with me,” he said.

Song followed him into the crowd, some of which she could not help but notice were now pointing at them and whispering. Some were blackcloaks, mostly second years, but there were some foreigners as well. Whatever had taken place here, it had not been quiet and would not go unnoticed. The list of officers she might be able to ask a favor from narrowed, to her smoldering anger. What teacher would want to reward a brigade that – Song made herself imagine the pristine snow on the summit of Sangshan, that blessed mountain, how it shone under the light of the Heavens.

She, too, would be imperturbable.

“Four dead, but they are not Watch and they pulled on watchmen in our own port,” Wen told her.

Song pulled her travel bag tight against her shoulder, following her bespectacled patron as he led them through the throng. He was leading her towards the gatehouse.

“Why?”

Wen pushed up his glasses and grinned nastily.

“Well, some Pereduri lordling took Khaimov for one of his slaves,” he said. “Told her to fetch his bags and attempted to slap her when she didn’t hop to obey.”

Her steps stuttered again, and it took Song every ounce of her restraint not to flinch. She could not imagine Maryam answering such an insult with anything but violence and Song would not blame her for it. She needed to begin considering the damages – four dead but none Watch, which painted the picture of escalation after Maryam was provoked and then the lordling’s guards being put down when they stepped out of line. Which the Watch would hardly bat an eye at, she thought, save if another watchman was involved.

“The lordling in question, he is a student?” she asked.

“Nkosinathi ‘Nathi’ Morcant, an Academy recommendation,” Captain Wen confirmed. “And yes, that’s the Port Cadwyn Morcants in case you were wondering.”

Her fingers clenched. Song was no deep student of Malani commerce, but even she knew that Port Cadwyn was one of the centers of the slave trade. The harbor was on the southwestern tip of the Duchy of Peredur, the last port of call for ships sailing to the western colonies. The slave trade had turned a once middling regional port into one of the busiest of the Isles. The House of Morcant was one of the richest in Peredur, perhaps even the broader Kingdom of Malan.

“Tell me they did not kill him,” she said, just to be absolutely certain.

If they did, House Morcant would spend enough gold on assassins to literally drown the Thirteenth in it. And not laying down but standing up. It wouldn’t matter even if the head of the Morcant cared little for the boy, and that he had looked for the fight besides. It would be a matter of honor to avenge their kin.

“No, they didn’t kill him,” Wen said, and though he didn’t add anything afterwards Song knew better than to relax. “The four dead were his guards, who took offense to Maryam’s own offense.”

He looked at her through the corner of his spectacles – and that damnable pulp was still on his spectacles, he had to see it so why would he not get it off? – and swallowed a grin, as if savoring what was to come.

“They just made him kneel with a metaphorical gun to his head while the crowd from the busiest arrival day watched, telling him to free his slaves or then they’d kill him,” Wen said with relish. “They narrowly had time to get him to sign papers before the garrison came in and detained everyone.”

Song partitioned the events inside her mind, placed them in order. Which parts of the violence she could justify under Watch law, which she would have to work around. We can squeak through, she thought. At least when it came to the killing. The slaves, though, the slaves were a problem. The Watch was not to practice or facilitate slavery, by its own laws, but most of Vesper did in one form or another and that meant the Watch did not consider slavery to be ‘universally unlawful’, as the Republics did.

What her brigade had done, unfortunately, might well fall under armed robbery by the standards of the black.

“What happened to the slaves?” she asked after a heartbeat.

It was too early to call them freedmen, unfortunately.

“They’re being held in the other detainment house,” Wen easily said. “Took a bit to make them understand what was happening, since not all of them speak Antigua well. Not unexpected considering where they’re from.”

Song’s brow rose.

“Provincials?” she asked.

Most city dwellers across Vesper spoke some Antigua, save for the deeper parts of the Someshwar where the Second Empire’s influence had never reached. Beyond the cities, though, it was far from certain. The times when Liergan’s hegemony had let them cram their language down the throat of the world were long past.

“Triglau,” Wen gleefully corrected.

Song breathed in deeply. Ah. There was no room for any sort of negotiation, then. Maryam would kill Nathi Morcant before allowing any outcome save unconditional freedom for her countrymen.

“The ship’s captain is kicking up a fuss, but Abrascal was clever enough to get you a witness,” Captain Wen said. “They’re all cooling their heels waiting for you to arrive, since the officer sent down from Fort Seneca refuses to rule on the matter without the captain of the Thirteenth Brigade present.”

She exhaled that deep breath. A cup of tea and a rest would have been pleasant, but the mess came first.

“Can I speak to them first?” she asked.

Wen shook his head, not needing ‘them’ to be specified.

“Their written accounts of the encounter have already been taken and will be provided,” he said. “It’s you and me for the Unluckies, the sea dog and the Morcant for their side.”

Song let out a sneer at the thought of slavers being allowed to sit in when her cabalists were still detained, but there was no getting around it. Nkosinathi Morcant had no captain to speak for him so he must do so himself, and the captain of Pereduri ship would want answers for his dead men.

“Thank you for the warning,” she said, inclining her head.

He shrugged. They had barely taken another three steps before Wen touched his chin and hummed thoughtfully.

“Oh, before I forget: Izel got shot.”

She flinched, head whipping his way.

“What?”

“Upper arm, relatively shallow,” the fat captain airily continued. “The wound has been seen to and he’s declined the attentions of Lady Knit.”

Song gritted her teeth. The prick. Wen, not Izel. He’d kept that back to shock her and finally gotten his flinch. She set aside the flare of anger, focusing on what lay ahead as they passed through the shade of the covenant pillars. What did she want from the conversation in the gatehouse? First, she thought, was to avoid sanctions inflicted on the Thirteenth for the deaths, both as a whole or individually. Second was to have the freedom of the former slaves confirmed by the Watch, which while more difficult should not be impossible.

It helped, having practical goals. Her stride lengthened as purpose set her shoulders. Song Ren pulled her bag back in place over her shoulder, looking straight ahead as she left the shade of the pillars for Orrery light. She could no longer hear the crowd, but she remembered. Ren, she made out. Unluckies. She did not waste a look back at the whisperers.

She didn’t have the time to care about them, not this year.

—

There were four of them sitting facing the desk.

To the left sat Captain Wen Duan, now martyring a fresh orange, and Song herself. To the right sat the captain of the Crest of Brass, a stooped older man by the name of Captain Rhys, and Nkosinathi Morcant. The young lordling was unharmed, save for the way his rich clothes were dirtied. Song barely paid either man attention, pretending she was still reading through Maryam’s written account of the events while from the corner of her eye she scanned the golden letters above the Pereduri yiwu’s head.

He was not tied to a Pereduri god. She had known that from the moment she saw the contract was Umoya instead of Gwynt, but the name of the deity in question would have sufficed. ‘Tender of Reeds’, the direct translation of it was. She knew that because last year the Tender of Reeds had been used in Theology class as an example for an entity straddling the line between third and second order.

In Malani stories the Tender of Reeds was the very first spirit of that land, one who had taught their forebears how to live on the Middle Isle. The oldest law code in Malan was called the Song of Reeds, their own Great Works placed him as King Issay’s spirit advisor. He was the Malani patron god of kingship and order in everything but name, deeply intertwined with their people’s understanding of the concepts.

Stolen novel; please report.

And this formidable god had seen fit to grant Nkosinathi Kennauc Morcant an exchange contract that was more than three paragraphs long, yet written with mathematical precision. Song did not recognize the units being used – they must precede the Second Empire – or the metaphysical concept being measured, which was an old Umoya formal word she recalled meaning ‘to be’. Whatever it meant, Morcant could take it from others and grant it to people for stated uses that had Song struggling not stare.

Not only ‘mending flesh’ but also ‘changing flesh’ and ‘strengthening flesh’? That sounded a lot like he could not only heal but also – a rap of knuckle against wood had Song jolting her stare away before she got anywhere near the price. Her gaze went to the officer that had been assigned to handle this matter, and who was a sight perhaps not familiar but neither unknown. Commander Salimata Bouare looked at them all like they were badly trained dogs who had just pissed on her favorite carpet, which was too apt a comparison for Song’s comfort.

“Finished?” she asked.

There was only so long Song could string this out without angering the commander, so she nodded. She had the facts, as reported by Maryam and by Silumko of the Twenty-Ninth Brigade. The latter of whom she suspected would soon be receiving gold from the Thirteenth’s brigade funds for this assistance, a move that positively smacked of Tristan. Bless him. You could always count on Tristan Abrascal to have an eye on an escape route when consequences came calling.

“Sally, my friend,” Captain Wen grinned, chewing on orange as he did. “How’ve you been? Would you believe me if I said I missed you?”

The dark-skinned commander’s elaborate earrings tinkled as she turned to address the two watchmen standing behind her.

“Should Captain Duan refer to me by anything besides my formal rank going forward, you are to remove him from the premises,” she said.

Even as the two soldiers saluted Song’s patron mimed locking his mouth and throwing away the key, smirking all the while. The worst part was that Wen did not even have the decency to be embarrassing her in private. While a corner in the back of the gatehouse had been cleared, a desk and chairs readied for this impromptu tribunal, there were still watchmen furnishing new students with brigade numbers and plaques less than twenty feet away.

Gods, there was even some other student in need of the commander’s time waiting on a chair by the wall. The Someshwari girl with her long plait in a net might be sitting quietly, but eyes rested curiously on the spectacle. She did not even try to pretend she was not listening, smiling cheerfully back when Song tried to quell her with a dark look.

“This is absurd. What need is there to debate anything when hundreds saw the events unfold?”

Song had admired the sleek shape of the caravel as her own ship sailed into port earlier, but now wished she could take that admiration back. The Crest of Brass, for that was the caravel’s name, had been the very ship bearing the fools at the source of this entire mess. Its captain was proving to be an additional headache. Captain Rhys was an old man with a thick salt-and-pepper beard and barely any hair left, his skin turned leathery by decades at sea.

That he was a ship’s captain and a man was not wholly unusual, but neither was it common. Malani and Pereduri, as a rule, tended to favor women as captains and ship officers – save for quartermaster, a position almost universally reserved for men. He must be well trusted by the lady of Port Cadwyn, to have been granted the captaincy of as fine a ship as the Crest of Brass.

“Hundreds saw the fighting after it had begun, and then the contract that Nkosinathi Morcant signed,” Commander Salimata corrected.

“Signed under duress,” Captain Rhys cut in.

Commander Salimata’s gaze cooled, but she let the interruption pass. Song’s lips thinned, but she could not deny that was a correct description of what the Morcant had been subjected to. And that duress was the thread that might just undo the work her brigade had done in getting those slaves out of their metaphorical shackles.

“Few bystanders paid attention to the beginnings of the altercation,” Commander Salimata said. “The witnesses we do have swore that-”

“They were paid off,” Captain Rhys snarled. “And killed one of my men, to boot! How could they possibly be taken as neutral wit-”

“Captain,” the commander icily said. “You have my sympathies for the deaths and the trouble, but allow me to assure that if you ever interrupt me again you will be swimming home to Port Cadwyn.”

The Pereduri captain swallowed, eyes flicking around. He found no support, not even from ‘Nathi’ Morcant whose face betrayed more irritation than sympathy. He cleared his throat.

“Apologies, ma’am,” he said. “I meant no offense, my frustration over the matter overcame my sense.”

Song wished that Commander Salimata had been slightly less intimidating, so the man might have kept blustering and pushed the Watch to dismiss him outright. But between Salimata’s stern mien and Captain Rhys evidently being able to recognize a reef of the ship-killing kind, it was not to be.

“An understandable mistake,” the commander replied, in a tone that made it clear it had been a mistake nonetheless. “As I was saying, our only two witnesses of the beginning of the altercation swear that it was Nkosinathi Morcant who first resorted violence by attempting to strike Maryam Khaimov.”

She paused.

“One testimony on the matter was given by Warrant Officer Yayauhqui, who then slew one of your crew and thus stands disqualified as a witness,” she said, fixing the Pereduri captain with a flat look. “Yet we have confirmed through bystanders that Warrant Officer Silumko of the Twenty-Ninth Brigade did not participate in the violence, so his testimony still stands.”

Commander Salimata turned a hard look on the young man sitting by the Crest of Brass’ captain.

“The entire trouble was begun by you, boy.”

Song studied the ‘boy’ in question, making no effort to hide it. Nkosinathi Morcant did not seem cowed by the fierceness of the scowl currently turned on him. And though her expectation was to find disdain or conceit on that round face, neither was present. He was listening attentively, deferring to Commander Salimata without being in any way apprehensive. This was not the arrogance of someone who thought they were untouchable, Song thought. It was something different, and that meant he might not be as much of a fool as his behavior on the docks would imply.

Unfortunate, since he would almost certainly be an enemy to the Thirteenth going forward. If Song had not misunderstood his contract and he truly could heal, setting him up as an alternative to Lady Knit, then that would be trouble. In a place like Scholomance, such a contract would be worth its weight in diamonds.

“I mistook the Akelarre as a slave in service of my house and sought to discipline her when I did not have the right,” Nathi Morcant said. “I was unaware that any Triglau served in the Watch, or even could given that to my knowledge none of their tribes were brought into the Iscariot Accords.”

Trying to excuse why he had almost struck a woman wearing Watch black, Song thought. It was not a strong justification, but neither was it entirely groundless. As an excuse it would fail, but it might serve as a decent way to lessen the gravity of what he had done. Which she could not allow, if the Thirteenth was to get away with the deaths.

“It was an overstep,” the Pereduri acknowledged, “but also an honest mistake.”

Commander Salimata’s gaze then moved her way, an unspoken invitation, and Song straightened in her seat.

“Warrant Officer Maryam Khaimov wore Watch black and stood besides two more wearing the same,” she said. “That the mistake was honest is irrelevant. Given its depth and severity, I put forward that the response given to the provocation was proportionate.”

The commander crossed her arms, flicking a glance at the ship captain besides the Morcant when the old man cleared his throat.