The Iron jackal

Seven

Pinn’s wound was not enough to shut him up.

‘It’s all going grey!’ he wailed. ‘Doc! Where are you?’

‘I’m right here, carrying your fat arse,’ Malvery grunted, as he and Crake manhandled Pinn into the Ketty Jay ’s dingy infirmary.

‘Who’s that?’ Pinn cried, looking about, his eyes unfocused. ‘Is that you, Doc? You sound so far away. I can’t hear any- Ow! ’ He yelled in protest as they dumped him unceremoniously on the surgical table. ‘Hey! Careful!’

‘Can we gas him?’ panted Crake.

‘I’m thinking more like we should put him out of his misery,’ Malvery said, running an eye over Pinn’s bloodied arm. He took hold of the shirtsleeve and ripped it up to the shoulder.

‘Aren’t you supposed to have a bedside manner or something?’ Pinn complained.

Malvery harumphed and busied himself with assembling his surgical gear. The instruments were hanging up in a dresser that was bolted to the wall and had once been used to keep plates.

Crake could barely suppress a smile as he watched the doctor bustling around. Malvery was in a grump because Pinn had made him worry. Despite everything, Malvery was fond of Pinn. Crake thought him an odious, immoral dimwit with the intelligence of a cough drop, but he was crew, so that was that.

It was sweltering in the tiny infirmary. Since last night, the Ketty Jay had been hidden beneath an arch in one of the massive rock formations scattered across the desert. Despite being in the shade, her temperature had slowly risen until it was almost as hot inside as out, and she couldn’t get rid of the day’s heat without the engine running. Crake couldn’t wait for nightfall, when they could get out of here and back to Shasiith.

He could hear the rest of the crew coming back to the ship, bringing the relic they’d found on the train, among other things. Bess was carrying a chest full of assorted salvage. It had seemed a shame to hijack an entire train just for one little Samarlan relic, so they’d scavenged for some extra loot on the side. Apart from the relic, the train had carried an unremarkable cargo, mostly crops and mail. Not worth the effort it would take to haul it away. But Silo and Jez had identified some valuable machine parts and odd Samarlan devices. Frey had found some fine jewellery and a matched pair of exquisite knives on the body of a dead Samarlan. Crake had even discovered a beautifully bound book, which for some reason Frey had quickly appropriated. The Cap’n barely read in his native langu K nad even disage, let alone Samarlan.

He’d have to go and check on Bess later. He’d need to ask Silo to help him repair her armour, but generally she seemed none the worse for wear, which was a relief. All in all, the heist was a success. The only casualty was Pinn and, to be honest, if anyone needed shooting, it was him.

‘Can you grab me some carbolic, mate?’ Malvery asked, as he was laying out the instruments he would use to scare Pinn with before eventually agreeing to gas him unconscious. ‘It’s in the dresser.’

Crake walked over to it and began opening drawers. ‘Where?’

‘Third drawer down on the right. No, wait, the second.’

But Crake had already opened the third drawer down on the right. There were no medical supplies in there, but a small collection of keepsakes and personal effects. A ferrotype album and various documents, including an old membership certificate for the Guild of Surgeons. Lying to one side was a small, velvet-covered box.

Ordinarily, he wouldn’t have been so rude as to pick it up and open it. But he recognised the size and shape, and he had an idea what was inside. Curiosity got the better of him.

It was a medal, the size of a coin, with its ribbon folded up underneath it. A metal circle surrounding an X. Simple, but carefully detailed with lacquer and filigree.

‘The Duke’s Cross,’ Crake said, his eyes widening.

Malvery looked up from his task. ‘Wondered where that got to. Didn’t have space to keep everything in those piddly little quarters we get, so I took to storing bits and bobs in here.’

‘Bits and bobs?’ Crake said in amazement. He held the medal up. ‘This is yours?’

‘Aye,’ said Malvery. ‘Aye, it was. I mean, it is.’

‘You’ve had this all this time and you never told anyone?’

‘There’s plenty secrets this crew ain’t told each other, I reckon,’ said Malvery. ‘I forgot about it, mostly.’

‘How did you get it?’

‘First Aerium War, I was a field surgeon on the front line. Saved a few fellers once, pulled ’em out of a firefight. They gave me a medal.’

‘So why keep it quiet? Aren’t you proud of it?’

‘Course I am. Prouder than I ever was ab KI e0"›out anything. Just seems it belongs to that younger feller who won it, not to me.’

‘Hey!’ Pinn said indignantly, raising his head. ‘Who cares about some stupid medal? I’m dying, here!’

‘Exactly,’ said Malvery, with a bland look at Crake. ‘Who cares? Now can you get me that carbolic, like I asked?’

The Ketty Jay ’s engine room was like an oven.

Silo was no stranger to this heat. He’d been born in it and had grown up in it. He’d felt it in the cells, in pens and camps, in factories and in the jungle after he’d escaped his captors. It wasn’t the same as any summer in Vardia. It was hotter, drier, carrying the smell of baked earth and dust. It drew sweat from the skin and punished the energetic. An oppressive, hateful heat.

Samarla was out there, and it wanted him. He should never have come back here.

He moved through the cramped maze of metal walkways that hugged the Ketty Jay ’s engine assembly, testing this and that, hovering like a restless wasp at an apple. His adjusted the electromagnets that pulverised refined aerium into ultralight gas. As usual, it was unnecessary. Everything was in order. The whole assembly had only been put in a few months ago, by some of the best engineers in Yortland. Silo had become somewhat redundant after that. Gone were the days when the Ketty Jay ’s engine just barely held together, and only Silo’s frantic industry kept her alive.

He missed those days.

Slag, the Ketty Jay ’s ancient cat, was lying on the injector pipe, drowsing in the heat. Silo normally liked having Slag around. He approved of the cat’s silent company and his independence. Slag wouldn’t suffer to be petted. He came and went as he pleased. But the cat’s presence irritated him now. The fact that the engine ran so damned well irritated him. Everything irritated him.

Shoulda spoke up, he told himself. He thought in Vardic nowadays, in the same rough border dialect that he spoke. He hadn’t heard or spoken Murthian in almost a decade. Shoulda said somethin’ to the Cap’n.

But what would he have said? Leave me in Vardia, I don’t want to go with you? Where would he stay? A Murthian wouldn’t last long on his own. If he wasn’t lynched by people itching to settle old scores from the Aerium Wars, he’d be kidnapped and returned to Samarla. His former masters offered a reward for returned slaves.

Even in Vardia, he was scarcely more free than he’d been in Samarla. At least in Samarla, he’d been able to see the chains.

Enough o’ that, he thought in disgust. I’m still a man, ain’t I? And on this crew, what I say, it got weight. Maybe I don’t say much, but that’s alright. I c K alic nohose that path. Chose to keep my silence after what happened.

But a man gotta raise his voice if he got a ’pinion. Or he can’t blame no one but himself when he suffers.

Not long ago he’d met a Samarlan. It was the first time he’d seen one since Frey flew him out of the jungle. That encounter had reminded him of something he’d spent years trying to forget. He was a slave. He’d always be a slave, no matter how far he ran.

He’d killed that Samarlan. Thrown him off the roof of a building. It had felt like liberation, for a while. But one man’s death didn’t liberate him. He still skulked out of sight, keeping his head down, hiding in the engine room. He still kept his opinions to himself. He still did what he was told.

Anger boiled up inside him. A sudden, uncontrollable fury. He felt it coming, and fought to cap it. He gritted his teeth, screwed his eyes shut, and exerted every ounce of control he had. His fingers tightened around the wrench in his hand. It was like a searing flood inside him, a need to kill everything and everyone, to destroy himself in one glorious rampage and then He whacked the wrench against the side of the assembly. Once, twice, three times. The cat took fright and bolted in a scrabble of claws.

That small violence took the edge off his anger. Slowly, it subsided. He was left panting, sweat trickling from his shaven scalp to drip off his nose.

Worse than ever. Damn it. Worse than ever.

Rage had been the bane of his family. It had killed his father and his brother and it had almost killed him. As a young man, he’d made the decision that he’d never let it consume him the way it had them. But sometimes, just sometimes, there was too much to keep inside.

Samarla. Just being here brought back the memories. The beatings. The forced labour. His countrymen, murdered before his eyes. But most of all, most of all, the humiliation.

But there were other memories, too. Memories of revenge. Fighting those Daks on the Rattletraps, chasing them down, he’d felt powerful. He hadn’t felt that for a long time. But he’d been reminded of it during the battle for the train, how he’d once been more than he was now. It had fired his blood and smashed his calm with an ease that frightened him.

You shouldn’t’a come.

He was loyal to the Cap’n, and proud of it. Loyal enough that he’d taken a bullet for him once. But when did loyalty become servitude? And when did servitude become slavery? He didn’t blame the Cap’n for not consulting him about going to Samarla. He blamed himself for submitting to the decision without a word of protest.

You chose this pat Khosof proth, ’member? After what happened. Never again, you said. Never again.

But Samarla was out there, beyond the Ketty Jay. The hated land. And suddenly it felt like everything he’d achieved since he escaped was futile.

He’d never left this place, not really. He’d dreamed of freedom, but a dream was all it had been. He’d exchanged one oppressor for another, and this one he couldn’t get away from.

You still a slave, he thought. And what’s worse, you done it to yourself this time.

‘Well,’ said Frey. ‘There it is.’

‘There it is,’ Ashua agreed.

They were standing in the cargo hold, both with their arms crossed.

‘So what is it?’ Ashua said at length.

‘I gather it’s a protective case of some kind.’

‘So what’s it protecting?’

‘That, I don’t know,’ Frey replied.

They regarded the object without much hope of enlightenment. It was a black oblong, a metre and a half in length, twenty centimetres thick and thirty wide. Beyond that, it was utterly featureless. It lay on the flat lid of the chest that contained the rest of the salvage.

The case that enclosed the relic kept its mysteries within.

They were alone in the cargo hold, except for Bess, who had gone dormant and now stood lifeless in the stifling gloom. Crake and Malvery had taken Pinn to the infirmary. Silo was in the engine room, as usual. Jez and Harkins, after helping them secure the Rattletraps, had gone off to run diagnostics in the cockpit. It was only a one-person job, but Harkins was happy to tag along.

Frey briefly wondered if Harkins had thought through the consequences of his obsession with the navigator. Jez’s heart didn’t beat, and she didn’t breathe. If he did manage to consummate his desire, surely it would qualify as necrophilia. Still, he couldn’t see Harkins ever making it with a live girl, so he supposed it was fair enough to try.

‘We ought to look inside,’ Ashua said.

‘You reckon?’

‘Give it a go,’ she urged. ‘Try to open it.’

‘We’re not supposed to.’

‘Why? Because the ghoul told you? You do everything she says?’

Frey snorted. ‘You do it, if you’re so keen.’

Ashua made a soft clucking noise, like a chicken. Frey shook his head in despair. ‘You’re such a child.’

Ashua waited expectantly.

‘Although, now I think about it,’ Frey continued, ‘I don’t much like carrying cargo when I don’t know what it is.’

‘Dangerous for all concerned,’ Ashua agreed.

‘Your fingers are smaller than mine. You might have better luck.’

‘You haven’t even tried yet. Might be you do the job just fine.’

They stared at the case for a while.

‘Will you just open it?’ Ashua snapped suddenly.

‘Alright!’ Frey cried, throwing his hands up in the air. He stalked over to the case and ran his fingers over it, searching for a way in. It had a strange texture, somewhere between stone and metal. There was no seam that he could find. If he hadn’t been warned not to open it, he wouldn’t have guessed it opened at all.

He should probably just leave it alone, he decided. But he didn’t like to look bad in front of a woman. Even if she was a gobby, tattooed street-rat he probably had a decade on.

‘Try the other side,’ Ashua urged him.

‘I was getting to it,’ he replied irritably. He turned the case around and felt along the edge, where he encountered a faint row of depressions in the surface. ‘There’s something here.’

‘What?’

‘I’m not sure. I-’ Then he stopped, because the case was slowly, silently opening with the lazy gape of a crocodile. He stepped back. ‘Reckon I did something right.’

The case split open as if hinged on one side, although there were no hinges to be seen. Inside lay a weapon of some kind. It took up the entire length of its container, resting in a delicately wrought cradle of metal. The relic.

It looked like some kind of enormous double-bladed sword. At its centre was a handle of carven bone, big enough to grip with two hands. Projecting from each end of the handle was a long, narrow blade. The blades curved slightly in opposite directions. They were not made o Kre ds. Projf metal, but a stone-like substance which had no lustre. It was beautifully fashioned, but there was an unsettlingly alien quality to the delicate whorls and curves cut into the surface. He saw patterns of circular indentations and tiny clusters of incomprehensible symbols.

On the inside of the lid was a teardrop-shaped emblem wrought in shining grey metal. It looked like a stylised wolf, or some kind of dog. Frey glanced at it for a moment before returning his attention to the infinitely more attractive item beneath it.

‘Now that looks like it would fetch a few ducats,’ he commented. ‘How old do you think it is?’

Ashua crowded close to have a look. She was dusty and filthy and the attractive new-sweat smell of her had been replaced by a stale odour now they were out of the sun. None of which stopped Frey being suddenly very conscious of her proximity.

I need a shower, he thought to himself. Very long and very cold.

‘Well, the Sammies have been around longer than anyone,’ said Ashua. ‘First civilisation, and all that. So if this counts as a relic to them…’ She shook her head slightly. ‘Doesn’t make sense. It could be thousands of years old, but it looks like it was made yesterday.’

‘Maybe they built things to last back then. What do you reckon the blades are made of?’

‘Dunno. Touch ’em and see.’

‘Hey, I opened it. Your turn.’

‘Frey,’ she said. He turned to meet her gaze. Then, very slowly, she puffed out her cheeks and began to cluck like a chicken again.

‘You,’ he said, ‘are a bad influence.’

She grinned at him. He put out his hand and laid it on the flat of the blade. It felt completely smooth, almost glasslike.

‘I think it’s some kind of ceramic,’ he said. ‘Weird. Never seen a blade like that, in Samarla or anywhere. Not even up in Yortland, and they make weapons out of any old shit up there. Seal bones and bear teeth and whatnot.’

‘Try it out,’ Ashua suggested.

‘What?’

‘Go on. Take it out, give it a swing.’ When Frey rolled his eyes at her, she cocked her head and raised an eyebrow. ‘Don’t bother resisting. You know you’re going to do it anyway.’

‘I really shouldn’t,’ said Frey, as he gripped the handle and lifted it out. It was Kt oan" startlingly light.

‘Careful,’ said Ashua. ‘Don’t-’

Frey yelped as a sharp pain lanced through his hand, and he let go of the weapon. It crashed to the floor with a clatter.

‘-drop it,’ Ashua finished wearily.

‘It bloody bit me,’ said Frey. The palm of his right hand was aflame with the memory of the pain. A single bead of blood had gathered there. He showed it to her. ‘Look!’

‘Poor baby,’ she said. ‘Quite a wound.’

‘Oh, piss off.’

She crouched next to the blade, searching it for signs of chips or scratches. ‘You’d better not have damaged it.’

‘Put it back in the container,’ said Frey. ‘Damn thing’s a menace.’

‘You think I’m touching it now? No, thanks. You put it back.’

‘ I’m not touching it!’

‘Well, we’ll leave it on the floor, then. Makes no odds to me. You shouldn’t have taken it out.’

Frey gritted his teeth in frustration. ‘You know, I could just kick you out the cargo door and leave you in the desert,’ he reminded her. ‘We’ve got the loot now.’

‘You won’t kick me off,’ she said, with infuriating confidence.

‘Why not?’

‘You’re not the type. You’re soft on women.’

‘I am not!’ he said indignantly.

‘Oh, you are,’ she said with a smile. ‘You’re a handsome guy under all that dirt. I bet you go through women like socks. That means you’re either a self-absorbed narcissist who needs female attention to groom his ego, or you’re a bitter closet misogynist who’s out to get revenge on women through some weird domination-and-conquest thing.’

Frey was rather pleased that she’d called him handsome. He made a show of considering the question, to disguise the fact that he didn’t understand some of the words. ‘I like the sound of the first one more,’ he ventured.

‘That’s what I reckoned.’

‘Where did you learn to talk like that? You sound like Crake sometimes.’

She shrugged, evading the question. ‘You gonna pick up that sword-thing, then?’

Frey didn’t much want to, but it was clear that she wasn’t going to help him out, and he couldn’t just leave it there as evidence of what he’d done. How would he explain it to the crew? Or to Trinica?

‘Fine!’ he snarled. ‘I’ll do it.’ He bent down and gingerly lifted the weapon, gripping the blades with his thumbs and fingertips, careful not to touch the edges. He turned it over awkwardly and inspected it. It seemed unharmed. Well, if the buyer noticed any damage, he’d just say it was there already.

‘Try not to fumble it this time,’ Ashua said.

Frey tensed for a moment, wondering if it was too late to change his mind about kicking her off. He took a breath and decided to be a bigger man than that.

‘We never opened the case, right?’ he said.

‘ You never opened it,’ she corrected.

He put the blade back in its cradle and closed the case. It became a simple black slab again, with no sign of a seam.

‘Sooner we’re out of this damn country, the better,’ he muttered. He stamped off towards the cockpit, flexing his sore hand.