Ketty Jay 04 - The Ace of Skulls (10 page)

Silo and the others caught them up as they reached the end of the street and found a five-way junction. One side of it had caved in, but most of the buildings were still standing. Pelaru checked his map again again scanned his surroundings intently.

‘Do you actually have any idea what we’re looking for?’ Frey asked impatiently.

Pelaru’s face cleared, and he pointed at a doorway with an ancient coat of arms still barely visible above it. ‘That,’ he said.

Seven

The Pumping House – Fictions – Crake Loses His Dignity – A Precipitous Crossing – Wards

P
elaru led them across the junction, once they’d established that there were no troops around. Frey hurried everybody after him. He wanted to get off the street. The Awakeners that had been fighting with Silo’s team would come up on their rear if they weren’t quick.

The doorway was the entrance to a tall, narrow building which stood at the junction between two roads. Its roof had fallen in and chunks of the façade had broken off, but the structure was intact otherwise. Frey glanced at the coat of arms as he approached. It belonged to some duke or another, possibly the symbol for the Duchy of Banbarr, within whose borders Korrene lay. It didn’t look very grand, so it was likely some kind of municipal building. There were letters carved across the frontage, but the stonework was too shattered to guess at the words.

The door had once been stout wood, banded in iron, but it had rotted and warped and now stood half-open on rusted hinges. They squeezed past it and found themselves in a chilly corridor scattered with broken tiles and chunks of stone that had fallen from the cracked ceiling.

‘What is this place?’ Frey asked the whispermonger.

‘An old pumping station,’ Pelaru said.

‘The relics are here?’ Frey said doubtfully.

‘If it were that easy, don’t you think they’d have been found by now?’ Pelaru replied. He was impatient, eager to get on and find his partner. Frey let him lead.

You’d better know what you’re doing
.

They made their way along the corridor. It was bare and lightless, and they had to break out gas lamps from Crake’s pack. A nearby explosion made the building shiver, and dust sifted down from the ceiling. Frey looked uneasily at the cracks in the wall, and wondered just how stable this place was.

They passed doorways that led into small rooms containing decayed office furniture, and chambers crowded with flaking pipes covered in levers and turn-wheels.

‘I tried to stop him,’ Pelaru muttered, almost to himself.

‘Your partner? Osger?’ Frey prompted. He was keen to get Pelaru talking. The Thacian had volunteered precious little information so far, but Frey had the sense he wanted to unburden himself. Whispermongers were renowned for being ruthless in their dealings, acting without emotion, respecting only money and taking no sides. But beneath his calm exterior, Pelaru was agitated and distressed. Even Frey could see that.

‘Osger was obsessed with Awakener relics,’ Pelaru said. ‘When he heard about this place, there was no reasoning with him. And you can be sure I tried.’

‘So he went looking for this shrine? What’s so special about it?’

Pelaru cast him a glance, with that haughty expression on his sculpted features that made Frey feel that he was being looked down on.

Thacians
, he thought.
So very punchable.

‘If the story is true, this shrine has been hidden away for a century. Even before the quake hit, it was only a rumour. Afterward, it was thought lost, if it had ever existed at all.’

‘So what’s changed?’

‘An explorer,’ said Pelaru. ‘Godber Blinn. He claimed to have found the shrine, and had with him a relic as evidence. Nobody believed him: the relic could have come from anywhere. But when Osger heard about him, he had me find the man and we listened to his story. He was demanding an exorbitant amount to reveal the details of its location.’

‘Sounds like a con artist to me,’ said Frey.

‘That was my reaction. Though he’d always been honest in his dealings in the past, as far as I could determine. Regardless, Osger believed him. In the end we made sure the information stayed exclusive to us.’

‘Oh yeah? How?’

Pelaru gave him a long, reptilian stare. The kind of look that said:
Don’t ask
. And you didn’t need to, after that. Frey wondered if he’d underestimated this man. Maybe he was bluffing, or maybe he was a damn sight colder than Frey had given him credit for.

‘Why didn’t Blinn just loot the place and sell the treasure himself?’ Frey asked.

‘Because he was scared.’

‘Of what?’

Pelaru’s face hardened slightly. ‘Fictions,’ he said, and wouldn’t say any more.

The corridor ended in a spacious rectangular hall, dominated by several huge pumps, their pistons and screws drab with dust and shadow in the lanternlight. Most of the ceiling had fallen in, and the floor was cluttered with debris.

‘Look for a way down,’ said Pelaru. ‘It’ll be here somewhere.’

They split up into three groups and made their way through the hall. Ashua went with Frey and Pelaru. Frey noticed Pelaru glancing in Jez’s direction as she moved off with another group.

There it is again,
he thought.
This man has way too many secrets.

The darkness brought on an instinctive hush, and they moved quietly. Outside, they could hear the crackle of gunfire and the occasional explosion. The fighting was not far off.

‘I worked it out,’ said Ashua to Pelaru. ‘Why the Awakeners are here. This Korrene place is dead, right? No strategic value, no resources worth taking, not even a particularly good place for a stronghold. Only one reason they’re expending so much effort here.’ Her eyes shone slyly in the lanternlight. ‘They’re after the same thing Osger was, aren’t they?’

Frey watched Pelaru closely. The same thought had crossed his mind.

‘I can only guess at their intentions,’ said the Thacian. ‘But yes, it seems likely. Blinn told a lot of people what he’d found in Korrene before we found him. But he told only us the exact location.’

‘So they came here to find it,’ said Frey. ‘But the Coalition got wind of their movements and intercepted them. Now the Awakeners are trying to hold out long enough to find this shrine.’

‘They must really want those relics, huh?’ said Ashua.

‘Maybe,’ said Pelaru. ‘Maybe they just want to be sure no one else gets to them.’

Frey grabbed Pelaru’s arm and pulled him round roughly. He stared hard into the other man’s eyes.

‘I’m sick of games, Pelaru. What’s in that shrine?’

Pelaru held his gaze a long time, not in the least intimidated. ‘I don’t know and I don’t care,’ he said. ‘Osger was excited but he wouldn’t tell me why. He said it would be a surprise. He was the one interested in relics, not me.’ He shook off Frey’s hand and looked away into the dark. ‘I want to find him. That’s all.’

‘Hey!’ called Malvery. ‘Over here!’

They converged on the doctor, who was standing near the top of a caged spiral staircase which drilled downward. Frey went first. After dragging his long-suffering crew into the middle of a warzone, leading from the front was the least he could do. It took the edge off the guilt a little.

‘As long as I don’t abuse their loyalty, I can look at myself in the mirror. The day I do is the day I don’t deserve to lead them. Same applies to you.’

Trinica’s words, that she’d spoken to him during one wonderful night in a restaurant in Samarla. She’d been talking about her crew, the crew of that rot-damned frigate she was shackled to. The crew that she’d chosen over him, in the end. Because her feelings for him were putting them in danger. Just as he was doing now, with his crew, for her.

I should give it up
, he thought.
I’ve got a good thing here. Good friends, good times. We can ride out the war in style and we’ll still be standing at the end of it. Forget Pelaru, forget Trinica. Turn around now, fly into the sunset and enjoy the rest of your life.

But he couldn’t. He just couldn’t.

As he descended, he noticed a foul smell, growing stronger with each step. A stench of wet decay, of slime, of shit and things unimaginably worse. By the time he reached the bottom, it was making his eyes water. He could hear groans of disgust from the men above him.

‘Come on, fellers,’ he said, summoning up some brio. ‘It’s not that bad.’

‘Cap’n,’ said Malvery steadily. ‘It smells like I just buried my face in Pinn’s cavernous arse flaps.’

Pinn’s riposte was a pointedly vicious fart, more eloquent than anything he could have managed with words. Ashua broke into hysterics somewhere up the stairway.

Pelaru gave Frey a flat look:
This is your crew?
Frey grinned at him and shrugged.

At the end of a short corridor was a heavy iron door, standing open. The stench was emanating from there. Frey poked his lantern through and looked out into the sewers.

They were at the end of a narrow tunnel. Light from Frey’s lantern shone on damp brick. Droplets glinted in the light as they oozed free and plopped from the ceiling. There was a stone walkway on the near side, raised above the level of the scummed and foetid water. It had been stagnant for fifty years, and the stink was appalling. Clumps of unidentifiable muck bobbed near the mouldering body of a massive rat. Further up the tunnel, globules of congealed fat had formed a small white island.

Frey looked back at Pelaru. ‘You’re sure this is the way?’ he asked, rather hoping for a negative.

Pelaru brandished another piece of cloth with another map on it, this time a sketch of the sewer network. ‘Perfectly sure,’ he said.

They made their way into the sewers, sticking to the walkway. Crake hadn’t gone ten metres before he had to stop and throw up into the water. When he was done, he stood there wheezing, leaning on his knees, wiping his mouth with a handkerchief.

‘You alright?’ Frey asked him.

Crake gave him an accusing glare. ‘I thought I’d given up all dignity long ago when I joined this crew,’ he said. ‘But this? This is a new low, Frey.’

‘It’s character-building,’ said Frey. ‘Does you aristocrats good to get down in the shit with the rest of us every now and then.’ He gave Crake a comradely slap on the back of his pack, which inspired the daemonist to bring up what little was left in his stomach.

Pelaru led them deeper into the sewers. They passed through junctions and over little arched bridges that crossed the still water. The dark was oppressive, but it held no terrors for Frey, who’d seen plenty worse. Rats squabbled and splashed out of sight. The conflict in the streets above was too far away to be heard. Once, Frey spotted a pair of shining eyes watching them from beyond the range of the lantern light, and his heart jumped in his chest; but it was only Jez, who’d dropped behind and was tailing them.

Frey’s reservations about the mission began to fade. There didn’t seem to be any Awakeners down here. If darkness and stink were all they had to worry about, then maybe it wouldn’t be so bad after all.

He was about to say as much when a dreadful howl echoed through the sewers. It rose and fell like a klaxon; a bone-chilling, deathly sound that sawed at the nerves and set their teeth on edge.

‘Um,’ said Ashua, when silence had returned. ‘What was that?’

‘The wind?’ said Frey. It was a wishful suggestion at best.

‘That,’ said Crake, ‘was
not
the wind.’

Frey looked at Pelaru. ‘You said something about fictions?’ he prompted.

‘Tales,’ said Pelaru. ‘Rumours. That’s all.’

‘Enlighten us,’ Crake said.

‘Ever since the quake, people have told stories about this place. A ghost city must have its ghosts.’

‘But Blinn believed in them,’ Frey pointed out.

‘Blinn believed in a lot of things. Not all of them were real,’ Pelaru snapped, suddenly harsh.

‘Might be you thought that before,’ said Silo, his deep bass voice echoing in the tunnel. ‘Might be you were wrong.’

Pelaru cast him a poisonous glance, but said nothing.

‘Eyes peeled, everyone,’ said Frey, and they made their way onward.

They hadn’t gone far before they found a fissure in the tunnel wall, wide enough to enter one by one. Pelaru headed inside without explanation, and Frey went after him, holding his lantern up. He heard Crake struggling through, the pack on his back clanking, and Malvery squeezing in with a grunt.

‘Least we’re getting away from that damned stink,’ the doctor said, huffing out his moustaches.

The fissure widened quickly, opening out into an underground grotto. As their lanterns came through and light swelled, they saw that a chasm split the grotto from side to side, ten metres wide at its narrowest point.

Then Pelaru cried out, and Frey swung his lantern round to see what had excited him. Strung across the chasm were two thick ropes, one above the other. The first was set at shoulder-height, secured by pitons in the walls of the grotto. The other was at ground level, wrapped around spikes driven securely into the stone floor.

‘They were here!’ said Pelaru. He hurried over to examine the pitons. ‘Yes, yes. This is Yort metal; he had a set of these. It’s him!’

Malvery had gone over to the edge of the chasm and was looking down doubtfully. Silo tested the ropes, yanking on them hard, and tried his weight on the lower one.

‘Looks secure, Cap’n,’ said Silo.

But Malvery shook his head. ‘Uh-uh. You’re not gettin’ me on that. Not a chance.’

‘You scared of heights or something?’ Pinn sneered.

‘Nope,’ said Malvery. He was looking at Frey. ‘Just don’t fancy trustin’ my life to a piece of rope. Not when I don’t see the point of it.’

Frey saw the defiance in his eyes. There wasn’t much discipline on the
Ketty Jay
; it was loyalty that made them work well together, not fear of punishment. But Malvery’s loyalty had been eroded of late, with the civil war and all of that. The doc was giving him a push, to see what he’d do.