The Lost Steersman (Steerswoman Series) (31 page)

Barely audible: “Says you.” Gebby stood huddled into herself.

Steffie’s puzzled glance requested instruction. Rowan indicated that he should stay in place; then she returned to the pantry, found some scraps of smoked beef, the last of the bread, nearly stale, some butter and jam. She brought all out and laid them on the table.

Gebby watched, her expression altering only subtly; but she swallowed several times.

While not stupid, the girl was certainly deeply ignorant, despite the age she claimed. Rowan was convinced that she did not properly understand the nature of the steerswomen’s ban. The principles allowed leeway in such situations, and Rowan declined to apply the ban for Gebby’s earlier refusal to answer.

Instead, she sat down, cut a slice of bread, began buttering it. “I definitely do not want to get you in trouble with your boss.” Especially as Gebby’s appearance and behavior implied harsh treatment in the past. “So I’m going to ask my questions very carefully.” She added a thick layer of raspberry jam to the bread. “When I think that what I’m about to ask is something you won’t want to answer, I’ll say it differently or try a different question.”

Whether Gebby followed the logic of this was unclear, but she watched each of Rowan’s actions with a deepening interest, swallowing more and more frequently. “But you still won’t let me go . . .”

“On the contrary.” Rowan waved one hand; Steffie stepped away from the door. “You’re perfectly free to leave any time you like.” She crunched into the bread. Jam dripped on her fingers; she licked it off.

Gebby was instantly back at the table; Rowan passed her the bread. “I think you don’t get enough to eat,” she commented.

“Never.”

The slice was gone. Rowan prepared another. “And I’ll bet the food isn’t very good, either. And no fresh vegetables.”

“Nothing’s fresh. Dried and smoked. Gotta last.”

Rowan handed over the slice. “And rationed.” Gebby’s glance told that the word was not familiar to her. “Counted out, bit by bit.”

“Got to. Run out if I don’t.” But this would only account for Gebby’s thinness and not the other signs Rowan noted.

The steerswoman found paper and charcoal, brought them over, began sketching. Steffie came near to watch. “If I were to ask you if you’ve ever seen this plant, would you worry about answering me?”

The girl looked, shook her head. “Never seen it.”

Rowan tried again. “This?”

“That’s twister-grass. Can I have more?” Steffie took over the serving duties.

“We call it blackgrass,” Rowan told the girl. She drew another. “And this? It’s blue.”

“Grows along under the twister-grass.”

Interesting. “All along or just here and there?”

“All under. Dig a hole, find even more, deep down.”

Another sketch. “What about this?”

“Huh. That’s a rock.”

“With this inside it . . .”

Recognition. “Them’s bad. Step on ’em, they break and slice you up. See?” She thumped her right foot up onto the table top; caked grime crumbled. Steffie huffed a stifled protest and stepped back, driven by outrage and stink.

The steerswoman found the smell irrelevant. She leaned forward to examine the instep, which was the cleanest part of the foot; then she nodded slowly and laid her own left hand beside it. Foot and hand bore nearly identical collections of small, white scars.

Gebby gaped a mouthful of half-chewed bread and jam. “You been there!”

“I believe I’ve been some place very much like it.” Rowan sat back. “Steffie, you were interested in my Outskirts tales. Well, take a good look. We’re talking to a Face Person.”

Gebby did not recognize the term; Steffie had to think long to recover it. “Face People . . . Those ones that live far out, way past the Outskirters?”

“That’s right. Most of the plant life out on the Face is poisonous to humans. Not immediately but cumulatively. Daily contact, year after year”— and she gestured at Gebby— “results in this.”

Steffie stared at the girl in frank amazement. “How’d she come so far by herself?” Gebby returned his regard with squinting hostility.

“Unfortunately, I suspect she did not have to travel far at all.” The girl’s pronunciation and speech patterns were degenerated alterations on the typical Alemeth accent. “She’s lived nearby for most of her life.”

Plant life native to the Outskirts and the Face was more vigorous and aggressive than Inner Lands forms, and typically would overcome it; but Gebby’s condition spoke of years of contact. If Outskirts lifeforms did exist so near Alemeth, all green life should have been completely driven out by now, unless— “An island,” Rowan said. Gebby stopped chewing. “Off the shipping lanes,” or it would have been sighted and charted long ago, “due south or southeast of Alemeth. And probably quite small,” or passing fishing boats would have come across it at some point, and Gebby’s concern about protecting the location would be meaningless.

Gebby regarded Rowan as if the process used to discover this information had been wholly magical. “I din’t tell you,” she said, slowly. “Din’t tell nothing ’bout no island.”

Rowan pushed the plate of beef across to her. The girl picked one slice up cautiously but did not eat. “Of course not,” Rowan said. “You can tell your employer that with perfect honesty.” She phrased her next statements carefully, again, more interested in reaction than answer. “I’m very interested in the comings and goings of a man named Janus. Anything you can tell me would be helpful.”

“Don’t know him.”

The reply was immediate and casually delivered; the girl was telling the truth. Very well. “I assume you arrived here in a boat of some kind . . .” She could not come up with a useful circumlocution, so she asked outright, “Does the boat have a copper hull?”

“Huh?”

“Under the waterline. Is the boat plain wood below, or is there something covering the hull?”

“Dunno what you mean.”

“Very well. One more picture.” This time Rowan took her logbook, flipped to the appropriate page. “Look at this.”

Gebby tilted her head. “Wossit, a tree?”

“No, it’s an animal.”

“Huh. Where’s its head?”

“It hasn’t got one.”

“Never seen it.” Gebby began on the beef slice, chewing thoughtfully.

Disappointing— but still, a pocket of Outskirts life, right on the Inland Sea . . . and the fact that Gebby did not know Janus did not rule out his visiting the island in secret . . .

The steerswoman needed to see for herself. She must visit Gebby’s island.

If Rowan left now, the entire town would assume that she had been a false steerswoman, a trickster and confidence artist.

But the demons were coming from somewhere. The fact that Gebby did not recognize the drawing meant little. The creatures might breed in a secluded part of the island, in a pocket of the proper salt water; they might not be dangerous until grown; they might be instinctively impelled to leave when they matured— they might be able to survive immersion in the waters of the Inland Sea long enough to reach Alemeth.

And if Gebby’s island was the only source of demons, then it could be possible to eliminate the creatures entirely. It would be a hazardous affair, certainly, but with enough help, depending upon what Rowan found . . .

She really did need to go there.

Rowan gritted her teeth. People would assume that she had run—

But, she thought, but— she had refused to allow their misconceptions to drive her from Alemeth; was it any more legitimate to allow them to keep her from leaving when she ought?

She was abruptly ashamed, and angry at herself for even considering the matter. She was a steerswoman; she would do exactly as steerswomen do, nothing more nor less.

But she did need Gebby’s cooperation. And the girl was protecting something.

What, in Alemeth, required secrecy?

“Gebby, listen carefully.” The steerswoman stressed the next words. “I am not in the least bit interested in spiders.”

Steffie missed the connection. “What?” But Gebby sat slack, gaping astonishment.

“As far as I’m concerned,” Rowan continued, “the spider-wife is welcome to keep her methods secret. But I do need to go to the island.”

“You can’t!”

“I think we should let— ” Rowan tried to recall the spider-wife’s name, realized that she had never heard it used— “your employer decide. Where is she now, do you know?”

“At the island. I got the boat. I get stuff, and go back.”

“Then you’ll just have to take me back with you.”

“You show up, she’ll kill you!”

Rowan wondered if this was literally true. No matter. “She won’t be able to,” she said simply.

“Then she’ll kill me.”

“I won’t permit it.”

“Then she’ll throw me out.”

“Considering the treatment you get, I don’t understand why you stay with her at all.”

“ ’Cause I’m next. When she goes,
I’ll
be the spider-wife.” The scrawny girl’s eyes glittered. “
I’ll
have all the money and the soft clothes and the pretty house in town. People, they’ll want to be nice to me, and they’ll listen all polite when I talk. ’Cause I’ll be the one does what nobody knows how. And— and anyone in the whole world, they want the spider cloth, it’s
me
sells it to ’em. And they’ll pay lots. And I’ll brush my hair in a twist, and wear blue silk every day, and if I grow up ugly, it don’t matter, ’cause all the boys will come calling anyway. Maybe you, even.” This to Steffie.

He snorted. “Not me.”

“I’ll be rich.”

“Then it’s Maysie’s boys’ll be after you.”

“Good. I like ’em pretty.”

“Hope you plan to take a bath before then.”

“I see you have your future all mapped out,” Rowan said. “And I don’t intend to jeopardize it. I’ll stay away from the area where you work. I will not ask you about the methods you use.” And this was hard for her to say— because now she
did
want to know: how such a thing as a spider could be coaxed to give up its silk, how the adhesiveness of the strands was neutralized, how anything so fine as spider silk could be handled and woven into cloth . . .

More urgent matters were at hand. She could forgo inquiries about spiders.

“All I plan to do,” the steerswoman continued, “is examine the island itself, study the plants and animals, and see what sort of creatures other than spiders might live there. I’ll stay out of your way. I’ll bring my own food. If the island is very small, I may only need to stay for a few days.” She neglected to mention that if demons were found, she would need to return with help.

Gebby remained stubborn. The girl shook her head. “You can’t.”

“At the very least, take me there and let me talk to— Gebby, what is the spider-wife’s name?”

“Luwa.” The girl pushed the plate away. “I won’t.” She rose.

“Haven’t you heard what’s been happening in town?” Rowan half rose, pushed the logbook toward the girl again, stabbed at the picture with her finger. “These animals, these demons, have been coming into Alemeth and hurting people and killing them— ”

“Din’t hear nothing. Don’t talk to people. Luwa don’t like me to.”

“It’s possible the creatures may come from your island— ”

“I never
seen
’em— ”

“They may be hard to find when they’re small, and they might not make any noise until they grow— ”

“
Won’t
do it,
won’t
take you— ”

“Don’t you
care?
” Steffie said. The girl and the steerswoman both turned to him. “People hurt and dying— don’t you care at all?”

Gebby thrust her chin forward. “Don’t none of ’em ever care about me. Animals eat ’em, so what, I say.”

By this statement, Gebby lost whatever right she had to Rowan’s sympathy. “Very well.” The steerswoman sat. “Since I know that the island exists, and the general area where it must be located, I’ll simply have to mount my own search. With so much area to cover, I’ll probably need assistance. Perhaps a number of the fishers might be willing to help.”

Steffie caught the idea. “Oh, sure. ’Specially if you mention it’s the spider-wife’s place you’re looking for. Bet you could get a whole fleet going.”

“Yes, that would be efficient. Unfortunately, I doubt the fishers would be as considerate as I am, nor as able to control their curiosity. They’d likely be clambering over everything, poking everywhere.”

“Maybe that wouldn’t be so bad. Lot of people making spider cloth, spreading the money around. Might just try to go there myself.”

“You can’t!” Gebby was desperate. “That’s
bad.
The spiders is
Luwa’s
work, and
her
money, and we work hard, and you’d be taking it away, and that’s not fair!”

“True. Under normal circumstances, it would be wrong of me. These are not normal circumstances.”