Steph Swainston - No Present Like Time

Gio’s voice was too low for me to hear as his knot of well-wishers bustled him out of town along the woodland path. Some men fetched their horses, others dawdled in the doorway fiddling with their lanterns.

Gio is impugning my virility and I can do absolutely nothing about it. I banged the heel of my hand against my forehead. Be calm! There will be time for revenge later. I’m not very good at later; I wanted him to suffer now.

God, I was livid. I was going to take this out on someone, and since I couldn’t beat Gio, Cinna Bawtere would have to do. I dived off the roof and flew in very turbulent air just under the low storm cloud’s base. I risked being sucked up into it. A gull battled along underneath me, vivid white against the dark iron gray. The hurricane tussled my hair and coat out behind me. My clothes were light even when waterlogged. My wings cleaved the gale, driving rainwater off their oiled surfaces, but the covert feathers were becoming damp and thinning; I was beating harder to stay up.

I followed Cinna out of Eske along the dark forest track, straining to see him. He was hidden beneath his black umbrella, sploshing toward the nearby Slaughterbridge village pub. Air roared over my wings as I slid down the sky. I struggled to slow my ground speed and maneuvered directly above him. I folded my wings back with a jolt and fell on him.

I hit Cinna with the soles of both boots between his shoulder blades, bowling him over and over into a puddle. I absorbed the impact into my legs and landed in a crouch. Cinna rolled around on his back, knees pulled up, winded. I burst out laughing; falcons must feel this exhilarated when they hit prey. “I take my hat off to you, Mister Bawtere! Never knew you had an acrobatic streak!” He kicked like a struck rabbit. A dagger appeared in his hand. He crawled out of the chalky, rain-pitted puddle and collapsed in a milk-white wet heap on the path. “The gallows waits in Eske; it’s a much shorter drop! I can take my pick of felonies in your catalog of crimes. You’re as good as dead!”

I did want to kill him. I wanted to feel the life go out of him under my hands. He saw my cruel expression-comprised of Tern’s rejection, Gio’s slander and six hours in a rainstorm-and he curled up, sobbing. Cinna’s predictability was consoling-I had thought I was losing the ability to read people. They seemed to be becoming gradually more incomprehensible.

“Ah…” Cinna panted. “Please don’t hurt me. Please…I…”

“How did Gio acquire the logbook?”

“I don’t know!…Ah…I swear! He’s a clever man; he has many agents. Ah…I respect you, Comet. You’re Eszai. You’re a legend in Hacilith.”

“Put the dagger down, then.”

Cinna did no such thing. I kicked his hand and the knife flew out of it. “Put it down!”

Cinna huddled under the remnants of his broken umbrella.

“How did Gio know of Tris?”

“I informed him. I’m sorry! You never said it was a secret!”

I suddenly realized that I had told Cinna everything, six months ago, under the influence of a fingernail full of scolopendium. Shit. It began to dawn on me that this appalling turn of events could be all my fault-caused by my big, stupid mouth.

I bated forward with my wings spread, made as if to kick him and he cowered. “Are you sailing with Gio?”

“Yes…Yes, what of it? I am My Own Man.” He huffed in a breath. “I’m to be captain of the Pavonine. Yes, Comet, I was a sailor by trade; had you forgotten? I’m returning to that trade now. It’s legal!”

“I see.” I drew my sword from under my coat skirts. “Do you believe all that bullshit Gio was spouting in there?”

Cinna knelt up, several acres of ghastly fawn brocade, and started prodding his saggy chest to check for broken ribs. His blond pin curls were plastered to his skull, his fat cheeks were ruddy. The pathetic specimen looked at me carefully through the pouring rain. “No, of course not…Though there’s a seed of truth in everything he said…He thinks you’re an alcoholic.” A knowing, assertive look appeared in his eyes. “I have a reliable source for decent cat, by the way.”

“Blackmail now, is it? That’s just one more reason to kill you!” I snarled, though his words set my mouth watering.

“Come on, Comet. Just because you’re illegitimate doesn’t give you free license to be a bastard. I haven’t told Gio about your love of scolopendium. Why should I? It’d bring me no benefit, and I’m a savvy businessman…Of course I don’t believe that the island is full to bursting with precious metals for the natives to bestow on us. However, I do know that Gio’s As Rich As Rachiswater. He’s paying me five times a merchant captain’s wage. He’s packing coin, plate and banknotes-he has chests full of it! He wants to set himself up on Tris. I’ve just finished conveying it all to Awndyn myself. Look, I still have the letter he gave me. I’ll show you, here.” Cinna fished inside his coat for a crumpled envelope with a broken seal, Ghallain manor’s whale emblem. I took the letter from his gnawed fingertips and raised a wing to shelter it from the rain, while I read:

TO: SITELLA GRACKLE, FIRST BANK OF HACILITH

I hereby instruct you to immediately liquidate all my assets currently in your care and to dispatch the monies to myself at the harbormaster’s office, Awndyn. They are, to whit: i) the proceeds collected to date from the sale of my academies, ii) all ordinary stocks held in the Hacilith bourse, iii) gold and silver plate held in the bank’s safe.

The bearer of this letter, Cinna Bawtere, holds my full confidence in this matter and is to be trusted as the guardian of the money.

GIO AMI

Money, lots of money, I deliberated while I refolded the letter. Cinna was smiling, showing textured teeth. “Comet, are you envious? You know you’ll never be free to escape to Tris yourself. You have to fly around the Fourlands until the inevitable happens-a goddamn Insect eviscerates you-and I don’t mean like at Slake Cross, I mean fatally. You’re cast off the Emperor’s fist like a hawk, to spy, and he lures you back and tethers you with the promise of eternal life.”

I took a squelching step toward him. “But, Bawtere, it’s jail for you! Make haste! We’ll see how far Gio sails without a captain.” I gestured with the sword and Cinna staggered to his feet, protesting and quaking. “Into town, Cariama Eske’s guard will look after you…They’ll throw you in a freezing cell, lock you in fetters and you can fuck your mother for all I care.”

“She’s dead.”

“Should make it easy for you, then. Hurry! I’ve a lot to do tonight. I’m busy because I have to find someone who will keep an eye on Gio and accurately report his plans to me when, for example, I land on the Pavonine’s gallery at dusk.”

Cinna had begun to snivel. “Okay,” he said, miserably; “I’ll do it.”

I said, “Oh, good. Then the noose can wait; tell me a little more about Gio.”

Cinna said: He knows that the Trisians distrust the Castle. He has a silver tongue, that man.

I said: Even if it was gold he couldn’t Challenge me.

Cinna said: Gio’s failed and he knows it. He might have got away with insurrection, but he tried to murder an Eszai. Oh yes, I heard from his own lips how he stabbed Lightning!

Me: He’s running?

Cinna: Yes. He can’t storm the Castle and skewer every Eszai much as he wants to. So he’s making his mark-leaving his name on history is immortality of a sort, seeing as he can’t have The Real Thing. If he holes up at Ghallain or hides out on Addald Isle it’d only be a matter of time before he’s betrayed and captured. But on Tris…

Me: Never!

Cinna: He wants to win over the Trisians. And San would have to leave him there, the King of Tris, because the Castle’s purpose is fighting the Insects. San could never fight people or invade islands.