Chris Wooding - Retribution Falls

‘How did you get that?’ Frey asked conversationally, indicating the scar.

‘How did I get what?’ the storekeeper asked, genuinely puzzled.

Frey thought a moment and then let it drop. ‘These filters you’re selling. They’d protect us against the bad air in the canyons?’

The storekeeper grinned. ‘Guaranteed. Did your old ones let you down?’

‘Something like that.’

‘That’s rough, friend. Well, you can rely on these.’ He pulled one out of a crate behind him and put it on. It was a black metal oval with several breathing-slits that fitted over the mouth and nose, secured over the head by a strip of leather. ‘Wo wetter n orb wetwibooshun bawls.’

‘What?’

The shopkeeper took off the mask. ‘I said, no better in all Retribution Falls.’

‘Okay. I need seven.’

‘Eight,’ Jez corrected. When Frey and Malvery both looked at her, she said: ‘The cat.’

‘Right,’ said Frey. ‘Eight. Give me a discount.’

‘Six bits.’

‘Three.’

‘Five.’

‘Four.’

‘Four and eight shillies.’

‘Done.’

‘You won’t regret it,’ the storekeeper promised, as he began counting out filters from the crate. ‘First time in Retribution Falls?’

‘How’d you guess?’

‘Lot of newcomers recently. You just got the look.’

‘Why so many?’

The storekeeper dumped an armful of filters on the cheap wooden table that passed as a counter. ‘Same reason as you, I expect.’

‘We’re just here for the beer and scenery,’ Malvery grinned. The storekeeper laughed at that, revealing a set of teeth better kept hidden.

‘You heard about what’s going on tomorrow?’ the storekeeper asked, as Frey laid down his coins on the counter.

‘Like you noticed, we just got here,’ Frey replied.

‘You know where Orkmund’s place is?’ He indicated a distant platform. It was too dark to make out anything but a sprinkle of lights. ‘Ask anyone, you’ll find it. Be there tomorrow at midday.’

‘What’s happening?’

‘Orkmund’s got something to say. Reckon it might be time.’

Malvery did a passable job of pretending he knew what the man was talking about. ‘You think so?’

‘Well, look around,’ said the storekeeper. ‘Some of these boys are going stir crazy. Can’t keep a bunch of pirates cooped up like this. They came to fight, and if they can’t fight someone else, they’ll fight each other. I reckon he’s gonna give the word to start the attack.’

‘Let me at ’em,’ said Frey. ‘Can’t wait to show that lot.’

‘You know who we’re fighting?’ the storekeeper gasped, which wrong-footed Frey totally.

‘Er . . . what?’

‘You know where Orkmund’s sending us?’

‘Don’t you?’

‘Nobody knows. That’s what we’re all waiting to find out.’

Frey backpedalled. ‘No, I meant, you know . . . the general them. Let me at them. Whoever they are.’ He trailed off lamely.

The storekeeper gave him an odd look, then snatched the coins off the counter and called out to a passer-by, trying to lure them over. Dismissed, Frey and the others moved away, distributing the filters between them.

‘Orkmund’s got himself a pirate fleet,’ Jez said. ‘That’s how Grephen’s going to do it. That’s how he’ll seize power. He’s made a deal with the king of the pirates.’

‘But there’s one last thing I don’t understand,’ Frey replied. ‘How’d Duke Grephen get Orkmund on his side?’

‘Paid him, probably,’ Malvery opined.

‘With what? Grephen doesn’t have the money to support an army. Or at least Crake doesn’t think so, and he should know.’

‘Crake could be wrong,’ Jez said. ‘Just because he has the accent doesn’t mean he has some great insight into the aristocracy. There’s a lot you don’t know about him.’

Frey frowned. He was getting heartily sick of this tension between Jez and Crake. They’d been barely able to work together when he needed them to navigate through the canyons of Rook’s Boneyard. Something needed to be done.

‘Back to the Ketty Jay,’ he said. ‘We’ve learned enough for now. Let’s see what Orkmund says tomorrow.’

‘We’re not going to have a drink?’ Malvery asked, horrified. ‘I mean, in the interests of gathering information?’

‘Not this time. Early start in the morning. I’m not having any trouble tonight.’

He started off back towards the landing pad. Malvery trudged behind. ‘I miss the old Cap’n,’ he grumbled.

Frey had almost all the information he needed. He was missing only one piece. Someone was backing Duke Grephen, providing the money to build an army of mercenaries big enough to fight the Coalition Navy and take the capital of Vardia. He needed know who. When that last piece fell into place, he’d understand the conspiracy he was tangled up in. Then, he could do something about it.

A serene and peaceful feeling settled on him as they made their way back towards the Ketty Jay. Tomorrow would bring an answer. He didn’t know how he knew, but he was certain of it.

Tomorrow. That’s when we start turning this around.

Crake was shaken out of sleep by Frey’s hand on his shoulder. ‘Get up,’ Frey said. ‘What is it?’ he murmured.

‘Come on,’ insisted the captain. ‘I need you in the mess.’

Crake swung his legs off the bunk. He was still fully clothed, having gone to sleep as soon as Frey left the Ketty Jay. He’d hoped to shake off the headache he’d picked up from breathing the lava fumes. It hadn’t worked.

‘What’s so urgent, Frey? Stove making spooky noises? Daemonic activity in the stew?’

‘There’s just something we need to sort out, that’s all.’

Something in his tone told Crake that Frey wasn’t going to let this go, so he got to his feet with a sigh and shambled after his captain, out into the passageway. But instead of going down the ladder to the mess, Frey walked past it and knocked on the door of the navigator’s quarters. Jez opened up. She glanced from Frey to Crake, and was immediately suspicious.

‘Can you come to the mess?’ Frey asked, though it sounded less a request than an order.

Jez stepped out of her quarters and shut the door behind her.

They climbed down into the mess. Silo was in there, smoking a roll-up and drinking coffee. He was petting Slag, who was lying flat on the table. At the sight of Jez, the cat jumped to his feet and hissed. As soon as the way was clear, he bolted up the ladder and was gone.

Silo looked up with an expression of mild disinterest.

‘How’s the Ketty Jay?’ Frey asked.

‘She battered, but she tough. Need a workshop to make her pretty again, but nothing hurt too bad inside. I fixed her best I can.’

‘She’ll fly?’

‘She’ll fly fine.’

Frey nodded. ‘Can you give us the room?’

Silo spat in his palm and stubbed the roll-up into it. Then he got up and left. Since speaking with Silo, Crake couldn’t help seeing the Murthian’s relationship with his captain in a new light. They’d been companions so long that they barely noticed one another any more. They wore each other like old clothes.

‘Sit down,’ Frey said, motioning to the table in the centre of the mess. Jez and Crake sat opposite one another. The captain produced a bottle of rum from inside his coat and put it on the table between them.

‘She doesn’t drink,’ Crake said. He was beginning to get a dreadful idea what this was about.

‘Then you drink it,’ Frey replied. He straightened, standing over them. ‘Something’s going on between you two. Has been since you went to Scorchwood Heights. I don’t know what it is, and I don’t want to know, ’cause it’s no business of mine. But I need my crew to act like a crew, and I can’t have this damned bickering all the time. The only way we’re gonna survive is if we work together. If you can’t, next port we reach, one of you is getting off.’