Stephen Hunt - The rise of the Iron Moon

'More and more every day,' shouted the man on the steamer. 'It is the last free town, unless any of the upland cities are still left standing.' He gazed down, obviously bemused by Samuel's archaic cuirass and tall spear. 'Is that all there is of you? All right, pass on, friend.'

Samuel rowed them past the passenger boat with three swift, strong strokes while Purity gazed back up at the men.

A free town, still. Perhaps with an equally free sailboat to carry them north? Their luck was turning at last.

The guard on the sixpenny ferry had been correct about more people turning up at the last free town every day. Outside Wainsmouth, the old town walls were packed with crowds queuing up in front of a line of tables for the chance to be admitted to safety inside.

Names, ages and occupations of those being admitted were recorded in ledgers, along with many other details. Few people seemed to fail whatever criteria were being applied to entry. The family in front of Purity and the Bandits of the Marsh was gushingly grateful that they were to be given sanctuary, the woman full of spite and bile over some village they had tried to enter on their way to the town whose desperate inhabitants had chased them away as thieves, waving pitchforks and birding rifles.

At one point, a couple of redcoats came trundling towards the town gate in an empty cart pulled by two grey shire horses. There was a short, disappointed exchange of shouts, then the cart was admitted back inside Wainsmouth proper. It sounded to Purity as if the cart had been out scavenging for something, but had found no luck on its search. She hoped it wasn't for food from the farms dotted along the South Downs. The mob of refugees might turn into a besieging army if they were turned away for a lack of supplies now.

They were a motley collection keeping order among the mob outside Wainsmouth. The country constabulary in their black frockcoats, redcoats from the regiments, even some shifty-looking fleet naval arm tars. But the desperation for food and shelter meant that the crowds were kept naturally pliable by their desire to be given sanctuary. No one protested too much when they were relieved of their packs of food and whatever other provisions they had with them. The rough-shaven men taking down the bandits' details accepted Purity's trade as seamstress without query or question, and although she had to surrender her sack of tinned goods, Purity got her strange sword through wrapped in cloth, and Samuel Lancemaster his spear – collapsed to its knuckleduster configuration and slotted into a carry space in his chest-piece.

The people on the desk showed a little more interest in Samuel's breastplate, asking him if he had been with the heavy cavalry to carry such a cuirass, but when the bandit demurred, the guards lost interest and waved them all through towards the town gates. Lucky that they did. A couple of nights before, Samuel had told Purity that the armour was part of his body, fused to him. Trying to take it off would be like trying to remove his ribs.

'Here are your tokens for your first day's meal,' the deskman said. 'Duties get assigned the day after. Go down to the largest warehouse on the quay. There's benches and food inside, servings are on a rota.'

Once inside the walls Purity had a fine view of the town sloping down towards the port. The large harbour was protected by a sea fort, built down the hillside and into the water, strong round towers connected by iron walkways and pocked by concrete cannon domes. Wainsmouth's waters looked bare of boats, only a couple of fishermen's stubby two-mast trawlers tied up where there were moorings for hundreds. But there was one vessel in the water to fill the majority of the empty berths. It was a u-boat of the fleet sea arm, lying as long in the water as a dreadnought with a conning tower as substantial as a fortress. Her bow had been cast as a regal lion, teeth and muzzle caught in a steel snarl – each of her eyes a cluster of torpedo tubes. Purity gawped. How the commodore would have loved to be here to see this titan of the deep. Triple gun mounts on her forecastle, double water-sealed cannon turrets on the stern. Her name was embossed in cursive script on the black hull, each raised letter painted bright red. The JNS Spartiate. Parliament's ensign, the cross and gate, fluttered on her flagstaff, a red field bisected with a white cross, the portcullis of the House of Guardians on the upper right-hand corner, the lion rampant in the lower left. A vessel that defied all of the kingdom's enemies to take her.

'A beauty, ain't she?' said a constable standing behind Purity. 'They'll never overrun Wainsmouth while we have her guns protecting the town. Now move along, get yourself fed down at the quay before you block up the way here.'

'These are the Jackeni of our age,' said Ganby, approvingly. 'People who know how to honour the tradition of hospitality.'

'I wonder if their hospitality might stretch to giving us a berth on that vessel down there?' Jackaby Mention pondered.

'These people need her here,' said Jenny. 'How many women and children in this town now shelter under her guns? I can fill the topsail of one of those fishing boats down there just as well.'

'A pity,' said Jackaby. 'The watchman was right; she is a beauty as fine as any. But you are correct, they need it here. You are ever our conscience, Jenny Blow.'

'And your bloodhound,' said Jenny. She pointed towards the quay. 'I can smell a stew bubbling in the pot down in the warehouse.'

'A stew, not a roast?' said Samuel Lancemaster, sounding almost disappointed. 'Well, anything will be better than the jellied chunks of bully I've been picking out of cans since we arrived here.'

It had been raining earlier that morning and the steep cobbled streets down to the quay were slippery – Purity nearly lost her footing several times. Bare feet are conscious of the land. They feel the bones of Jackals, connect with the blood of the world. You will know when the time is right for shoes. Indeed, and how her friend Kyorin had approved of those words from Elizica. Was that good guidance, now? When the Kals were cooperating with the Army of Shadows, trying to sink their fangs in her throat. She had the blood of queens running through her veins. She had the maths-blade concealed on her back and she had the Bandits of the Marsh fighting by her side. It was time she stopped being the nation's breeding house ragamuffin and began acting like its one true queen.

Purity thought she detected a pulse of disapproval from the spirit of Elizica of the Jackeni at her pride as she walked towards a cobbler's halfway down the road to the bay; but then, Elizica of the Jackeni hadn't needed shoes, or anything else in the way of clothes, for a very long time. What did she know?

Purity asked the Bandits of the Marsh to save her a seat at the warehouse. Behind the hexagonal panes of the shop's curved bay windows were all sorts of shoes, boots and sandals ranging from the fine to the workaday. But it looked dark inside the shop, and there was a sign reading 'closed' behind the door's sidelight pane. Oh well. She was about to follow the bandits down the rest of the hill when a rustling came from inside the shop and the sign twisted around to read 'open'.

'There we are,' Purity announced to the air and Elizica. 'Fate after all.'

There were oil lamps inside, but their wicks stood dry behind glass – saving fuel, but making the room dark and unwelcoming. In the gloom a boy shuffled forward with a stool for her, an apprentice with a wooden stump below the knee of his left leg. His voice had an annoying grating quality, as if he was trying to ingratiate himself.

'The master bids you sit, damson,' said the boy. 'Be out soon.'

He hobbled over to the door, locked it and twisted the sign to read 'closed' again. Strange. Why had he done that?