Chris Wooding - The Ace of Skulls

Frey could barely see through the agony. His vision had become blurred and his legs had no strength in them. It was hard to tell one pain from another. His torso was an aching mass. He still couldn’t draw breath properly. But he had a purpose, a focus, and that kept him moving.

Malvery got up from the ground, where he’d been tending to casualties, and came hurrying over. The doctor’s moustached face loomed in Frey’s vision.

‘Frey,’ he said in horror. ‘What in buggery happened to you?’

‘Forget about me,’ he said, and gritted his teeth as something shifted and stabbed inside him. ‘Her! Save her!’

Malvery looked at Trinica. ‘Put her on the floor,’ he told Crund, and then he crouched next to her and looked beneath the crude dressing they’d wrapped around her wound. ‘What happened to her?’

‘Cap’n put a cutlass through her,’ said Crake.

‘You what ?’ Malvery said. He was feeling her pulse. ‘Second thought, I don’t even wanna know.’ He put the dressing back. ‘Frey, this is too bad. I can’t-’

‘I don’t wanna hear it, Doc. Make it happen.’

‘She needs blood. Now.’

‘Give her mine!’

‘You ain’t got enough to give.’

‘Do what I say, damn it!’ Frey cried, then was seized by a coughing fit and spat blood on the ground.

‘Cap’n!’ Malvery barked, and the volume of his voice shocked Frey into silence. ‘If you ain’t compatible, you’ll kill her. Likely you’ll kill yourself tryin’ anyway. And even if you are compatible, I don’t rate my chances. Let me save you ! Or if not you, there’s plenty people round here I can save. I’m a doctor, alright? I know what I’m doing!’

‘Take my blood!’ said Crund.

‘No!’ said Frey. ‘What if you’re not compatible?’

‘What if you’re not?’ Malvery said.

‘I am !’ Frey snarled. ‘We were tested. . After we knew about the baby. . Doctor took my blood for. .’

‘What baby?’ Malvery said, but Frey ignored him. There wasn’t time to argue! Didn’t he see that?

‘We’re compatible ,’ he said through gritted teeth. ‘We’ve always been. . compatible.’

‘Frey, I can’t. It’ll kill you. I can’t do that!’

Frey found a burst of strength, fuelled by frustration, and he seized Malvery by the front of his jumper and pulled him close. ‘Doc,’ he said. ‘If you ever. . If you were ever a friend to me. . You gotta do this now. This is everything, you hear? This is everything .’

Malvery’s face was a picture of doubt. This went against everything he believed, as a doctor and as a person. Frey knew what Malvery thought of his obsession. Shit, Malvery didn’t even like Trinica very much. But Frey had to do this, and he couldn’t do it without Malvery’s help.

He owed Trinica a life. And he aimed to give her one.

‘It won’t save her,’ Malvery said, but there was defeat in his voice and Frey knew he’d won.

‘Gotta try,’ said Frey. ‘Gotta try.’

Malvery wrestled with his conscience a moment more, but in the end he lowered his head, and his brow clouded. ‘Get her inside,’ he said. ‘I’ll do what I can.’

The others knew better than to try to stop him, and for that Frey was deeply grateful. He couldn’t fight any more battles. He let them take him into a room off the courtyard, where they put him on a table, and they laid Trinica out next to him. She was still, and looked so small; the rise and fall of her breast was hardly perceptible. But he felt no terror of her now. The daemon inside her had been destroyed, beaten by the daemon in his blade. Even if she died now, she died herself, unconquered.

He was dimly aware of Malvery returning with supplies he’d taken from the Ketty Jay . He saw the doctor laying out jars and tubes, heard him snapping instructions at Crake, who was assisting him. They assembled the apparatus for the transfusion, blurred ghosts fussing in the background.

He stared up at the ceiling. Wetness trickled down his cheek. A tear, leaking from the corner of his eye. He didn’t want to leave this life. He loved it too much. It had treated him appallingly at times, and he’d abused it in return, but at that moment it seemed the most wonderful and precious of things. He couldn’t stand the loss of it.

But he’d lived. He’d made a difference. And now he could say with honesty that he’d done his damnedest.

There was that. At least there was that.

He felt the bite of a needle at his inner elbow. He turned his head, and saw a transparent rubber tube stretching from him to a glass jar that lay between him and Trinica on the table. The jar was connected to a rubber bulb which Malvery was squeezing rapidly. At the other end of the apparatus was a needle in Trinica’s arm.

‘Make a fist,’ said Malvery to Frey. ‘Crake, give him something to squeeze. It’ll help the blood through.’

Frey had little enough strength in his body, but he crawled his hand across the the table, and took up Trinica’s. And he squeezed her cold fingers as hard as he could manage.

‘Reckon that’ll do,’ said Malvery, through a thick throat.

Frey felt very far away from everything now. It was as if he were watching the scene from the end of a long tunnel. His body no longer seemed his own. He observed with detached fascination as the rich, dark blood began to fill the jar, his blood. He saw it slip along the tubes, and finally into Trinica, a glistening red thread between him and her.

A great calm washed over him, a sense of rightness. He felt complete. Then his eyes fluttered closed, and he was gone.

The funeral was held on a high hillside on a bright chill morning. A nipping wind blew about the mourners, stirring their coats against them. Long thin clouds raced across the sky. In the distance lay the city of Thesk, slumped and shattered but still undefeated, and the Archduke’s palace stood proud at its heart.

It was a lonely spot, and there were only eight at the graveside including Bess. She held a bunch of mountain flowers in one huge hand, with a great sod of earth hanging off them where she’d torn them from the ground. The rest were all crew, except for Samandra Bree, who’d come with Crake. Harkins sniffed quietly and Pinn had his collar up and his shoulders hunched, his grim face barely visible. Silo was impassive as ever. Ashua stood silently with her arms crossed.

Before them all stood Malvery. He’d volunteered for the eulogy. It seemed the least he could do.

‘What can you say when a part of your life ain’t there any more?’ he said, his voice low and heavy. ‘Words don’t change much. Best you can do is remind yourself why it is you miss ’em.’

He paused for a long time. Bess stirred uncertainly.

‘He was a fighter,’ Malvery said at last. ‘You gotta give him that. Can’t ever say he was lucky in love, but he found it in the end, and that’s more than most of us can expect. He could be an arsy bastard at times, but mostly he made us laugh, and he always seemed to be there when you needed him.’ He gave a deep sigh and lowered his head. ‘He was the heart and soul of us. There wouldn’t have been a Ketty Jay without him.’

He went down on one knee and placed one hand on the grave marker. It was an old plate from the engine room, scratched with a name and some dates.

‘We’ll never forget him,’ said Malvery. ‘He was a damn fine cat.’

Afterwards, as they made their way back to the shuttle, Crake said ‘Shame the Cap’n couldn’t be here. He’d have liked to see Slag off with the rest of us.’