Chris Wooding - The Black Lung Captain

'Can't blame a man for making a living,' Frey said. His ears had pricked up at the mention of Shine. He was partial to a drop or two himself.

'My point is, I get around, and I hear a lot,' said Grist. 'One day I heard there was some explorer shooting his mouth off about something he'd seen.' He thumbed at Hodd. 'So I found him, and I asked what it was all about. Says he found a downed aircraft in a rainforest. A craft full o' treasures, just lying there, abandoned. Waitin' for someone to come take 'em.'

'A rainforest?' Frey asked. He raised his flagon and looked over at Hodd. 'Where were you? Samaria?'

'Kurg.'

Frey choked into his beer, spraying a cloud of froth out of the flagon and all over his face. He wiped it away with his sleeve and stared at Grist.

'You want to go to Kurg? '

'Aye,' said Grist. 'And I want you and your crew to come with me.'

Frey blew out air between his lips. Kurg. The vast island off Vardia's north-eastern coast. Impenetrable. Hostile. Populated by beasts so horrible that the mere mention of them made the local wildlife scatter.

You must be joking, he thought. But Grist most certainly wasn't.

'I assume you've got some proof of your story?' Jez asked Hodd.

'Oh yes!' Hodd said eagerly, as if he'd been waiting the whole conversation for this moment. He drew an object from his pack, all bundled up in cloth. He laid it on the table and unwrapped it with a flourish.

It was a piece of black metal, of bizarre and foreign design, the length of an arm. Circles, semicircles and curves, stacked on top of each other or interlinked. There was the suggestion of pattern and symmetry, but Frey couldn't quite force it to make sense. Jez craned in to look closer.

'Ever seen anything like that? Hodd challenged.

'No,' said Frey. 'But there's plenty I haven't seen. Could be from somewhere far off. Peleshar? Nobody knows what that lot are up to.'

'I'll tell you who made it,' said Hodd, his voice dropping to a whisper. 'The Azryx!'

Staring at the object was giving Frey a headache, so he stopped. 'The who?'

'Azryx,' Jez murmured, still gazing at the strange design. Her eyes had become unfocused in that strange way they sometimes did. 'A lost civilisation with highly advanced technology. They're supposed to have died out and disappeared beneath the northern ice. At least that's if you believe the rumours. There's never been any real evidence they ever existed.'

'Until now!' said Hodd, stabbing the table with his index finger.

'You appear to know your stuff, ma'am,' said Grist. 'Care to say how?'

Jez blinked as she surfaced from her daze. 'I used to be the expedition navigator for a man called Professor Malstrom. He was an authority on the Azryx. We spent months hauling all over Yortland looking for clues. Never found any.'

'Ah, the Professor! I know him well!' Hodd cried. 'How is the old bugger?'

'You can't know him that well. He's been dead more than four years,' said Jez.

Hodd looked awkward for a moment, then made an airy gesture with his hand. 'It's so easy to drift out of touch. Especially when you're off in the far corners of the world.'

Lost civilisations? It was all sounding a little bit ridiculous now, and Frey had already pegged Hodd as a braying halfwit. If not for the presence of Grist, Frey wouldn't be entertaining this fool at all. But Grist seemed like a man who knew his business, so he supposed there must be something to the story.

Frey patted the object on the table. 'Why don't you tell us where you got this, and let us decide if it comes from some made-up civilisation or not? It'll give me a chance to finish my breakfast, if nothing else.'

His patronising tone was lost on his target. 'Of course, of course. Allow me to convince you.'

Frey waved a fork at him, his mouth already full. 'Please try.'

'I'm an explorer of some renown, even if I do say so myself,' Hodd began. 'I take on the missions that others won't touch. Men more short-sighted than I will map New Vardia and Jagos while I search for the truth yet unknown, for mysteries beyond imagining!'

Frey glanced at Grist, and was pleased to see the other captain roll his eyes. At least one of them wasn't an idiot.

Hodd didn't notice. 'I was alone in the rainforests of Kurg when I saw it. It was—'

'Hold on,' said Frey. 'What were you doing there in the first place?'

'I was engaged in the search for a hidden tribe of savages, mentioned in ancient texts from the days of the Angroms, the first dynasty, founded by Wilven the Successor when he united all of North Pandraca. These texts have lasted almost three and a half millennia, preserved by a curing process unknown to us today. They speak of a people on Kurg who could see the future, by means of an elixir. If such knowledge existed, I had to find it.'

'An elixir that lets you see into the future?' Frey asked, raising a sceptical eyebrow.

'Think of it!' Hodd enthused.

Frey returned to his food. 'Oh, I am.' He wondered if there was a similar elixir that would allow him to reclaim the lost minutes of his life he'd wasted listening to this drivel. 'And you went there alone? To Kurg?'

'Oh, no, not alone. I have some connections, you see, and wealthy investors willing to finance my expeditions. With their help I assembled a team of—'

'And this team, where were they when you found the object?'

Hodd's eyes shifted nervously. 'They . . . um . . .'

'They got eaten,' said Grist. 'The ones that didn't get poisoned by the bad food, or died of the rot in their wounds, or sickened with the chills 'cause they went in winter without the right gear.'

'The chills? In a rainforest?' Frey asked.

'Kurg's cold,' said Jez. 'The northern parts are above the Arctic Circle. It's a bit warmer on the south coast, but it's still no fun in winter, especially at night.'

'Oh,' said Frey. This was news to him. His knowledge of geography outside of Vardia was shocking.

'You're a smart man, Cap'n, and I see what you're drivin' at,' said Grist. 'Bumble-butt rich folk, more money than sense. This man Hodd couldn't plan an expedition if you nailed a shopping list to his arse.'

'Hey!' said Hodd, looking hurt.

'The issue ain't what he does or how he does it, nor what he thinks about this or that. It's what he found.'

They looked expectantly at Hodd. The explorer was sulking and didn't seem in the mood to talk to anyone.

'Ah, come on, Hodd,' said Grist, giving him a hearty slap on the shoulder. 'Don't take offence. It's just how we captains talk. Always makin' fun. No harm meant, eh, Frey?'

Frey put up his hands with an innocent face. 'Like he says. It's just how we talk.'

'I suppose so,' said Hodd, reluctantly.

'But just to be clear,' said Grist, leaning over to Frey, 'I'm in charge of this one.'

'Right,' said Frey, considerably relieved. He turned his attention back to Hodd, who was rearranging his ruffled feathers. 'So you were making your way out of Kurg, presumably a little the worse for wear, and you found an aircraft crashed in the rainforest. What kind of aircraft?'

'Like nothing I'd ever seen before,' said Hodd. 'Like nothing anyone has ever seen.'

'Can you describe it?'

'Er . . .' said Hodd. 'It was big. Hard to get a good look at, really, all broken and tangled in the forest as it was.'

'Tangled?' said Jez. 'The forest had grown up around it?'

'Oh yes,' said Hodd. 'It's been there a long time. Thousands of years, no doubt.'

'Listen to the next part,' Grist advised Frey.

'As you can imagine, I was thrilled at my discovery,' said Hodd. 'I immediately set about exploring it. The craft was quite deserted, but I was in no doubt that it was of a design unfamiliar to Vardia or any of its neighbours. There was writing, in letters I have never seen. And such strange artefacts! Those alone would have convinced me. I have an extensive knowledge of antiques, you know. My father was quite the collector. There has been nothing like this in our histories or anyone else's.'