Chris Wooding - The Black Lung Captain

'Well,' said Frey, looking around at the dank room. 'It was certainly worth it.'

Grist didn't rise to the sarcasm. 'Thought there'd be answers here, but there ain't answers. The books were past savin'. Couldn't read what was on the chalkboards. This place is just a museum.' He coughed his hacking cough. 'Still, I put the land to good use. The warehouses, the hangar. You come in at night when no one's around to spot you. No records, no docking fees. Nice little place to hole up. And I can move my product through here without anyone takin' an interest.'

'Your father's reseach,' said Trinica. 'You still have it?'

'Safe in my cabin, don't you worry.'

'You're aware of the repercussions if it was made public? If it could be proved that the Awakeners have been using the daemonic techniques pioneered here?'

'Aye, I've got a notion. Would that offend you, Cap'n Dracken? You've a soft spot for the Awakeners?'

'I don't have a soft spot for anyone,' Dracken replied. 'I wondered if you were intending to take revenge on them. Your father was most likely murdered by an Imperator. I assume you knew that?'

'I figured as much,' said Grist. 'The thought had crossed my mind, I'll admit. But I've more urgent business to deal with first.' He broke out into a tremendous coughing fit that left him wheezing and watery-eyed. His crewmen shifted uneasily, glancing at one another.

'You alright?' asked Frey. 'Wouldn't want you to keel over and die. Much.'

Grist wiped spittle from his beard and went over to the small chest that was sitting on a nearby table. He opened it up. 'I'm touched by your concern, Cap'n, but I ain't keeling over anytime soon.' He took out the metal sphere that Frey had first seen on the Mane dreadnought. 'Not now I got this.'

Jez's attention fixed on the sphere. Smooth black metal with silver lines curving all over its surface. There was no symmetry to it - at least, no symmetry that a human would recognise - but as Jez stared at it, the pattern seemed to almost make sense, straining on the edge of recognition. There was a chanting in her head, louder even than the voices of the ghosts here. A wordless summons, from far away. Far to the north, behind the Wrack. The Manes. Wanting her.

'What is it?' she heard herself say. 'What have we been chasing all this time?'

'This?' he held it up. 'It's an alarm.'

Frey blinked. 'A what?'

'An alarm.'

'Not a doomsday device, then?'

Grist peered at it. 'Not really.'

'Oh.'

'It's a distress beacon,' Grist said. 'All dreadnoughts carry them. You remember I told you about that Navy report, when they found a downed dreadnought? I neglected to mention a couple o' things. Like how there were still Manes alive on it, and the Navy fought 'em back. And how one of 'em locked itself behind one of those daemonically guarded doors that your man Crake had so much fun gettin' through. And how, right after, a half-dozen dreadnoughts appeared. Appeared, Frey. A hole got punched in the sky, and they came sailin' through.' He puffed on his cigar. 'That takes power of a kind you and I can't imagine. Dad reckoned that whatever provided it, it was behind that door. And he was right.'

'What about the dreadnought we found?' asked Frey. 'Why didn't they use the sphere?'

'Maybe they didn't want to go back,' said Jez. 'They'd rejected the Manes. It killed them in the end.'

She shivered with the memory of the terrible, endless loneliness. But that's how we all live, every day. Sealed up in our own little worlds. We only know of each other what we choose to show.

Frey frowned. 'Listen, Grist. I had a chat with an Awakener, back on the All Our Yesterdays. He told me that thousands of people would die if that fell into the wrong hands. Now you're telling me it's just an alarm?'

'Oh, right,' said Grist. 'See, he was probably thinkin' of what'll happen when the alarm goes off. What'll happen to all the people in this city when them Manes turn up, after I activate this thing.' He turned and stared at Jez, his face hardening. 'Or rather, when you do.'

Crake sat with his back against the wall of the store room, and whistled a tune to himself.

'Dunno how you can be so damn calm, while we're cooped up in this place and the Cap'n and Jez are in who knows what kind of trouble,' said Malvery, who was pacing the floor. He walked up to the metal door that sealed them in, and hammered on it with his fist. 'Hey! We're freezing in here! Give us some rum, for pity's sake!' When he got no response, he pulled his coat tighter around him and continued to stomp up and down. Silo, sitting in the corner, watched him blandly.

'May I have your pocket watch, Malvery?' he asked. 'Trinica's men took mine. Presumably they thought it was possessed.'

Malvery took out his watch and tossed it over. Crake pressed the catch and the case sprang open.

'You late for something?' Malvery asked irritably.

'Oh, no,' said Crake. 'Right on time.'

He smiled wryly. It seemed like a long time since he'd smiled. As if a tombstone had been laying on his chest, heavy and cold, which was now gradually lifting away.

The grief he felt at the death of his niece was both old and new. He'd always known in his heart that he could never get her back, but he could never make himself believe it. Not until he'd tried. Now that he had, now that he'd seen the sheer impossibility of it, the weight of the task he'd placed upon himself was lessening day by day. It had taken Jez's harsh words to make him face up to himself.

It was strange. Bess, his niece, was dead. It was his responsibility, his hand that had wielded the blade. He would never shed the guilt of that. And yet he felt better now than he had for two years. He'd finally accepted what he'd done, instead of trying to change it.

It hurt. Of course, it hurt, like a bright blade in his guts. But it was a clean hurt. The pain of healing. Not the slow, grim death that he'd been trying to blot out with alcohol. For the first time since his niece had died, he saw light. Sharp and hard, but light. And he wouldn't look away, no matter how it brought the tears to his eyes.

Malvery was suspicious of Crake's smile. He narrowed his eyes. 'You've got something up your sleeve, haven't you?' He hunkered down next to Crake and poked him in the ribs with a meaty finger. 'What you up to, eh?' he asked.

'You remember the first time Dracken captured us?' he said. 'Just outside Retribution Falls?'

'Ain't likely to forget it. We all nearly got hanged on account of her.'

'We put down in the Blackendraft,' said Crake. 'An endless, trackless waste of ash, far as the eye could see. I put Bess to sleep so she wouldn't attack anyone and get us all killed. Trinica left her there when we flew off.'

'Right,' said Malvery. 'You were all in a gloom, thought you'd never see her again. But Jez found her. S'pose because of those Mane abilities she's got.' He paused. 'Never thought of that till now.'

'Yes. But if we hadn't got out of being hanged, or if Jez hadn't found Bess, then she'd have stayed asleep for ever. Like a metal statue in the middle of the wastes.'

'Where you heading with this, Crake?'

'Back in Marlen's Hook, you asked me if I'd done anything useful lately. Any new daemonic artefacts, any new techniques, that sort of thing.'

Malvery waved it off, embarrassed. 'Aw, mate. I was just giving you a kick in the arse, you know. Trying to get you to lay off the booze before you ended up like me.'

'I know,' said Crake. 'And I want to thank you for that. You and Jez, you both helped me a lot.'

Malvery shrugged. 'That's what friends do, right? They give it to you straight. Speaking of which, get back on the subject.'

'Look, the point was, what you said got me thinking. About that time with Bess. How it could happen again, and I might not be so lucky next time. If I put her to sleep, and I lost that damn whistle . . . then what? I might never be able to wake her up.'