Robert Redick - The Rats and the Ruling sea

'I do not understand,' he said. 'How can you think the clan would be well served by your death? Surely your nephew's rule will tear it apart anyway?'

'Not surely, my friend. Only probably. That is beside the point, however. Of all my people's maxims, the most sacred is clan before self. None of us quite live up to that maxim, but all of us aspire to. When we abandon the effort, we die. It has happened countless times in our history, as we learn when the survivors of massacred Houses share their tales. Almost always the death of a clan can be traced back to selfishness. A leader who has lost the people's love tries to stay in power through fear. An ixchel chased by humans runs towards the clan house instead of away. Two ixchel duel over a lover, and one dies — or two.'

'Or even three, if the lover is too heartbroken to live on,' said Hercol. 'So at least it happens in our fables.'

'I think you do understand me, Hercol,' she said. 'The sort of questions you people face only in wartime or feuds of passion, we face endlessly, throughout our lives. What deed of mine will protect the clan? What will endanger them? What will keep death at bay until tomorrow?'

Hercol's hands trembled slightly beneath her. 'I have been thinking of that day,' he said. 'The day you asked us to kill Master Mugstur.'

'I had no right to address you thus,' said Diadrelu.

'You had every right. How were you to know that we were not your equals in honesty?'

'Honesty?' Dri frowned. 'Speak plainly, man. I must go soon.'

'Of course I am a killer,' whispered Hercol. 'Did I not say that I was Ott's righthand man? That I worked his will, pursued his mad notion of Arquali "interests," until the day he went too far?'

'The day he ordered you to slay the Empress and her sons,' said Diadrelu. 'You told us.'

'I failed the sons,' said Hercol. 'They were the age of Pazel and Neeps — indeed I look at those two and am reminded of Maisa's children. Like the tarboys, they grew up with danger and loss, and yet somehow their hearts remained open. They would be grown men by now, if I had saved them. Ott keeps their bodies packed in ice, in a cave under Mol Etheg. Shall I tell you why he goes to such trouble?'

'If you wish to,' she said.

'When a spy has completed all his other training, he must pass one final test. He must go with Ott to that cave and look at Maisa's sons, lying there grey and wrinkled with their throats slit. Princes of Arqual, he tells the trainee, but also enemies of Magad the Fifth — and therefore of all the people. Ott asks for the trainee's opinion. If the young man objects, or questions the idea that blind loyalty is what Arqual needs; if he so much as looks troubled, then he never joins the Secret Fist. Instead he joins the host of the disappeared, one more sacrifice on the altar of the State.'

'You left that world behind,' said Diadrelu softly, 'and have atoned for it thrice over. As for her sons: you must let those memories go. You cannot save everyone, Hercol. That is another thing we ixchel learn as children.'

The warrior's hands were still trembling. A bit impatient now — did he think his burden so special? — she turned her head, so that she was looking down on the fingers encircling her.

'Herid aj!'

Someone had been at his fingernails. On his left hand, one nail was torn out completely, and the finger hideously swollen. Another nail had had slivers cut from it, as though by the tip of a very sharp knife, and the shards that remained dangled by their roots. On Hercol's right hand the fingertips were blue-black, the nails crushed into the flesh. It might have been done with a hammer, or the heel of a boot.

'No,' she said, breathless with fury. 'Hercol — brother — who did this to you?'

'My old master,' said Hercol, setting her carefully on the floor, 'though I swear he did not enjoy himself. Perhaps Ott still dreams that I will return to the fold, and lead the Secret Fist when he no longer can.' Hercol considered his hands. 'Something held him back, in any case. If he had enjoyed himself I would be far worse off.'

The ixchel woman drew her sword. 'All the same, he has signed his death warrant.'

'Are you mad?' said Hercol, starting upright. 'This is Sandor Ott we are speaking of. A man who has listened for the assassin's tread for fifty years. Put revenge out of your mind.'

'It is not for revenge alone that I shall strike,' she said, 'though revenge is cause enough.'

'Dri,' said Hercol, 'the man is poison. I have heard him give lectures on the dangers of ixchel infestations.'

'Infestations!'

Before Hercol could say more she raised her hand. A voice was calling from the passage. It was Ludunte, shouting in ixchel-speech. 'Hurry, mistress! All the giants have assembled!'

'I come,' Dri shouted back. To Hercol, she said, 'The council begins, I must go. But when it is over I will return to you. That I promise.'

'The promise I ask is that you stay away from Sandor Ott,' said Hercol.

'You do not have it,' she said. 'None of this would be happening if it were not for that man's evil inspiration. And he was not aboard when Ramachni cast his spell, so he cannot be the spell-keeper. Let us discuss it no further. I am a warrior, the same as you, and will choose my own kill.'

'No, I say! He is too deadly. Not for nothing has he lead the Secret Fist for so long.'

'Long enough, I think. Infestations, he actually-'

'Damn it, woman, I forbid this!'

'Forbid?' said Diadrelu. 'Am I your dog, then, to be sent to a corner? One man on this ship has a claim to my obedience — my nephew Taliktrum — and him too I have chosen to disobey. Forbid! Think carefully, human, before you use that word with me again.'

Hercol dropped forwards onto an elbow, forcing her back a step. 'Hear me,' he pleaded, his voice quite changed. He held up his fingers. 'I will recover from these wounds. Don't leave me with one from which I never shall.'

She had never been so utterly lost for words. The human's breath washed over her. His eyes, rheumy and dilated and as big as her head, were close enough to touch. She could not look at both of them at once.

'Mistress!' called Ludunte again.

Now it was Dri who was trembling. What was wrong with her? She closed her eyes and reached out, burying her hand in the warm bristles of his eyebrow, which leaped at her touch like a horse's flank.

'I will never understand you people,' she said.

The space between the floor of the mercy deck and the ceiling of the hold was just four inches. Dri entered through a 'jug-stopper,' a quick improvised door, cut by Ludunte that very morning. As soon as she was inside Dri knew rats had been here before her. The smell was faint, but not old. A terrible place to meet with rats. They would have every advantage here.

She crawled forwards, through dust that lay like a grey snow, deeper than her wrists. She saw her hand in his eyebrow, parting the sleek black hairs. When he spoke she felt the vibration in her arm.

The planks stretched in all directions. In such crawlspaces one could usually spot the humans three compartments off, by the splinters of lamplight that pierced the cracks in floor or ceiling. Tonight not a glimmer met her eyes. But ixchel can see without the light of the sun or lamp: there ahead lay her sophisters, looking down through the tiny gap Ensyl had opened with the spyjack.

Dri crawled up between them. 'We must take care with this dust,' she said. 'Humans cannot hear our speech, but coughs and sneezes are another matter. The day may come when we stand with them — stand as brothers, but-'

Ensyl glanced at her in surprise; Dri was not one to lose the thread of her pronouncements. Angry with herself now, Dri wiped the dust from her clothes.

That man is not here. Banish him, face and voice.