Robert Redick - The Rats and the Ruling sea

'I don't see why you're telling me all this,' said Thasha, disturbed by the mention of Pacu.

'Lady Thasha, the carriage that took your father to his residence that day was later used by others, and it was but one of many I kept track of. These carriages worked the streets until dawn. At that point, an honest driver brought me something left behind in his coach. I was never able to determine the owner, and the truth is that I forgot I carried the thing, when Mr Burnscove invited me to join your crew.' His voice grew animated. 'Such a thrill I had at the thought of it! To see mighty Etherhorde, and to earn my passage in the service of Ignus Chadfallow! But Burnscove lied to me. We will not see Etherhorde. We will not see any familiar place again.'

'We were all lied to,' said Thasha. 'But we're going to stop them, you know, we-'

She checked herself. It was too soon to offer Fulbreech confidences of that sort. 'What was this thing you carried?' she demanded.

'See for yourself,' said Fulbreech.

Thasha and Pazel both turned to look. There in his hand lay Eberzam Isiq's little bronze flask. Thasha's breath caught in her throat.

'You recognise it,' said Fullbreech, satisfied. 'Then my guess was correct. This was the admiral's property.'

Pazel's eyes narrowed. 'Was?' he said.

Fulbreech started, as if taken aback by the question. Then he bowed slightly in Pazel's direction. 'I stand corrected, is. And now, m'lady, you can look forward to the day you return it to him personally.'

Thasha took the flask. She blinked at the handsome Simjan face before her. 'Fulbreech — Greysan — thank you ever so much. For all you've done for us.'

Fulbreech shook his head. 'You owe me no thanks.'

Pazel's mouth twitched, as if he agreed wholeheartedly. Fulbreech noted the expression with a raised eyebrow, then turned a brief, sly smile on Thasha, who had reddened, although she was not sure why.

'I must be off,' said Fulbreech. 'The doctor wants a report on the reading he assigned me last night, on the subject of brain deformities. Lady Thasha, Pathkendle.'

Another bow, and he was gone. Thasha whirled on Pazel.

'You prat. How could you make that face at him?'

Pazel managed to look sheepish and angry at once. 'I'm surprised you looked away from Greysan long enough to notice.'

'I'll look where I blary please. And you can dine on dung.'

Pazel's retort was interrupted by Uskins' deafening howl: 'All hands! Bracing stations. Watch captains forward. Topmen aloft. Stand by the fore topgallants. Handsomely, you lard-arsed layabouts!'

'Pitfire!' said Pazel, as the lieutenants' shrill pipes began to sound. 'What's he need all hands for? We're laying alongside that ship, not racing her.'

'How do you know what we're doing?'

Pazel looked at her with unconcealed scorn. Then he turned his eyes up to the tip of the mainmast. Thasha followed his gaze: a streaming pennant had been loosed there: two green stripes with a yellow between.

'"Draw Along and Confer,"' Pazel told her. 'Surprised you don't know that, given whose daughter you are.'

She could have slapped him. Wait till our next lesson, you dog.

Mr Elkstem put the helm to port, and the Chathrand 's bow swung towards the whaler. Just then they heard Neeps shouting their names. A moment later he arrived, entirely winded. 'Looking everywhere for you,' he gasped. 'Hercol's doing the same. Come on, we've got to get to the orlop — now.'

'All the way down there? What for?'

'Just come on.'

He took off running again, and they followed, mystified. 'We're going to have to use the gunner's pole,' Neeps shouted. 'Ladderways are blary jammed — everyone's coming up!'

Between the port ladderway and the capstan was a four-foot-square hatch that stood up several feet above the deck. Its cover had not yet been removed since the lifting of the fog, but Neeps knocked out the pins without hesitation and pushed the cover aside. The next moment he was over the lip of the hatch and gone.

Pazel followed, tucking his elbows close to his body and vanishing down the square black hole. Thasha did not hesitate for an instant. She had wanted to do this since the day she came aboard. Climbing onto the rim of the hatch, she looked down and saw the top of the greased iron pole just a foot beneath her, bolted firmly to the deck beams.

'Upa! Get down from there!'

It was Alyash, the new bosun with the frightening scars. 'You've no right to open that hatch! You could hurt someone! What are you playin' at, missy?'

He darted forward with startling speed. Thasha jumped feet-first through the opening, felt the man's blunt fingers graze her cheek, and then she was gone, flying down the pole with the cool slick grease flowing through her fingers and spattering her face, laughing as the decks flew by — main, upper gun, lower gun'How do I blary stop?'

Even as she cried out, she understood: the grease turned to thick tallow, her hands began to rasp, and beneath her the boys shouted Squeeze! Use your legs! and she did so, and stopped almost elegantly a foot above the berth deck.

'… see those men in the gun compartments?' Pazel was saying. 'What are they up to? What's Uskins doing with them?'

'Not a clue,' said Neeps, cleaning his hands on a rag hung for that purpose beside the gunner's pole. 'And there's no time to find out. Come on, we have to take the ladderway from here.'

There were no crowds at this level, and they descended the ladderway at a run. In the main compartment of the orlop deck, however, they met a troop of some dozen tarboys preparing to ascend. They were carrying cannonballs, plungers, and buckets of gunpowder.

'Saroo!' Pazel cried as the tarboy struggled past. 'What in Rin's privy are you doing?'

'Gun duty,' Saroo called over his shoulder. 'Just for show, mate. Rose don't like the looks of that whaler, somehow. Wants 'em to see we're armed.'

Thasha watched the tarboys lumber up the stairwell. The explanation did not satisfy her, but Neeps was tugging impatiently at her sleeve. 'I didn't mean tomorrow, Thasha.'

They ran diagonally across large and shadowy compartment and into the starboard passage. There they met Hercol, pacing nervously in the shadows. 'We are too late,' he said. 'She has gone.'

'Who's gone?' Pazel demanded.

'Diadrelu,' said Neeps in a furious whisper. 'Oh, hang it all! She warned me she couldn't stay!'

He led them on, past the starboard sail locker and the midshipmen's cabinettes. Stepping through a bulkhead door, they came suddenly into a passage strewn with crockery, much of it broken, and a number of dirty spoons.

'Teggatz sent me down here to collect the steerage dishes,' said Neeps. 'I had a perfect stack in my hands and was making for the ladderway when something pricked my foot.'

'You mean you stepped on a nail,' said Pazel.

'Hardly, mate.' Neeps glanced up and down the hallway, then knelt and began to probe the dusty boards with his fingertips. After a moment he seemed to find what he was looking for, and struck a board with the heel of his hand. There was no click, no creak of a hinge. But where the blow landed a tiny trapdoor sprang open. Within they could see only darkness.

'Pitfire, Neeps,' whispered Thasha. 'You've found an ixchel door.'

'I didn't exactly find it, to tell you the truth,' said Neeps. 'She caught my attention with the tip of her sword. Oh blast it, if only you hadn't been so hard to find! Dri had something terribly important to tell us.'

'Close the door, Neeps,' said Hercol.

'Just a minute,' said Thasha, startling them. She knelt and put her hand through the trapdoor. It led onto a narrow rectangular tunnel between the upper and lower floorboards. In one direction the way was blocked by a joist, but in the other the tunnel was open. Twisting, Thasha crammed her arm farther inside.