Stephen Hunt - Jack Cloudie

Rubbing his throat, Jack staggered up the Iron Partridge ’s main boarding ramp and back to the airship’s keel deck, his mind spinning with unanswered questions, the pain of his neck muscles made a collar — reminding him how near to death he had just come. Reminding him he was just as much a prisoner on board the airship as he had been in jail.

Omar ran through the great house’s central garden. Everywhere there were gas lamps burning without thought for the cost, people moving about the colonnades and pavilions, some sprinting through the cold night air as the first stars slid across the heavens above.

He nearly ran into the house’s soldiers by one of the fountains, dozens of troops dragging struggling men in long black robes through the garden. With a start of recognition, Omar realized that these were learned men, the House of Barir’s womb mages. How could these powerful sorcerers be manhandled so? They held the miraculous secrets of creating the salt-fish that generated the house’s wealth from mere sea water.

‘Stand aside,’ one of the soldiers shouted at Omar, and he was pushed back with a rifle butt while the womb mages were hauled into the centre of the garden.

The soldiers carried crates with them that they spilled onto the carefully tended grass, and Omar heard the rattling of copper pages bound with metal chord hitting the ground. He scooped a book up, staring at the metal-stamped lines of characters, a handful of letters, — A, C, G, T — repeated over and over again in seemingly random patterns. This had to be one of the womb mages’ precious spell books. The sorcery that allowed the creation of such wondrous biologicks as the salt-fish. Omar nearly dropped the book in superstitious dread. It was said that to read such a miracle without a womb mage’s powers would cause you to go blind.

A soldier snatched the copper book out of Omar’s hands and thrust a glass jug of foul-smelling green liquid at him. ‘Pour it all over the pages,’ ordered the soldier. ‘Splash none over yourself.’

The soldier began to pour the liquid over the crate of spell books, acid turning the tomes into a bath of hissing steam and bubbling fury. Omar emptied the whole flask over a crate and then ran towards Marid Barir’s office, turning to see the womb mages flung backwards by the first volley of the firing squad. Bursting into the master’s office, Omar nearly tripped over the body of the house manager lying sprawled across the tiles, sending an empty vial of poison scuttling across the floor. Omar was still on his knees when he saw his father’s kaftan by the window. A richly jewelled dagger had been thrust into Marid Barir’s chest.

‘It is not fitting for the last of this house’s blood to die in bondage,’ whispered Omar, moving closer to the body, remembering his father’s words. His father of a single day seemed to be staring peacefully across the rooftops of Haffa below. I wish I could feel more sorrow than this, but I cannot. You were my master for longer than my father, a good master, but a poor father. Will my sadness serve your soul, as you are lifted into heaven? ‘I will go, master. And I take Shadisa with me. She does not deserve to be a slave. I think she will not care for such a life, even less than I did.’

By the time Omar reached the bottom of the stairs, the bells were ringing from the top of each of the house’s tall corner towers.

‘They’re coming,’ a soldier yelled, pushing a spare rifle into Omar’s hands. ‘Down the caravan road.’

‘Please,’ Omar said. ‘Shadisa of the golden hair, the kitchen girl, where is she?’

‘Down to the town!’ ordered the soldier, ignoring Omar’s question. ‘The women and children have first call on the boats. We will hold the raiders back. All men to stand and hold.’

‘I don’t know how to use this.’ Omar had been about to protest that as a slave he could be put to death for merely holding a rifle. But of course, he was a freeman now, free to die as their house’s enemies fell upon them.

Grabbing the rifle angrily out of Omar’s fingers, the soldier drew the curved scimitar from the belt by his side and pushed it at Omar. ‘Do you know how to swing and cut, idiot?’ he shouted, disappearing into the gardens.

Omar went looking for Shadisa, jostled and shoved down the corridors by the running staff and soldiers. The palace echoed with the sound of his boots as retainers bundled past him, ignoring his pleas.

At last someone came towards Omar who looked like he had more on his mind than bundling the house’s contents up into sheets, but the scar-faced fellow slapped the sabre out of Omar’s hand and grabbed him by the throat, waving a sword under his neck. ‘The house’s treasury, where is it?’

Brigands were already in the house! They must have scaled one of the outside walls in advance of the main party of looters. Another man came running behind the first bandit, fresh blood staining the front of his robes. ‘He won’t know,’ hissed the newcomer. ‘Stick this foul-smelling slave in the belly and let’s find someone worth taking back across the sands.’

‘I know where the treasury is,’ hacked Omar as the brigand’s grip tightened. ‘My master keeps so many coins down there — towering hills of silver, enough to blind you if you open the doors during high sun.’

‘Take us to the treasury,’ commanded the brigand who had his throat. ‘And your bones may end up on the slave block back in Bladetenbul, rather than within the ashes of this palace.’

‘Quickly!’ ordered the other. ‘We’re the first, and we’re taking the first’s share.’

‘You are fleet fellows,’ said Omar as he was released. He sped up his walk to a sprint in front of the two bandits. ‘But even such master brigands as you will be slowed by the weight of coins I shall lead you to.’

If our house guards hadn’t already spirited the money away, of course. Either on their own account or to help the House of Barir’s people escape with more than empty pockets and a heretic’s fate awaiting them. If that was the case, Omar suspected, he wouldn’t be getting to see the capital’s slave market. Please, fate, keep your servant alive for a little longer. I still have many great deeds to perform. I just need a little time to work out what they will be.

As they dashed down the house’s lower central corridor, a group of five or six brigands spilled out from a doorway, struggling women flung unceremonially over their shoulders. One of the women had golden hair and dark olive skin. Shadisa!

Omar yelled and was flung against the wall for his trouble, held there by his two brigands while the screaming line of kitchen staff and their new masters vanished up a stairwell at the far end of the corridor. Omar’s shout had gone unheard by the rival brigands under the racket of their newly acquired human cargo.

‘Adeeba’s men,’ growled one of his captors.

‘Fool of a slave,’ the other brigand slapped Omar’s head with the buckle of his scimitar guard. ‘There are quicker ways down here.’

I have to get her back. Think. ‘But the master’s counting rooms are yet two floors below us,’ said Omar. ‘Buried deep in the harbour cliffs. That girl with the golden hair was one of those trusted with the code to the lock.’

‘Liar!’ accused the bandit who had struck him. ‘Who would trust a woman with such a thing? You are trying to get us to save one of your little sweetmeats, eh?’

‘No,’ insisted Omar. ‘She knows. Marid Barir is a clever man. He knew a serving girl would never be questioned for the lock’s code.’

The first of the bandits sneered. ‘Too bad. Adeeba’s men will sell her on the trading block back in the capital like they always do. Such a secret will not be much use to the girl when her new master comes calling each night, eh?’