Philippa Ballantine - Geist

Their own party was ready; he and Aachon were in the lead with weapons drawn. Laython and her grinning party were at their backs. Yet as they drew up alongside and the boarding hooks were thrown across, Raed knew that there would be no fight.

The deck was covered in bodies, all wearing the dark green of the Imperial Marines or the sky blue of the Navy, though both shades were much darker than they should have been. The sharp smell of blood wafted from Corsair in a palpable cloud.

With a glance over his shoulder, Raed saw that most of his crew had turned very pale. They were sailors in the main, not used to battle and blood.

“Aachon, is the weirstone showing anything?” he asked quietly over his shoulder.

His first mate should have protested, perhaps reminding his captain that they were in open water, but with one look at the carnage on board Corsair , he mutely removed the heavy orb from his pocket.

Aachon’s eyes changed when he looked into the orb, going to a clear milky white as if he were blind. He kept his back to the crew whenever using his Sight; he knew it disturbed them. When he’d been cast from the Order, Aachon’s pride had taken a deep beating. Now he cosseted what little talent remained.

After a moment, his eyes cleared. “I see nothing aboard but death and the memory of it.”

“Very well.” Raed clapped him on the shoulder. “The rest of you, wait here.” For once they followed his orders mutely. He and Aachon leapt across to Corsair ’s deck.

The first step and Raed nearly slipped. Ships were cruel like that: they held on to blood once the scuppers were blocked. And this was very, very fresh blood, and the drainage holes were indeed blocked by masses of bodies.

It was hardly the first time that either he or Aachon had faced such a sight; there had been plenty of battles with princes when he was younger. Many had come to the Unsung’s place of exile to kill him, and Raed had fought on his father’s behalf. However, this was different.

His senses were only mortal, so he could hardly bear to imagine what his first mate was going through. The stenches of spilled guts, blood and fear were thick over the deck. They both took a moment to steady themselves physically and mentally.

It looked, at first sight, as if every soldier and sailor had died on deck. As Raed and Aachon began to pick their way down toward the quarterdeck where Captain Moresh had presumably once stood, they rolled the occasional body over to see what had caused their death.

Raed quickly realized that they really needed to perform only one such examination. It had been nothing human. No bullet had pierced the sailor he examined, nor had he been stabbed or slashed with any saber or cutlass. The Pretender had hunted wild boar on his father’s island and had seen men gored before him. These wounds resembled this more than anything, angry gouges from some great beast with tusks ten times larger than that of any animal he knew.

His fingertips tingled where they grasped the poor dead man’s arm. With a gasp Raed jerked upright, shaking his hand and feeling his skin begin to crawl.

“My prince?” Aachon was at his side, weirstone in one fist, cutlass in the other. The orb only reflected blue.

“No, it’s all right. It’s all right,” Raed repeated with a final shake of his hand. The assertion, he knew, was more for his own benefit than for his friend’s. The tingling mercifully subsided, but the shock of it had been enough to pull him out of his fear of the dead.

Ignoring the massacre, Raed picked his way through the bodies to the quarterdeck. Here it appeared that some sort of last stand had taken place. Sailors had shoved barrels and coils of ropes down the short steps to the main deck in an effort to block whatever had wreaked havoc there.

Together Raed and Aachon clambered over this makeshift barricade. Whatever had killed Corsair ’s crew had obviously become enraged at the last few survivors. The remains clustered around the wheel were barely recognizable as human. Both men turned away for a second, sucking in the slightly cleaner air near the gunwales.

Carefully, Raed turned around and tried his best to dispassionately survey the scene for any further clues. He found himself stating the obvious just to get it out of his head. “This was no attack by a man. All the bodies are Imperial, well-trained men. They would have brought down one or two . . . unless the enemy took their dead when they departed . . .”

Aachon raised the orb; through it and milky eyes he surveyed the scene. “There is only their blood.” He paused and his breath hissed over his teeth. “My prince, there is no trace of their souls onboard. Such carnage . . . and no souls.” His eyes cleared as he lowered the stone, and expressed foreboding. They both knew what that meant.

“A geist of some sort?” Raed whispered, taking in the bloodbath all around them. “But, open water . . . Open water, Aachon . . .” He could feel his precious safety melting away, leaving a chill pit of fear behind. This couldn’t be happening.

His friend looked gray at the prospect as well. It was a fact that the Deacons knew—it was a fact that every man, woman and child that breathed knew—geists could not cross a stream, river or ocean. Some of the lesser sorts could even be bested by a full chamber pot.

Raed wondered if this rock-solid, immovable fact had been the last thought on Captain Moresh’s mind as he was shredded like a joint of meat. He imagined so. He could see them all screaming it over and over again as they died in agony. And then their souls were gone.

Geists hungered for souls. Most didn’t have the strength to take them, though, and were forced to rely on scaring mortals as best they could. Whatever variety of unliving had done all this had more power than any Raed had ever heard of.

He cleared his throat. “You’re Deacon-trained, Aachon . . . Did they teach you what kind of geist could wreak this much death?”

His friend shook his head, and Raed noticed that Aachon’s grip on the weirstone had become decidedly shaky. “There is nothing—you understand, nothing—that I know of, that can do this. A geist that kills like this . . . Even your—” He stopped suddenly. He’d almost said it; almost crossed the line they had both silently agreed upon. The absolute shock on Aachon’s face had nothing to do with the horror around them. “I am sorry, my prince. I . . . I . . .”

“This has got us both knocked back, old friend.” He squeezed the other’s arm. “Luckily we both know that I wasn’t on Corsair .” His attempt at humor fell flat in very unfertile ground.

“Of course!” Aachon whirled about and began clambering past the ineffectual barricade, back to the main deck.

“What is it?” Raed yelled after him, rushing to follow.

“The ship’s weirstone.” His friend stood in front of the doors to the cabins, like a man gearing himself up to dive. “Every Imperial warship has a weirstone of the top rank, keyed by the Deacons to warn of geist storms. Stones also remember, just in case humans don’t survive to tell.”

Raed nodded. Geists might not be known to cross water, but sometimes particularly vindictive ones were known to whip up foul weather near the coastline just for amusement. The Deacons had begun to make life easier for everyone. His grandfather’s foolishness in dismissing their native Deacons had been merely the first in the list of bloody stupid mistakes; mistakes they were still paying for.

“Right, then. We find the weirstone.” It felt good to have something to do, yet both of them stood at the doors for a second. What horrors lurked back there?

When Raed finally rushed the door, it felt much more appropriate to kick it open rather than merely push it. The sudden bang in the quietness of the carnage echoed like a thunderclap. Both men charged in. Despite their weirstone’s inactivity, the Pretender considered the possibility that there might still be a geist in there. After all, if this thing could cross water, what else could it do?