The Iron Jackal Read online

  He crashed into the edge of the rooftop, bounced off, and plunged towards the street. There was an instant of tumbling, of rushing air and overwhelming terror. Then he collided with something soft which wrapped around him, folding him in bright colours. It only held him for a heartbeat before something snapped and he was dropping again. He fell onto a second soft barrier, which snapped in turn, and then he hit the ground with an almighty crash, although happily with a lot less force than he’d expected.

  He lay where he’d landed, stunned. He was enveloped in a cocoon of tough fabric. Everything hurt. He couldn’t quite believe he was still alive to enjoy the pain.

  Voices in a foreign tongue were hissing and shouting all around him. Hands reached in, pulling away the fabric. An awning. He’d been caught by a couple of them on the way down. Enough to slow his fall. Enough to save his life.

  Lucky, lucky bastard.

  People crowded in on him, some angry, some concerned. Dakkadians, with their broad, pale faces, light hair and narrow eyes. Samarlans, with elegant features and skin black as pitch. He tried to untangle himself from the awning. The onlookers helped him up. Some were rougher than others.

  Piles of earthenware pots surrounded him. Many of them were smashed. He ran his hand through his hair and looked about in a daze. He’d landed in the middle of a stall. The narrow strip of sky above him was almost closed out by awnings, but despite the shade the market was stiflingly hot. The air was heavy with churned-up dust and the babble of traders and customers.

  An old, thin Samarlan – presumably the owner – began to berate him, wagging a finger in his face. Other people started arguing amongst themselves. None of it was in Frey’s language, so he didn’t pay much attention. He was still getting over the shock of the fall.

  Then his gaze found Ashua, and he remembered his purpose.

  She was running down the last flight of stairs to the ground, a dozen metres away. As if she sensed that she’d been spotted, she looked over her shoulder, directly at him. His mind sharpened to a hot, angry point. She’d nearly killed him. Her expression turned fearful as she saw the look on his face.

  Suddenly the pain didn’t matter. The exhaustion and the shock fell away. He was going to get her.

  The store owner grabbed his arm to stop him escaping. He had his cutlass out in a flash, holding it to the old man’s throat.

  ‘I’m not in the mood,’ he said.

  The old man glared at him hatefully, but Frey’s eyes were harder still and the old man let him go. The crowd backed away, seeing he was dangerous. He retreated a few steps to make sure no one was going to come for him, then turned and headed off after Ashua.

  He pushed his way through the swelter, shoving people aside when they weren’t quick enough to get out of his way. His body twinged and protested with every step as new bruises made themselves known. Roaming chickens scattered at his feet. Robed Dakkadians and finely-clad Samarlans passed by in a lurid blur. He almost tripped over a blind man of the untouchable caste, who raised a gnarled hand and a white-patterned face towards him as he passed.

  Ashua was ahead of him, her ginger hair drawing his eye among the black and blond of the locals.

  They turned into a lane which had been roofed with rough planks, creating a gloomy tunnel lined with stalls. Sharp sunlight beamed between the gaps in the planks, striping the citizens that bustled along beneath them. The crowd had thinned out here, to make space for a huge beast of burden. It was a leathery desert monster, all tusks and horns and armour, shambling through the dim world of the market. Two robed handlers, Samarlan nomads, walked in front of it, carrying pointed prods.

  As Ashua hurried past she snatched a prod from one handler’s grip and shoved it hard into the beast’s hind leg. It bellowed, rearing and stamping, surprised by the pain. People began to scream and flee, piling over themselves in their efforts to get clear. Frey was almost knocked over in the stampede, but he rallied and fought doggedly through the pack. The nomads tried to calm the beast, which snorted and swiped its head at anyone within reach. Two Daks pulled an unconscious Samarlan out of its way before he could be trampled. Frey pressed himself close to the wall and edged along until the danger was behind him.

  She’d gained ground on him again, but she was tiring now. He could see it in the set of her shoulders. When she tried to push through the people in the market they pushed back more often than not. She wasn’t as strong or as forceful as he was. The crowd was hampering her more than him.

  He found a surge of energy, inspired by fury, and forged on.

  Suddenly, the market spat them out into the open, and he found himself on a street that ran alongside a river. The city fell away towards the water in uneven tiers. Temples stood on the banks, their crowded steps descending into the murky flow. People swam among the cows and beasts that waded in the shallows. Women washed their clothes on the shore. Several hulking bridges spanned the river, cluttered with buildings both elaborate and rickety. The sun glittered redly on the wavelets, throwing a dazzling streak across the water.

  On another day, Frey might have been impressed with the spectacle. But his whole world had narrowed to a single purpose, a bloody-minded need to catch this damned woman who had caused him so much trouble. Ashua was running along the riverside, with a low wall to her left. She was clutching her ribs, carrying a stitch, and she could barely manage more than a jog. Frey was still riding the adrenaline from his fall, and he renewed his effort, sensing the end was near.

  She looked over her shoulder to see how close he was. As she did so, a Samarlan boy wheeling a small cart emerged from the alley ahead of her. She crashed into it, sending fruit and bags of seeds rolling and skidding everywhere. Before she could get back to her feet, Frey was on her. He seized her by the collar, threw her onto her back and pinned her to the ground, his cutlass across her throat. The boy yelped and fled into the alley.

  For a long few seconds, they stayed like that, he on top of her, faces inches apart, both of them sweaty and gasping for breath. Frey, still scared and shaken from his brush with death, wanted to exact revenge for what she’d put him through; but now it came to it, he couldn’t think how. He was trembling with exhaustion. He was also aware that there was a young female beneath him, which was a good thing more often than not. The feelings that provoked diluted his anger a little.

  She gave him a nervous smile. ‘Well,’ she said. ‘This is nice.’

  ‘Can we talk now?’ he asked, in carefully measured tones.

  ‘You’re really not going to kill me?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Jakeley Screed didn’t send you?’

  ‘Never heard of him.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘I feel a bit of an idiot, now.’

  ‘You should.’

  ‘That’s, er, one man dead and another man maimed because of that little misunderstanding.’

  ‘Not to mention the fact that I fell off a building!’ Frey was unable to keep a note of strangled rage out of his voice.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘You don’t look too bad, though, considering.’

  ‘It hurts,’ he said. ‘A lot.’

  ‘Sorry.’ She looked down her nose at the cutlass. ‘Could you get off me? I won’t run away again.’

  ‘If you do,’ said Frey. ‘I swear I’ll kill you so hard your entire family will die from the shock.’

  ‘You’re a little late for that,’ she said. ‘But I get the point.’

  He released her, stood up and stepped back. She got unsteadily to her feet as he put his cutlass away. He pointed meaningfully at the pistols in his belt.

  ‘Yeah, yeah. I see ’em,’ she said. She staggered over to the low wall that separated the street from the river bank, and leaned against it. The Samarlan boy, judging that the danger had passed, scampered out of hiding to collect the spilled fruit and seeds. He loaded them quickly into his cart and wheeled it away.

  ‘Right, then,’ said Ashua. ‘What was it you wanted?’

  Two

>   Ashua’s Vocabulary – Frey is Recognised – Negotiations – Out on the Town – Pinn Makes an Announcement

  Frey pushed his way into the tavern, and let the heat and smell and noise enfold him. The room was crowded with men, mostly Vards, with a few clusters of young Samarlans and Dakkadians brave enough to mix with foreigners. The air was muggy with sweat and the fumes from pipes, cheroots and roll-ups. Shutters had been thrown open, looking out over the street, but the night was thick and still and there was little wind. Conversation was conducted at shouting pitch. Gas lamps lit the corners, fending off the gathering shadows.

  He took a deep, contented breath. Taverns weren’t the most fragrant of places, but to Frey they meant happiness, good humour and good times. The company of friends. A place where you didn’t have to care. Walking into a lively tavern felt like coming home.

  The others followed him in. Malvery, who let nothing stand between him and his grog, pushed past Frey and began muscling his way to the bar. Crake and Pinn trailed in his wake.

  Jez, who’d stayed by his side, surveyed the place. ‘You really do pick ’em, Cap’n,’ she said distastefully.

  ‘I used to hang out here all the time when I was sixteen,’ Ashua put in.

  Frey gave her a curious look. ‘When was that? Yesterday? How old are you, anyway?’

  ‘Younger than you,’ she replied.

  ‘Well, you certainly don’t look a day over thirty.’

  ‘You do. Many, many days.’

  He raised an eyebrow at Jez. ‘She’s a vicious little sprite, isn’t she?’

  ‘Kids,’ Jez commiserated.

  Ashua rolled her eyes. ‘Are you done with the condescension? You’re boring me, and I’m busy.’

  ‘You’re from Rabban, right? Out of the slums?’ Frey asked, as they made their way through the tavern. ‘Where’d you learn a word like condescension?’

  ‘I had a good teacher,’ Ashua replied, and something in her tone told Frey not to push it any further.

  ‘Hey! It’s Cap’n Frey!’

  Frey turned to see a grizzled, wiry-looking man grinning eagerly at him.

  ‘You are, ain’t ya?’ the man persisted. ‘I’d recognise that mug anywhere! Even with all them bruises on it!’

  One of his friends had joined him now, and was squinting at Frey like a jeweller studying a suspect diamond. After a moment, his face cleared and he beamed, showing a mouthful of crooked teeth.

  ‘You’re right!’ he declared. ‘Rot my socks, it is ’im! What ’appened to you?’

  Frey delayed his response as long as he could, to milk their amazement to its limit. ‘Have we met before?’ he asked innocently, ignoring the question.

  ‘Naw! I seen your picture!’ cackled the first man. ‘The hero of Sakkan, that’s what they calls you! The man what took on the Manes to save—’ He suddenly stopped, and his eyes widened. ‘Wait a minute. Is that ’oo you’re ’ere for? It is, ain’t it?’

  Frey gave them his best I-couldn’t-possibly-say smile. ‘Gentlemen,’ he said, touching his forehead in a farewell salute.

  ‘Oh, yes! Don’t mind us, Cap’n. You got business, I see,’ said his admirer, grinning again as he backed away. ‘A treat to meet you. A real treat.’

  ‘You too,’ said Frey, with all the appearance of meaning it.

  Ashua scoffed to herself, but Frey was too pleased to notice. He didn’t think he’d ever tire of the thrill of being recognised. Ever since that reporter from the broadsheets had asked him to pose for a ferrotype, he could scarcely walk into a tavern without being accosted by drunken admirers. Even here, in Samarla. They all wanted to hear the tale of that day over Sakkan, when he’d chased the Storm Dog through a hole in the sky and found himself at the North Pole, the home of the terrible Manes. In a short few months he’d gone from a nobody to a minor celebrity. He still hadn’t got used to the way people stared at him with awe, hung on his every word, and acted as if they were blessed when he deigned to sit with them.

  Still, ridiculous as it all seemed, it was getting to be like a drug. He craved the attention. He liked to feel impressive. And it had other advantages, too. Frey had never been a man who needed much help to get women into bed, but since the whole incident at Sakkan it had become so absurdly easy that he almost felt sorry for them.

  Thoughts of other women fled his mind as he rounded the bar and spotted the one he was here to meet. She was sitting in a large private booth, separated from the rest of the room by elaborately carved wooden dividers. Half a dozen burly pirates made sure none of the rabble got anywhere near her. She drank alone at a table, a thin, startling figure dressed in black with her skin and hair white as chalk.

  Trinica Dracken, captain of the Delirium Trigger.

  He recognised Balomon Crund among the guards, the Delirium Trigger’s bosun and Trinica’s right-hand man. He was a stumpy, ugly fellow with a scarred neck and matted black hair. Frey nodded at him as he approached, and Crund nodded back, though not without a certain reservation. Trinica’s crew were intensely protective of her.

  ‘Just you and her,’ he said, thrusting his chin at Ashua. ‘Your navvie stays out here.’

  Frey looked over at the bar, where Malvery was calling for booze with a bellow like a wounded ox. ‘You want to wait with the others?’

  ‘I’ll stay here,’ said Jez. ‘Someone’s got to keep an eye on you.’

  The bodyguards parted to let Frey and Ashua pass. The dividers cut out some of the sound, and the gas lamp had been turned down to minimum, filling the booth with shadows. They sat down opposite Trinica. Frey tried not to wince as he manoeuvred his bruised body into the chair. He was acutely aware that he wasn’t looking his best at the moment, but Trinica showed no sign of even noticing.

  There were three mugs on the table. Trinica filled the empty ones from the bottle. Frey’s eyes flickered to the silver ring she wore. She noted his attention, and regarded him with a black gaze. Contact lenses made her pupils unnaturally large, giving her a frightening aspect. Her hair had been hacked into short clumps. She looked like she’d recently escaped from an asylum.

  Frey took a swig of his drink. It was rum. Good stuff, too.

  Trinica’s gaze switched to Ashua. ‘Miss Vode,’ she said. ‘Rumour has it that you’ve been gathering men for a job.’

  Ashua regarded the other woman for a moment, calculating. ‘I was,’ she said. ‘But now one of them has pulp where his right hand used to be and another has an extra hole in his face. Not sure what happened to the others, but they’re probably halfway to Vardia by now.’

  Trinica looked at Frey and tutted. Frey tipped his mug at her in a salute. ‘Yep. That was me. Can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs.’

  ‘Captain Frey and his crew will take the job,’ Trinica said to Ashua, ‘if you’re willing to provide the details.’

  ‘Him?’ said Ashua skeptically.

  ‘He did dispose of your men and bring you here,’ said Trinica. A corner of her painted red mouth curved upward. ‘Despite suffering an amusing amount of damage on the way.’

  ‘He is pretty hard to get rid of,’ Ashua conceded.

  ‘Oh, I know that very well.’

  Frey gave an exasperated snort. ‘Ladies, how about we take care of business before you start ganging up on me? I’ve already had one beating today.’

  Ashua sat back in her chair and folded her arms. ‘How much do you know?’ she asked Trinica.

  ‘I know that you intend to hold up a train which is carrying a valuable Samarlan relic. I have a buyer in Vardia, who heard of the shipment and asked me to obtain that relic by any means necessary.’ She sipped her rum. ‘What I don’t know is when or where the shipment is moving. And I believe that you do.’

  ‘I’ve got my sources.’ Ashua nodded at Frey. ‘So what’s your deal with him?’

  ‘We go way back,’ Frey said wryly. He put his feet up on the table.

  ‘Let’s just say he’s more capable than he seems,’ said Trinica. ‘And I d
on’t like to risk my own crew when I don’t have to.’

  ‘So you’re doing her dirty work for her?’ Ashua inquired of Frey.

  ‘And getting paid handsomely for it,’ Frey replied with a grin.

  Ashua thought for a moment, looking from one to the other. Deciding if she could trust them.

  ‘You know you can’t use aircraft, right? It’s outside the Free Trade Zone. You try flying in daylight and the Sammie Navy will catch you and blow you out of the sky.’

  ‘We understand you intend to use a’rashni.’

  If Ashua was surprised that Trinica could speak Samarlan, she didn’t show it. ‘Yeah. Rattletraps. That was the plan.’ She tapped her toes restlessly. ‘I get fifty per cent of the buyer’s price. On delivery to you.’

  Trinica laughed. ‘You get ten per cent, or my men will drag you into a back room and pull out your fingernails until you give up the information for free.’

  ‘Thirty per cent.’

  Trinica’s face became cold. ‘I don’t think you heard me, Miss Vode.’

  Ashua’s nerve broke. ‘Alright, ten,’ she said with forced airiness. ‘But I’ll be there every step of the way to make sure I get my share.’

  Trinica looked at Frey, who was tipped back with his hands behind his head in a position of easy recline. He groaned. ‘Fine. I’ll babysit.’

  ‘You can arrange the vehicles?’ Trinica asked Ashua.

  ‘If you can front the funds.’

  ‘I think we can manage that. Talk to my purser, Ominda Rilk. He’s the Dakkadian over there.’

  Ashua was suspicious. ‘You sure you want a Dak involved in this? That bunch’ll sell you to their masters faster than you can blink.’

  ‘He’s a third generation Free Dakkadian. His grandfather bought himself out of slavery. He’s loyal to me, not the Samarlans.’

  ‘If you say so,’ Ashua replied with a shrug. She got to her feet. ‘The shipment moves in four days. I’ll be in touch.’ With that, she left. Frey watched her depart.