The Black Lung Captain totkj-2 Page 37

  'Wait, you did what?

  'Don't you dare judge me!' he shouted. 'Don't you dare! I'd do anything to get her back. But not that way. Not some stitched-up post-autopsy puppet of cold meat. I'd be exchanging one abomination for another. That wouldn't be my Bess. So I looked for another method, but there isn't one!' He raked his hand through his hair anxiously. 'And after that . . . after that I wondered if I could make her smarter, you know, something closer to what she once was. Spit and blood, at least that'd be something. But I don't have the slightest notion how to do it! I don't even know what I did when I put her in there!' He was pacing back and forth now, making wild gestures, so agitated that he could barely contain himself. 'And then I thought . . . I thought, what if I did rescue her from wherever she went? What if I did restore her, and my beautiful little niece woke up and looked at herself, and held up those metal hands in front of her, and realised what she was? Can you imagine such a horror? Trapped inside an unfeeling metal shell for ever, her only companion the man who put her there? It's . . . it's positively macabre! It's that kind of meddling that led to all of this in the first place!'

  He stopped, stared at her, and suddenly the angry expression on his face wavered, his lip trembled and tears shimmered in his eyes. 'I can't bring her back,' he said.

  'No,' said Jez. 'You can't.'

  She pitied him. Blinded by guilt, desperate to atone for the crimes of his past, he'd wanted to achieve the impossible. But Bess's body was gone. He might have salvaged a part of her, but he'd never get back the girl he'd known and loved. Her skin, her hair, her smile -they'd rotted away in the grave. All he could do was move her essence from the vessel she occupied to another one. And that wasn't any kind of solution.

  But he had to try. He had to prove to himself that it couldn't be done, that there was no way to save Bess. He needed to fail before he could be made to see.

  'It's not as simple as life and death, Crake,' she said. 'You should know that. I'm technically dead. My heart doesn't beat. But I am Jezibeth Kyte. I'm as much Jezibeth Kyte now as I was the day the Manes caught me.' She looked at Bess: an empty7 shell, her essence departed to wherever it went when Crake sent her to sleep. 'All that you knew of your niece, all the things that made you love her . . . they're gone. Gone for good. And what lives in that suit is not that girl.'

  Tears had started to fall. Crake was beginning to sob. He wiped his nose. 'Why are you telling me this, Jez?'

  'Because you can't change things, Crake. What you need to realise is that your niece died that night. That golem is just a memory of her. But it's not your niece. Your niece is dead.'

  Crake shook his head.

  'Say it, Crake!' she urged him. 'It's been killing you every day, and it won't stop killing you until you accept it.'

  'She's there!' he insisted, thrusting a finger at the armoured suit. 'I put her in there! It's up to me to get her out!'

  'You can't!' said Jez, grabbing him by the shoulders. 'That over there, that's something else. And it loves you and it needs you to take care of it, but it's not your niece.''

  Crake pushed her away with a moan of anguish. He spun around and lashed a mass of chemical apparatus off a nearby table, then snatched up the book he'd been copying from and hurled it at Jez. She stepped aside with ease.

  'What do you know? What do you know about it?' he shouted at her. Spittle flecked his beard, and his bloodshot eyes bulged.

  'I know the difference between being alive and being dead,' she said calmly. 'Better than anyone, I reckon.'

  Crake rampaged around the sanctum, knocking over anything he could see. When he'd smashed or thrown anything he could lay his hands on, he wheeled drunkenly against the wall and leaned there, sweating and red and spent.

  'Say it, Crake,' she said relentlessly. 'You can't save her. You don't have the power. She's dead. Say it.'

  'Alright!' he said. 'She's dead! I killed her and she's dead and gone! Happy now?'

  His words rang into the silence, and then his face crumpled and he began to cry. He hugged himself and slid down the wall until he was sitting on the floor. 'She's dead,' he said again.

  'You have to accept that,' Jez said. 'Accept it. Make it a part of you. Move on.'

  'Easy for you to say,' he muttered. He clambered unsteadily to his feet, his face hard with disgust. 'I know why you're here. I know what all this is about. You've a daemon inside you, and you want it out.'

  'Well, yes, I—'

  'Well, nothing! You think I haven't considered that? All this time when I suspected you were a Mane? I was your friend, Jez. You think I hadn't wondered if I could fix you?'

  Jez had a sinking feeling in her guts. 'Can you?' she asked.

  'No!' he crowed. 'No! No one can! Because you died, Jez! Because your heart doesn't beat! I could drive that daemon out of you, but it's the only thing that's stopping you being actually dead. Without that daemon, you're just a corpse. Accept that! Make that a part of you!'

  Jez was shocked by the viciousness in his voice, the hate on his face, the glee with which he crushed her hopes. Tears prickled at her eyes. She struggled to maintain her composure. She'd hurt him, and he wanted to hurt her back. She understood that. It didn't make it hurt any less.

  No wonder he left as soon as it was clear that she was a Mane. Maybe that was the spur he needed. He didn't want her to ask him. He didn't want to tell her that there was no help for her. That she was condemned to slowly turn into something else.

  She fought to come up with some kind of argument, some way to persuade him that he was wrong. But his reasoning was infallible. In fact, had Jez not been so desperate to rid herself of the invader in her body, she might have seen it herself. Even someone who knew nothing about daemonism could have worked it out. But just like Crake, she'd believed what she wanted to believe, what was necessary to keep going. And just like him, she'd been doomed to failure from the start. Some things couldn't be changed, no matter how hard you wished.

  But now that she came to it, she found there was none of the disappointment or sorrow or misery she'd expected. Instead she felt a bleak, sad sort of resignation. The peace of a prisoner as they walked to the gallows, knowing that all possibility of reprieve or escape was gone. Maybe she'd always known, deep down, that there was no going back.

  'Alright,' she heard herself say. 'I believe you.'

  'Good,' he said.

  She walked around the room. 'There's no chance.'

  'None.'

  'The way I am is the way I am.'

  'Exactly.'

  She shook herself, brushed a strand of hair back from her face, and nodded. 'Then that's how it is,' she said quietly.

  Crake gazed mournfully at the empty shell of the golem. 'That's how it is,' he agreed.

  She raised her head. 'We'd like you to come back, Crake.'

  The daemonist surveyed the room, strewn with the wreckage of his studies. 'Yes,' he said. 'I'm finished here.'

  They held a small gathering on a hillside on the way back to Iktak. There was nothing to bury, so they simply raised a marker: a slab of metal that they'd scored with one of Silo's screwdrivers.

  Bessandra Crake

  Beloved niece of Grayther Crake

  DY138/32-147/32

  The whole crew attended, except Pinn, who was no longer with them. Crake was glad of that. He'd only have asked moronic questions. The others understood well enough, though. They didn't know the dead girl, nor why Crake was honouring her now when she'd died two years ago. But they came anyway and kept silent. Because he asked them to. Because he wanted them there, and they were his friends.

  And though they couldn't have failed to notice the similarity between the name on the grave and Crake's golem, he knew they'd never guess the truth. It was too terrible, too impossible. Easier to assume he'd named the golem in her memory.

  On reflection, Crake decided they were right.

  Bess herself - the golem Bess - stood off to one side, her ball clutched in her massive hands, shifting restlessl
y. She'd picked up on the mood and made sad cooing noises, but he wasn't sure whether she really fathomed what was happening here. If his niece truly was inside that armoured skin, he'd surely have seen more of a reaction. She was witnessing her own funeral, after all. But the way she behaved was no more than might be expected of a faithful dog.

  The wind was warm, rippling the grass, and sunlight broke through the clouds to slide over the hills in great patches. Harkins had his cap scrunched in his hands. Malvery's head was bowed. Jez had tears in her eyes. Frey and Silo stood solemn and grim. Even the Ketty Jay, visible nearby, was a witness to this.

  She's dead, he told himself. It still didn't feel true. But, on some level, something had changed. He'd begun to feel that, if he repeated it enough, he'd believe it. That was something, at least. That was hope.

  No words were spoken. They simply stood and stared at the grave-marker. Silently sharing the emptiness of death.

  After a time, Crake stooped and laid a small toy at the foot of the marker. A doll that he'd bought in Tarlock Cove. Bess had always been enchanted by the toys he bought for her. He used to pretend he made them himself, in his secret basement. It explained what he was doing in the wine cellar of her father's house, night after night. It had been her desire to see his mythical toy workshop that led her to sneak into his sanctum, on the night that was to end her life.

  He heard the rustle and clank of leather and metal, and felt Bess arrive next to him. She looked down at the grave-marker, tiny glimmers of light glittering behind her faceplate. Then she bent down, and put her ball next to the doll.

  Crake choked back a sudden sob. He rubbed his eyes with his fingertips and smiled at her, as best he could. He put his hand on the cold armour plate of her shoulder and patted it.

  'Good girl, Bess,' he said.

  Then he turned away from the grave, to face the sympathetic gazes of his friends. He pulled in a deep breath, raised his head, and nodded.

  'I'm ready,' he said. 'Let's go get Grist.'

  Thirty-Three

  Many Angles — 'She Doesn't Really Do Subtle' — A Confrontation

  Sakkan was a city of geometries, all slopes and angles. Situated deep in the frozen Duchy of Marduk, it didn't hide underground like many northern settlements, nor did it shelter in the lee of a mountain. Instead, it stood stern and resilient as the rock of the plateau it was built on. A summer dawn was breaking, hazy cloud choking a sky that was dull and bleached of colour. There was no wind, and no snow. The cold hung in the still air and seeped like liquid into the bones.

  A tractor rumbled and sputtered through the quiet streets, surrounded by a wary escort of fifteen men and two women. It towed a trailer behind it, carrying a large, lumpy shape, concealed under a tarpaulin. The men and women moved quickly, with hurried steps, their eyes darting this way and that, hands never far from their guns.

  Time was of the essence here. Word of the arrival of the Delirium Trigger and the Ketty Jay would soon spread. The element of surprise would be lost. That wouldn't do. They needed to hit their target hard and fast.

  Frey glanced around the faces of his crew. Harkins had remained behind but Jez, Malvery, Silo and Crake were with him. They were focused and determined. There was a new confidence about them since Crake had returned and Jez had been accepted back into the fold. Malvery had even muttered about searching for Pinn once they were done with Grist.

  Things were different between them now. The sense that their world was unravelling had faded, and that gladdened Frey immensely. The end was in sight. Maybe they would track down that porky idiot Pinn once they'd mopped up here.

  He was cold, and rather scared, and it was far too early in the morning to get killed. But for all that, he felt a fierce kind of love for his crew right then. There was nothing quite like the cameraderie of men and women who faced danger together. It was a bond stronger than friendship. Going into battle with another person at your side was a level of trust altogether unknown in the world of the aristocrat or the peasant.

  Besides, he really liked it when they kicked arse.

  Marduk's second city was built almost entirely from the grey-black stone of the region. It clung to the hilly back of the plateau, rising in grim tiers above them, walled sections linked by sloping roads and winding switchback stairs. Stout towers stood defiantly against the threat of winter gales. The streets were austere but not bare. Monuments and statues of dukes and explorers looked down on neat squares and wide boulevards. Banks and powerful trading houses competed for the most impressive premises. Sakkan was a dark and hard place, but it hadn't forgotten how to be grand.

  The tractor's engine sounded eerily loud in the quiet of the dawn. The man driving it was Balomon Crund, Trinica's bosun. He was a squat, ugly man with dirty, matted hair and a burn scar on his neck. Not too easy on the eye, but Trinica thought highly of him. He'd been her most loyal supporter in the mutiny that deposed the Delirium Trigger's previous captain.

  Frey could see why she trusted him. Though he was a taciturn sort, the signs were clear to a man of Frey's experience. Crund adored her. He'd seen it on the faces of several of her men: a certain sort of veneration, somewhere between affection, respect and awe. She'd made herself untouchable, put herself on a pedestal, and made them love and fear her. She couldn't rule by raw strength, so she'd fashioned them a cruel goddess, and let them come to her altar.

  But the woman they knew wasn't the one Frey knew. That one had disappeared, it seemed, just as he feared she would.

  The sight of Trinica in her make-up and black attire was jarring after a month of seeing her without it. But worse was the change in her behaviour. She was distant now, closed off from him. Her black eyes were empty and showed nothing. He told himself she had to be that way in front of her men, but he wasn't sure that was the whole truth. Perhaps she wore her personalities like a coat, to take off and put on as necessary. Perhaps the feelings he'd thought were growing between them had been the same: another woman's feelings, not those of a pirate queen.

  He caught himself. Damn, what was happening to him? Since when had he spent this much time fretting about a woman? Don't be such a sap! he told himself.

  The streets began to thin out as they came to the eastern edge of the city. Trinica's men led the way. She'd sent scouts ahead while Frey was off picking up Crake, and their reports had been encouraging. They'd found the warehouses Roke had spoken of, and apparently they'd seen Grist as well, and spotted the Storm Dog in its hangar.

  The news made Frey restless with excitement. He'd wanted to fly in there and blast the place to pieces. Trinica had persuaded him otherwise. The Coalition Navy might not take kindly to an aerial assault on one of their major cities, she pointed out. Better to make it a ground assault. Take them by surprise. Catch Grist before he could even get his craft into the sky.

  There were five in the assault team from the Ketty Jay, the rest from the Delirium Trigger. Harkins had been left with the aircraft, and instructed to stay in contact via the earcuffs. Frey would need the pilot's eyes in case things went airborne. The Delirium Trigger stood ready to take off at a moment's notice, at a signal from a flare gun Trinica carried. Just in case the Storm Dog got out of its hangar. Grist wasn't going to slip away again.

  They passed early risers and late revellers, drifting through the streets. Many had heard of Trinica Dracken, and recognised her. They kept their distance, sensing trouble.

  There'll be trouble for someone, alright, Frey thought.

  The further from the landing pad they went, the more the city flattened and spread out. Eventually, they reached an industrial district of factories and warehouses. The roads became narrow, bleak and dirty. Walls crumbled, cracked by frost. The air smelled of chemicals, and the buildings were sooty with residue.

  Crund brought the tractor to a halt just before the crest of a rise. Beyond, the road dipped down towards a group of blank brick warehouses huddled round a large aircraft hangar. The warehouses were surrounded by a formidable metal fen
ce, ten feet high and tipped with spikes. A pair of guard towers stood overlooking the compound.

  Frey got a better view with his spyglass. They were Yorts, their beards and hair knotted and braided, faces tattooed and pierced in several uncomfortable-looking places. They were carrying heavy repeater rifles, and appeared generally unfriendly.

  He scanned the compound while the others pulled the tarpaulin off the trailer and checked their weapons. There were fifteen guards that he could see. One guard each.

  Not good enough. Fair fights were for suckers. It was time to employ their secret weapon.

  He walked around the side of the trailer, where Bess now lay uncovered. 'Wake her up, Crake,' he said.

  Crake put a brass whistle to his lips and blew it. No sound was made, but Bess stirred and sat up. Trinica's men stepped back uneasily. Some of them remembered the golem from her rampage through the Delirium Trigger when she was berthed in Rabban during the Retribution Falls affair.

  'Come on, Bess,' said Crake. The golem clambered down and the trailer groaned in relief. Trinica's men set about detaching it from the tractor they'd hired from the landing pad.

  'Are your people ready?' Frey asked Trinica.

  Trinica gazed at him in that cool, half-amused way she had. 'They'll do their part.'

  The group split into two. Five of Trinica's men were staying behind with the tractor. The rest were coming with Frey and his crew, Trinica and her bosun included. Frey didn't feel good about Trinica fighting alongside him - he'd have preferred her safe and out of the way - but she wouldn't be dissuaded and he knew better than to try. She was hungry to get her own back on Grist. She wanted to be there in person when the big man went down.

  'Get moving as soon as you hear the first gunshots,' he told the men who were staying behind. They acted as if they hadn't heard. They didn't take orders from anyone but their mistress.