Page 429

ALLIANCES

‘P ARAGON , P ARAGON . W HAT am I to do with you?’

Brashen’s deep voice was very soft. The hissing rain that spattered on his deck was louder than his captain’s voice.

There did not seem to be any anger in it, only sorrow.

Paragon didn’t reply. Since Brashen had ordered that no one must speak to him, he had kept his own silence.

Even when Lavoy had come to the railing one night and tried to jolly him out of it, Paragon had remained mute.

When the mate had shifted his attempts to sympathy, it had been harder to keep his resolve, but he had.

If Lavoy had really thought Brashen had wronged him, he would have done something about it.

That he hadn’t just proved that he was really on Brashen’s side.

Brashen gripped his railing with cold hands and leaned on it.

Paragon almost flinched with the impact of the man’s misery.

Brashen was not truly his family, so he could not always read his emotions.

But at times like this, when there was contact between flesh and wizardwood, Paragon knew him well enough.

‘This isn’t how I imagined it would be, ship,’ Brashen told him.

‘To be captain of a liveship. You want to know what I dreamed? That somehow you would make me real and solid. Not a knock-about sailor who had disgraced his family and forever lost his place in Bingtown. Captain Trell of the liveship Paragon. Has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?

I thought we would redeem each other, ship.

I pictured us returning to Bingtown triumphant, me commanding a sharp crew and you sailing like a grey-winged gull.

People would look at us and say, “Now there’s a ship, and the man who runs him knows what he’s about.

” And the families that discarded us both might suddenly wonder if they hadn’t been fools to do so.

’ Brashen gave a small snort of contempt for his foolish dreams. ‘But I can’t imagine my father ever taking me back.

I can’t even imagine him having a civil word for me.

I’m afraid I’m always going to stand alone, ship, and that the end of my days will find me a sodden old derelict washed up on some foreign shore.

When I thought we had a chance, I told myself, well, a captain’s life is lonely.

It’s not like I’m going to find a woman that will put up with me for more than a season.

But I thought, with a liveship, at least we’d always have each other.

I honestly thought I could do you some good.

I imagined that someday I’d lay myself down and die on your deck, knowing that part of me would go on with you.

That didn’t seem like such a bad thing, at one time.

But now look at us. I’ve let you kill again.

We’re sailing straight into pirate waters with a crew that can’t even get out of its own way.

I haven’t a plan or a prayer for any of us to survive, and we draw closer to Divvytown with each wave we cut.

I’m more alone than I’ve ever been in my life. ’

Paragon had to break his silence to do it, but he could not resist setting one more hook into the man. ‘And Althea is furious with you. Her anger is so strong, it’s gone from hot to cold.’

He had hoped it would goad Brashen into fury. Anger he could deal with better than this deep melancholy. To deal with anger, all you had to do was shout back louder than your opponent. Instead, he felt himself the horrible lurch of Brashen’s heart.

‘That, too,’ Brashen admitted miserably. ‘And I don’t know why and she scarcely speaks to me.’

‘She talks to you,’ Paragon retorted angrily. Cold silence belonged to him. No one could do it so well as he, certainly not Althea.

‘Oh, she talks,’ Brashen agreed. ‘“Yes, sir.” “No, sir.” And those black, black eyes of hers stay flat and cold as wet shale. I can’t reach her at all.

’ The words suddenly spilled out of the man, words that Paragon sensed Brashen would have held in if he could.

‘And I need her, to back me up if nothing else. I need one person in this crew that I know won’t put a knife in my back.

But she just stands there and looks past me, or through me, and I feel like I’m less than nothing.

No one else can make me feel that bad. And it makes me just want to… ’ His words trailed off.

‘Just throw her on her back and take her. That would make you real to her,’ Paragon filled in for him. Surely, that would bring a rise from Brashen.

Brashen’s silent revulsion followed his words.

No explosion of fury or disgust. After a moment, the man asked quietly, ‘Where did you learn to be this way? I know the Ludlucks. They’re hard folk, tight with a coin and ruthless in a bargain.

But they’re decent. The Ludlucks I’ve known didn’t have rape or murder in them. Where does it come from in you?’

‘Perhaps the Ludlucks I knew weren’t so fastidious. I’ve known rape and murder aplenty, Brashen, right on my deck where you’re standing.’ And perhaps I am more than a thing shaped by the Ludlucks. Perhaps I had form and substance long before a Ludluck set a hand to my wheel.

Brashen was silent. The storm was rising. A buffet of wind hit Paragon’s wet canvas, making him heel over slightly. He and the helmsman caught it before it could take him too far. He felt Brashen tighten his grip on the railing.

‘Do you fear me?’ the ship asked him.

‘I have to,’ Brashen replied simply. ‘There was a time when we were only friends. I thought I knew you well. I knew what folk said of you, but I thought, perhaps you were driven to that. When you killed that man, Paragon – when I saw you shake his life out of him – something changed in my heart. So, yes, I fear you.’ In a quieter voice he added, ‘And that is not good for either of us.’

He lifted his hands from the railing and turned to walk away.

Paragon licked his lips. The freshwater deluge of the winter storm streamed down his chopped face.

Brashen would be soaked to the skin, and cold as only mortals could be.

He tried to think of words that would bring him back.

He suddenly did not want to be alone, sailing blindly into this storm, trusting only to a helmsman who thought of him as ‘this damned boat.’ ‘Brashen!’ he called out suddenly.

His captain halted uncertainly. Then he made his way back across the rising and falling deck, to stand once more by the railing. ‘Paragon?’

‘I can’t promise not to kill again. You know that.’ He struggled for a justification. ‘You yourself might need me to kill. And then, there I’d be, bound by my promise…’

‘I know. I tried to think of what I would ask you. Not to kill. To obey my orders always. And I knew you and I knew you could never promise those things.’ In a heavy voice, he said, ‘I don’t ask for those promises. I don’t want you to lie to me.’

He suddenly felt sorry for Brashen. He hated it when his feelings switched back and forth like this. But he couldn’t control them. Impulsively, he offered, ‘I promise I won’t kill you, Brashen. Does that help?’

He felt Brashen’s convulsion of shock at his words.

Paragon suddenly realized that Brashen had never even considered the ship might kill him .

That Paragon would now promise thus made him realize that the ship had been capable of it.

Was still capable of it, if he decided to break his word.

After a moment, Brashen said lifelessly, ‘Of course that helps. Thank you, Paragon.’ He started to turn away again.

‘Wait!’ Paragon called to him. ‘Are you going to let the others talk to me now?’

He almost felt the man’s sigh. ‘Of course. Not much sense in refusing you that.’

Bitterness rose in Paragon. He had meant his promise to comfort the man, but he insisted on being grieved by it.

Humans. They were never satisfied, no matter what you sacrificed for them.

If Brashen was disappointed in him, it was his own fault.

Why hadn’t he realized that the first ones to kill were the ones closest to you, the ones who knew you best?

It was the only way to eliminate the threat to yourself.

What was the sense of killing a stranger?

Strangers had small interest in hurting you.

That was always done best by your own family and friends.

The rain had winter’s kiss in it. It spattered, annoying but harmless, against Tintaglia’s outstretched wings.

They beat steadily as she flew upstream above the Rain Wild River.

She would have to kill and eat again soon, but the rain had driven all the game into the cover of the trees.

It was difficult to hunt in the swampy borderlands along the Rain Wild River.

Even on a dry day, it was easy to get mired there. She would not chance it.

The cold grey day suited her mood. Her search of the sea had been worse than fruitless.

Twice, she had glimpsed serpents. But when she had flown low, trumpeting a welcome to them, they had dove into the depths.

Twice she had circled and hovered and circled, trumpeting and then roaring a demand that the serpents come back.

All her efforts had been in vain. It was as if the serpents did not recognize her.

It daunted her to the depths of her soul to know that her race survived in the world, but would not acknowledge her.

A terrible sense of futility had built in her, combining with her nagging hunger to a smouldering anger.

The hunting along the beaches had been poor; the migratory sea mammals that should have been thick along the coast were simply not there.

Hardly surprising, seeing as how the coast she recalled was not there either.