Red Seas Under Red Skies: The Gentleman Bastard Sequence, Book Two (Gentleman Bastards 2)

The waters lightened with their passage west, from the cobalt of the deeps to sky-blue to translucent aquamarine. The place was teeming with life; birds wheeled overhead, fish darted through the shallows in silver clouds and sinuous shapes larger than men shadowed them. They stalked languidly in the Orchid’s wake as well: scythe sharks, blue widowers, bad-luck reefmen, daggerfins. Eeriest of all were the local wolf sharks, whose sand-coloured backs enabled them to vanish into the pale haze below the ship. It took a keen eye to spot the ghostly incongruities that betrayed their lurking, and they had the disconcerting habit of circling beneath the craplines.

Locke thanked the gods that they weren’t jumpers.

For a day and a half they sailed on, heeling over to dodge the occasional reef or smaller island. Drakasha and Delmastro seemed to know the area by heart and muttered over Drakasha’s charts only at rare intervals. Locke began to glimpse human detritus on the shoals and rocks - here a weathered mast, there the skeletal ribs of an ancient keel on the sandy bottom. On one afternoon watch, he spotted hundreds of crablike things the size of dogs congregating on the overturned bottom of a ship’s hull. As the Orchid passed, the creatures fled from their artificial reef en masse, making the water around it froth white. In moments they had vanished completely.

Locke went off that watch a few hours later, aware of a steadily growing tension in the crew around him. Something had changed. Drakasha paced the quarterdeck ceaselessly, ordered extra lookouts to the mastheads and held whispered conferences with Delmastro and Mumchance.

‘She won’t tell me what’s going on,’ said Jean after Locke dropped what he thought was a subtle hint. ‘She’s all lieutenant and no Ezri at the moment.’

‘That in itself tells us something,’ said Locke. ‘Tells us to curb our good cheer.’

Drakasha mustered all hands at the evening watch change. All the Orchids, one vast, sweaty, anxious mass of men and women, fixed their eyes on the quarterdeck rail and waited for the captain’s words. The sun was a disc of burning copper crowning jungle heights dead ahead; the colours of fire were creeping up layer by layer through the clouds, and all around them the islands were falling into shadow.

‘Well,’ said Drakasha, ‘here it is, plain. The winds have been steady as hell these past few days, out of the south. We can drop anchor in Prodigal tonight, but we can’t make it through the Trader’s Gate.’

There was a general murmur from the crowd. Lieutenant Delmastro, stepping up beside the captain, placed a hand on her weapons belt and hollered, ‘Quiet! Perelandro’s piss, most of us have been here before.’

‘So we have,’ said Drakasha. ‘Stout hearts, Orchids. We’ll do the usual. Red Watch, take some ease. Expect an all-hands call in a few hours. After that, nobody sleeps, nobody drinks, nobody fucks until we’re safe home again. Blue Watch, you have the duty. Del, see to the newcomers. Run it all down for them.’

‘Run what down?’ Locke looked around, asking the question to the air as the crew dispersed.

‘Two passages to get to Port Prodigal,’ said Jabril. ‘First, Trader’s Gate, that’s north of the city. Twelve miles long, say. Twists and turns, shoals all over the place. Slow going at the best of times, but with a hard south wind, piss on it. It’ll take us days.’

‘So what the hell are we doing?’

‘Second way, from the west. Half as long. Still twisty, but ain’t near so bad. Especially with this wind. But it don’t get used if anyone can help it. They call it the Parlour Passage.’

‘Why?’

‘Because there’s something there,’ said Lieutenant Delmastro, pushing her way through the little crowd, ex-Messengers all, that had gathered around Jabril. Locke saw her give Jean’s arm the briefest squeeze, and then she continued: ‘Something . . . lives there.’

‘Something?’ Locke couldn’t keep a hint of irritation out of his voice. ‘Is the ship in danger?’

‘No,’ said Delmastro.

‘Let me be more specific, then. Are those of us aboard her in danger?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Delmastro, sharing a glance with Jabril. ‘Will something come aboard the ship? No. Absolutely not. Might you . . . feel like leaving the ship? I can’t say. Depends on your temperament.’

‘I’m not sure I’d enjoy the close attention of anything swimming in these waters,’ said Locke.

‘Good. Then you probably don’t have anything to worry about.’ Delmastro sighed. ‘All of you, think on what the captain said. A bit of rest is the thing; you’ll be called up halfway through your usual off-watch, so snatch what you can.’ She stepped up beside Jean and Locke overhead her whisper, ‘I certainly intend to.’

‘I’ll, ah, find you later then, Jerome.’

Locke smiled despite himself.

‘You going to catch a nap?’ asked Jean.

‘Bloody hell, no. I expect to twiddle my thumbs and go steadily out of my skull until called for duty. Maybe I can find someone to share a hand of cards—’

‘Doubt it,’ said Delmastro. ‘Your reputation—’

‘Unjust persecution for my good fortune,’ said Locke.

‘Yeah, well, maybe you should consider a public streak of bad luck. Word to the wise.’ She blew Locke a mocking little kiss. ‘Or whatever you are, Ravelle.’

‘Oh, steal Jerome and do your worst to him.’ Locke folded his arms and grinned; Delmastro’s loosening up toward him had been a welcome change over the previous few days. ‘I’ll be judging your performance by how pissed off Treganne is when we see her next. Hell, that’s how I can amuse myself. I’ll solicit wagers on how riled-up you two can get the Scholar—’

‘You do anything of the sort,’ said Delmastro, ‘and I’ll chain you to an anchor by your precious bits and have you dragged over a reef.’

‘No, this is a good scheme,’ said Jean. ‘We could place our own bets with him, then rig the contest—’

‘This ship has two anchors, Valora!’