"Better get some more meat," said Ambel.
Erlin wondered how it was they ever got anywhere if this was the rate they always travelled. And was it her imagination, or were they all looking a lot more blue than they had before? She sat against a rail and watched as they unhooked the rowing boat and Ambel lowered it into the water. The island was a distant speck and she wondered about going with them this time. When Ambel rowed the boat out still attached to the ship with a thick hawser, she realised what he intended to do. She stared with her mouth falling open as he began to really dig in with the steel oars. Slowly he pulled the ship around and began towing G.o.d knows how many tons of timber and metal towards the island.
It took most of the day and the sun was going into fade-out by the time Boris dropped the anchor and peered with deep suspicion down the length of its chain. Ambel turned the rowing boat back to the ship and leaving it on the water he hauled himself up the hawser onto the deck.
"I want to come with you this time," said Erlin.
Ambel shrugged. "Morning," he said then turned and bellowed down the deck, "Pland, boxies here, get a line out."
Pland, a squat little man who spent most of his time at the helm muttering to himself and chewing bits of purple seaweed that squeaked when he bit them, glared at Ambel then slouched off to one of the rail lockers. He removed a line coiled around a wooden frame. It had a weight at the end of it and two small side lines bearing hooks.
"What about bait?" he asked.
Ambel went below deck and came up with their last steak held away from his body on his knife.
"Aw, come on," Pland wailed.
"Just do it," said Ambel.
Erlin watched while Pland tapped at the steak until a worm poked its head out. He reached out to it and it quickly sank its teeth in his hand. Grimacing and swearing he drew his hand away, pulling the worm from the meat. Once it flopped free he pulled it from his hand, a small squirt of blood hitting the deck, then he impaled the worm on a hook. The worm squawked and writhed about, but Pland tied it in place with another piece of line. He did the same again for the other hook then dropped the line over the side. His hand had healed by the time Erlin approached him.
"Do you often get the bait like that?" she asked.
"Better than some ways. Least we ain"t the only meat on board."
Erlin was contemplating that when Pland stepped on a worm, which was trying to sneak away from the meat, and grinned with satisfaction. The worm writhed about and bit at his boot.
"You next you little b.a.s.t.a.r.d," he said.
Erlin walked to her cabin, suddenly feeling the need to lie down for a little while. When she returned to the lamplit deck Pland had quite a catch. Boxies were another aptly named Spatterjay life form. They were simply cube-shaped fish with eyes on one face of the cube and a tail sticking out of the other. Pland had stacked a number of them next to him like building blocks. Ambel was standing behind him biting chunks out of one like an apple. As he ate it the boxy blinked at him mournfully. Between bites Ambel was giving Pland his considered advice.
"Gently now, don"t tug so hard or it"ll be off again."
He did and it did. Pland swore as the line slid through his hands until he was unwinding it from the frame again. Erlin walked up and stood beside Ambel, trying not to meet the boxy eye to eye.
"Reckon he"s got a turble on," said Ambel. He picked up a boxy and held it out to her. "Want one?" Erlin tried to refuse, but she was really hungry. She held her hand over its eyes and bit into it. It was like eating curried squid with pieces of banana in it. Rather palatable really, if only all those other boxies wouldn"t look at her so.
"Wouldn"t it be kinder to kill them first?" she asked.
He stared at her shocked. "Kill boxies?"
She noticed he had eaten his one down to its spine. All that remained was the tail at one end and a little face at the other. He tossed this back into the sea and she watched in amazement as it swam away. For a moment she thought she was going to vomit. When she did not, and in fact took another bite out of her boxy before she could think about it, she was almost startled. Is this what they called going native?
Come sunrise Erlin, Ambel, Peck and Boris were in the boat heading for the sh.o.r.e. Erlin had a pack of equipment and in her pocket a surgical laser the case of which she had managed to open, to remove its safety governor. It was completely illegal, but she felt a d.a.m.ned sight safer with a weapon that could cut through anything within two metres of her on this crazy world. Anyway, Polity law was supposed to apply here, but it seemed to go no further than the security fence around the gating facility. Hoopers seemed to find the ideas of law and justice nearly as amusing as politics. They just got on with things. She often wondered about Ambel. Was he the captain of the ship, or was he deferred to because he could settle an argument by ripping people"s arms out of their sockets?
Ambel rowed the boat into the green sand beach, then with two more strokes of the oars brought it up onto the sand. He did it effortlessly, as if it made no difference to him what substance was supporting the boat. They climbed out and Ambel hoisted out his blunderbuss and rested it across his shoulder. There it was again. The thing probably weighed about a hundred kilograms. Ambel ambled up the beach.
"See if we can get another rhino worm. Boxies ain"t that filling, and we need the meat for a sail," he said.
They walked along the green strand ignoring the rustlings and gruntings from the dingle. Erlin was jumpy. Every time anything moved in the tangled undergrowth she had the nib of her laser pointing in that direction. The life forms of Spatterjay seemed to have a propensity for taking chunks out of one, and she would not heal as quickly as crew. Abruptly they all drew to a halt around Ambel, who had stopped and was peering at something in the sand. Erlin took a look and wondered what the problem was. All that lay there was a piece of screening from an old re-entry vehicle. Ambel raised his gaze from the yellowing gla.s.site and stared down to the sh.o.r.eline. There was quite a distance between.
"Oh s.h.i.t, I thought it was further west," said Boris, with feeling.
"Are we ... is this ... you know?" said Peck.
"Yes," said Ambel. "Back to the boat."
At that moment the dingle parted and an arm came out. It was six metres long, thin, and seemed as hard as bone. The long long hand stretched two metres from wrist to fingertip. It was a blue that was almost black. It plucked Peck from the sand and pulled him into the dingle. Erlin stared at what was on the other end of the arm and wasn"t sure she believed what she was seeing. Peck was shrieking as loud as he could. The noise he was making was joined by a loud maniacal laughing and giggling as the dingle closed, then both sounds receded.
"d.a.m.n and b.u.g.g.e.ration!" said Ambel.
Erlin thought that an understatement.
"Back to the boat now, yes?" said Boris eagerly.
"You go," said Ambel. "Take the Earther back with you." With that Ambel entered the dingle.
"What was that?"
Boris forced a grin. "Oh, the Skinner. Let"s go now shall we?"
"No," said Erlin, and quickly followed Ambel. By the time she caught him up she wondered if she had gone insane. The Skinner? The names on Spatterjay were usually quite apt, so what did the Skinner do?
"You should"ve gone back to the ship," said Ambel, then glanced over her shoulder. "You too."
Erlin looked behind to see Boris approaching, his grin turned rictus on his face.
"Just couldn"t miss the fun," he said.
They moved on into the dingle, pear-trunk trees ashiver, and suspicious looking vines draped in the branches of something like an inverted pine tree. In all direction the undergrowth tangled all into darkness, yet it was easy to follow the Skinner"s path of crushed vegetation.
"Big one," said Boris, and they all crouched down at Ambel"s signal and kept very quiet. A giant leech oozed past nearby, waving its wad-cutter at them for a moment.
"They normally don"t bother," said Ambel. "But if they do you don"t get it back. One got Pland a year or two back. Been a bit cranky ever since."
Erlin tried to make sense of that. Surely not? The leech"s mouth had been half a metre across.
"Keep away from the pear-trunk trees," Ambel told her as they moved off again.
Pear-trunk trees? She looked up into the branches and saw things hanging there, but they did not look like pears. Of course, the trunk. It was squat and pear-shaped. The bark was real strange though. She wondered about its structure ...
"I said keep away - "
The pear-trunk tree shivered and Erlin screamed.
"All right, I got it!" yelled Boris. He tugged on the leech attached to her back and she screamed some more. It took Ambel"s help to pull the leech off. She lay face down in the mould sobbing. She could feel the hole in her back.
"Don"t worry," said Ambel. "I got it." He beat the leech on the ground until it released the lump of flesh it had unscrewed. Erlin regarded him with tears streaming from her eyes. G.o.d it hurt. Until now the whole process had seemed so unreal.
"That won"t work," she said as Ambel approached with part of her back between his forefinger and thumb.
" "Course it will," he said.
He screwed it into her back and the pain immediately started to fade. Slowly she got to her feet and tried to reach around to the wound. There was blood, but she couldn"t quite reach ...
"You"re one of us now," said Boris.
Erlin stared at him. Of course, the leeches. It all made sense now. She had to get her blood under the nanoscope as soon as she could.
"Come on," said Ambel, shouldering his blunderbuss.
When they reached the putrephallus stand at the edge of the dingle, Erlin refused the mask Boris offered her until the smell hit her, then she s.n.a.t.c.hed it from him and quickly placed it over her face. The weeds were green and, again, well named. There was an Earth fungus that looked similar, but that did not throb quite so disconcertingly.
"See the hill. He lives up there," said Ambel.
Boris eyed him suspiciously."You"ve been here before."
"Couple of times. Chopped him up last time and spread him all over the island. Reckon it took him a century or two to pull himself together."
"Someone tried burning once," said Boris. "Wouldn"t burn."
The conversation went completely over Erlin"s head. Beyond the putrephallus the hill rose up into a gentle pimple in the centre of the island. Ambel unshouldered his buss and began walking up the slope, his head darting from side to side. Definitely bluer, thought Erlin. Then she looked upslope just as the nightmare loomed into view and came screaming and giggling down towards them, something flaccid, and which she had no wish to identify, held in its long fingers. It was like a man who had been put on a rack for a hundred years, every joint and muscle stretched out impossibly. It was huge blue and spidery and came capering down the hill as if to welcome them. Ambel"s blunderbuss boomed and a great cloud of smoke wafted away. The Skinner went, "Oh!" and fell on its back.
"Quick!" shouted Ambel, drawing his knife. Boris did likewise and followed him. They reached the Skinner just as it sat upright, reached round behind itself, and threadled its long hand through the hole Ambel had made in its chest. Ambel and Boris skidded to a halt.
"s.h.i.t!"
"b.u.g.g.e.r!"
Erlin ran past them and swiped with her laser scalpel. The Skinner"s long head thudded on the ground and looked at her accusingly. She laughed a little crazily and proceeded to cut the rest of the monster into pieces.
"That"s the ticket!" bellowed Ambel, and proceeded to pick up bits and hurl them in every direction. Boris joined him and soon the Skinner was scattered all over the hillside and in the jungle below, barring the head that Ambel held onto, and the flaccid thing it had been carrying. Erlin saw it direct for the first time and immediately threw up.
"Oh G.o.d! Peck!"
It was Peck, outwardly.
Ambel looked at Boris and nodded towards the skin. Boris picked it up and shook it, then turned it around and peered at the split from the circle cut around the a.n.u.s to the one cut around the mouth.
"He"s gonna be a bit cranky for a while," said Boris.
Ambel nodded in agreement. Erlin turned away. They had both gone mad, she had to get help for them. When she turned back they were walking back up the hill. She quickly followed.
She had nothing left to throw up when she followed them into the basin in the top of the hill. She just retched a little. The rest of Peck was jammed between two rocks, writhing about and making horrible noises. Erlin followed them down and watched in horror as they dragged him down and dropped him on the ground. All his muscles she could see, all his veins. His lidless eye-b.a.l.l.s glared up at the sky. She advanced with her laser switched on. It was the only merciful thing to do.
"No!" Ambel knocked the laser from her hand. "Don"t you think he"s got enough problems? Find his clothes."
Erlin dropped to her knees, not sure if she wanted to cry or laugh. No, this was not happening ... but it was. When she looked up, Ambel and Boris were putting Peck"s skin back on him, tugging the wrinkles up his legs and pressing the air bubbles out ... and Peck was helping them.
As she watched Peck climb unsteadily into the boat she said to Ambel, "What are you going to do with the head?"
Ambel held the Skinner"s head up in one hand.
"I"ll put it in a box, then he"ll never be able to pull himself together properly."
Erlin had lost all her doubt. Of course, why not? She wondered about the report she must make. A nice scientific dissertation about how the leech fibre kept everything alive so that the leeches would have more prey to feed on, that was fine, but what about the Skinner? How would she tell them what the fibre had turned Spatterjay Hoop into, and what happened to humans too-long deprived of the Earth proteins that kept the fibres in abeyance? No, she would move her research in another direction - something about the leech symbiosis with the pear-trunk trees. She was relieved, as they came to the ship, to see a couple of sails circling above it. Both Boris and Ambel were now a much darker shade of blue, and Ambel seemed to be getting taller. Her own blueness was hidden by the natural colour of her skin, though Ambel had told her she had a pretty blue-white circle in the middle of her back.
JABLE SHARKS.
The ship: three masts st.i.tched across the horizon, black against the lemon sky. The hull is a cliff of wood topped with rails supported by tallow urns. Carvings everywhere. Wood and bone knitted together, interlaced, cunningly crafted. Along its sides are longboats braced like a beetle"s wing cases. It seems deformed - top heavy. In the rigging are five crew, two hanging idle and one in the crow"s nest, the twins reefing a sail. Below the deck are five more: three sleeping, the Barrelman, and Cook. On the deck to make things even are five others, for the moment.
Bosun Hinks handlines for green mackerel and the Captain sits in drugged stupor. Hinks pays him no mind. It is a fear the Captain has never named that drives him to the smoke, but he is not as bad as some, better than most, and only gives orders when the sharks are in. The rest of the time Hinks has charge. From his handline he now glances to Cheyne and Pallister who are sharpening the great knives ready for the next jable run. These harpoons are made of manbone and laminated shark skin. One of them is tipped with rare hull-metal, but it is never used during a run, being too valuable to lose.
"Ketra! Ketra!"
Hinks ties his handline to the rail and stares to where Chaff lies with arm stumps leaking into his bedding and the smell of his dying sickening the air. Tiredly Hinks climbs to his feet and walks over to the dying man. Cheyne is quickly with him.
"Chaff ... Chaff, it"s Hinks." He squats down beside the man and touches a palm to sweat-soaked hair. "Chaff."
Behind him Cheyne pulls a long bronze-edged stiletto from his sash and waits.
"Chaff, speak to me, please."
"He would choose death."
It is Pallister who speaks, Second Knife now that Chaff is dying.
"I would choose death and I would expect my friends and shipmates to release me, even had I no tongue to ask it."
He looks with especial concern to Cheyne. Cheyne has no tongue.
"Ketra! Ketra!"
Hinks glances to the Captain. "The Captain says no knife until he asks for it. By the Book. By the book."
All three of them regard the large black book resting next to the Captain"s hooka. The book he always has with him but never seems to read. They are aware of its presence, its weight, that it is the source of the fear that drives the Captain to his choice of oblivion. They listen to the creak of his chair as he rocks slowly back and forth puffing the smoke into the air.
"He will not see now," says Pallister.
They observe the reddened eyes fixing on the horizon as the rocking of the chair gradually comes to counter that of the ship. The glow of the gauze-wrapped wad of dreamfish waxes and wanes like the beating of a sick heart. Hinks turns from the Captain to the two knifemen.