What is true, rodent? The sorcerer was in the hold, his footfalls ringing on the catwalk, seconds away. The sorcerer was in the hold, his footfalls ringing on the catwalk, seconds away.

'They gnaw us like termites,' said Mugstur. 'They will drive us mad. Do this, and with the Angel's consent I shall give you what is in my keeping. Fail and my people shall devour it.'

'But where in the black Pits am I to get peppermint oil?' demanded Taliktrum.

Felthrup saw Arunis across the hold, a few steps from the bridge. With a wrenching final effort he shot out a hand and grabbed Taliktrum about the waist. The ixchel's eye's went wild, Mugstur leaped snarling into the air, Arunis shouted, ' There you are! There you are! ' And Felthrup dropped like a stone into the darkness. ' And Felthrup dropped like a stone into the darkness.

He was flat on his back, his hand empty. No longer in the hold - the dream had moved him again. He blinked. A crystal chandelier. Scent of leather and ladies' perfume. He was in the first-cla.s.s lounge.

He sat up, straightening his gla.s.ses. Taliktrum and Mugstur were gone. He had done it; he had saved the ixchel for another day.

'Witless oaf,' said Arunis.

Felthrup jumped violently. The mage was seated in an elegant chair, eyes fixed on him. His pale hands issued from the black sleeves of his jacket like two cave creatures, unused to the light. His tattered white scarf was knotted at the throat. A second chair stood near him, and between the two was a little table supporting a round silver box.

'How did you manage to fall like that?' Arunis demanded.

Felthrup scrambled to his feet. 'I saw - a rat! A number of rats! They startled me.'

'So naturally you leaped into the hold.'

'I--'.

'What did you mean by shouting It's true?' It's true?'

Felthrup chuckled nervously, brushing himself off. 'It's true that they're loathsome - that we are loathsome, we rats. Once you're used to human form.'

'Do not get used to it,' said Arunis. 'You will not get to play at being a man much longer, unless you give me what I seek. But I shall not threaten you tonight, Felthrup. I think we both understand the situation. Come and sit beside me.'

His eyes indicated the empty chair. Felthrup did indeed understand the situation. He could refuse, he could turn and walk away, but Arunis had found him now and would not lose him until he woke from the dream. Better to keep the mage from anger, if he could. He went to the chair and sat down.

'Try these candies, won't you? Men call them pralines.' Arunis raised the lid of the silver box and chose one of the multicoloured sweets within. Felthrup hesitated, but only for a moment. He chose a large square candy and bit it in half. Despite himself he gave a whimper of delight.

'Raspberries above, hazelnuts below! It is two delicacies in one!'

'And you are two beings in one, Felthrup. A rat who collaborates with fools, plagued by dreams he cannot remember. And a man who remembers everything, what the rat sees and what Arunis teaches, the shame of being a filth-creature and the n.o.bility of human form. A man who could spare the rat much agony, and make him the loved and lauded scholar he was meant to be.'

'Please don't, Arunis,' said Felthrup softly.

'And all so simply, what is more. No one need ever know what he'd done. Why, the rat himself would never know. Do you realise that, Felthrup? Your dream-self can do everything. Your rat-self will not even be aware that it has happened, and none of his friends will suspect a thing!'

'I am one being, not two. You have interfered with my dreams.'

The mage shook his head. 'I have but listened to them. We want our dreams heard, after all. It's the deepest wish of every woken creature, to be heard by those with power to make dreams come true. I alone have paid attention to the longings of your heart.'

Felthrup smiled oddly. 'That's not true, not true in the least.'

'But of course it's true. Felthrup, you give your loyalty too cheaply. What has it brought you? Ramachni saved your life - but only because you knew about the s.h.a.ggat Ness, and could inform him. What I ask is no different, except that I put our relations on a more honest footing.'

'Honest?' Felthrup wrung his hands, still smiling. 'You say you will make me a man for ever, but you never say how you would accomplish this miracle. You cannot even make your s.h.a.ggat back back into a man.' He looked up, suddenly fearful. 'Pardon my bluntness, sir, I didn't--' into a man.' He looked up, suddenly fearful. 'Pardon my bluntness, sir, I didn't--'

Arunis lifted a rea.s.suring hand. 'No need to apologise; it's a business-like question. And I'm happy to answer, since you have no means of pa.s.sing on what I say to your waking self. I shall make you a man by the power of the Nilstone. I am destined to wield it, Felthrup, and by its might I shall remake the world. Your friends have not the least inkling of my purpose. They are the rodents, truth be told. They are ground-hugging mice; they see but inches through the gra.s.s. You have chosen to stand up, to comprehend a larger world. You see further, Felthrup - but I see for ever. I see the grim truths, the choices, the destiny of Alifros. With the Nilstone I can guide that destiny as surely as the G.o.ds themselves.'

'Do the G.o.ds require such a.s.sistance?'

Arunis' smile disappeared. After a pause, he said, 'Isiq's stateroom. It is the one place on the Chathrand Chathrand that I cannot see, cannot enter. Give me this simple gift, won't you? Tell me what happens in that stateroom, and the world is yours.' that I cannot see, cannot enter. Give me this simple gift, won't you? Tell me what happens in that stateroom, and the world is yours.'

'I suppose,' said Felthrup, averting his gaze, 'that you want to know if they speak of when Ramachni might return, and how they shall fight you in the meanwhile - that sort of thing.'

The sorcerer's soft jowls broke once more into a smile. 'Exactly so - and you have just answered the first question I would have put to you, without my even asking. You have told me that he is not back yet.' yet.'

He appeared immensely relieved. He laughed, gazing almost fondly at the other man. Felthrup laughed too, but only to disguise his horror at what he had just said.

'Not back,' said Arunis, 'and perhaps never to return at all. I knew it. Deep inside, I always knew he was not so great a mage as they claim. Now then, my good rat, there is one thing, one very essential thing, that I am certain is never discussed outside that room. Who is Ramachni's spell-keeper? Whose death will turn the s.h.a.ggat back into a living man?'

Felthrup s.n.a.t.c.hed another candy and popped it into his mouth. He didn't know; as far as he was aware it was a secret kept even from the spell-keeper himself. Felthrup swallowed the candy and smacked his lips.

'You're very clever, Arunis,' he said.

'I am three thousand years old,' said the sorcerer amiably.

'And what would you do if I couldn't help you? If I couldn't bring myself to say another blessed word about the stateroom, or my true and only friends?'

Arunis considered his nails for a moment. Then he too reached for the candy box, and lifted the lid.

White froth erupted from the container. Felthrup tried to leap up, but found his arms and legs bound to the chair by iron shackles. The mage rose and stepped away as the cascade poured from the little table to the floor. Not froth, but worms: slick, ravenous white worms, gushing into the room through the silver box like the sea through a hull breach. Felthrup was screaming, he could see their faces, their barbed and distended mouthparts, their intelligent eyes. They reached his right ankle first, punctured the skin there like nails through dough, he pleaded, howled, they were tunnelling deep into his human flesh, scaling him by the hundreds, thousands, he was being devoured and he felt every point of mutilation, he was vanishing, vanishing into the bodies of the worms.

Thasha was wrenched from her own troubled sleep, in which she was puzzling over the entry 'Fulbreech' in the Merchant's Polylex Merchant's Polylex, by a sudden jolt she couldn't identify. It was still night. The dogs were barking. Her hand closed on her knife hilt before her feet touched the floor.

But in the outer stateroom she found the tarboys stumbling and swearing, and Jorl and Suzyt desperately licking Felthrup, who had exploded from his basket moments before with a bloodcurdling squeal.

'Another nightmare,' groaned Pazel, who had bashed his knee on the samovar. 'At this rate we're going to have to take him to Chadfallow.'

'Or Bolutu,' said Neeps. 'Maybe a horse pill would keep that rat asleep.'

They were trying not to look at Thasha - or trying to seem as though they weren't. She was wearing lace underthings and no more. Irritated at everyone, she fell back into her room, laid down the knife and pulled a dressing robe over her shoulders. Then she crossed the stateroom and gathered Felthrup into her arms.

He was shaking uncontrollably, drenched in cold sweat. 'The w-wor . . . ' he stammered.

'The worst one yet?' she asked, stroking the lame little creature. 'You poor thing. Tell me about it; that always helps with nightmares.'

'Don't remember. Never can remember. My legs hurt. Oh Thasha!'

'Hush now. It's over.'

'All over. All finished, done.'

'Felthrup,' she said gently, 'can't you remember anything? It really might do some good, you know - like coughing up a poison, rather than keeping it inside.'

The rat squirmed in her arms. His stump-tail twitched. He made an obvious effort to still himself, to bring something, anything back with him from the darkness.

'Where are my spectacles?' he said.

12.

Lady Oggosk's Warning

10 Teala 941 89th day from Etherhorde

'You are Alifros,' shouted Captain Rose.

He stood at the quarterdeck rail, red beard tossing in the wind. As he spoke, he swept a hand over the sailors and tarboys, the hundred Turachs, the forty pa.s.sengers let out on deck for the first time since Ormael: literally the whole ship's company, swelling away from him across the gigantic topdeck, or watching from their stations on the masts.

No one looked impressed by his remark. At the wheel behind Rose, Elkstem shook his head slightly, as if to say Any old tosh Any old tosh - though neither he nor any member of the crew would have risked such facial dissent in Rose's sight. - though neither he nor any member of the crew would have risked such facial dissent in Rose's sight.

They had sailed thirty-nine hours, east by south-east: a fast, flawless running. The waters east of Simja were deep and well-charted; there would be no hazards sooner than Talturi, another day's journey at the least. No rain, nor any hint of it. Still it was odd to summon all hands just to talk philosophy.

But then everything was odd. The sailors gazed up at Rose, fear and anger mingled in their eyes. Most had not set foot on land since Tressek Tarn, eight long weeks ago. None had gone ash.o.r.e in Simja. And their n.o.ble mission had been reduced to one of plotting and deceit. Thasha was dead; none knew why. Pacu Lapadolma had married the Sizzy in her place; then the Sizzies had come and called them murderers.

That particular notion was becoming more likely by the day. The men were filthy and stiff and tired of each other's smells. The new hands (including five new tarboys) were still in shock: the night before Rose had called them to his cabin and, surrounded by Turachs, revealed that they were not, in fact, bound home to Etherhorde. By the time he had explained their true mission the boys were shaking, and the men pale as death.

Some of the old crew had yet to move beyond such terror. Most, however, had turned it into a sort of doomsday rage. Their ultimate fate was beyond their control: they were little people caught in the affairs of kings. But they bitterly resented the loss of the earthly joys of sh.o.r.e leave.

Fear might nonetheless have kept these longings buried had not the Lily of Locostri Lily of Locostri, a floating brothel famous throughout the Crownless Lands, made an appearance in Simja. For two nights she had worked her way quietly about the bay, pa.s.sing close enough for the breeze to carry hints of jasmine and mysorwood perfume to the Chathrand Chathrand. Such teases were bad enough, but the sound of young women's laughter had sparked fights and fits of weeping, self-inflicted wounds with rusty knives, the drinking of walrus oil and other acts of pure hysterical frustration. Mr Teggatz, the mildest-mannered cook in fleet history, had thrown back four pints of basting wine, insulted the G.o.ds, chased his tarboy a.s.sistant with a meat cleaver and vomited into a dumpling stew. And then the orders had come: Stations! Weigh anchor! All hands make ready to sail! Stations! Weigh anchor! All hands make ready to sail!

'If we're Alifros, Rin save this blary world,' muttered Neeps.

Rose had yet to speak again. He gaze swept fore and aft, and his hand was still raised above the crowd.

'He's up to something,' said Pazel. 'He's got that gleam in his eye.'

Jervik Lank, standing right in front of them, glared over a burly shoulder. 'And you've got bilge for brains, Muketch. Shut your gob.'

There were sn.i.g.g.e.rs from several tarboys. Pazel looked at Jervik's broad back with contempt. The older boy's hatred of Ormalis was as strong as ever, but his superst.i.tious fear of them had lately diminished. That could be remedied: a few Flikkerman-hisses or Augronga roars would set him straight. Pazel was far more worried by Jervik's new ties to Arunis. He had spotted them together again just that morning.

'What's the matter, then, Undrabust?' said Jervik, seeing Neeps' look of rage. 'Ah, I know. You're missin' that village girly, ain't you? I've been hearin' about the two of you.'

Pazel struggled to hide his fury. Jervik could only mean Marila, the Tholja.s.san girl they had met among Arunis' captives, and left behind with her little brother in Ormael. Neeps turned scarlet, and Pazel wondered if he had had taken taken a shine to Marila. taken taken a shine to Marila.

'Let it go, Neeps,' he said softly.

'Tha's right,' laughed Jervik. 'Listen to your mate, Undrabust. After all, his girly's dead.'

His laughter carried to Mr Uskins, who turned and froze the boys with a stare. Pazel clenched his fists until the nails bit into his palms. Jervik was goading them, as he had done from the start of the voyage, as he had done to Pazel for years on an earlier ship. But knowing that his abuse was tactical did not make it any easier to bear, and neither did the fact that Thasha was actually safe and sound. Pazel felt a loathing for Jervik so tangible he could almost chew it.

'You are Alifros,' Rose repeated at last. 'Few among you will understand me, and the time has not yet come for me to explain. But there is one matter about which you should have no doubt. Everything has changed Everything has changed. The known world lies behind us. The lives you have lived, the comforts you grew fond of, the very people you have been until this moment - gone gone!'

He bellowed the last word, snapping more than a few wandering eyes back to his face. When he continued his voice was lower.

'We've said our goodbyes, men. Not just to the Imperium, but to the world of law itself - any law, save that of nature and her occulted guardians. You're amused, I know. You think, "We're not even out of the Peren, who does he think he's fooling?" But you're wrong. Everything has changed. Very soon you will discover this for yourselves.'

He leaned towards them, daring eight hundred souls to give so much as a giggle. No one obliged. Then Rose straightened, nodded to Uskins, and went to stand beside Elkstem at the wheel.

Mr Uskins leaped up the quarterdeck ladder and faced the crowd. He raised a sheet of parchment above his head. The first mate's teeth were set in a grimace. He crushed one end of the parchment in a fist.

'New crewmembers will fall in on my left and be recognised!' he screamed, in a voice that suggested he would fall on them with beak and talons. 'Face forward, order of rank! And by the lions of the sea, if you waste our time I'll have you lick every man's heel on the Chathrand Chathrand, beginning with those sporting boils or open sores, Rin drown me if I lie! Mr Kiprin Pondrakeri, seaman!'

A muscular sailor with a shaved head and tattooed arms leaped forward through the crowd, knocking aside men and boys in his haste.

'Mr Vadel Methrek, seaman!'

A turbaned man followed the first. As they scrambled for the ladder the crew struck at them - not gently at all - and hissed, and growled Rotter Rotter or or Lousehead Lousehead or or Bottom o' the barrel! Bottom o' the barrel! The soldiers joined in; even the tarboys struggled to land a few blows. The soldiers joined in; even the tarboys struggled to land a few blows.

The mystified pa.s.sengers looked on, appalled. But the crew were relieved: now at last they knew why they had been called on deck. No one, not even Uskins, was truly angry. This was a procedural pa.s.sion, and one more way of seeking good luck on the voyage. From time out of mind it had been the practice of the Merchant Service (and the Arquali navy) to induct crew members with threats and insults - the better to protect them from the ghosts of dead sailors, who might feel jealous if they received smiles and friendly applause. Every recruit knew of these rights. They would, in fact, have taken grave offence if treated kindly.

Pazel and Neeps jostled with the rest, looking for someone to abuse. By the weird logic of the service, to hang back now was the only true form of contempt. Rounding the starboard windscoop, Pazel saw a wiry Simjan sailor rushing forward, arms wrapped protectively about his head. 'Sc.u.m!' he cried, and pulled back his fist. he cried, and pulled back his fist.

A rough hand caught his arm. He was yanked backwards, off balance. Jervik's fist came down like a club against the side of his head. The next moment he was on the deck. Moisture struck his chin: Jervik's spit.

'You ain't crew no more,' he said. 'Don't you forget it.'

Then Jervik was gone into the melee. Pazel felt as though a horse had kicked him in the face. In a blind rage he forced himself to stand - and just as quickly fell, dizzied and weak. I'll get you, Jervik, I'll get you, d.a.m.n your dumb soul I'll get you, Jervik, I'll get you, d.a.m.n your dumb soul.

Neeps found him as the free-for-all came to an end: Pazel had crawled to the back of the crowd and laid his face against a cool iron breastplate. Neeps helped him stand up. The look the small boy wore might have given a Turach commando pause.