Bone Jack

The captain responded with silence. Then, as the natural order of things dictated, he snatched the sword and pointed it at Itzal’s throat.

To his credit, the captain didn’t immediately slash Itzal’s throat. Instead, he looked over at Nergui. It gratified Itzal, and somewhat slowed his hard-beating heart, to see he had correctly judged the captain to be an intelligent sort and not given to rash actions. The captain looked at Nergui, waiting for an explanation. Nergui, in his turn, looked at Itzal with the strained twist of his mouth, more grimace than smile, of a man who hoped that the explanation wasn’t as foolish as he expected it to be.

“I want passage to Modris Khan,” Itzal said. “I needed it swiftly, and I have no property with which to barter.”

“Which is peculiar,” Nergui said. “And convenient, since we intend to make sail for Modris Khan. It does not, however, suggest any reason why we should not kill you and your men now.”

“I can think of one reason,” Itzal said. He took a deep breath. He had known at this point that he would have a sword pointed at him. It felt more nerve-wracking than he expected. He had to struggle to keep his breathing and heartbeat calm.

“Please,” Nergui said. “Share, before you find your insides scattered on the deck.”

“Master Maledict Lilywhite’s failed negotiations did not fail as much as you heard,” Itzal said.

That left Nergui silent for a moment. “Why would you mention that name?” he asked.

That calmed Itzal a great deal. Lilywhite struck the right chord. “Lilywhite attempted to stall negotiations with your khan for control of a certain property of military application,” Itzal said. “And Lilywhite couldn’t deliver.”

“Which means what to you?” Nergui asked.

“I have delivered,” Itzal said.

“Have you,” Nergui said, letting the words have a bit of a questioning tone but filling them mostly with disbelief.

“With your permission…” Itzal said, reaching for a pocket of his new coat. Itzal looked at the captain, making his intentions clear. The captain nodded. Itzal took out the bill of ownership that named himself as owner of the Full Kits. He handed it to Nergui. Nergui raised an eyebrow at the smears of blood, but read the document without comment till he nearly finished it.

“It says weapons and armor…” Nergui said. “And…what is this word? My Alwatan could use some work.”

“It means these men here,” Itzal said, gesturing at the Full Kits. “These are some of the legendary Warrior Slaves of the Guild of Slandersmiths…at least, I think they’re legendary. Are you?” Itzal asked Caesura. Caesura, smiling again, bowed, slow and graceful.

“Master forgive, if I speak out of turn,” Caesura said. “The Warrior Slave of Alwatan enters into the stories of other realms as a whirling nightmare, leaving red histories in the ground of shortened lineage.”

“There you have it,” Itzal said, turning back to Nergui. “Could not have said it better myself. At all. I see what Bat-erdene meant about you, Caesura. Heart of a poet. So you see, Mister Nergui. I am in the midst of delivering certain promised property to Modris Khan. I shall be obliged for any aid you think you can afford me.”

Nergui’s tight frown far from communicated cheer. He looked rather more like someone suffering from the shock of misjudging somebody else about whom they’d felt quite certain.

To his credit, whatever his personal feelings, Nergui didn’t bow to pettiness. He said a few words to the captain, who barked a few back. Nergui, then, seemed to pull rank. The captain had that torn look of a ship’s captain being told to give place to a higher authority. On a ship, there ought not be any higher authority than the skipper. Whatever appeal or threat that Nergui made had the effect Itzal hoped it would. With a hissing growl as irritated as a wordless sound could be, the captain lifted the point of the sword from Itzal’s chest. As if intent to vent his feelings on something, if he couldn’t on Itzal, the captain strode into the midst of his crew. He began shouting commands that had his sailors tripping to make corrections to everything they did.

Nergui held the folded bill of ownership out to Itzal. “He wants to throw you and these…Warrior Slaves in irons, and store you in the bilge.”

“I suppose, if that’s the only place for us…” Itzal started to say. Nergui waved the words aside.

“There are quarters available. We came this way with minimum crew,” Nergui said. “In order to take warriors back with us from Khuurai Dalain. We never expected Galzuu Khan to send any, but there are appearances to maintain.”

“Why bother with the trip?” Itzal asked. “Seems an awful lot of trouble.”

“There are old laws to respect,” Nergui said. Then hesitated. He stared with his sagging eyes out at the horizon. Even so, Itzal felt himself being measured up. This Nergui listened more than he watched, and remembered more than he looked. Itzal simultaneously liked that, and decided to be wary of it. A man who did not rely on his eyes could in some ways be less easily fooled.

Seeming to come to a decision about Itzal, Nergui said, “And there are invisible movements to consider. Ours is an economy of honor and merit…or it is, at least, an economy of the perception of the same. Like a magician, sometimes we must draw attention to something before it might be effective.”

“So…Modris Khan was…what, bragging?”

Nergui squinted. “That word is crude.”

Itzal made note Nergui didn’t disagree.

“I am sure you are hungered. I find busy mornings leave me hungered,” Nergui said. “And your slaves as well.”

Itzal frowned at the phrase. Nergui noticed.

“You do not like to own other men?” Nergui asked. Itzal shook his head. Nergui nodded. “When I completed my indentured years, I did not know how to define myself. To be owned gave shape to my life.” Nergui paused—thought about it. “Still, it is better to own myself.”

Nergui had a lunch spread out for Itzal and the Full Kits in an empty space forward of the crew hammocks. Nergui said this would have been the place where warriors from Galzuu Khan would berth.

“It is somewhat fitting that you should take the space,” he said, looking around the spacious emptiness. If thoughts zipped around behind his eyes he did a good job of concealing them. “We prepared for a much larger contingency.”

Itzal faced his face in different directions, as if paying attention. He nodded, pretending to complete the effect. Really, he paid attention to the food and not much else.

“Do you know that, had you been any better expected, your reception would have been much different,” Nergui said. Itzal looked at the steward’s inscrutable face. “You fell upon us like a stone from the sky. The only reason you are not more dead is this fact that we did not know to expect you.”

“That is an advantage I mean to press for as long as I can,” Itzal said.

Nergui no doubt had some thought or emotional response to that, but he gave no sign of it. For a while longer, he sat with Itzal and the Full Kits. Then he excused himself and left.

“Keep an eye on each other,” he said before leaving. “The crew feels no great warmth toward you. Do not relax your guard, else you’ll find yourselves more uncomfortable than you are.”

Then he left.

“Master forgive, if I speak out of turn,” Caesura said. “Perhaps we ought to set a guard at the door, if he spoke true words.”

“Yes. That would be wise, Mister Kimse,” Itzal said. Nodding, Caesura gave his salute. Then he said a few words to the Full Kits. Two of them rose from the table, taking food with them, and sat cross-legged on the floor near the door.

Itzal ate for a while longer, but he slowed down. While he did, he noted that the Full Kits seemed to be talking about him, if their gestures and smiles were anything to be reckoned by.

“Caesura,” Itzal said. Caesura bowed his head in his response. Itzal did admire the man’s gracefulness. He sat cross-legged on the wood planks of the dim room in a way that upraised the surroundings, in Itzal’s opinion. “Caesura, I don’t know where your loyalties lies…I mean to say, are you on their side…” Itzal nodded at the Full Kits. “I mean…I’m not sure how to ask what I mean.”

“Master forgive, if I speak out of turn,” Caesura said. “We are all on your side. I have no more loyalty to these brothers in arm of mine than I have to yourself. Barring any ludicrous suggestion you might have to hurt my brothers in arms—I will not hurt my brothers in arms, if it can be helped—I will treat your every command like my own thoughts. As we all will…it may do you well to learn a language that they know…”

“Yes, no doubt,” Itzal said. He thought for a moment. “What about requests?”

Caesura smiled. “Master was not brought up with slaves,” he said.

“Nor with servants, or anyone much to do anything for me. The closest we had back home was the cooking staff, and we only had them some of the time. Usually we cooked for ourselves. Cooked. Cleaned. Did repairs on our home… This is quite different.”

“Would it put you more at ease to make requests of us, master?” Caesura asked.

“I think so,” Itzal said.

Caesura nodded, making it slow and graceful, like a king giving assent for something. Itzal took that as permission to do it.

“In that case, then…don’t take this the wrong way…but they’re holding what you might call ‘sad conference,’ ” Itzal nodded toward the other Full Kits, talking among themselves about Itzal. “Are they talking about me? And, more importantly, are they saying anything about me that ought to concern me?”

Caesura looked serious. He turned to listen to the others. It seemed he had not noticed what they had to say until now. After a moment, Caesura smiled again. “Oh,” he said. “No.”

“No they’re not talking about me?”

“No, you have no reason to feel concerned about it,” Caesura said. “They are making…what could they be called in your tongue? Harmless jabs at your character? They are talking about how it may be difficult to keep up with you, if you make it a routine to run around at such a speed as you did when we boarded this vessel.”

“Oh,” Itzal said.

“They do not know what to make of the fact that you leaped from the jetty onto the railing of this vessel, leaping as you did past the outriggers. They think you must have done it by trickery, but they have not yet reasoned through the trick of it.”

“Oh,” Itzal said. He felt his face redden, though he didn’t know why. He couldn’t say himself how he had done it. He hadn’t noticed doing it. But now that he thought of it, that meant he’d jumped at least twenty feet, flat-footed. “I see,” Itzal said.

“Master forgive, if I speak out of turn,” Caesura said. “I do not myself know what to make of it.”

Hopefully nothing, Itzal thought. “So they’re not…planning an uprising, or something?” Itzal said, partly to change the subject, and partly because he wanted to hear the truth of the point from Caesura. Caesura could be colluding, but Itzal had to put his faith somewhere.

“Master forgive, if I speak out of turn,” Caesura said. “What put an idea like that in your head?”

“It’s a thing that usually happens with slaves,” Itzal mumbled.

“Is it?” Caesura asked.

“I hear that it is,” Itzal said.

“Master forgive, if I speak out of turn,” Caesura said. “From whom?”

“Dagny Brynjar Vang,” Itzal said.

“I…um…” Caesura said, then seemed to remember himself. “Master forgive if I speak out of turn. I believe that is a novelist. His notable works include the Epic of Gudbrand, who led a revolution of misused gladiators against their oppressors.”

“Yes.”

“We,” Caesura said, in the precise tone of someone attempting not to be offended, “are not that kind of slave.”

“Well,” Itzal said, deciding that he would decide how he felt about that after he got to know the Full Kits better. “That’s a mercy. I’m, um…I’m sorry if I gave offense. I did not mean to. This is all so new to me still.”

“Quite all right,” Caesura said in a tone that said it wasn’t yet all right, but it might be after he got over his emotions.

Itzal enjoyed traveling with the Full Kits. They knew how to use unassigned time.

“We are property,” Caesura said. “We are not passengers. We must learn to fill our time.”

They used the time mostly in drills. They’d take out weapons and fight each other. Not to win, and not from any interest to prove anything to either themselves or each other or to anyone who might be watching. They wanted to keep themselves sharp, like their weapons. Any time they didn’t spend training with their weapons, they spent maintaining their weapons. But they had slanderswords, which meant that their weapons didn’t require much maintenance. Since they finished with maintenance without much time spent, Itzal figured they’d lapse into boredom or idleness—gambling or drinking. Soldiers did that. Itzal had read about it, and he had seen it happen with the city watch back home.

The Full Kits didn’t seem to have patience for that. They did drink. They put away whatever wine, ale, mead, or grog they could get their hands on. But they never grew belligerent, and never seemed bored. They filled idle hours with chattering conversation, filled with swooping gestures. Itzal asked Caesura what they talked about.

Tearing himself from the conversation, but without a glance at Itzal to say it, Caesura explained.

“Tactics,” Caesura said.

And that was the only explanation he gave.

After that, Itzal left them to it. He tried to use the few words of Alwatan he knew to begin building his vocabulary and made slow progress. In so doing, he discovered that the Full Kits pretty much only talked tactics. They designed maneuvers for themselves and talked about past maneuvers they’d done and what they could learn from them. And they talked about the history of tactics, and tactical theory. Itzal heard the names of various generals, dead and still living, who had written about tactics and strategies and the doings of war. The Full Kits had read extensively on the subject.

Itzal wished he could catch up with their language quicker. He thought he’d learn a great deal from them.

And so that leg of the voyage continued. Itzal wished more than anything that he had a book or two to divert himself. Without any diversion at all, he spent a lot of time trying to keep his agitation under control. He didn’t have anyone to speak with about it. Caesura usually absorbed himself in conversation with the Full Kits, which needed to be the way of it, Itzal gathered. The Full Kits operated as a tight unit, so they had to all talk of what they planned to do. None of the ship’s crew liked him, even if he spoke better Yaria. They frowned at him and shouted at him to get out of the way whenever he ventured out of the room where Itzal and the Full Kits billeted. In spite of that, Itzal spent most of his time out on deck. He didn’t like to add the feelings of cramped quarters to his ever-growing feeling of isolation. Below decks he felt like a prisoner. At least on deck he could watch the far horizon—watch the grasses whip past, and the clouds blow over, grey and cold. He could smell the wind, promising rain, and take at least small comfort in the pressing of wind on his skin.

On one of these ventures on deck, he stood at the far aft rail. He’d closed his eyes so that he could breathe in the rain-scented wind, blowing before an oncoming rain shower.

“You are a peculiar…” said Nergui’s voice from nearby. He seemed to pause to choose his word. Itzal looked around while Nergui paused. “Man,” Nergui said, choosing the term. He didn’t seem happy with his choice, but he didn’t seem to have anything better in mind. “I have always known where a man is vulnerable, after not many words of conversation I always know where I can squeeze him to get what I want.”

“Sounds like a valuable skill for someone in your position,” Itzal said. “I am sure you’ve long ago discovered mine.”

The smoke from Nergui’s pipe twisted in front of his motionless eyes. “That is why you are so peculiar. You do not fear loss of wealth, nor do you seem attached to any hidden lovers. You do not have the bearing of a man who fears pain. You do not even seem to place value on your own life.”

“That’s astute, I suppose,” Itzal said.

“It is strange,” Nergui said. “I have thought of only one thing…but no, it would be wrong for so young a person.”

“I’m sure it’s correct, whatever it is,” Itzal said.

Nergui’s drooping eyes stared for a while at Itzal, as if making a judgement about Itzal’s ability to cope. “It seems to me that you would consider taking your life as a favor. As if what I could leverage over you might be threatening to keep you alive.”

That surprised Itzal. “That’s not what I thought you’d say,” Itzal said.

“Is it not?” Nergui said.

“No. I thought you’d say…” he started, then fell quiet. He had it so clear in his own mind. But now that he thought of it, he didn’t know what to call it. He had it clear. It was a warm afternoon with books and perhaps a cup of tea. But it was also a rock in a meadow where he could sit and wait for rain to start. It was also new-fallen snow, and the rare moment when the Atrium of the Academy was empty and echoed with a gargantuan silence like a giant sleeping, and a steaming hot bath. That’s what it was. That was what people could threaten him with. But what was that? He couldn’t think what.

Nergui awaited what he would say. Since Itzal didn’t know what to say, he offered an apologetic smile. Nergui didn’t return it.

“Tell me, peculiar little man,” Nergui said, “what do you hope to get from this deal with Modris Khan? You’ve gone to a great deal of trouble to get this far.”

“You have no idea how true that is,” Itzal said.

“A man who goes to such lengths does it for gain of some kind. What do you mean to gain?”

“Home,” Itzal said, then felt self-conscious like he did when he lied to professors. He had always been terrible at lying to professors. He’d get hot and bothered and come clean just to get rid of the discomfort. He felt like that now. The sensation confused him. He could not think what might be dishonest in the answer.

Nergui squinted exactly like a professor who knew they detected a lie, making Itzal even more uncomfortable. It did nothing to help his imagination. He continued to feel nervous and dishonest, and he could not think how to put it right.