The Black Lung Captain

Twelve

The rain began again in the night. They trudged through the mud, slipping on roots, cold and soaked to the bone. Any hope of shelter had been left behind with their packs. Though they were hungry and tired, nobody had any thought of stopping. They had no idea if the beast-men were tracking them or not, but Frey didn't want to get caught napping. By unspoken consent they travelled through the night, making their slow, frustrating and occasionally painful way through the near-total dark of the rainforest.

The downpour let up at dawn, and a dull light came over the cloud-shrouded land. By then Frey was utterly miserable: half-drowned, freezing and exhausted. But nothing had killed them in the night, and the worst they'd suffered on their journey were scrapes and bruises, so he reckoned they could count themselves lucky.

We're coming back three men less than when we set out, he thought. But none of them were mine. That's the important thing. I brought them all back alive.

Grist was plodding along tiredly ahead of him, following in Hodd's footsteps. Frey eyed the strange metal sphere cradled under his arm. He hadn't let it go for a moment, not even when the beast-men attacked.

What are we gonna do about that? he wondered. He didn't trust Grist not to pull a doublecross. Didn't feel at all easy about letting him hold on to that thing. There'd be another confrontation before all of this was over. He wondered if he'd come out of it so well the second time.

They reached the landing site in the early morning. There was a general exclamation of relief as they spied the gunwale of the Storm Dog rising over the treetops, and a round of congratulations for Hodd, who'd guided them expertly by night to get them back to safety. The mood became suddenly buoyant. They'd made it. Even if they weren't exactly carrying chests of booty, they still felt like they'd conquered the savage island. Frey's crew would be glad just to get back to somewhere they could get a good meal and a mug of grog.

The trees thinned out and they walked into the barren clearing where their aircraft stood. The sounds of the awakening rainforest filled the air, and they could hear the distant bellow of the waterfall that fell from the mountains, but otherwise all was quiet. The cargo ramps of their craft were closed, and there was not a sign of another living being. They came to a stop, sensing something amiss.

'Maybe it's earlier than we thought?' Crake suggested, consulting his pocket watch. 'Nobody up yet?'

'Something ain't right,' Malvery rumbled. 'Feel it in my pods.'

'In your pods?' Pinn asked.

Malvery clasped his crotch with one hand. 'My pods are shrinking,' said Malvery. 'Trying to hide, ain't they? Sure sign of trouble.'

'Sure sign of you being a bloody fruitcake,' Pinn muttered. 'The day I take advice from your bollocks is the day I—'

'Go back to your fairytale sweetheart?' Crake finished for him, rather maliciously.

'Hey!' Pinn cried, but Malvery's guffaw drowned him out.

Frey was getting a bad feeling about this whole situation. It got worse when he heard the crunch of a shotgun being primed behind him. Malvery's laughter died away to a quizzical and rather worried chuckle.

'Everyone stay right where you are,' said a voice. 'Keep your hands away from them pistols!' He heard footsteps on the stony ground. Men coming from the trees behind them.

His heart sank. He should have seen it coming. Should have known Grist would try and pull something.

'Throw your weapons on the ground, all of you!' ordered the voice.

'You just told us to keep our hands away from them!' Frey said. 'Make up your mind.'

It wasn't a smart thing to do, but Frey was frustrated and he couldn't curb his mouth in time. He was rewarded with a shotgun butt to the back of his head, which sent him to his knees, skull pulsing with white agony.

'Anyone else want to be clever?'

Frey spat bitterly and blinked to try and clear his vision. He pulled out his pistol and tossed it away.

I should have seen it coming. Should never have trusted that bastard. Not even for a moment.

But when he looked up, he saw Grist throwing his own weapon on the ground, his face dark as a thundercloud.

Not him? Then who?

Frey got back to his feet, his hands in the air, and faced the newcomers. There were six he could see, and several more stepping into the clearing from the other side. They must have encircled the aircraft and lain in wait. Hard-faced men who looked like they knew their business. The foremost - the one who'd almost brained him with a shotgun butt - was a hulking bruiser with a face like a bag of spanners. A man behind him was fumbling with a flare gun, which he raised and fired into the sky.

'Where's my crew?' Grist snarled.

'Trussed up safe, Cap'n Grist. Don't you worry,' said Spanners.

'And mine?' Frey asked.

Spanners gave him a look. 'Still in the Ketty Jay, far as I know. She ain't goin' anywhere, and nobody's stupid enough to try gettin' inside with that golem waitin'. Don't intend on tanglin' with that beast twice.'

Twice? Frey thought. Who are these people?

Then he heard the rumbling of engines overhead. He looked up to see the prow of a frigate gliding into sight from behind the peak of a nearby mountain. His heart had already sunk into his stomach; now it felt like it was trying to make its way down his leg with the intention of tunnelling through his foot and heading underground.

He knew that frigate. That black, scarred monster, built like an ocean liner, her deck laden with weaponry.

Trinica Dracken's craft: the Delirium Trigger.

He watched the shuttle descend from the frigate with a deep sense of trepidation. She would be on it, of course. The woman he'd loved, once, back when they were both young and didn't know any better. The woman he'd deserted on their wedding day. The woman who'd tried to kill herself in her grief and only succeeded in killing the baby in her womb. His baby.

But that was a long time ago. Before she became one of the most feared pirates in Vardia. Before she robbed him of a fortune outside Retribution Falls.

Before she changed into something else.

They waited at gunpoint, surrounded by armed men. Their own guns had been unloaded and left in a heap a short distance away, along with their blades and other weaponry. Frey's cutlass rested on top of the heap; assorted knives, machetes, clubs and a set of knuckledusters were scattered around it.

A cold wind blew across the landing site. Frey tried not to shiver in his wet clothes. He clamped his jaw, which was threatening to tremble. He wouldn't show any weakness. Not to her.

The shutde touched down, and a ramp opened to let the passengers out. His stomach was a painful knot of anticipation. Damn it, how did that woman do this to him? Half of him hated her, the other half craved seeing her again. It had been more than a year since he'd last laid eyes on her, while she was depriving him of a hard-won chest of ducats that could have made him a rich man.

He'd imagined a reunion many times since, in many different ways. But always in circumstances more favourable than this.

Then he saw her. She stepped off the shuttle, her bosun by her side. Slender, dressed head to toe in black. Chalk-white skin, short blond hair hacked into clumps. Red lips, garishly painted. She wore contact lenses to blacken her irises, making her pupils seem wide as coins. Everything about her was calculated to unsettle. She dressed like Death's bride, or perhaps his whore, and people called her both.

The very sight of her made him angry. He couldn't help it. How could she bury her beauty under this horrifying facade? Her very existence was a blasphemy against the girl who lived in his memory. His idealised portrait of perfect romance. The love that might have been.

How could she do that to him?

'Trinica Dracken,' Grist muttered. 'I heard of her.'

'Yeah,' said Frey. 'Me, too.'

He recognised her bosun from their last meeting. A squat man, with matted black hair that hung untidily around a swarthy, simian face. His skin was puckered in a patch over his cheek and throat, a burn scar, visible above the collar of his shirt. Frey tried to keep his eyes on the bosun as they approached, so he wouldn't have to look at Trinica. But his gaze kept going back to her, and eventually he gave in to it.

She stopped in front of them and looked them over. Her black eyes lingered a moment on Frey before passing by with scarcely a glimmer of recognition or greeting. Then she looked at Spanners.

'This is all they had on 'em,' he said, holding out the metal sphere.

'Then that's what we came for,' Trinica said. 'Mr Crund?'

Her bosun took the sphere from Spanners. Grist glowered and seethed at the sight. Frey fancied he could feel the heat of the rage coming off him.

'Captain Grist, Captain Frey,' said Trinica, nodding at both of them. 'It's been a pleasure.'

And with that, she turned and walked away. Crund departed with her. The armed men who'd surrounded them backed off towards the shuttle, keeping their weapons trained on the captives.

Frey stared after her. Stunned.

That was it? That was all? No 'Long time, Darian?' Not even the banter of old adversaries? He'd waited a year to see her again and that was all she gave him?

She'd robbed him doubly this time. It wasn't just that she'd taken the sphere from them; it was that she'd done it with such a shattering disregard for his feelings. He'd thought about her ever since their last meeting, reliving that final smile she'd given him. A smile that came from the old Trinica, the briefest glimpse of the young woman he'd loved. He believed in that smile. He'd convinced himself that young woman was still there, buried under the heartless criminal she'd become. He'd fantasised about meeting her again, teasing out that smile once more.

But she, apparently, hadn't given him a moment's consideration.

They stood in silence as the shuttle rejoined the frigate. Nobody was quite sure what to say. They watched as the Delirium Trigger lit its thrusters and slid out of sight over the mountains.

'I really hate that bitch,' Frey muttered.

'How did she know?' Grist snarled. There was danger in his tone, like the ominous rumblings that precede an earthquake. His face was red; he was almost choking with rage. 'How did she find us? How did she know?' He turned and faced the group. 'Which one of you told her?'

Frey was intimidated enough to take an unconscious step back, but Malvery was uncowed. 'Calm down, mate,' he said. 'We've not been out of your sight since you came to us with the job. It's hardly gonna be one of us.'

Hodd raised a quivering hand. 'Remember that I, ah, approached several people before I came across your good self, Captain Grist. It's entirely possible that—'

He got no further. Grist gave a bellow of rage, and punched him in the face with appalling force. Hodd squealed as he fell to the ground, holding his bloody mouth, eyes wide with fear and distress. Grist stamped over to the heap of weapons, scooped up a machete, and stamped back towards Hodd, who'd got to his knees and was making incoherent shrieking noises through his hands.

'Here, wait a minute . . .' said Malvery, but his protest was halfhearted. None of them really thought he'd do it. Not until he swung the machete with all his might and buried it in the side of Hodd's neck.

Time stopped for Frey. The shock of the moment froze them all where they were. Hodd gaped blankly.

Then he coughed, and a flood of red spilled from his throat and over his lips. His hand came up and felt for the grip of the machete, as if trying to work out what it was. He made a feeble attempt to pull it free, but his hand slipped on the blood that had already coated the handle. It squirted from the wound in grotesque pulses.

His eyes had that terrible look in them. A look Frey had seen many times before. The look of a man who couldn't quite believe his time was up.

He keeled over sideways and was still.

Grist stared down at the explorer, his chest heaving. Nobody said a word. They watched him carefully, waiting to see what he'd do next.

'We're gonna get the sphere back,' he said eventually. 'We're gonna get it back, you hear? Your crew and mine. We'll track that woman down and we'll have what's ours and more besides. Nobody steals from Harvin Grist.' He took a breath, straightened, and looked over at Frey. 'You in, or not?'

Frey looked back at him. Trying to judge the depth of the mania in Grist's eyes. His first appraisal of the man had been seriously off. There was a blackness at his core that Frey didn't like at all.

To give up his shot at a fortune was no easy thing. This was the second time Trinica had stolen from him, and that was hard to take. But even so, he could have walked away. He was getting in over his head, and he knew it. Might as well play with dynamite as have a partner like Grist.

But she'd scarcely acknowledged him. That was what burned. All this time, all that had passed between them, and he meant less than nothing to her. He felt snubbed and humiliated, and he wanted to make her pay for that. He wanted revenge. She'd never walk all over him again.

'I get Hodd's five per cent,' he said, motioning toward the dead man.

Grist snorted in disgust. 'Fifty-fifty it is, you bloodsuckin' bastard,' he said. He turned his back and walked off towards the Storm Dog. Crattle followed him.

'Another mission ends in resounding success, then,' Malvery said sarcastically. He headed for the Ketty Jay. The others drifted away after him, all except Jez, who was eyeing the corpse of Hodd.

'You sure about this?' she said doubtfully.

'No,' said Frey. 'But we're doing it anyway.'

Jez nodded to herself. 'Right you are, Cap'n,' she said. Then she, too, walked off towards the Ketty Jay, and Frey was left alone.