The Diamond Isle

5

‘Go on, have a grape.’

‘Thank you, no,’ Kinsel Rukanis repeated stiffly, keeping his eyes downcast. He’d found it safer that way.

Kingdom Vance replaced the crystal fruit bowl on a polished oak table. He plucked a grape for himself, popped it into his mouth and assumed an exaggerated expression of pleasure. ‘Hmmm. You don’t know what you’re missing.’

‘What I’m missing,’ Kinsel said, daring to lift his gaze, ‘is my freedom.’

The pirate feigned concern. ‘Is my generosity lacking in some way? Is the quality of the wine not to your liking? Are the silk sheets on your bed-’

‘I hate to spoil the delight you take in mocking me, Vance, but please don’t abuse my intelligence.’

‘You think it intelligent to insult my generosity? When someone talks to me like that it’s usually a prelude to their death.’

‘Then have done with it. Even dying’s preferable to your brand of hospitality.’

‘You can have your freedom whenever you want. Or at least a chance to win it. You’ve only to meet me in combat. We can do it now, up on deck.’

‘I’ve told you before that I won’t do that.’

‘Should you win, I give you my word that my crew would release you, if that’s what you’re worried about. Or if it’s a question of your skills being less than mine, I’m sure we could find a way of evening the odds. I could fight with one hand tied, perhaps.’

‘I’ll not lift a sword against you or any other man.’

Vance laughed. ‘You fascinate me, Rukanis. You’re not a coward, yet you don’t believe in violence. Whereas I’ve always found it an invaluable tool in my line, not to mention a continuous source of entertainment.’

It was no idle boast. Kinsel had seen Vance’s fickle brutality toward his enemies and crew alike.

Both men were big, in their different ways. Vance was taller than average and large-framed. A mass of black curly hair framed his craggy, blemished face, and he was full-bearded. He favoured showy clothing; blue ankle-length frockcoat with gold trimming, breeches stuffed into thigh-high leather boots. And he swathed himself in jewellery: bracelets and ear studs, chains and pendants, rings on every finger.

Where Vance was flamboyant, Rukanis was modest by nature; in his life before slavery he could hardly have been called ostentatious. He was a little below the norm in height, and thickset, with a slightly barrelled chest that denoted the extra lung capacity of a singer; though the tattered convict’s uniform he currently wore hung looser now. His hair and beard were dark and had started out trimmed short, but now both were growing unruly.

Vance crunched into a red apple. ‘If you’re not willing to fight for your freedom,’ he said, chewing, ‘I’m not inclined to grant it.’ He discarded the apple after a further bite, tossing it casually over his shoulder. It joined a clutter of half eaten fruit littering the floor of his grandly appointed cabin. ‘Besides, you’re more use to me alive.’

‘Why?’

‘The gift of your voice, for one thing. Despite what you may think, I’m no savage.’ He belched and wiped the juice from his beard with the back of his sleeve.

‘What’s the other thing?’

‘You were sentenced for Resistance activities. Who better to call for those on the island to give up?’

‘I’d be appealing to strangers. Why should they listen to me?’

‘You underestimate your influence. The Diamond Isle’s been taken over by rebels. Chances are you know some of them.’

‘That’s quite an assumption. And even if I did, why should they give up because of me? Their vision’s bigger than one man.’

‘Vision,’ the pirate mouthed contemptuously. ‘They have as much vision as a eunuch looking for a good time in a whorehouse.’ He fixed Rukanis with a steely gaze. ‘Do you know Zahgadiah Darrok?’

‘I’ve heard the name,’ Kinsel replied cagily.

‘Darrok’s behind this defiance. He’s formed a union with these damned revolutionaries to keep me from what’s rightfully mine.’

‘You mean the island? I thought he owned it.’

Vance flashed sudden anger. He brought his fist down hard on the table, jangling the dishes. ‘Own be damned! He as good as stole it from me!’

Kinsel thought that unlikely, but judged it best to stay silent.

‘Darrok and I share a history,’ Vance continued, calming somewhat. ‘We worked in harness to forge a dominion in these waters, and further afield.’ He adopted a theatrically hurt look. ‘I thought we were friends. Then he stabbed me in the back. It was a grievous betrayal.’

‘I don’t see what it has to do with me.’

‘Then you lack imagination, singer. That island rightly belongs to me, and to the alliance I’ve built with my fellow merchant adventurers. We need it as a base, and I’ll do whatever it takes to get it. If that means using you any way I see fit, I will.’

‘They won’t trade, if that’s what you’re thinking. And I wouldn’t want them to.’

‘How noble of you,’ Vance sneered.

‘Look at it from their point of view. My well-being or all their futures. It’s no contest.’

‘We’ll see.’

‘This whole thing is insane, Vance. You’re wasting lives in pursuit of…what? A rock in the middle of the ocean. There are other islands. Why not settle for one of them?’

‘Lives are just another overhead in my business. The men who threw in their lot with the alliance did it willingly, and they knew the risks. Lives are nothing. It’s my honour that counts.’

‘So your honour demands such carnage? Surely it’s better to come to some accommodation with the rebels. They might even-’

‘Enough! Your…reasonableness vexes me.’

Kinsel braced himself for a blow. Or worse. It didn’t come. Instead Vance leaned back in his chair and thumped his feet on the table. He supported his head with laced fingers at the back of his neck.

‘Sing for me,’ he said. ‘The way you did the other day, after the raid. Soothe me.’

‘And if I refuse?’

‘You’re so concerned about lives. The fate of the next…oh, let’s say ten prisoners who fall into my hands will hang on what you decide now. And so will the prisoners.’ He laughed at his little joke.

‘Very well,’ Rukanis replied quietly. He stood, doing his best to prepare himself for what would be an ordeal.

‘Make it something restful,’ Vance ordered. ‘All this talk sets my nerves jangling.’

Given that his captor displayed the volatile emotions of a child, Kinsel decided on a lullaby.

He began to sing. The air he chose wasn’t particularly doleful, but his interpretation lent it a certain melancholy, and inevitably it brought Tanalvah to mind, and the children. The thought of them was all that kept him going. Now he was performing a lament for their loss, and found a kind of solace in it.

His thoughts turned to the world of normality he’d been forced to leave behind. Its familiarity, its certainties, seemed so distant and unreal to him now.

Kinsel Rukanis longed for his old life. He craved the sanity of Bhealfa.

Somewhere in the backwoods of western Bhealfa, Prince Melyobar was attempting to eat a raw chicken.

He sat at a small dining table in the spacious wheelhouse of his palace, wearing a look of distaste as he chewed unyielding, rubbery flesh.

‘Urgh!’ He spat out the meat, grimacing. ‘This is disgusting! Whose idea was it to serve me such muck?’

An alarmed manservant hurried forward, bowing low. ‘Begging your pardon, Your Highness, but…you ordered it that way.’

‘What?’ He blinked at the man, perplexed.

‘You said…that is, Your Royal Highness commanded that your food be served uncooked in future. In order to foil poisoners.’

‘When?’

‘You were gracious enough to issue the order to your chef yesterday, Highness.’

‘Nonsense!’

‘But, Your Eminence-’

‘Claptrap, I say! The fool misheard me. Or somebody’s being deliberately wayward.’ His plate and cutlery went flying. ‘Take it away!’

The servant bent to retrieve the debris, then scurried off, trying to bolt and fawn simultaneously.

‘Flog the cook!’ Melyobar shouted after him. ‘And have yourself flogged for insolence!’ Contemplating the empty table, a suspicion dawned. ‘Gods,’ the Prince muttered. ‘Guards! Guards!’

A pair of sentinels rushed to him, drawing their swords.

‘Sire?’ the sergeant enquired.

‘I’ve reason to believe he could be on board.’ They had no need to ask who their monarch referred to. ‘I think he’s using his shape-changing powers. Sound the alert. Comb the palace for someone impersonating me.’ The guards seemed confused, then stared quizzically at him. ‘Well it’s not me, obviously! Dolts. Now get on with it!’

The duo retreated. Further instructions were unnecessary. They were called on to search for Death at least once a day.

Tense at the best of times, the incident did nothing to steady Melyobar’s nerves. Although barely into middle-age, he looked much older, and his thinning hair had greyed early. His shaved face was bulbous, with a sallow complexion; his body was flabby, running to stout.

‘Your Highness!’ the steersman hailed from the wheel. ‘We’re approaching the valley!’

Melyobar rose and went to join him, the episode of just seconds before forgotten. The brevity of the Prince’s attention span was legendary.

The upper half of the wheelhouse consisted of an expanse of precious clear glass. Melyobar took in the scene. Ahead lay the mouth of a deep valley, though it was hard to see in the driving snow. A trail could just be made out snaking through the valley’s floor, edged with snow-laden trees.

Had an observer been stationed on top of either cliff-like wall, enduring the blizzard, they would have witnessed an awesome sight.

The Prince’s floating palace was enormous, beyond ostentatious in its embellishments, and now the whole prickly confection bore a coat of sparkling white. Moved by magic whose cost took a sizeable bite out of Bhealfa’s gross national product, the palace glided under the direction of a team of top-grade wizards.

Equally impressive was the court’s entourage. Several dozen lesser castles and mansions, owned by leading courtiers, and similarly powered, followed in its wake. ‘Lesser’ in comparison to Melyobar’s gigantic folly, that is. They would still appear remarkable if seen without the contrast.

As it drifted regally, the whole procession was bathed in a crackling discharge of magical energy. Dazzling tendrils leapt from one structure to another, like blue lightning, connecting them in a glittery, ever changing web.

Down below, on mere ground, an army kept pace. In fact, two armies; one a military force deserving the name, the other a ragbag of civilian camp followers, tens of thousands strong. They travelled in a multitude of every conceivable wheeled transport, or rode herds of horses. The lowliest plodded on foot. All were stung by driven snow and cut by icy winds.

‘Why are we moving so slowly?’ Melyobar demanded, slumping into his throne.

‘The weather, sire,’ the steersman explained nervously. ‘This is about as fast as we can go in these conditions.’ He pointed to the glass. ‘And that valley is very narrow, Highness. Getting us through will be like threading a needle.’

Melyobar snorted.

The steersman, along with his superiors and all their subordinates, would much rather have gone another way, but the Prince insisted on this route; and to fly above the gorge would have taken a ruinous amount of magic.

They entered the valley’s entrance carefully, well above the treetops. On both sides the sheer cliffs seemed to press in. Beads of sweat appeared on the burly steersman’s brow as he gently manoeuvred his titanic charge. The navigation took every ounce of his skill, not least because his commands had to anticipate the great bulk he was trying to control. It was like steering a mighty ship at sea; there was a lag of some seconds before its phenomenal weight sluggishly responded.

They lost a little height and the base of the palace brushed across the tops of some particularly tall trees. The dislodged snow plummeted onto the camp followers travelling beneath, adding to their discomfort and vexation. They sent up an anguished roar of protest. The steersman gingerly began to regain altitude.

‘Oh, do get a move on!’ Melyobar grumbled. ‘We’ve no time to waste!’

The startled handler’s concentration was fractured. His hand jerked on the wheel, just enough to move the leviathan a degree off course. He struggled to right it.

Inexorably, the palace slowly glided towards the right-hand cliff wall. There was a series of loud crashes, followed by an intense grinding noise as it scraped along the cliff face. Everyone in the wheelhouse, a score at least of functionaries and guards, had their teeth set on edge. The room shuddered. Glassware and china crashed to the floor.

The Prince seemed supremely unaffected, or curiously unaware of what was happening.

Gradually the palace corrected itself and resumed its stately trajectory, but no more than half a minute of relative calm ensued. A sharp bend in the valley loomed ahead, and in order to negotiate it safely the palace’s speed had to be further reduced. It was a delicate operation. If the speed dropped too low it could cut off the magical supply, and their means of support.

Taking what felt like an age, with Melyobar’s obvious impatience a constant background presence, the steersman took them round the serpentine curve. He was aided by two assistants now, working a bank of levers that operated a complicated system of rudders.

When at last they were back on the straight, to many suppressed sighs of relief, Melyobar again urged more haste. As the valley opened out at that point, the palace could increase its pace.

At the rear, the entourage followed, a line of drones trailing their mammoth queen. They swarmed at the bend in a hovering queue, each slowing as much as they dared to traverse the turn. But one of the last, a multi-turreted affair faced with alabaster, approached a grandiose castle that lay in its path too fast. The speeding structure resorted to braking and swerving at the same time. It clipped the castle, sending it wobbling aside, and careered towards a cliff wall. The speeds involved were relative, so to onlookers it was like watching a clumsy underwater ballet.

The ricocheting palace struck the cliff and literally compressed, a good third of its mass compacting in on itself. Chunks of masonry dislodged and fell. For a drawn out moment the building hung in the air, cerulean lightning playing all over its surface. Then the light went out and its compact with gravity was cancelled.

It plunged like a rock.

That part of the horde unlucky enough to be directly below stood no chance. The palace, disintegrating as it fell, shedding screaming occupants, came down as an avalanche. Its impact was thunderous, and released huge billows of dust that even the heavy snowfall was hard put to dampen.

Melyobar stood to get a better view of the chaos visited on the gorge. ‘I believe that was Count Barazell’s residence,’ he observed, addressing no one in particular. ‘Damned bad luck.’ He sank back into his throne, sighing. ‘Still, should keep Death diverted for a while. Every cloud and all that.’ He waved a languid hand at the crew. ‘Full speed ahead.’

The palace gathered momentum. The end of the valley could be seen, and soon the procession would be in the open snow-covered fields beyond.

Melyobar beckoned an aide. The man was ashen, like everyone else in the room; but they differed from the Prince insofar as his features were permanently wan.

‘As soon as we’re clear,’ he said in an undertone, ‘have search parties sent back.’

The aide stooped. ‘Of course, my lord. I’ll have the rescue teams prepare.’

‘Rescue? Oh. Very well, if they find any surviving aristocrats they can bring them out. But tell them to give corpses priority.’

‘Corpses, Highness?’ The aide’s rigid, tight-lipped response made him look like one himself.

‘Just a selection. I could use a couple of dozen.’

‘Does your Highness require any particular kinds of…cadaver?’

‘I’m not fussy. But come to think of it, bodies of the lower orders serve us best, I think.’

‘Very good, sir. Will that be all, Your Highness?’

‘Yes, yes. Get on with it.’

When the official had gone, Melyobar rose, passed a gamut of bowing flunkies and left the wheelhouse. Outside, he was joined by an escort of his personal guard, four strong, who fell in behind him. He led them to a corridor terminating in an oak door. The sorcerer lounging in a chair beside it leapt up, and in a flurry of obsequiousness opened the door and ushered in the Prince and his guard, then squeezed in after them.

They were in a perfectly square, wood-panelled room not much bigger than a large cupboard. The only things in it were a glamoured lighting orb on the ceiling and a book-sized slab of brown porcelain, etched with runes, set into the wall by the door. At Melyobar’s curt order, the sorcerer laid his palm against it.

The room began to descend. Slow at first, it quickly picked up speed, causing the Prince’s stomach to take a little tickling flip. It was a sensation he quite enjoyed.

His private elevation chamber was essentially a box. It sat inside a shaft that ran from this high point to one of the palace’s lowest, with access to various levels in between. Magically generated pressure, drawing from the same energy propelling the castle, moved the chamber up or down at the direction of its wizard operator. Melyobar prided himself on embracing all the latest conveniences.

The limit of the chamber’s capacity was six people. Consequently they were all crushed together, with Melyobar at the centre of the scrum, allowing his bodyguards a unique opportunity to experience his eccentric attitude to personal hygiene. The descent passed in an awkward silence.

When they finally arrived at their destination, to a chorus of expelled breaths, they tumbled into a subterranean corridor. Leaving the sorcerer behind, the group entered a labyrinth of tunnels which led to a lengthy journey through a series of checkpoints and locked gates. At last they came to a pair of heavily reinforced doors guarded by armed men. Melyobar ordered his escort to wait and went in alone.

He was in a large, windowless room with rough stone walls that made it resemble a cavern, though scores of glamoured globes kept it well lit. Perhaps twenty people were working there, most of them sorcerers.

A wizard greeted him. ‘You’ll require this, Highness,’ he added, offering a bulky white mask identical to the one he and all the others were wearing.

Melyobar needed the sorcerer’s help to position it correctly over his nose and mouth. The mask had been soaked in some kind of sanitising agent, mixed with a mild perfume, which made the Prince cough.

‘How goes the work?’ he asked when he stopped spluttering.

‘Well, sire. Would you care to see?’

‘Why else would I be here?’

The sorcerer guided him to the far end of the room. Four huge metal tanks stood there, each with a glass window. Melyobar went to the nearest and peered in, but all he could see was milky liquid. He was about to complain when a spherical, deathly white object bumped against the glass. The Prince jerked back in shock, emitting a startled squeak.

‘No need for alarm, Highness,’ the sorcerer assured him. ‘Nothing here can harm us providing we’re careful.’

Melyobar stared in morbid fascination at the floating corpse’s head. It looked as though it had been a man, but as putrefaction had set in, it was hard to tell. One eye was missing, the other bulged. The flesh was bloated and turning green.

‘Begging your indulgence, Highness,’ the sorcerer went on, ‘but we really do need some more subjects.’

‘I have it in hand. You’ve made use of all the others?’

‘Oh, yes, sire. But the process is experimental, as you know, and wastage has been high.’

The travelling court yielded dead people on a regular basis. Melyobar had supposed enemies hung from the battlements in cages until they starved. Others he tortured at random on the chance they might be his shape-changing arch-foe in disguise. Some he merely had stabbed while having dinner with him. But these obviously weren’t enough for the sorcerers’ needs.

‘What else have you to show me?’ the Prince said.

‘We have our first distillation, sire,’ the wizard informed him with a note of glee.

‘You’ve produced the essence?’

‘Not quite, Highness. But we’re very close. Come, sire. See.’

He took his liege to a secure cabinet and inserted a glamoured key. Reaching inside, he brought out a tiny glass phial. Praying Melyobar wouldn’t demand to handle it, he held the container up to be examined.

The Prince blinked myopically. ‘It’s completely clear,’ he complained, ‘like water.’

‘Don’t be deceived, my lord. There is much here that cannot be seen.’

‘But will it do the job?’

‘In sufficient strength and quantity, sire, yes. Indeed, we’ve begun testing.’

‘Show me.’

An adjoining chamber, one of many, housed a pigsty. It wasn’t possible to enter as the door had been replaced with a thick sheet of glass, but Melyobar could see well enough. The sty was filthy. Two mature pigs lay on the straw, shivering convulsively, their legs in spasm. Their skin had a mottled, greasy appearance, and their eyes were glazed.

‘How do you get in there?’ the Prince wanted to know.

‘We don’t, sire. Once the subjects are exposed to the solution we seal the chamber. We leave them enough food and drink so that we know it isn’t starvation that’s making them ill. Then we observe. We could never dare open this room again, Highness.’

‘Hmm. What of higher forms?’

‘We’ve had some success there too, sire.’

He showed him to another glass-fronted antechamber, this one having bars in addition.

There were three crude bunks inside. Two men and a woman occupied them. All were covered in sweat, and looked as if they were in a twitching coma. The woman’s eyes were open and she was staring glassily, like the pigs.

‘Excellent,’ Melyobar said.