The Iron jackal

Eleven

It was an underground town, built of wood and rope, spanning the cavern like a twisted web. The terrain was extremely uneven, plunging and bulging and thrusting up great stalagmites, but the town had conformed as best it could. Huts and shacks crowded into every available niche. Buildings piled up against the walls, the lower ones supporting the ones above. Rope bridges crisscrossed in the air, reaching across terrible drops, linking perch to perch. The cavern roof was lost in a haze of petrol fumes from generators that powered the weak and yellowed floodlights which bathed the town in a queasy glow.

Crake stared. He was amazed that a place as tumbledown and precarious as this had survived long enough to grow to such a size. It was cool and dim, so torches and lamps and oil-drum fires burned everywhere, despite the inflammable nature of the place. The town planners deserved hanging as well. Assuming anyone had planned this place, which he doubted. It must have grown like a mould.

He tutted to himself. Don amp;rs f duri hequo; t be a snob, Grayther . But he couldn’t help it. He was an orderly man, and the chaos of Samarla in general – and this place in particular – offended his sensibilities.

Slinkhound led them down a slope and through a cluster of dwellings. There was activity all around them, though nothing like the free-for-all on the streets above. They passed a stall, little more than a table by the side of the trail, trading in scavenged junk and rags. The owner was haggling with a customer, and ended up swapping a dried strip of unidentifiable meat for some bits of fabric. Men nearby were helping a fellow untouchable put together a clumsy shack. Others sat around a fire, passing round a dirty bottle, smoking and talking.

Crake looked about uneasily at the people of the Underneath, and received suspicious gazes in return. The poverty of this place intimidated him. Especially since these people didn’t seem broken and weary like those above, but defiant and possibly hostile. Crake had been brought up an aristocrat, and he’d never been entirely at ease around poor people, who were prone to rough jokes or explosive and bewildering violence.

Nevertheless, he was excited. They were going to see a sorcerer. A real, live Samarlan sorcerer. Crake had only read about them in books. They were the daemonists of the South, who practised the Art without the use of devices and machines. Crake wasn’t sure how much of it was superstition and quackery, but the scientist in him was eager to see one at work.

Beyond the cluster of dwellings, they came to a sagging hut which stood on its own. Slinkhound spoke to Ashua and then went inside, pushing through the curtain that hung over the doorway. Ashua turned to the crew and said:

‘Now we wait.’

Frey was eyeing the hut uncertainly. ‘Are you sure about this? I mean, wouldn’t I be better seeing a doctor?’

‘A doctor would tell you to chop that bugger off,’ Malvery slurred drunkenly. ‘Might as well see what this feller can do.’

‘There’s another reason I brought you here,’ said Ashua. ‘I didn’t want to tell you before, ’cause it sounds… well, unlikely. But that thing on your hand? I’ve heard of it before.’

‘You have?’ Frey asked eagerly.

‘The black spot. Means you’re marked for death. The Sammies say ancient sorcerers used it to deter thieves or something.’ She shrugged. ‘I mean, it’s just a legend. People say all kinds of shit, especially here.’

But Frey had latched on to the idea. ‘You reckon it’s some kind of curse?’

Ashua looked embarrassed. ‘Sounds stupid when you say it like that, right?’

Frey seemed to brighten. ‘So it means I won’t lose this hand?’

‘I’d say it means you’ll die horribly instead.’

Frey thought about that, then grinned and gave a little laugh of relief. ‘I was worried there for a minute,’ he said, looking fondly at his hand.

‘Cap’n?’ Jez asked with concern in her voice. ‘You did hear the bit about dying horribly, didn’t you?’

Frey was aware that everyone was looking at him, and became defensive. ‘Look, I’d rather be dead than maimed, alright?’

Ashua thumbed at Frey. ‘Narcissist,’ she said to the crew in general.

‘Old news,’ Crake replied.

‘She keeps calling me that!’ Frey complained. ‘What does it mean ?’

‘It just means you’re exceptionally brave,’ Crake lied smoothly.

‘Oh,’ said Frey. He puffed up a little and glanced at Ashua. ‘Thanks.’

Crake gave Ashua a hard look. She rolled her eyes but kept her mouth shut. One day the Cap’n was going to catch on to Crake’s habit of mocking his limited vocabulary, but it wouldn’t be today.

Slinkhound emerged from the hut and beckoned Frey and Ashua inside. He waved at the rest of the crew, as if to say: not you. Crake was alarmed. He wasn’t coming all this way only to stand outside.

‘Cap’n! Let me come too! I have to see!’ It came out sounding rather more desperate than he intended.

Frey looked at Ashua, who said a few words to Slinkhound, who tutted and waved him in.

‘ Let me come too,’ Pinn mimicked sourly in a baby voice. ‘Why does he get to go? Kiss-arse.’

‘Excuse me?’ Crake said as he passed. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t speak Moron.’

It was a cheap rejoinder, but it pleased him nonetheless. He went through the musty curtain and into the hut, leaving Malvery struggling to prevent Pinn drawing his pistol.

The interior of the hut was squalid and cluttered with macabre totems. Skulls and jars of pickled animal foetuses made for a sinister motif, and the air stank of smoke and incense. There was no furniture beyond the mats on the rough plank floor, and a bed of mouldy straw in the corner.

Sitting cross-legged in the centre of the room was the sorcerer. He was an untouchable like the rest of them. His skin was a deep black and his face marked in white but, unlike the people outside, he was obese. Long grey hair, matted into dreadlocks, hung over his face and spilled onto his belly. His filthy beard tangled with the mass of beads and totems hanging around his neck. He wore an animal-skin waistcoat, hanging open to allow his gut to protrude, and a loincloth tied up like a nappy. Despite his size, his leathery skin hung off him in folds, and his face was a maze of fleshy chasms. He was slouched forward and appeared to be asleep, or comatose, or dead.

Crake was less than impressed. He’d been expecting someone fiercely intense, a wild-eyed savage of some kind. Instead he’d found a giant bearded raisin.

Slinkhound motioned for Frey to sit down in front of the sorcerer. Frey did so, though he didn’t look keen. Crake wasn’t surprised. He could smell the sour-milk reek of the bloated man even over the incense.

The sorcerer stirred, raised his head, and opened his eyes. The sight gave Crake a little fright. They were so bloodshot that they appeared entirely red.

The sorcerer’s lips moved, and a small black twig emerged. He rolled it from one side of his mouth to the other, studying Frey with a flat glare. Then it disappeared back into his mouth, and he began to chew it with a horrible crunching sound.

Ah, thought Crake. Hookroot bark.

The sorcerers of Samarla had other ways than science to draw daemons from the aether, so it was said. They used secret techniques and rituals, the details jealously guarded. That, and vast quantities of highly potent and dangerous narcotics, like raw hookroot bark.

No wonder the sorcerer looked a mess. He was loaded.

Crake’s skepticism deepened. He was beginning to think he was a fool for taking this seriously. Perhaps all the lurid reports from Samarla were just rot after all. He couldn’t see how this enormous ruin of a man could possibly command the same kind of power that a Vardic daemonist did, with their careful formulae and advanced machinery.

Eventually the sorcerer spoke. His voice was a shock, so hoarse and deep and croaky that it only barely passed as human. The foreign syllables wheezed and crackled and rumbled from his chest.

‘Hold out your hand,’ Ashua said. ‘The manky one.’

‘It’s not bloody manky, it’s cursed,’ Frey protested, but he held it out towards the sorcerer anyway.

The sorcerer enfolded Frey’s hand in his own huge, rubbery paws. Frey, who didn’t like holding hands with men at the best of times, was trying not to squirm away. k awbbe

The sorcerer closed his eyes, and there was silence until Crake’s stomach growled noisily. He reddened and gave Ashua an apologetic look. He’d eaten nothing all day, being busy in his sanctum.

Then the sorcerer shuddered. Frey tensed and tried to pull away, but the sorcerer clamped his hand tight. For a moment, they were frozen like that.

‘Er,’ said Frey.

The sorcerer’s head tipped back, his dreadlocks sliding from his shoulders. He began to tremble. His chewing became frantic. A strange humming noise was coming from his nose, getting higher and louder.

‘Er, fellers, I’m not sure I like this…’ said Frey, but the sorcerer was strong, and Frey couldn’t work his hand free.

Crake scoffed as white foam began to bubble over the sorcerer’s lips. He’d seen charlatans like this before. Mediums, pretending to contact the dead. Spit and blood, even the Awakeners were nothing more than a bunch of confidence tricksters, when it came down to it. He wouldn’t be fooled so easily.

But despite his doubts, Crake became worried as the sorcerer’s fit worsened. A little scared, even. The man’s contortions were really quite distressing. He was horrible to look at. Frey was frantically tugging away now, but it was like trying to move a rock. Crake looked over at Ashua and Slinkhound, and he thought he saw them exchange a sly and wicked glance. Some kind of conspiracy? What were they up to?

And then he caught himself. He was becoming paranoid and scared. Of course he was. Everyone did, in the presence of daemons. His subconscious was reacting to the unnatural.

Whatever the sorcerer was doing, it was working.

He watched with growing amazement. How could it be? Some kind of trickery? A subtle form of hypnotism, to make his audience feel something that wasn’t there? No, that was ridiculous. Crake’s senses were finely honed from years of chasing daemons, and this was exactly the feeling he got when he was in the midst of his experiments. The sense of wrongness, the involuntary fear reflex. And it was all being done without machines, without devices.

There was only one explanation. It was all as the reports had said. Somehow, between the drugs and their strange techniques, the Samarlans could deal with daemons without using science at all.

The sorcerer’s fit subsided to shuddering again, making his flesh wobble. He spoke again, howling words through foam-flecked lips. Frey recoiled in disgust as his face was spattered.

‘He says…’ said Ashua. ‘He says you took something that didn’t belong to you.’

‘Hey, I didn’t steal anything! I just took it from someone else who stole it.’

Ashua shushed him as the sorcerer spoke again. ‘It’s old, he says. Thousands of years. A daemon from before…’ She paused, frowning as she worked out the translation. ‘Basically, he’s not sure what it is. He says… it builds itself from everything you’re afraid of, whatever that means. He says…’ She shrugged, more and more confused. ‘He says to beware the Iron Jackal. Make of that what you will.’

‘There was an emblem on the inside of the relic case, you remember? I thought it was a dog or a wolf.’

‘Reckon you thought wrong, then.’

‘Can he get rid of it? The daemon?’ Frey asked. Ashua put the question to the sorcerer, who had fallen quiet and was breathing heavily.

The sorcerer’s eyes rolled in his head and he spoke again.

‘No,’ said Ashua. ‘He says no one can.’

‘Oh,’ said Frey. ‘Well, that’s just great.’

‘No one but you,’ she added, as the sorcerer kept speaking. His tone drifted from high to low, raspy to breathy, hoarse to sharp, as if he were a signal being tuned in and out. ‘He says you have to take the relic back to the place where it came from.’

‘I don’t even have it,’ Frey said.

‘Will you shut up?’ Ashua snapped. ‘I’m listening!’ The sorcerer was talking over them both, as if they weren’t there. ‘Um… restore it to its rightful place… by full dark of the full moon. ..’ Her face cleared and she smiled in understanding. ‘That’s how you lift the curse! It’s like the legends said: it’s a curse to protect against thieves. The only way to free yourself is to return whatever you stole.’

‘So it is a curse?’ Frey said.

‘Yes.’

‘Not just a manky hand, then?’ he added, with a certain amount of triumph.

‘You are bloody impossible,’ Ashua said.

‘What happens if he doesn’t bring it back in time?’ Crake asked.

‘Right, good question,’ said Ashua. She put it to the sorcerer, whose head was lolling back on his neck, milky saliva drooling from the corner of his mouth. The sorcerer crunched at his hookroot twig again, and his head k anod questio came up, fixing Frey with bloodshot eyes.

Ashua translated as he spoke. ‘He says… the daemon that guards the relic… it will get stronger with every passing day. You’ve seen it once. It will come for you… three more times. The third time will be at full dark on the night of the full moon. If it hasn’t killed you already by then… it will become fully… er

… manifest… to reclaim the property of its master.’ She paused, and looked at Frey, and Crake saw genuine concern on her face. ‘And that night will be your last.’

Frey stared at the sorcerer for a moment. Then he pulled his hand away violently, and this time it came free. The sorcerer cried out and fell back, flopping to the ground where he lay gasping like some vast, blubbery creature of the deep dragged on to dry land. Frey ignored him, getting angrily to his feet.

‘Nobody tells me which is my last night alive,’ he said. He looked at Crake and frowned. ‘Wait, which is my last night alive?’

‘Full moon’s in twelve nights’ time, if you don’t count tonight.’

‘Right!’ said Frey. ‘Well, I plan to live a lot longer than twelve more nights.’ He pulled out a compass from his pocket. Crake recognised it: it used to be his. Months ago, he’d thralled a daemon to it so that it always pointed towards Frey’s silver ring, which Frey had since given to Trinica. ‘All we need to do is find Trinica and get that relic back.’

‘And then we need to find out where it came from in the first place,’ said Ashua. ‘And then we need to go there and put it back.’

‘Yeah, yeah, one thing a time,’ said Frey. ‘Let ’s get hold of it first. She’s not gonna be pleased when I come asking for it.’

‘Hey, I’m not returning my share!’ Ashua warned. ‘No refunds from this girl.’

Frey was gearing up for a retort when the curtain in the door of the hut was pulled aside and Malvery stuck his head in. ‘Everyone having fun in here?’ he asked. ‘Good. We got trouble.’

‘You have no idea,’ said Crake, and they hurried out to see what else fate could possibly pile on their shoulders tonight.