“So?”
“So…” She showed him the setting on his espringal. “You point your espringal at something, and fire the second half of the anchoring string at it—and it will pull five shriekers from their catapults. Since the catapults are pointed inwards, not outwards, the shriekers should go right through the walls of this ship, and our anchoring slugs will redirect the projectiles toward whatever it is that you shot at.”
Gregor stared, amazed. “So…when I fire my imprinter at something, I will essentially be firing five shriekers at it?”
“Yeah. Fire again, get the next five. And again, the next five. You get three volleys, I get four. Seems handy if we want to sink the ship or…if we encounter anything else in here. Just…be aware that it’s going to rip through a lot of shit to get to your targe—”
She heard something echoing below them, faint but high-pitched. She stopped and peered backward into the darkness.
“Did you…” she asked.
“Yes,” said Gregor, troubled. “I did.”
They listened hard, and then they heard it again—the sound of a man screaming.
The sound tapered off. Sancia and Gregor stood without speaking, listening to the creaking, groaning, shuddering ship move around them. There was no other sound.
“So—that’s not normal, right?” she asked.
“It is not,” said Gregor.
There was a long silence.
“I…suppose we had better go investigate,” said Gregor quietly.
“What time is it?” said Sancia.
Gregor pulled out a scrived timepiece and huddled by his scrived lantern to see. “It’s not even ten o’clock yet.”
“So…they can’t have done it yet, right? They have to wait for the lost minute, for midnight.”
“I am afraid I am not the expert on this material.”
“Shitting hell,” said Sancia. She wiped sweat from her brow and lifted her espringal. Together they continued into the depths of the galleon.
* * *
—
They wound on and on through the decks of the ship, through quarters and chambers and stairwells. The air was hot and moist and dreadfully still, and the lights from their lanterns seemed painfully small, tiny bubbles of luminescence attempting to beat back the dark.
Then they heard a scream again, echoing from the innards of the giant vessel. They exchanged a look and continued on, deeper and deeper in, espringals ready.
“We’re approaching the cargo holds,” whispered Gregor.
“Which means what?”
“I’m not sure. But there should be large chambers up ahead. Perhaps where they keep the slaves.”
They came to one corridor that seemed unusually long and straight, perhaps running from bow to stern. They stopped and shone their lights down its length, but could see no end to it.
I hope no one is at the other side, thought Sancia, looking back at us.
They started down the corridor, moving as quietly as they could. Sancia flexed her scrived sight as they walked. For a long while she saw nothing at all—and then she raised a hand.
They halted as she examined what lay ahead. She thought she could see a handful of unusual scrivings on the floor a few dozen feet away—a scrived timepiece, a sachet, a fire starter for lighting a pipe, an augmented knife…
It’s a person, she thought. I’m seeing what’s in his pocket or on his belt…
They weren’t moving. And they were just beyond the light cast by their lanterns.
Someone is lying down over there, she mouthed to Gregor, pointing ahead.
Gregor nodded and crept forward, espringal raised. Sancia watched, trying not to breathe too loudly as his light stretched forward along the wooden floors of the corridor…until it fell upon a spreading pool of blood.
Gregor paused ever so briefly at the sight of it. Then he walked forward until the light illuminated the body of a man lying facedown on the side of the corridor.
He did not rush to the body. Instead, Gregor looked into the darkness, head cocked, no doubt listening for the killer. Then he stepped forward through the blood, knelt beside the body, and rolled it over.
Gregor quickly withdrew his hand. Sancia couldn’t see what he was reacting to, but it was no comfort to her that a veteran of so many wars could have such a reaction.
“What is it?” she whispered.
“This man…This man’s eyes have been removed,” said Gregor.
“What?” she said, horrified.
“His eyes are gouged out.” He leaned closer and held his little lantern up to the body’s face. “No. Cut out.” He examined the rest of the man. “And…Sancia…I think he did this to himself. Look.”
Grimacing, Sancia approached and saw the augmented knife clutched in the man’s fingers. His wrists had been slashed open, and his front was covered in blood.
“Wait,” she said. “He killed himself?”
“Yes. Though I suspect he cut his eyes out first.”
She swallowed her horror and studied the body. He looked quite affluent, wearing an elaborate doublet and hose, with lace collars and cuffs. She examined him with her scrived sight, and peered closer at his scrived sachet and the many permissions it bestowed on him.
“Definitely Dandolo,” she said. “And I think a scriver. I haven’t studied their sachets in a while, but…this looks very inner-enclave to me. Why did he do this?”
“I do not know.” Gregor looked down the corridor and held his lantern high. “But that’s where he came from.”
She looked and saw droplets of blood on the corridor’s darkened floor, marking the man’s path. He must have come from the other end of the corridor.
There was a noise—a strangled sob from the far end of the corridor, lost in the dark.
Sancia did her utmost not to jump or scream. Gregor’s face remained totally impassive. He stood, raised his espringal, and began stalking down the corridor toward the sound.
“Please come with me,” he said quietly. “And let me know what lies ahead.”
She followed him down the corridor, stepping around the blood on the floor.
It’s still not midnight yet. What happened here? What in hell is going on?
Finally their light fell upon the end of the corridor: a small, blank wall, with a single plain door, hanging open. She could see nothing but darkness on the other side. There was blood on the handle of the door and around the frame—remnants of bloody handprints as someone fumbled with it, she guessed.