Iron Council - China Mieville [9]
The man passed villages. What animals were there to see him howled.
At the stub-end of the hills, in a drying landscape, the drifting man neared an interruption. Something embedded in the dirt, a star of rust-red and ragged brown-black cloth. A dead man. Come from very high and ironed down into the land. A little blood had soaked into the ground and blackened. The meat was tendered and flattened into outlines.
The man who drifted above the earth and the bird who rode him paused above the dead. They looked down at him, and they looked up with unnatural perfect timing into the sky.
CHAPTER THREE
On the second day out, in the grey waves of the Meagre Sea, Cutter’s party hijacked the Akif. Pomeroy held a pistol at the captain’s head. The crew stared in disbelief. Elsie and Ihona raised their guns. Cutter watched Elsie’s hand shake. Fejh reared out of his water-barrel with a bow. The captain began to cry.
“We’re taking a diversion,” Cutter said. “It’s going to take you a few extra days to get to Shankell. We’re going southwest first. Along the coast. Up the Dradscale River. You’ll make Shankell a few days late, is all. And minus a bit of stock.”
The crew of six men sulked and surrendered their weapons. They were all casuals on a daily rate: they had no solidarity with each other or their captain. They looked at Fejhechrillen hatefully, out of some prejudice.
Cutter tied the captain to the wheel, by the dehorned sables the Akif carried, and the travellers took turns to menace him while the mounts watched. His blubbering was embarrassing. The sun grew harsher. Their wake widened as if they unbuckled the water. Cutter watched Fejh suffer in the hot salt air.
They saw the north shores of the Cymek on the third day. Merciless baked-clay hills, dust and sandtraps. There were scraps of plantlife: dust-coloured marram, trees of hard and alien nature, spicate foliage. The Akif churned past brine marshes.
“He always said this would be the only way to get to Iron Council,” Cutter said.
The minerals of the Dradscale estuary made lustre on the water. The brackish slough was full of weed, and Cutter gave a city-dweller’s gape to see a clan of manatees surface and graze.
“Is no safe,” said the helmsman. “Is with—” He gave some obscenity or disgust-noise, and pointed at Fejh. “Up farther. Full of riverpig.”
Cutter tensed at the word. “On,” he said, and pointed his gun. The pilot moved back.
“We no do,” he said. Abruptly he tilted backward over the rail and into the water. Everyone moved and shouted.
“There.” Pomeroy pointed with his revolver. The pilot had surfaced and was heading for one of the islands. Pomeroy tracked him but never fired.
“Godsdammit,” he said as the man reached the little shore. “Only reason the others haven’t gone after him is they can’t swim.” He nodded at the cheering crew.
“They’ll fight back with their fucking hands if we push this,” Ihona said. “Look at them. And you know we won’t shoot them. You know what we have to do.”
So in ridiculous inversion, the hijackers ferried the crew to the island. Pomeroy waved his gun as if carrying out necessary punishment. But they let the sailors off, and even gave them provisions. The captain watched plaintively. They would not let him go.
Cutter was disgusted. “Too fucking soft,” he raged at his friends. “You shouldn’t have come if you’re so soft.”
“What do you suggest, Cutter?” Ihona shouted. “You make them stay if you can. You ain’t going to kill them. No, maybe we shouldn’t have come, it’s already cost us.” Pomeroy glowered. Elsie and Fejh would not look at Cutter. He was suddenly fearful.
“Come on,” Cutter said. He tried not to sound wheedling or scornful. “Come on. We’re getting there. We’ll find him. This bloody journey’ll end.”
“For someone so known not to give a damn,” Ihona said, “you’re risking a lot for this. You want to be careful, people might think you ain’t what you like to think.”
The Dradscale was wide. Ditches and sikes joined it, channelling in dirty water. It was unbending for miles ahead.