Sea of Ghosts - Alan Campbell [3]
‘I need you to stand aside, ma’am,’ the colonel said.
Ida didn’t budge.
‘We are here on Emperor’s Hu’s orders,’ he added. ‘If you fail to comply we will arrest you for resisting Imperial troops in a time of war. The punishment for such a crime is typically six to nine months’ incarceration.’
She folded her arms.
He observed her for a moment with cold eyes. ‘I don’t think you fully comprehend the danger,’ he said. ‘That crackling noise you heard when she spoke was the sound of air turning to vacuum in her lungs. She can’t help herself. Unmer children lack the restraint of adults.’
Ida glared at him. ‘She’s not doing anybody any harm.’ From the corner of her eye she noticed the child move close behind her.
The colonel glanced across at the two men perched on the shelves on the opposite side of the aisle and raised his eyebrows. These two were like ancient crows: scrawny, bow-legged creatures with wild black hair and noses shaped for pecking. They might both have been the sons of the same unfortunate woman. They held their heavy guns easily enough, but their narrowed, squinting eyes did not inspire confidence. One of them shook his head and spoke in a thick Greenbay accent, ‘Not without hitting the woman, sir.’
Creedy grunted. ‘You couldn’t hit the ocean from a boat, Swan. I can end all this time-wasting with one shot. If we dynamite the woman’s body afterwards, it’ll look like the Unmer child killed her.’
The colonel raised his hand. ‘No, Sergeant,’ he said. ‘We will adhere to the law.’ He thought for a moment, before turning his attention back to Ida. ‘Do you have a receipt for that book, ma’am?’
She blinked. ‘I hadn’t bought it yet.’
‘We are authorized to shoot looters on sight.’
Creedy laughed.
Ida felt strength draining from her legs. She cried out, ‘It doesn’t give you the right to shoot an unarmed—’
She didn’t get a chance to finish. The girl bolted away from her, down the aisle.
Ida half-turned.
And Creedy fired.
A flash erupted from the weapon, accompanied by a tremendous boom. The child shrieked as a second burst of light bloomed against her back. She dropped like a rag doll. Ida’s heart clenched in desperate panic. She felt as if the air had been sucked from her lungs.
Smoke leaked from the barrel of Creedy’s gun. He lowered the weapon and said, ‘Damn.’
Ida’s ears still rang with the sound of the detonation. It took her a moment to realize that the Unmer girl had not been harmed. Still clutching her doll, the poor child was trying to push herself upright amidst the piles of fallen treasure.
‘I shot her in the back,’ Creedy said.
‘Reload your weapon, Sergeant,’ the colonel said.
Creedy was shaking his head. ‘The round just vanished.’
The child was sobbing. She got to her feet and edged backwards away from the men. Behind her loomed one of the Trove Market’s many brine tanks, twelve tons of poisonous seawater glowing faintly behind its glass walls. A sharkskin woman stood in that brown gloom, watching the child approach. She thumped a fist against the inside of her container, but her warning made no sound.
Banks shouted, ‘The tank, Colonel.’
Creedy was hurriedly pouring powder into his gun.
The colonel nodded to the crows on the opposite bank. ‘Swan, Tummel, please do try to avoid any sort of mess.’
They raised their weapons.
The child wailed.
Explosions rattled the air. A hail of pellets crackled against the child’s red frock and flared out of existence. She screamed and dropped her doll. Through a veil of white smoke Ida saw her turn and flee.
‘Slippery little bitch,’ Creedy said.
Whether the girl was unable to perceive the brine tank, or whether she simply did not notice it in her panic, Ida didn’t know. But she doubted that what happened next was deliberate. The child ran straight into the container’s curved glass wall.
There was a blaze of white light, a sharp bang . . .
And the tank shattered.
A wave of brine erupted out onto the market floor, washing artefacts