Sea of Ghosts - Alan Campbell [80]
Now the doctor’s gaze searched the ground. He was trying to comprehend this. ‘But now you’re hurting me,’ he said. ‘It’s the same thing.’
‘You’re probably right,’ Maskelyne admitted. ‘But it’s too late now.’ He thought for a moment. ‘I wonder if we could justify your death if we assume that mankind isn’t a single organism, but is actually two organisms. That way, I could be part of one . . . and you could be part of the other.’ He nodded. ‘Yes, that works. You die, while I maintain the moral high ground.’
‘What? You’re completely insane.’
Maskelyne sat down beside him. ‘You’re not a psychiatrist are you, doctor?’
Shaw shook his head.
‘No, I didn’t think you were.’
‘Please . . .’ The doctor was gasping now, trying to move his rapidly stiffening leg. ‘Stop this.’
‘Can’t be done,’ Maskelyne said. ‘Your blood is changing.’
The doctor grabbed his trouser leg and pulled it up. Green crystals had already begun to form on his skin. He let out a wail. ‘Changing into what?’
‘Exactly what it looks like,’ Maskelyne said. ‘Your widow is going to be a very rich woman.’
Ianthe withdrew her consciousness from the whirlwind of terror in the doctor’s mind. She lay in darkness and focused on the rising and falling of her chest as she breathed. Maskelyne’s wife, Lucille, had put her in a small bright room in the west wing of the fortress. The views she’d seen through the other woman’s eyes had been of a sickle-shaped island with deepwater docks and industrial buildings down by the shore. Heavy iron ships waiting in their moorings in the bay. A metallic beach flashing in the sunshine, lapped by the tea-coloured sea. The scent of brine of the breeze. They were three leagues east of Ethugra, but she hadn’t been able to see the city from Lucille’s perspective.
She could feel silk cushions under her. She knew they were blue.
For a long while she lay there, thinking. Should she try to reach her father again? She hadn’t been able to locate him since Maskelyne’s men had captured her. Had he even returned to the prison on Halcine Canal? Had she simply missed him, or had he abandoned her again? She didn’t even know if he was alive or dead. And with a million people living in Ethugra, a million perspectives to explore, she might never know the answer to that question. Her frustration quickly turned to anger. Nothing really mattered but punishing Maskelyne for what he’d done. And she had the means to accomplish that.
She slipped into Jontney’s mind, but found him cuddling his mother, and so she quickly departed again. She didn’t want to feel Lucille’s arms around her. Maskelyne was in a storeroom next to his armoury, where he was busy rummaging through a box of tools and humming to himself. He had already looked out a hammer and a stone chisel.
Ianthe let her mind fly through the abyss between minds like a comet racing through the heavens. The inhabitants of Scythe Island formed a small but intense constellation beneath her, surrounded by a plain of countless lights burning under the sea. To the west she perceived Ethugra as a great conflagration of dusty spots, a galaxy formed by tens of thousands of people. As she neared the city, she became aware of a fine ship berthed in Averley Harbour. A group of people had gathered on the plaza before the Administration Buildings. And all of them were looking at one woman.
CHAPTER 10
THE TRIAL OF TOM GRANGER
The emperor’s dragon-hunter-class steam yacht rolled into Ethugra like a circus. The triple-funnel, single-masted Excelsior was far sleeker than Briana’s man-o’-war. Indeed, if Hu’s claims were to be believed, she was looking at the fastest and most luxurious human-built vessel in the world. She slid out of the Glot Madera and into Averley Plaza under steam power alone, accompanied by a fanfare of trumpets from the heralds on her deck. The sails furled along her yards were as crisp and white as marzipan. Her three funnels sat behind the wheelhouse and in front of the mast, disgorging torrents of steam and vaporous whale-oil smoke into the heavens. Her bow sliced through