The Black Lung Captain - Chris Wooding [56]
“Here, wait a minute …” said Malvery, but his protest was halfhearted. None of them really thought he’d do it. Not until he swung the machete with all his might and buried it in the side of Hodd’s neck.
Time stopped for Frey. The shock of the moment froze them all where they were. Hodd gaped blankly.
Then he coughed, and a flood of red spilled from his throat and over his lips. His hand came up and felt for the grip of the machete, as if trying to work out what it was. He made a feeble attempt to pull it free, but his hand slipped on the blood that had already coated the handle. It squirted from the wound in grotesque pulses.
His eyes had that terrible look in them. A look Frey had seen many times before. The look of a man who couldn’t quite believe his time was up.
He keeled over sideways and was still.
Grist stared down at the explorer, his chest heaving. Nobody said a word. They watched him carefully, waiting to see what he’d do next.
“We’re gonna get the sphere back,” he said eventually. “We’re gonna get it back, you hear? Your crew and mine. We’ll track that woman down and we’ll have what’s ours and more besides. Nobody steals from Harvin Grist.” He took a breath, straightened, and looked over at Frey. “You in or not?”
Frey looked back at him. Trying to judge the depth of the mania in Grist’s eyes. His first appraisal of the man had been seriously off. There was a blackness at his core that Frey didn’t like at all.
To give up his shot at a fortune was no easy thing. This was the second time Trinica had stolen from him, and that was hard to take. But even so, he could have walked away. He was getting in over his head, and he knew it. Might as well play with dynamite as have a partner like Grist.
But she’d scarcely acknowledged him. That was what burned. All this time, all that had passed between them, and he meant less than nothing to her. He felt snubbed and humiliated, and he wanted to make her pay for that. He wanted revenge. She’d never walk all over him again.
“I get Hodd’s five percent,” he said, motioning toward the dead man.
Grist snorted in disgust. “Fifty–fifty it is, you bloodsuckin’ bastard,” he said. He turned his back and walked off toward the Storm Dog. Crattle followed him.
“Another mission ends in resounding success, then,” Malvery said sarcastically. He headed for the Ketty Jay. The others drifted away after him, all except Jez, who was eyeing the corpse of Hodd.
“You sure about this?” she said doubtfully.
“No,” said Frey. “But we’re doing it anyway.”
Jez nodded to herself. “Right you are, Cap’n,” she said. Then she, too, walked off toward the Ketty Jay, and Frey was left alone.
THE BUTCHER’S BLOCK—PINN GETS A LETTER—ADVICE FROM A DRUNKARD
arlen’s Hook stood between the Blackendraft ash flats and the Scourfoot Desert, an outpost of humanity in the most lifeless of places. To the west were the Hookhollows, their sharp tips peeping over the edge of the high Eastern Plateau. Restless volcanoes hidden among the mountain peaks filled the sky with a grimy haze, which was carried onto the plateau by the prevailing winds. The land was gloomy and bleared.
The port was built on a blunt lump of black rock that thrust dramatically upward from the ash-crusted earth. The heart of the settlement was on the flat top of the rock, where there was a landing pad for aircraft. It was the only place in Marlen’s Hook that had anything recognizable as streets.
Jez stood at Frey’s shoulder as he brought the Ketty Jay in toward the landing pad. She’d been to Marlen’s Hook twice since joining Frey’s crew, and she never looked forward to returning. The place was a lawless den of thieves and cutthroats. The Coalition Navy ignored it because it was so remote from civilization and because the ash in the air clogged up engines and lungs alike.