The Bookman - Lavie Tidhar [76]
"I was not aware of the exact nature of the cargo, no, sir."
Wyvern slapped him again. He had long, sharp claws that caught in Orphan's skin and drew blood. "It was nothing!" he roared. "It was old rubbish, packaged for weight, nothing more. Why were you on the Nautilus, boy? What was important enough to get Prince Dakkar to give up his ship?"
"Prince Dakkar, sir?"
"The captain of the Nautilus, boy. The man who would be King, if only he had his way, so he could unite India against us Johnny Lizards and rule it himself. He disappeared, did you know that? And with him your mysterious fat man."
"Sir?" He was not trying to be obtuse. He just thought he'd better speak as little as possible. Wyvern took a step back from him and grinned.
"Sit down," Wyvern said. He motioned to a comfortable-looking armchair. Orphan hesitated.
"Sit down, boy!"
He sat down.
The lizard captain turned and regarded Orphan. His single eye seemed redder than before, an old, dying star in a weathered, alien face.
"A few days ago," Wyvern said, his voice soft and quiet – so low that Orphan struggled to hear him – "I received a message, by Tesla waves."
"Sir?"
"It came from the Nautilus," Wyvern said. "Giving me their location – and heading."
Orphan looked at him and kept quiet. Someone had betrayed the ship, he thought. But who?
"Why," said Captain Wyvern, and he came and stood very close to Orphan now, and his tail swished menacingly against the floor, "did you try to reach the island?"
"Sir?" Orphan said.
Captain Wyvern slapped him again. The slap threw Orphan back. Pain criss-crossed his cheek.
"I let you live," Wyvern said, in the same quiet, cold voice. "Once. I might not be so tolerant again."
Orphan looked at him, and the lizard pirate looked back. There are no more choices, his face seemed to say. The Nautilus, Orphan thought. It had been betrayed. He thought of the proud Dakkar, losing his ship, perhaps his life. He thought of the Bookman, who was far away, still scheming, still manipulating Orphan's life, holding a power over him that was, nevertheless, useless here, now, in this cabin.
There were no more choices. They had all branched and twisted only to converge on this one particular moment, reducing his choices to two once more: to live, or to die. And he thought – Do you trust him? And was surprised with the answer he gave.
He nodded, and felt himself relaxing back into the chair. What else did he have left, now, but honesty?
And so, and almost with a sense of relief, he told the pirate captain his story, beginning with that moment, so long ago it seemed, of his meeting with Gilgamesh by the river.
TWENTY-FIVE
Answers
They could not wipe out the North-East gales Nor what those gales set free–
The pirate ships with their close-reefed sails, Leaping from sea to sea.
They had forgotten the shield-hung hull
Seen nearer and more plain,
Dipping into the troughs like a gull,
And gull-like rising again–
The painted eyes that glare and frown In the high snake-headed stem,
Searching the beach while her sail comes down, They had forgotten them!
– Rudyard Kipling, "The Pirates in England"
The bay was nestled in the midst of an inhospitable shore; a thick, green forest rose over the mountain. Orphan could hear drums in the distance, booming over the surf, coming from far inland.
The bay's water was calm, almost placid. Crescentshaped, the bay seemed like a friendly mouth, its lips a cheerful beach of fine yellow sand. The Joker sailed into the bay and dropped sails and anchor. The air was hot, humid, suffused with the smell of growing things. Orphan, who had got used to smelling unwashed bodies in the close proximity of the pirate ship, felt suddenly light-headed. The bay seemed like a paradise, tropical and impossible like a French painting. Something that wasn't a bird flew briefly over the treetops, black leathery wings spread taut, then disappeared into the canopy.
The boy-cook, Aramis, came and stood by him on the