Parabolis (13 page)

Arturo Lucien was waiting in front of the breaker with two more stretch limousine coaches. They were guarded by a small entourage of Rogues. Dale passed them as he entered through the office and into the hangar. With no electric power, the gates had to be opened manually. He worked a mechanical crank that was connected to a pulley system. The chains rattled as the steel gates opened into the black bay. There were patches of thinning fog in the middle-distance like slow departing ghosts.

Meanwhile, Remy motioned one of the Rogues over. The Rogue carried in his arm a flare secured to a tripod. A bellow-like contraption was attached to it by a hose. He prepared it at the end of the dock, hidden deep below the hangar in the direct line of sight from the sea beyond. There was a burst of light as the flare ignited before it settled into a steady blue flame. Remy stood at the gates, eyes scanning the darkness.

Arturo walked up beside Dale, blowing into his hands.

“It’s freezing,” he said.

“What happens now?”

“We wait. As soon as the transport passes the naval blockade, it’ll surface in the bay where the water is shallow. Then hopefully, it’ll spot the flare and cruise straight in before anyone notices.”

“So it’s an underwater vessel?”

“What did you expect?”

“You said this transport wasn’t going to be illegal.”

“Not all underwater vessels are illegal.”

“Oh, so these guys are marine surveyors? Just a couple of scientists, right?”

“No. They’re Submariners.”

“You mean ‘pirates’.”

“Look, nothing
you’re
doing is illegal, okay?”

Shaking his head, Dale lit up a smoke. He then followed Arturo down to the dock where Remy waited.

“Let me get this straight,” Dale said, walking behind Arturo. “I’m an accomplice in a smuggling operation conducted by pirates and the city’s most notorious criminal organization, but it’s not illegal?”

“Just relax, will you?”

Dale blew out a plume of smoke. “Don’t I look relaxed to you?”

“Yeah, but the way you’re making all this sound—it’s making me nervous.”

Remy checked his watch, looked up, and suddenly raised a hand. Everyone held their breath and peered with him into the darkness.

“There,” whispered Arturo, pointing into the void.

Remy tapped his cane against the docks and the Rogue underling immediately began working the tripod contraption. The flare signaled in bursts of rhythmic pulses.

It took him a moment before Dale noticed the large moving silhouette emerging out of the darkness. A mass, swiftly and silently gliding toward them. The steam engine had been shut off. Purely on momentum, the stealth vessel settled into the docking bay. Stenciled into the side of the matte black iron hull was its name in weathered gray paint: The Saint Viljoen.

Dale recognized it immediately. And something stirred within. He was a child again, marveling at a sea vessel in his father’s breaker. “That’s not a Submariner. That’s
the
Submariner.”

“Yep. He’s a good friend of mine,” Arturo replied, brimming with pride. “We did a lot of business together in the past when I was still a sea merchant. It’s all about making the right connections.”

The first to disembark was its captain, Leon Getty, a Submariner whose name was widely recognized among seafarers. He was one part charming gentlemen, two parts ruthless murderer. He climbed out of the hatch and swaggered down the docking ramp, his long navy coat hovering just above his ankles. Down his chest, holstered in two rows of three on either side of his suspenders, were percussion-pin pistols, and two more on his hips. His bronzed skin was weathered and leathery. His dark hair was pulled into a neatly folded back-knot. The tightly pulled hair and the large hoop earrings in both ears accentuated his narrow face. When he spoke, the deep voice came with a noticeable lisp.

“Traversed have I from shore to shore in the womb of the Amaranthian. But none have my eyes beset a friendlier face than this,” he said, clutching Arturo’s arm. He greeted him with a kiss, as it was customary among men of the sea. “It’s good to see you, old friend,” he added, with an affectionate gaze.

“You too, Leon.”

“He looks like shit,” came a sultry voice from behind the captain.

“And you, lovelier than ever, Cassiopeia,” Arturo replied.

Cassiopeia, “Siren of the Saint,” was rumored to be as fetching in form as she was dangerous. Dale had heard of her generous bosom, hips of an hourglass, and long striding legs that men would fall on their swords to part—embellishments of libidinous men who’d been at sea too long. Other than a plunging décolletage, chocolate brown curls, and a saber sheathed at her side, Dale thought Cassiopeia’s colorful language was more notable than anything in her appearance.

“Come here and let me greet you proper, you filthy brack swab.”

Arturo couldn’t help but blush when she kissed him on the cheek, giving hue to his otherwise pasty skin.

Leon gave Dale a nod. “So is this handsome fellow the face behind our darkly encounter?” he asked.

“No, this is my friend, Dale Sunday,” Arturo replied. “He owns the breaker.”

Cassiopeia looked at Remy. “And who’s the ass in the hat?” she asked.

“I am Remy Guillaume of the Carousel Rogues,” Remy replied, with a formal bow, top hat in hand. “Perhaps the lady can take greater care with her choice of words.”

“Perhaps I can take care to stick the heel of my boot in your throat, Mister Top Hat.”

“
Hetep
, Cassiopeia,” said Leon, in the pirate tongue. “You’ll forgive my first mate,” he added, stepping forward. “She is especially temperamental after a long journey.”

The Submariner’s eyes were fixed elsewhere. Dale followed his gaze over his shoulder and noticed that the entourage of Rogues had positioned themselves all throughout the hangar, overlooking the dock with their missile weapons trained on Leon.

“Your reputation precedes you, Captain Leon Getty,” said Remy. “We know who you are. We know to whom you answer. And at sea, you may be an unrivaled bunch. But I would like to remind you and your first mate that you are currently standing on land under the protection of the Carousel Rogues. We expect you to behave accordingly.”

Leon immediately raised a hand and silenced Cassiopeia before she could respond.

“We understand,” he replied. “And we have no intention of overstaying our welcome. We only need to complete this exchange and then we’ll be on our merry way.”

The Rogue who had been working the flare had put it out and was now standing beside Remy with a large leather suitcase in hand.

“As agreed,” said Remy, “we will give you your payment once we can verify that the passengers are indeed who they say they are.”

“And what fool would pretend to be when they are not?” said Leon. “Tread carefully, good rogue. These are no ordinary men.”

He clapped his hands twice. On cue, a fellow pirate waiting at the mouth of the Saint Viljoen’s cargo door opened it. A tall, broad-shouldered man emerged in a tieless black suit. His face was hidden behind a ghostly, expressionless mask made of porcelain. He descended down the docking ramp alone.

Remy bowed and introduced himself.

“Where is the Fat Fox?” asked the man in the ghost mask.

He had a slight Silven accent.

“We will take you to him, shortly,” Remy replied. “But first, I must confirm your identity. A mere formality, you understand.”

The Ghost curiously cocked his head.

“You wish me to remove my mask, Remy Guillaume of the Carousel Rogues?”

“No. You only need to answer a simple question.”

“Wouldn’t cutting your throat be confirmation enough?”

Before he finished speaking, a figure stood behind Remy, holding a blade to his throat. No one, not Remy, Dale, nor anyone else had noticed this dark figure disembark and sneak up behind Remy. It was as if he appeared out of thin air. All of the Rogues in the breaker shuffled alert at the threat. They aimed their weapons, but too late. The rest looked on, stunned and immobile.

Remy signaled his men to stand down with a raised hand. He moved slowly.

“
Qi a santom rachnya fad espel?
” he then asked.

Remy spoke to the Ghost in a dead language—a language with which only scholars of ancient languages were familiar.

The Ghost paused and studied him.

“
Espel a santom nai
,” he finally replied, rolling up his sleeve just enough to show Remy a tattoo on his left wrist. It was of a compass marked with ancient runes, framed in a machine cog.

“
Mora a’unde espel si yakovz
.”

The Darkness then released him, sheathed his blade, and stepped away. As he did, he moved unlike anything Dale had ever seen, like a figure from a feverish nightmare, deliberate and menacing.

The Darkness wore a lean-fitting outfit of charcoal gray dappled with black, rendering him nearly indistinguishable against the backdrop of night. And over his head was a matching mottled balaclava with two separate holes cut out for his ink-black eyes. He wore thin gloves attached to bracers of matted black leather and boots fastened with wraps nearly up to his knees. Sheathed into a shoulder harness under the arms on either side were two throwing knives. And running horizontally across his hips just below the small of his back was the scabbard housing his blade. Nothing of him was uncovered.

The blade itself was similar in form to an Omeijian wakizashi, too long to be a dagger and too short to be a sword. But to the trained eye there was no mistaking it for anything other than a customized variant. It was simpler and more pragmatic in design, with a straight single-edge as opposed to the curve common to Omeijian blades. And there was no guard between the collars separating the blade from the handle. The bladed half measured slightly longer than the length of its wielder’s forearm, while the braided grip was nearly equal in length for two-handed leveraging.

Remy rubbed his throat where the Darkness had pressed his blade up against it. Then he signaled the Rogue standing beside him who handed the suitcase over to Leon. While the Submariners checked its contents, counting the bundles of banknotes, Remy looked at the Ghost and gestured toward the breaker exit.

“Please, if you will come with me.”

The Ghost and the Darkness followed Remy out and disappeared into one of the guild’s stretch coaches. Remy then returned with a satchel containing the rest of Dale’s pay.

“You have seen nothing and know nothing,” he said. “Our business is complete.”

And then he left.

When the small convoy had set off, Dale was left with Arturo, the Submariner and his crew. There was a collective sigh.

“What the hell was that?” asked Arturo.

“We almost got killed,” said Cassiopeia. “That little rat hat cocking Rogue nearly got us all killed.”

“What was that?” Arturo repeated.

“That, my dear Arty, was the Samaeli,” Leon replied. “Had I known they were the cargo, I would never have agreed to this transport.”

“What’s a Samaeli?”

“The scariest thing in Parabolis. They are the shadows within the shadows. Until now, I knew them only to exist in tavern tales.”

“Why would the Fat Fox hire them?”

Leon shook his head and wagged his finger. “Dear, dear, Arty, nobody hires the Samaeli. They’re not petty bounty hunters, freelancers to be contracted. They do not give audience to those they mean to service, or rather, use.”

“So, if they weren’t hired, what are they doing here?”

“The darkness weaves what terrors it pleases and no prey knows its reason.”

“We need to get out of here,” said Cassiopeia. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”

“Agreed.”

“But you just got here,” Arturo tried.

“And we’ve got what we came for,” said Leon, holding up the large suitcase.

“What’re you going to do with those? You can’t just spend that anywhere.”

“Republican marks are worth twice their value in gold in some places.”

“Muriah Bay?”

“Precisely.”

Muriah Bay was a small coastal village hidden in a cove just north of the Republic’s border. Because of its remote location, it was a common stop for smugglers and black market traders.

“We’ll need to settle for a few months to resupply anyway before the long voyage back,” Leon added. “The crew’s getting restless.”

“As am I,” said Cassiopeia. “Captain, please.”

“Gentlemen, I have washed my hands of this and you would be wise to do the same. These men of shadow bear ill omen. Neither strength nor cunning can deliver you from such evil. Cast not your lives to the winds of chance and depart with me from the very memory of this night.”

“Here, here,” said Arturo, raising an imaginary glass.

“Arty, this is no joke. Stay away from them. The Lords of the Sea know I’d hate for something terrible to happen to you.”

Dale found the exchange fascinating. Despite all of his misgivings about Arturo, warranted or not, in some select part of the world, within some select circles of self-serving fortune hunting pirates, Arturo was actually cared for, his friendship valued.

“Those men, they aren’t human,” said Cassiopeia, clutching his arm. “Even the Pirate Lord Del Rasa shudders at the thought of them. The Rogues don’t know what they’re getting into. You’d be wise not to make the same mistake. And take care of your skin. You look sick.”

She climbed the ramp and disappeared into the hatch.

“Too brief, I know. But as always, it was good seeing you, Arty. And Dale, it was a pleasure. Any friend of Arty’s is a friend of mine. Remember that. Gentlemen.” The captain then boarded the vessel after his first mate, turned to his crew below and barked, “
Nosere vai!
”

As the steam engines began to spit and knock before settling into a soft steady hum, he looked down at Arturo and Dale from the opening, blew a kiss, and closed the hatch.

The Saint Viljoen drifted back into the bay as quickly and quietly as it had come. Dale couldn’t tell at what point it had submerged, having lost track of the hull against the black horizon. He only saw the wake of the water until that too, disappeared, and all was still again.