Blaggard's Moon (59 page)

“ ‘Gentlemen, your Captain is dead. He's hung in Skaelington, along with Mr. Mazeley. I therefore claim this ship as mine, and you as my crew.' That's his words exactly,” Delaney confirmed.

“That was happy news?”

“It wasn't to a lot of 'em, who left there on the spot. But it was happy to me. I didn't know Conch well, and I was glad to get shed of him since he's the one made me shoot…” Delaney stopped.

“He made you shoot what?”

“He made me…” Delaney's face went pale—he could feel the blood drain from it, even as his heart seemed to slow to a crawl and pound at the same time. “I can't say, ma'am.”

“You don't need to say.”

Delaney felt enormous relief. “Thank ye kindly. The Captain, I mean the new captain, Belisar Whatney, he brought a few men with him. Blue Garvey, meanest man I ever knew.”

“I've met him. He visited my father-in-law's farm recently.”

“Right. He was one of those what went to get you. And a few others. We lost a good bit a' the crew that day, who didn't want to sail for no
Belisar What-not, as they called him. But new crew was easy to pick up in Mumtown. Except for Ham Drumbone. He's the storyteller, came with Belisar. He gathered up your tale from bits and scraps, you and Damrick, and told it all to us from the start.”

“That explains why so many people seem to know who I am.”

“Yes, ma'am. We all know all about you.”

“But you were telling me about Belisar's search for Conch's gold.”

“I was?” Delaney couldn't remember. But then, he couldn't remember talking so much before in his entire life. And then to a woman. And then to a woman he wasn't supposed to talk to at all. “I think I said enough.” He glanced at Lemmer.

“I understand,” she said. “Belisar probably didn't let anyone know that he was in search of the gold all that while.”

Delaney said nothing, but thought hard. Then he said, “I remember thinkin' it odd that Belisar wanted to give the
Shalamon
a thorough cleansin', right away.” Delaney stroked his chin. “He started that right after he shot Jubal Turley, who was the only man fool enough to speak up when Belisar asked if there were any questions. After he shot Jubal, and there were no more questions, he said he wanted every inch of the ship swabbed out and washed of all its grime. And that's why,” Delaney said knowingly. But he stopped there. Belisar had been looking for the map. Belisar didn't care much about keeping a ship up to some naval standard, as he proved in the years since.

“He was searching for the map, no doubt.”

“Did ye give it to him? When he found ye on the farm?”

“If I had, I wouldn't be alive.”

“Well, I'm glad ye didn't then.” Delaney said it with a full heart.

“Thank you, Smith Delaney. But I don't have it. He and his men ransacked our house, and tore up all the farm buildings. They shot our dogs and the cow, then burned everything that would burn.”

Delaney nodded. It was the way of pirates. Delaney hadn't gone with Belisar on that particular mission; it was just Blue Garvey and Spinner Sleeve and a couple of others. But word was, they'd done all they could to get her to talk about where the map was, or short of that, where the gold was. They would have even shot Didrick Fellows if he'd been home, but he'd gone to Mann to sell some sheep.

“Glad they didn't hurt the two of ye,” Delaney said at last.

She seemed to think that was an unusual thing to say. “Thank you, Mr. Delaney. But the only reason they didn't hurt me, or Autumn, was
that I told them if they did I'd never say a word and they'd be without their treasure.”

“So they took ye with 'em.”

“I'm sure your captain has something horrible planned for us.”

Delaney couldn't argue with her there. “So there's no map?” Delaney asked.

She looked at him with that sly look again. “I didn't say that, did I?”

“Really? Where is it?” he asked.

She laughed. It wasn't much of a laugh, or a very loud one. But it was enough. Delaney heard with his own ears the reason so many men had been drawn by that sound, even from across a room. “Smith Delaney, I'll tell you what. If you'll help me escape, I will tell you.”

This sobered him up. “Ma'am, I can't do that. I'm sworn to the service of Belisar the Whale, and if you tell me where the gold is, I'll just have to tell him.”

She shook her head. “A loyal man.”

“I am that.”

“And honest.”

“Honest?”

“Yes. You could have made me promises, heard my story, and then gone to tell Belisar everything. That's what a loyal but dishonest man would do.”

“He would?” Delaney didn't say it, but he thought that mostly he didn't do that because he didn't think of it.

Just then the little girl stirred. She raised her head, and sleep was in her eyes. She sat up and rubbed them with chubby, delicate little hands. “Where are we, Mama?”

“On a ship. Still on a ship.”

Autumn looked at Delaney. “Are you a bad man?”

Delaney's mouth dropped open. Those little eyes, so sweet and innocent, and trained on him with a question that seemed like bright sunlight shining down a well. “I'm not gonna hurt ye, if that's what yer asking.”

“Is he bad, Mama?” Autumn asked, turning to the authoritative source.

“We don't know yet,” Jenta said simply.

Autumn looked at Lemmer. “Is he bad?”

“We don't know. He's asleep.”

“Should I sing a lullabye?”

“Yes. Yes, I think you should.”

The little girl stood up and walked toward Delaney. Putting her little hands on the rusted iron bars, and her face between them, she looked up at Delaney with blue eyes shining, little white speckles in the blue parts, and began to sing the song.

A true lang time,

A lang true la

And down the silver path to a rushing sea,

Where moons hang golden under boughs of green,

A lang true la, 'tis true,

And the true heart weeps

As her song she sings,

A true lang time for you…

He was dumbfounded. It was the voice from his dream. The dream he'd had in Mumtown. He never thought he'd actually hear it, but there it was. And the song…it was the same song. Even more beautiful, more haunting than he'd dreamed it. Had he dreamed it into being? Or had he dreamed of what was to come?

The girl kept singing, verses he hadn't heard before…

Oh, carry my burthen, and carry her true,

For she steers for the south and the east

And the few,

A lang true la,

The drum and the yew,

A true lang time, my sweet.

A true lang time and we shall meet

On the silver path to the rushing sea

Where moons hang golden, and boughs are green,

A lang true la, 'tis true.

'Tis true, and lang, and lang true la,

A lang true la, and you.

The song went on, but Delaney was lost. He was lost in those eyes, in that voice, and in not knowing whether he dreamed or was awake. He was down in that well with the sun shining bright above, and couldn't seem to climb up out of it. There was beauty here he had never known,
and sadness, and longing, but it felt like perhaps he had known it all once, long ago. It was the beauty of a lullabye, sung from behind the cold iron bars of this world.

Finally the girl finished her song, and looked up at him. “My mama taught it to me. Would you like me teach it to you?”

Delaney had nothing to say. So Autumn turned to her mother and put a hand on a hip. “He's not a bad man, Mama. He's just afraid.”

“Come here, Autumn,” she said. And the girl ran to her mother, and jumped up on her lap.

“If you change your mind, Mr. Delaney,” Jenta told him, “you let me know.”

Delaney looked at her and nodded. They said not another word for the rest of the shift. Somewhere in there, though, as his mind clarified itself, he realized that Jenta's last comment was meant to be about setting her free in exchange for the map to Conch's gold, and not about her daughter's offer, which was to teach him that song. He didn't know which offer was more troubling.

Delaney was never so glad to finish a watch as he was on that night. “Don't talk to her,” he intoned to the man who relieved him. “She's dangerous.”

Their destination became a matter of great speculation and much debate, though this time without the flying fists and the flashing knives. But the farther they traveled south with Jenta and Autumn aboard, the easier it became to guess. Perhaps Belisar had not found Conch's map, but in tearing the ship apart and putting her back together, he had certainly pored through all of Conch Imbry's papers, and read the Captain's log in great detail, and with great interest. There, everyone agreed, he would have learned all about the Hants. He would have learned, there or elsewhere, that Conch had kept his very own Hant, the chieftain he'd installed in that ruined castle outside Skaelington. That was a man who could make any man talk. Or, they surmised, any woman. But as Skaelington was off limits now, a shining example of ruthless liberty from the influence of pirates, there might be another option. And their heading certainly tended to confirm it.

Not many aboard had been to the Forests of Sule. Some had. A very few could tell of the time they'd traveled there to cut the trees and stack the lumber of the night-oak, from which the
Shalamon
would be built. As the sun rose and set, and the ship's course remained true, the
speculation gave way to certainty. A certain amount of dread crept into conversations. Belisar would do anything, go anywhere, for a shot at the legendary hoard of coins amassed by Conch Imbry. He'd risk anything, including all their lives.

The drums stopped.

Delaney sat up straight and looked around him. There were no sounds. Even the bullfrogs had quit croaking. He peered down into the black water below him, but could see nothing. He waved his arms around, then stuck out his toes. “Where are you, boys?”

No
Chompers
surfaced.

Swallowing hard, he pulled his feet up under him. His knees creaked and his muscles ached. But nothing else happened. He peered around at the reeds that surrounded the pond, but they were black and still. For an instant, just an instant, it seemed that he'd imagined everything, that none of it was real. That he'd been dreaming the whole thing, all of it: the
Chompers
, the Hants, the drums, everything.

He put a hand, palm down, on top of the post under his buttocks, and flipped himself around again, and shinnied down. The post rocked unsteadily, but his grip was sure. With his toes about two feet from the surface, he leaned out and peered down again. And there they were, his little fishies, roiling the water, their big front teeth agape, little bear traps intent on sailor meat. He sighed, content. “I was worried about ye,” he told them affectionately. “But yer all good to go. You jus' hang tight, now, and old Delaney will feed ye soon enough.” And he climbed back up the shaft and took his accustomed seat.

It was odd. He felt ready to die. But when it came to it, it turned out he really didn't want to die. It was the pain, he told himself, not so much the actual dying, that caused the fear. Who wanted to go through all that, having bones extracted? Had to be like having a tooth pulled, which he'd had done more than once. Just thinking of it made his jaw ache—the surgeon grabbing on with a pair of pliers, and two or three men holding him down…even being drunk as a skunk, which was the only civilized way to do it, it was like they were ripping out his skull through his jaw. Having all his bones pulled out, all at once, that had to be the same. Probably worse.

He thought of the priest, Carter Dent, and how horribly carved up he'd gotten. That might be even worse, Delaney thought, but he didn't know for sure. That Hant had poisoned him, just for good measure. They said the Hant had given the poison because it made everything hurt worse.
Just the opposite of whiskey or rye or rum. It had made images come into the priest's head, too, scary images, while it made every little touch feel like a red-hot knife blade.

That poor priest.

And poor Jenta. She had not agreed to talk, though Belisar had given her chance after chance. And so he'd taken her to the Hants.

Delaney remembered how the
Shalamon
arrived in port, at Sule City.

“Looks like a bunch a' mud huts on a beach,” Delaney noted, peering over the port rail.