Emmy

Screams and cannon blasts sounded overhead, muffled by the thick wood of the hull. Tremors shook the beams above and rattled in tune with the terror of the captives. The Masvam ship rocked like a cork in the great sea. Emmy clung to her cage as fear took hold. Those who hadn’t grabbed their bars were bucked and tossed inside their tiny prisons. Emmy kept her eyes on Zecha and tried to keep her tears at bay. His body rolled with the waves.

As the ship lurched he tumbled across the length of the hold, landing in a crumpled heap at Charo’s cage. She pushed her hands through the bars and wound her talons into his filthy shirt to stop him rolling again.

The ship jerked again. Surrounded by shrieking and screeching, Emmy felt like a character in one of Krodge’s bedtime tales of Moon Rogues and demons. Metakalans pounded on bars and rattled doors with desperate claws. Some even came loose. The momentary bubble of joy did not last long. They were trapped below the deck of a beleaguered ship. There was little elation in that.

Above them there were more blasts. Emmy’s breath came faster and faster. What was happening? Who was attacking? Could they be friends, or would they be more enemies? There was no way to know, and that made Emmy’s heart hammer. She scrabbled forward and clawed at her lock again. If some of the other cage doors came loose, surely hers could, too…

An ominous creaking came from above, followed by what sounded like a tree being felled. Whatever it was hit the deck above, sending deadly tremors through the hold. Emmy stopped her work and listened. The hold was silent, every ear listening.

There were more vibrations.

Then came screams, thundering footsteps, and the clash of sword on sword. The ship was being boarded. That was the only explanation Emmy’s spinning brain could find.

The fighting above seemed to last for eternity. Emmy’s fight with her lock continued. She was about to give up when there was a flash of cold and clack—something happened, and the lock dropped to the deck.

‘I did it…’

She shoved the cage open with freezing claws and untangled herself. Straight away she went to Zecha, pulling him from Charo’s grasp, laying his head on her lap.

‘Help him,’ Charo said, her words thin with despair.

Emmy was forced to lay Zecha’s head in the filth to allow her claws to reach his wound. The stab was deep, the edges ragged. Emmy’s breathing hitched as her medical knowledge laid out the likely outcome before her. It was like Krodge was speaking in her head.

A deep wound, through the stomach. Excess bleeding with filth penetrating from the outside. From the inside, filth from the bowels seeping into the wound. It needed to be cleaned. Even then, the likelihood of survival was low. It was easy to sew the outer wounds closed but the inner damage was a different story.

Emmy couldn’t breathe. With Charo it had been easy. There had been no damage to the fleshy inside of the body. But Zecha’s stomach… It was different. She was sure of it. It would be difficult…

‘But it is not impossible,’ came Krodge’s voice.

In an instant Emmy was back in the kitchen of the apothecary with a dead body stretched out on the table—an entirely illegal practice, but Krodge felt herself above such archaic laws. She had opened the female, exposing the myriad of organs within. Emmy had only been ten but she had watched with fascination, not disgust.

‘Study the insides,’ Krodge said. ‘Sometimes you need to get your claws into the inner workings of the body to save it.’

The crone had taken Emmy on a tour of this inside world, smiling in conspiracy, knowing Emmy was so under her control that she would never tell of these journeys into the unknown. And if Emmy had spoken? No-one would have believed the Moon Rogue.

Emmy blinked and stared at the wound with new eyes, scanning it with every measure of expertise and memory she had.

It was deep but she could save him. She just knew it. If only she had the equipment, a knife, pulled-gut thread.

You don’t need that, a strange voice said.

Emmy stilled, gripping Zecha hard. The voice was not her own, nor was it Krodge’s. It was unknow yet strangely familiar, as if she had heard it many cycles before.

Lay your hands on him, the voice continued. You’ve done it before. Stop the bleeding. Save him.

Emmy swallowed. She shut her eyes. This was it. She had lost her mind. A voice in her head, a voice that sounded familiar? It wasn’t real.

Even so, the strange coldness tingled anew in her talons and she opened her eyes once more. Zecha lay prone, filthy, dying. She might have lost her mind but she could help save his life.

Trembling, she placed her hands on the wound.

The coldness came in waves, pulsing from somewhere deep inside. It was all for nothing. It was her imagination. It was a fever dream, unreal, foolish. But then, she thought, her eyes never leaving Zecha’s pallid face, what did she have to lose?

She kept her hands on Zecha for some time. Beside her, Charo reached out. The tips of her talons brushed the edge of Emmy’s shoulder. The three stayed like that as confusion and fear swirled around them, hundreds of Metakalan voices crying out their fear. Above them, the sounds of combat continued. Emmy’s coldness abated, replaced by the warmth of love and the hope she had somehow saved him.

After a time, the metallic slice of sword on sword ceased. With it came silence in the hold, a silence that was only broken by the jangle of keys, the slide of a barrel into a mechanism, and the smooth turn of a lock.

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Light and sweet air spilled into the hold, and Emmy had to shield her eyes against the brightness. Her eyes focused and she saw two figures silhouetted against the sky.

‘By Ethay and Apago,’ a strangely accented voice said. ‘It stinks in here.’

‘What are they carrying?’ the second odd voice asked. ‘Livestock?’

The figures stepped forward. Emmy couldn’t breathe. These were the folk who had attacked the ship. They had dark skin and dark armor, and bright eyes that shone like jewels. Emmy had seen many of their kind before, coming into Bellim’s port on ships with a two-headed serpent on the prow.

‘Althemerians,’ she whispered.

Her grip on Zecha grew tighter.

‘By the gods,’ the first Althemerian said, her voice low. She kissed her fist, then laid it on her chest. Her arms jingled, for they were covered with many bracelets. ‘They weren’t transporting livestock.’

Those Metakalans who had been freed from their cages lunged forward, grabbing for the strangers.

‘Thank you!’

‘By the goddess, you’ve saved us!’

Beside her, Charo rattled against her cage and grinned.

‘They’ve come to free us,’ she said.

Emmy tried to smile in return but something Krodge had said not long before came back to her.

‘There’s an Althemerian custom I’m quite fond of. It’s about owing a debt to those who have helped you.’

She glanced at the rising tide of Metakalans, now being held back by more and more Althemerians. Eventually they let the captives scramble onto the deck. Emmy clutched Zecha’s body to her, shielding him from the stampede. With those already freed out of the way, Althemerians—both male and female—came along the length of the hold, striking off the locks of those still enclosed. Not all the cages bore living survivors. That thought spurred Emmy’s tongue into action.

‘Help!’ she cried.

A wiry Althemerian male approached her, wearing a weather-beaten blue tunic and the heaviness of a life of battle on his face. Two twined serpents were picked out in thread on the chest of his uniform.

‘My friend,’ Emmy said. ‘He’s been stabbed. He needs help.’

‘Easy,’ the Althemerian said, his many bracelets jangling. ‘Easy now. I’ll get a healer.’

He disappeared from the hold, returning with two others. One was male and wore the same uniform as the first Althemerian. The other was a female, a different symbol on a black tunic. It was a strange thing, colored red, a heart within an eye. Many bags hung from her belt, heavy with their contents. She knelt at Zecha’s side and pried his eyelids open, checking for signs of life. She used her left arm, on which were many more bracelets than on her right.

‘He isn’t dead,’ Emmy said. ‘I know he’s not. Help him!’

The female—a healer—nodded and gestured for the males to lift Zecha between them. He was slung from their hands, prone but no longer bleeding.

‘He isn’t dead,’ the healer confirmed. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’

The three disappeared up the deck with Zecha and Emmy went to follow. But a cry from Charo stopped her. Another Althemerian struck the lock from her cage and Charo extricated herself. Straight away she threw herself into Emmy’s arms, wrapping her own around Emmy’s tall, thin body.

‘We’re saved,’ Charo whispered, ‘and Zecha will be okay.’

Unable to speak in return, to say everything would be fine, Emmy pulled away and took Charo’s hand. Together they slipped into the flow of freedom, their limbs cracking and loosening after so long in captivity.

Emmy took in heavy swallows of freshness, trying to quiet her hammering heart. The unsullied air caught in the back of her throat. If their saviors had been anyone but Althemerians she might have had more joy. Unfortunately that was not to be.

Alongside the captured Masvam ship was a long Althemerian rig, complete with flags streaming in the sea breeze. They bore the entwined serpents of the Althemerian gods. It was the same sigil found on the chests of their ‘liberators.’ Emmy had seen it long before, struck onto the backs of foreign coins. Remembering Krodge’s words, the image didn’t fill her heart with joy.

Neither did the sight that greeted her when she looked at the deck.

Hewn bodies littered it, a garden of murder. Kelom was there, his insides spilling out, death’s scream on his face. Yamor’s head was at arm’s length from his body. Another commotion came from up the deck. Emmy and Charo followed the noise, pushing their way through the crowd.

It was Pesmam struggling in the grip of his Althemerian captors.

He was brought before a striking female with dark skin and armor and sparkling green eyes. Her uniform was richly embroidered with serpents in greens and blues and silver. There was something about her that commanded attention. Charo and Emmy couldn’t look away. She wielded a heavy sword and her arms were bedecked with hundreds of sparkling bracelets.

‘As captain of this slave ship,’ the Althemerian female said, her voice regal, ‘you have committed a grave crime. I, Princess Valaria of Althemer, condemn you to death for your wickedness, on the authority of my mother Queen Valentia and the balance of Ethay and Apago.’

Emmy and Charo looked at one another, sharing the same thought. A princess?

Pesmam’s struggle grew stronger as he was forced to his knees, but he was no match for his captors. The Althemerian princess, Valaria, raised her sword.

Pesmam was held in place. He had no final words. His last gesture was to spit at the princess’s feet.

The blade was sharp and swift. Pesmam’s body slumped to the deck of his ship, while his head was held aloft by the princess.

‘So is the justice of the Twin Gods, and of the Queen of Althemer!’ said Valaria. Then, all grandness gone, and she handed her sword and Pesmam’s decapitated head off to an attendant. ‘Put that somewhere. I’ll need it later.’

‘Yes, Princess.’

Pesmam’s headless corpse was tossed into the sea. The princess turned and disappeared. The atmosphere was one of unabated elation. Althemerian sailors brought supplies from their rig, taking charge of the Masvam ship. The injured were transported to the other vessel, the Althemerian sailors’ feet light on the planks slung between the ships. They have to take care of Zecha, Emmy thought. No matter what Charo said before, surely it was better to be a captive and alive than dead and free.

Regardless, she was certain he would not die.

Emmy thought of the coldness in her hands and the voice in her head. It was madness, but she couldn’t help but hope that she had helped him somehow.

Despite her assurances that life was better than death, a niggling doubt was at the back of Emmy’s thoughts. Charo’s earlier words echoed back.

‘I’ve lived as a slave, and it’s no life at all.’

Charo’s current words were tinged with the half-delirium that swept across the deck of the ship.

‘We’re free now. Once Zecha’s better, we can make our way back to Bellim, or what’s left of it. Or we could go somewhere else. Or—’

Emmy grabbed Charo and pulled her aside. She kept her hand clamped on Charo’s shoulder.

‘What’s wrong?’ Charo asked, her eyes searching Emmy’s face.

‘I wouldn’t be so hasty.’

Emmy’s expression bore no joy and Charo’s grew pained.

‘What do you mean?’ she asked. ‘We’re free from the Masvams.’

‘We’re free from one slaver,’ Emmy said, gesturing at the flag of two twined serpents flapping in the breeze, ‘but we’ve been saved by the hand of another.’

Charo’s eyes went wide and glassy and she shook Emmy’s hand from her shoulder.

‘No,’ she said. ‘They’ve saved us. They’re not slavers, not like the Valtat…’

Emmy chuckled, but the sound was dry.

‘Don’t they know anything in the north?’ she asked. ‘The Althemerians have saved us but by their laws, we now owe them a debt. They’ll keep us until they decree that debt is repaid.’ She choked out another laugh. ‘Don’t you see? We haven’t been given our freedom at all.’