Sham had crept away from the Shroakes, this time, by routes they had suggested, that took him away & back into the town without drawing the attention of the watchers that were undoubtedly there. He blinked at what Robalson was saying. Robalson himself seemed uninterested in the rumours of state attention he was, unthinkingly, recounting.
“I just don’t see it,” he said. “About you, I mean. You think you want to be a salvor, but I’m not even sure you do.”
“Funny,” said Sham. “That’s what they said. & what about you, then? What do you even do, Robalson?”
“What do I do? Depends on the day. Some days I wash decks. Some days I clean the heads & oh my oily hell I’d rather get smacked into the godsquabble. Some days I do better things. Know what I saw today? Something from the upsky fell, about a month ago. Onto a beach in the north. They keep it in a jar, charge a few coppers to see it.”
“It’s alive?”
“Sham. It fell out of the upsky. No it’s not alive. But they keep it in vinegar or something.”
“But anyway you know that ain’t what I meant,” Sham said. “Which is your train?”
“Oh,” said Robalson. “Never you mind.”
“Yeah,” Sham said. “Whatever.” Fine. Let him play his mystery-boy games. “The upsky,” Sham said distractedly. “The grundnorm. The horizon. All these edges. What stories d’you know about, y’know, the edge of the whole world?”
Robalson blinked. “Stories?” he said. “You mean, like, Heaven? Same as you, probably. Why?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know if they was true?” Sham said, with sudden fervour, an intensity that took him quite by surprise.
“Not really,” said Robalson. “For a start, they ain’t, they’re just stories. For a second, if they are true, some of them you don’t want to be. What if it’s true that you should shun it? What is it they say’s there? A universe of sobbing, is it? Or, a crying treasure?” He shook his head. “It don’t have to make much sense to know it ain’t good. Angry ghosts? Crying forever?”
THIRTY-EIGHT
THE OWNERS OF THE MEDES WANTED THE COIN & credit that molemeat & fur & oils would bring. They didn’t care whether or not Naphi caught this, that, or the other particular mole. Except just perhaps that certain events would mean an increase in the power of her name, & that kind of brand recognition might mean income for them.
They were passing rare, captains who not only had their ultimate quarries, their nemeses, but who actually snared them. Like all Streggeye youth, Sham had been to the Museum of Completion, seen the famous flatographs of women & men standing on the mountainous carcases of philosophies: Haberstam on his beetle; ap Mograve on her mole; Ptarmeen on the sinuous mutant badger Brock the Nihil, beaming like a schoolchild with his dead nothing-symbol under his foot.
The Medes crew had three days to turn a middling moletrain into a travelling fortress of philosophy-hunting. Hammers hammered, spanners spanned. The trainsfolk ran tests on the engines & the backup engines. Sharpened harpoons, stocked up on gunpowder. They patched up leaks in the cladding. The Medes hadn’t looked so good for years. It hadn’t looked this good when it was first made.
“You know what the stakes of this are,” Naphi said. She wasn’t much of a one for speechifying, but she couldn’t not. As her officers had told her, the crew needed to hear something. “We may be at railsea a long time,” the captain said, voice cracking through the tubes. “Months. Years. This hunt will take us far. I am prepared. Will you come with me?” Ooh, nice touch, Sham thought.
“There are no trainspeople I’d rather have with me. We hunt for the glory of Streggeye, for the owners of this fine train.” A few knowing smirks at that. “For knowledge. & if you will, you hunt for me. & I won’t forget it. We go south—& then we go where knowledge takes us. Gentlemen & ladies of the rails—shall we?”
The crew cheered. They raised raucous support for the hunt, for the end of the uncertainty. “For the captain’s philosophy!” The shout was taken up across the decks, from every carriage of the train. Really? Sham thought.
“Sham,” said Dr. Fremlo as the crew went to their tasks. “The harbourmaster delivered this.” The doctor handed over a sealed letter, at which Sham stared in consternation. He muttered thanks—not every crewmember would have handed it over, certainly not so honourably refusing to read it first. Sam Saroop, the letter said. Close enough, he supposed. Honourable or not, the doctor was not uncurious, & waited while Sham split the seal.
SPECIAL OFFER! Sham read. TO THE VISITOR TO THE SHROAKES. GOOD RATES PAID FOR INFORMATION ABOUT THEIR PLANS! VISIT HARBOURMASTER TO FIND OUT MORE. ACT NOW TO RECEIVE FREE GIFTS!
“What is it?” Dr. Fremlo said, as Sham scrunched the paper up & curled his lip.
“Nothing,” Sham said. “Junk mail. Rubbish.”
“I DON’T KNOW WHAT’S WRONG WITH ME,” Sham said, “that I just don’t feel it.” He’d been telling the Shroakes of Naphi’s rhetoric, her galvanising the crew.
Caldera shrugged. “Neither do I,” she said. “But maybe you’re lucky.”
“Lucky?”
“Not to want to throw your hat in the air.” Caldera was counting what looked like pins or screws or something on the kitchen table. Dero was packing tins into suitcases.
Sham was getting better at sneaking away from the Medes. When he had turned up at the Shroake House, the siblings had greeted him without surprise.
“Come in.” Caldera smiled. “We’re just at the end of lessons.”
“Lessons” turned out to be Dero & Caldera sitting opposite each other in the library, amid a scree of books, ordinator tablets & printouts. On the shelves around them were as many bones & bizarreries as books. Dero was sorting & stashing the materials of learning, according to some incomprehensible system. “What are your lessons like in Streggeye?” Caldera said. “What’s your school like?” She blinked under Sham’s gaze. “Don’t know that many people your age here, let alone elsewhere,” she said. “I’m curious.” Was she blushing? Well, no. But she was a bit bashful.
“We went to Streggeye,” Dero said. “Didn’t we?”
“Oh, they took us all over,” said Caldera. “But I can’t remember. I can’t say we know anywhere.”
So Sham told her a little about Streggeye Land. He was blushing, even if she was not. He stumblingly turned an anecdote or two from his quite ordinary childhood into stories of an exotic land, while Dero finished putting away the bits & pieces.
Sham continued, & Caldera listened without looking at him, & Dero left the room. Sham heard the door to Byro’s room open & close. & he kept talking, & after a minute it opened again, & Dero returned. His face was set & his eyes red. Dero stood between Sham & Caldera. Sham’s stories faltered at last. The young man from Streggeye & the quasisalvors’ daughter turned away from each other.
“My turn,” said Caldera, & slipped out of the room.
“Turn for what?” said Sham. He did not expect Dero to explain, & Dero did not. He just stood with his lip out as if ready for a fight, in increasingly lengthy & uncomfortable silence, until Caldera came back. She carried a picture of Dad Byro, a scarf, a battered old foldable ordinator from his desk.
Her face was as stricken as her brother’s, but when she spoke, she made her voice sound normal. “Where’s your bat?” she said.