‘She’s Unmer,’ he said. ‘She’ll kill you without meaning to.’
‘She can’t be Unmer,’ Ida retorted. ‘The Haurstaf would have sensed her.’
The colonel looked at her without the faintest glimmer of emotion. ‘If you say so,’ he said. ‘Debating the situation further serves no purpose, ma’am. Please move aside, or we will remove you by force.’
Ida did as she was told, stepping through the piles of glittering junk. Now that she thought about it, the girl’s frock did look old enough to be an antique. An original Unmer garment, intact and undamaged by the sea? The sheer value of it astonished her. And wasn’t there an odd graveyard smell in the air?
‘But how did she get out?’ she said.
‘Crawled straight through a wall, I imagine.’
‘But the Haurstaf would have sensed that!’
The colonel puffed on his cigar. ‘The Haurstaf always seem a trifle lax when the emperor neglects to pay his dues on time. If you would be so kind as to make your way towards the nearest exit, we will handle the crisis from here.’
The soldier beside him grunted. ‘Fucking extortion is what it is.’ A great dark brute of a man, he crouched on his high perch like some enormous ape, with the butt of his firearm pressed firmly into his massive shoulder and the barrel aimed at the child. On the back of his hand he bore a small black tattoo. It looked like a shovel.
‘Language, Sergeant Creedy.’
‘Well, it is,’ the other man persisted. ‘They let this one escape to teach Hu a lesson.’
‘Then they’re not coming?’ Ida said.
‘It seems unlikely, ma’am,’ the colonel replied.
She was about to protest the woeful inadequacy of this when the child cried out suddenly, ‘I want my mother.’ Her voice reverberated strangely in the vast space; it was accompanied by a queer crackling sound, like distant cannon fire.
The colonel reached into his satchel and pulled out a fist-sized ball of baked clay. A short fuse extended from its wax-sealed top. He examined the munition carefully, then glanced up at the vaulted ceiling. ‘Banks,’ he said to the second man sharing his side of the aisle. ‘I’d like your opinion on the roof.’
This soldier was much younger than his companions, but he surveyed the gloomy space above them with the grim demeanour and confidence of a much older man. He sniffed and rubbed at his nose. ‘The Unmer built this whole place,’ he replied. ‘Those corbels date back to the Lucian Wars. The problem is, I can’t tell exactly what’s above them from down here. We blow that roof, and we might bring down more than just rubble.’ He paused and sneezed into his hand. ‘Dragonfire would be better.’
‘Did you bring a dragon, Banks?’ the colonel said.
The younger soldier looked as if he was about to say something, then he shook his head wearily and returned his gaze to the ceiling. ‘We must be close to the Unmer ghetto, sir,’ he said. ‘Bring that down on our heads and the emperor will not be happy.’
‘What do the maps say?’
He blinked watery eyes, then gave a grunt. ‘What maps? Hu doesn’t consider the Trove Market close enough to his palace to warrant the expense of a survey. The Haurstaf would know, but-’
‘Blow the roof?’ Ida exclaimed. ‘What do you mean, blow the roof?’
‘Standard procedure, ma’am,’ the colonel said. ‘Nothing for you to be concerned about.’ He stood up, stared intently at the little girl for a moment, then turned to the big soldier by his side. ‘Fire a round at the child, Sergeant Creedy. Aim for her head.’
‘Aye, sir.’ The huge soldier pulled back the weapon’s firing lever, with a click.
Ida rushed in front of the child to block his shot. ‘What in heavens do you think you’re doing?’ she said, brandishing her book. ‘She’s just a little girl.’
‘I need you to stand aside, ma’am,’ the colonel said.
Ida didn’t budge.
‘We are here on Emperor’s Hu’s orders,’ he added. ‘If you fail to comply we will arrest you for resisting Imperial troops in a time of war. The punishment for such a crime is typically six to nine months’ incarceration.’
She folded her arms.
He observed her for a moment with cold eyes. ‘I don’t think you fully comprehend the danger,’ he said. ‘That crackling noise you heard when she spoke was the sound of air turning to vacuum in her lungs. She can’t help herself. Unmer children lack the restraint of adults.’
Ida glared at him. ‘She’s not doing anybody any harm.’ From the corner of her eye she noticed the child move close behind her.
The colonel glanced across at the two men perched on the shelves on the opposite side of the aisle and raised his eyebrows. These two were like ancient crows: scrawny, bow-legged creatures with wild black hair and noses shaped for pecking. They might both have been the sons of the same unfortunate woman. They held their heavy guns easily enough, but their narrowed, squinting eyes did not inspire confidence. One of them shook his head and spoke in a thick Greenbay accent, ‘Not without hitting the woman, sir.’
Creedy grunted. ‘You couldn’t hit the ocean from a boat, Swan. I can end all this time-wasting with one shot. If we dynamite the woman’s body afterwards, it’ll look like the Unmer child killed her.’
The colonel raised his hand. ‘No, Sergeant,’ he said. ‘We will adhere to the law.’ He thought for a moment, before turning his attention back to Ida. ‘Do you have a receipt for that book, ma’am?’
She blinked. ‘I hadn’t bought it yet.’
‘We are authorized to shoot looters on sight.’
Creedy laughed.
Ida felt strength draining from her legs. She cried out, ‘It doesn’t give you the right to shoot an unarmed-’
She didn’t get a chance to finish. The girl bolted away from her, down the aisle.
Ida half-turned.
And Creedy fired.
A flash erupted from the weapon, accompanied by a tremendous boom. The child shrieked as a second burst of light bloomed against her back. She dropped like a rag doll. Ida’s heart clenched in desperate panic. She felt as if the air had been sucked from her lungs.
Smoke leaked from the barrel of Creedy’s gun. He lowered the weapon and said, ‘Damn.’
Ida’s ears still rang with the sound of the detonation. It took her a moment to realize that the Unmer girl had not been harmed. Still clutching her doll, the poor child was trying to push herself upright amidst the piles of fallen treasure.
‘I shot her in the back,’ Creedy said.
‘Reload your weapon, Sergeant,’ the colonel said.
Creedy was shaking his head. ‘The round just vanished.’
The child was sobbing. She got to her feet and edged backwards away from the men. Behind her loomed one of the Trove Market’s many brine tanks, twelve tons of poisonous seawater glowing faintly behind its glass walls. A sharkskin woman stood in that brown gloom, watching the child approach. She thumped a fist against the inside of her container, but her warning made no sound.
Banks shouted, ‘The tank, Colonel.’
Creedy was hurriedly pouring powder into his gun.
The colonel nodded to the crows on the opposite bank. ‘Swan, Tummel, please do try to avoid any sort of mess.’
They raised their weapons.
The child wailed.
Explosions rattled the air. A hail of pellets crackled against the child’s red frock and flared out of existence. She screamed and dropped her doll. Through a veil of white smoke Ida saw her turn and flee.
‘Slippery little bitch,’ Creedy said.
Whether the girl was unable to perceive the brine tank, or whether she simply did not notice it in her panic, Ida didn’t know. But she doubted that what happened next was deliberate. The child ran straight into the container’s curved glass wall.
There was a blaze of white light, a sharp bang…
And the tank shattered.
A wave of brine erupted out onto the market floor, washing artefacts aside as it surged between the aisles. Ida leapt for the safety of the nearest set of shelves and tried to clamber up among the trove. Her foot slipped, and she felt cold seawater close around the heel of her shoe. The metal stink of brine filled her nostrils. She yelped, snatching her foot away, but it was too late. Her ankle had already begun to itch.