It had become her habit to visit the camp most afternoons, compelled by a sense of duty mingled with a masochistic guilt, for the people she had done so much to save now had very little. A minority, those lucky enough to have relatives across the sea who might take them in, had chosen to sail for other ports shortly after arrival. The majority had stayed for the simple reason they had nowhere else to go or no funds for passage elsewhere. The camp covered several acres of nonarable land a mile or so north of Feros, tents and makeshift shelters sprawling across a series of low hills beneath a pall of smoke and dust. Ironship continued to supply food and fuel, but only enough to forestall an upsurge of trouble and in spite of a rising tide of resentment amongst the native Feros population. Protectorate patrols were scrupulous in hounding any incomers from the port’s environs and only a few refugees had found regular employment.
She made her way through the rows of tents and shacks, greeted by the usual nods of respect or calls from those she remembered from the siege, and many she didn’t. However, she noticed as the days went by respect was often replaced by anger.
“Tell those bastards we need more milk!” a woman called to her from one of the shacks, hefting a skinny toddler in her arms to emphasise her point. “Or d’they want us to starve? Is that it?”
“I no longer work there, madam,” Lizanne told her, forcing a sympathetic smile before moving on.
She found Fredabel Torcreek at the makeshift clinic, engaged in tutoring Joya in the correct method of applying a bandage. Clay’s aunt had taken a protective interest in the girl since the evacuation, partially motivated by the years Joya had shared with her nephew as they lived out a perilous childhood in the Blinds. Their patient was a young woman wearing a clownish mask of white make-up and swearing constantly as they tended the wound in her upper arm.
“Been fighting again, Molly?” Lizanne asked, moving to her bedside.
“Them that don’t settle their bill deserve punishment.” Molly Pins winced as Joya tied off the bandage. “You sure you ain’t got no Green? I can pay.”
“Sorry, Moll.” Fredabel shook her head. “Last of it went three days ago.” She handed over a small wrap of paper. “One half-spoonful in a tincture of clean water twice a day. You get a fever or feel sick at any time you come right back, you hear?”
“Yessum.” Molly swung her legs off the bed, nodding thanks as Lizanne helped her to her feet. “Cralmoor sends his regards, Miss Blood,” she said. “Should I see you, told me to say they saw off another press-gang t’other night.”
Lizanne smothered a sigh of frustration. The Maritime Protectorate had become somewhat desperate to replenish its ranks recently. Pressing vagrants into service was permitted under company law, but the practice had long fallen out of use, until now. “I’m sorry to hear that,” she said. “However, I’m afraid my influence will be even less effective these days.”
Molly shrugged. “He says they didn’t kill any sailor boys this time, but they come round again it’ll be a different matter. If you got anybody to tell, then you’d best tell ’em that.”
Lizanne had long given up trying to educate the refugees in her true status. For many of these people she remained Miss Blood, their great Blood-blessed saviour. The notion that she was in fact little more than a minor functionary, and now not even that, didn’t seem to have penetrated the collective consciousness. “I will,” she said instead.
After Molly had taken her leave Fredabel brewed coffee in her small canvas-walled office-cum–living space. “What happened to her customer?” Lizanne asked.
“Didn’t make it,” Joya replied. “Some managerial type fallen from grace. Liked to take his frustrations out on the girls from the Blinds. Should’ve known better than to welch on Molly’s bill though. Don’t worry, he won’t be missed. Cralmoor took care of it.”
Lizanne stopped herself delivering another lecture on the parlous effects camp violence had on the refugees’ reputation. She was now essentially powerless after all and in no position to be lecturing anyone.
“You have news?” Fredabel asked, passing her a mug of coffee. Lizanne was impressed by her self-control in not asking the question sooner. Thanks to Lizanne Fredabel knew her husband, daughter and nephew had survived the search for the White, but the interval between trances no doubt made for a nerve-wracking wait.
“I tranced with Mr. Torcreek three days ago,” she said. “He and the Longrifles are aboard the Protectorate vessel and making for Lossermark. The captain is insistent on replenishing supplies. Also, he remains undecided about the next course of action.”
“Can’t say I blame him.” Fredabel sank onto a stool, clasping her hands together. “But I guess my husband’s attitude remains unchanged?”
“He and the other Longrifles remain committed to this course of action.”
“It’s madness,” Joya stated. Lizanne had noted before how her managerial origins tended to overcome her Blinds accent in moments of stress. “Sailing south through an ocean full of hostile Blues . . .”
“The Blues seem to be concentrated in northern waters,” Lizanne said, recalling the admiral’s words at the meeting. “They have a good chance of making it.”
“If this captain agrees to take them,” Fredabel pointed out.
“Quite so.” Lizanne paused and pulled a bundle of scrip notes from her dress pocket. “For medicine, and whatever you deem fit,” she said, handing the notes over.
Fredabel’s eyebrows rose as she counted the bundle, which comprised a quarter of the profits from the newly established Lethridge and Tollermine Manufacturing Company. “You ain’t making yourself poor on our account, I hope.”
“Business is booming,” Lizanne assured her. “We should be able to take on some more workers soon.”
She stayed for a time, catching up on the camp news, which often made her consider that this place was simply a transplanted if much-reduced version of Carvenport. Although many social barriers had disappeared under the pressures of siege and evacuation, others lingered with surprising tenacity, and the camp had soon evolved a neighbourhood structure that reflected prior allegiances. The former denizens of the managerial district proved the most strenuous in maintaining a certain exclusivity in their wood-and-canvas dominion, though Lizanne felt there was something pitiable in their attempts to cling to lost eminence. They could strut around in their fine but increasingly threadbare clothes all they wanted, in the end they were all just beggars now.
Emerging from the clinic a short while later, she drew up short at the sight of a tall, large-bellied man in a shabby business suit. “A little overdramatic, don’t you think?” Taddeus Bloskin asked her.
“What do you want?” Lizanne said, acutely aware she had neither product nor weapon on her person, though she took some comfort from the fact that Bloskin had chosen to come alone.
“I want what I assume your little tantrum was intended to achieve.”
Lizanne forced herself to remain still as Bloskin reached into his inside pocket to extract a bundle of papers bound with a black ribbon. “I believe, Miss Lethridge,” he said, proffering the papers, “it’s time to renegotiate your contract.”
CHAPTER 3
Hilemore
“Lighthouse in view, Captain,” Steelfine reported, glass raised to his eye as he peered through the early-morning mist. “She’s still lit.”
Someone’s alive here, at least, Hilemore thought, his relief tempered by the suspicion that the Spoiled, or whatever commanded them, were not beyond mounting a ruse to lure them into an ambush. “Best take no chances, Number One,” he said. “Sound battle stations. Split the riflemen into two sections and spread them along both rails.”