That was peculiar.
“An’ there was this odd feller, this mornin’,” Pewl said, “just kinda wandered down the beach.”
“Who?”
“That’s the odd part. Silver hair down to here—” Pewl stopped cold at the look Camargen gave him.
“Go on. What about him?”
Pewl went on, very quietly, very respectfully under that look. “Dunno, Cap’n, wish I did to tell ye, but I heard it round the shipyard.”
“There’s a shipyard?”
“Aye, Cap’n, but not as to say much of a shipyard. More a breaker’s yard. Capper runs ‘er, an’ I pick up work from time to time, I did, savin’ your offer, Cap’n, for which I’m—”
“The silver-haired man. What happened to him?” Damn him. Damn him. Things magical had their own way of finding a shore, hadn’t he said it to himself, about the ruby, about the rest of the Fortunate’s treasure. So had their personal curse, whose last gasp had come with Camargen’s hands around his neck, as they went under the waves.
“Far as I know, Cap’n, ‘e disappeared into the town. Talk was he was the oddest-lookin’ sod wot ever was, an’ not answerin’ a hail, but nobody wanted to touch ’im.”
“Just walked in.”
“So’s to say, sir.” Pewl had a very honest face at the moment, a scared-honest face. One could see all the way to the back of the bloodshot eyes. Camargen knew the look, was relatively sure Pewl wouldn’t cross him, not for his life. But it was well to have these things firmly laid out.
“So’s you know, Pewl, I’m from foreign parts myself. And I want that man. I want him alive, so I can have the pleasure of killing him myself. And I’ll fry the guts of any man who ever crosses me in that particular or any other. Do you hear me clear, Pewl?”
“I hears ye, Cap’n.” Marble-mouthed Pewl was, like everybody else hereabouts, but the old Ilsigi was in the rhythms of Pewl’s speech, Pewl himself seemingly coming from elsewhere, and Camargen understood him well enough. Likely Pewl understood him better than anybody else at hand. “I hears ye clear.”
“That’s very good, Pewl,” Camargen said. “I’ll not be hiring many, at first. I’ll be looking for a ship, a proper ship, d’ ye understand me?”
An animal cunning came into Pewl’s eyes, the hint of a grin to his mouth, which was missing a front tooth. “Aye, Cap’n. A deepwater ship.”
“That’s my notion. And I’m writing you down in the book …” Truth was, he didn’t have a proper book, but a man like Pewl believed it as holy writ when it was written down and signed. He made one of his sheets of paper do, and took a note. “Pewl, able seaman, foretopman, hired in—what’s the name of this port?”
“Sanctuary.” Pewl almost thought it was funny, and then decided it was deadly serious. “Sanctuary, Cap’n.”
“Sanctuary.” Camargen wrote it down. “The date?”
“Why, as it’s Produr, the sixteenth, year forty-four of the new reckoning.”
“What new reckoning?”
“Well, as it’s 3971, in the old Ilsigi.”
Not much could make the blood leave Camargen’s face. It seemed to for a breath or two, on a rapid calculation. Eight hundred years. Eight hundred years, damn silver-hair to an eternal hell!
“Cap’n?”
“Nothing.” Camargen finished his entry, turned the paper about. “Sign your name.”
“Aye, sir.” Pewl made his mark, not an X, but the Peh, for Pewl, of which Pewl was probably quite vain. “’At’s fair writ, Cap’n.”
“You’ll mess here in this inn,” Camargen said. “Meat twice a week, duff once, ale two pints a day, the rest whatever the inn’s serving, and don’t get drunk and don’t break the furniture. I’ll give that word to the barkeep. You have a knife?”
“Aye.” A pleased little slap at the back of the belt.
“Keep it sharp. You take no other work on the side. No hire but mine. None of this working for Capper. You’re writ in the book, hear?”
“Aye, Cap’n.”
“I’ll be looking for a ship, Pewl. I’ll be looking.”
“First I know of one, Cap’n.”
“And first you know of the silver-haired man. Hear me, Pewl? Alive, have you got that?”
“Aye,” Pewl said. “Aye, Cap’n.”
Camargen said nothing else while Pewl drank his ale, only put the paper with the rest of his accounts, his reckonings what it would take in wood and cordage to assemble a ship, no proper ship being at hand.
Capper, Pewl said. A sort of a shipyard.
But first was a slippery sod of a wizard, who’d killed his crew, sunk his ship, and stranded him here.
The younger boy followed him through the rapidly emptying market, yattering freely about his family, his father’s stoneyard, his (apparently very large) older brother, but mostly he went on about his grandfather, his very old, very important grandfather, the one who’d told him stories about the old days, who knew exactly what had happened to Kadakithis, and whose dreams had implanted this Bec with a dream of his own, a dream to write the real history of Sanctuary.
“Which should include all the stories, shouldn’t it?” Bec asked, his head tilted thoughtfully.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I’ve been collecting stories from anyone who’ll talk to me, but I’ve only been writing down those from people who were actually there.” A sideways glance. “What people think happened is important, too, isn’t it? Like you’re trying to do with your drawing of Kadakithis, but in this case, maybe writing down the rumors is almost as important as the truth—as long as I write them like they’re rumors and not truth. Isn’t that what makes rumors part of history, too?”
Kadithe shrugged, more interested than he let on. The kid wasn’t just hot air. He had real information and was serious about his dream.
If there was one thing he could appreciate, it was a dream.
“And who do you figure’s going to read this history of yours?”
“Everybody. I’ve already started it in Rankene,” he said proudly, “but I’ll translate it to Ilsigi—when I learn to write it.”
“You write Rankene, but not Ilsigi? Writing’s writing, isn’t it?”
Bec laughed. “’Course not. Different letters. Different rules.” He sighed, a bit too heavily for credibility. “But Mama’s Rankan and proud of it and she gets all upset when I ask about Ilsigi letters. My brother could help, but he won’t, so for now, I just collect the stories and write them down in the language I know.”
He patted the bag he carried slung across his shoulder—a proper scribe’s bag, Kadithe noted with a twinge of jealousy, quickly stifled. But oh! Wouldn’t he love to have such a treasure? To keep just one of his drawings, to show—
Funny how after all these years he still longed to share his sand drawings with Grandfather. Satisfy yourself, my dearest boy, Grandfather always said these days. There’s no other opinion that counts.
If only that were true. Bezul’s appreciation, his wife’s, now Bec’s … so much in so little time. It was intoxicating … and only increased his wish that Grandfather could see, that he could know his efforts weren’t in complete vain.
He stopped on the far side of the bridge, ducked under an awning, and pointed with his chin toward the stairway leading to Pyrtanis Street and Grabar’s stoneyard.
“Headed home?”
Bec shrugged. “Shite, no.” He patted his bag. “Stories to find, you know.” And with a big grin: “Got more than ever, now I’m into the made-up stuff, too.”