Assail (Malazan Empire, #6)(116)
The ragged fortune-hunters who crowded the dock waving and shouting were no more reassuring. Ragged and starving they were, in tattered shirts and canvas trousers, with mud-caked bare feet. They shouted their services as stevedores. Jute wouldn’t trust a pot of shit to any one of them.
Lurjen gestured further along the dock and Jute was relieved to see the Ragstopper coming alongside. Thank the gods for that. He peered around for the Resolute and was troubled to see she had dropped anchor in mid-bay, not far from the Supplicant.
The crowd actually had the temerity to try climbing the gangway. Buen was pushing them back; he cast a glance to Jute, who shook a negative. ‘No work,’ Buen yelled. ‘Not today. G’wan with you!’
‘Bastards!’ one shouted back.
‘You’ll get yours! You’ll see!’
Buen pulled his truncheon and waved them off. Someone new pushed through the crowd: short, grey-haired, in rags just as dilapidated and dirty. Cartheron Crust. Jute hurried down the gangway to meet him.
‘How are you?’
‘Better. Been better.’
‘Recovered?’
The old captain pulled a hand down his patchy beard. ‘Somewhat. Hard bein’ reminded of one’s mortality like that. Feelin’ old now, have to say.’
Jute gestured to the shore. ‘What do you think?’
‘Fuckin’ mess.’
‘Quite.’
Cartheron waved him on. ‘C’mon, let’s go see who’s in charge of this dump.’
Jute held back. ‘Just the two of us?’
Cartheron didn’t stop. ‘Yeah. Trust me. It’ll be just fine.’
Jute shouted back to Buen on the gangway: ‘Making arrangements!’ and hurried after him.
A knot of eight armed men and women blocked the base of the dock. They wore styles of leather armour from all over: the detailed engraved and enamelled leathers of Seven Cities, the plain layered leathers common to south Genabackis, even an expensive set of leaf-shaped scaled leathers clearly crafted in Darujhistan. The probable leader stepped up: a big black-bearded fellow in a long coat of mail. A longsword hung shoved through his wide leather belt.
‘Welcome to Wrongway,’ this fellow announced as they neared.
‘Wrongway,’ Cartheron echoed. ‘Funny.’
The bearded fellow grinned. ‘Yeah. Lying Gell thought so.’
‘Lying Gell …?’
The man hitched his belt up his broad fat belly. ‘Lying Gell, Baron of Wrongway.’
Cartheron turned to Jute. ‘There you go – that didn’t take so long, did it?’ He addressed the spokesman: ‘And you are …?’
The man’s grin widened over broken browned teeth. ‘They call me Black Bull.’
‘Black Bull? Why’s that?’
The grin sank into a scowl. ‘That you don’t want to find out.’
Cartheron waved the man off. ‘If you say so. Thanks for the welcome.’ He moved to pass.
Others of the eight shifted to block the way. Black Bull chuckled. ‘You don’t get it. Docking fees.’
‘Docking fees?’
‘Aye. Docking fees.’
Cartheron shrugged his bony shoulders. ‘How much?’
The spokesman cast a lazy glance over to a scarred woman with long hair the colour of straw, the one who wore the expensive Darujhistani leather armour. She supplied: ‘Two vessels – forty hundredths-weights.’
‘There you go. Forty hundredths-weights.’
Jute asked: ‘Forty hundredths-weights of what?’
Black’s grin became crafty. ‘Why, of gold dust, a’course.’
‘But we just got here. We don’t have any gold dust.’
Black shrugged his humped shoulders. ‘Well … that’s just too bad. Have to escort you to our exchange tent.’
Cartheron raised a hand for a pause. ‘Listen, if it’s all the same to you, I’d rather not exchange money in a tent owned by a guy named Lying Gell.’
Black pursed his lips. ‘Fine. You can just turn round and go home then.’
‘How about coins in equivalency? Silver?’
Black shot a glance to the woman, rubbed his chin. ‘Well now, that’s highly irregular. Have to be a surcharge on that. An extra fee of …’
‘Fifty per cent,’ the woman said. To Jute, her grin was far hungrier and scarier than Black Bull’s.
‘Fine,’ Cartheron sighed. He gestured to Jute. ‘Pay the man.’
Jute blinked. ‘Pardon? Me? Pay?’
Cartheron waved him forward. ‘’Course!’
The hireswords parted to reveal a table. The woman in the expensive armour leaned against it and urged Jute onward. Jute pulled out his purse and started setting coin on the scarred wood planks. The woman crossed her arms, counting. Upon closer inspection, the scars appeared to be knife slashes. As if someone had deliberately savaged her face. She caught Jute eyeing her and pointed a finger down. He quickly lowered his gaze. In the end, it took every silver coin he possessed to satisfy her. Sighing her irritation, she finally waved him off and brushed all the coin into an ironbound wooden box the size of a helmet.
Black Bull held out an arm, inviting them onward. ‘There you go. That wasn’t so hard, was it? Wrongway welcomes you.’