The Merchant of Dreams (Night's Masque, #2)(6)
They were greeted by a stout, elderly skrayling with white shell beads woven into his braids. He bowed to them in the skrayling manner, arms at his side with palms facing forward.
"My master desires to visit the Outspeaker," Coby said in Tradetalk, after the introductions were over.
"Of course. The brother of Erishen-tuur is always welcome with us. Kiiren-tuur's tent is over the next ridge, downstream from the hendraan."
"Hendraan?" Coby asked. Another Vinlandic word to add to her vocabulary.
"Place of staying, with many tents," the harbourmaster said.
She thanked him, and conveyed the directions to Mal. As they left she could feel the harbourmaster's eyes boring into her back. He must be curious as to what a boy of his own people was doing in the company of two English visitors, but evidently the outspeaker's business was not his to question.
A steep path led up from the harbour to the interior of the island. Steps had been cut into the cliff face, but like the harbour wall they had not been maintained well. Several times Coby lost her footing on the weathered stone and had to steady herself by grabbing a handful of the coarse weeds that had sprung up by the path. At last they reached the top, where they were buffeted anew by the powerful westerly winds that swept the island. A dry, dusty track led across short turf peppered with rabbit droppings. In a sheltered hollow about half a mile to the west, the skraylings' striped tents rose out of the surrounding bracken and gorse like an unseasonal flush of toadstools.
"Take the boy to the camp and see if you can find his kin." Mal gave her the pouch into which they had gathered all the intact necklaces. "I'm going to look for Kiiren."
She nodded, guessing it was his brother Sandy he really wanted to see. If it had been her own lost brother waiting in the next valley, no amount of curiosity about the skrayling expedition could have kept her from him. She waved Mal away, then set off towards the main camp.
As they drew nearer, she could hear the sounds of raised voices. She glanced at Ruviq, but the boy only grinned and quickened his pace. Coby hurried after him, wondering what could be causing such a commotion amongst the normally peaceful skraylings.
On the seaward edge of the camp a wide circle of ground had been stripped of its turf and dozens of skraylings were clustered around the perimeter, stamping and cheering. Through a gap in the crowd Coby could make out two figures within the circle, locked in a wrestling hold. Patches of dust stuck to their grey-and-pink skins, adding to the mottled effect of their natural colouring, and their long hair was tied back with coloured ribbons like the ones on the harbour monument. Both were naked as savages. A blush rose from her suddenly tight collar and she made to turn away; too late. She stared in horrified fascination at the stubby, hairless tail extending from the base of the nearest wrestler's spine until her view was thankfully blocked by the shifting crowd.
She shuddered. There were rumours, of course, but she had dismissed them as ignorant gossip like all the other tall tales circulating back in London: that the skraylings bound elemental spirits into bottles, sacrificed human infants to their dark gods – though to Coby's knowledge the skraylings acknowledged no gods, heathen or Christian – and that they had no females and were born from the bark of trees, which was certainly nonsense. Master Catlyn had explained that skrayling females preferred the safety of their island cities and did not wish to undertake the long and hazardous journey to Europe.
Her train of thought was interrupted by a roar from one of the wrestlers, followed by the thud of bodies hitting the ground. A few moments later the crowd erupted into whoops of victory on one side and groans of disappointment on the other, and the match was over.
The spectators began to disperse, only to come to a halt when they caught sight of the new arrivals. Or rather, Ruviq. Coby realised they were all staring at the boy in surprise and alarm. One of them, whose facial tattoos were almost identical to Ruviq's, pushed through the crowd and threw his arms around the boy, exclaiming loudly in Vinlandic. Others crowded around them, their tone of voice questioning.
She tried to explain in broken Tradetalk what had happened, but when she came to the part about finding the bodies, her throat closed around the words and tears began to stream silently down her cheeks. She held out the pouch.
"These are all?" one of the skraylings asked.
"Yes." The word came out as a croak. She swallowed and tried again. "Yes. All."
Ruviq said something to the others in Vinlandic, miming pulling at his throat.
"It was your necklace we found," she said to him. "I think Mal – Catlyn-tuur – has some of the beads. Do you want them back?"
"Blue-stones?"
"No, only the lodestone ones."
He shook his head sadly. "Only the blue-stones were given to me by my father. I must make new."
"He would be proud of you," Coby said, patting him on the shoulder.
Her business completed, she bade farewell to the skraylings and set off to look for Mal. The light was already fading, and an icy wind whipped the waist-high bracken into a dark, rattling sea. Behind her, the skraylings' voices rose in an eery song of mourning.
The harbourmaster's directions proved easy enough to follow. Mal skirted the coastward edge of the settlement and soon found a little stream, swollen now with winter rains, cutting through the thin skin of earth to reveal the island's rocky skeleton. Soon it descended into a narrow defile that opened out into a sheltered dell looking out to sea. A single tent stood well back from the cliff edge. Sheltered behind it from the constant winds, fist-sized stones ringed a circle of ash.