Page 41 of The Neverfear

‘Drink,’ croaked Koo. ‘Mine, drink.’ He was about to fly out again, but there was a bird cry overhead, and Koo darted to hide in Irian’s jacket, burrowing his face into her armpit in fear.

Carla Venasque swept down the length of the beach on the back of the stymphalian bird, its bronze wings gleaming.

‘How’s the prisoner?’ she said.

‘I need water,’ said Irian.

Carla reached into the saddlebag on the stymphalian and took from it a slim flask. She thrust it between the bars of the cage.

‘And food?’ said Irian.

‘Not today. Perhaps, as the tide comes in, you can catch a little fish.’

Irian had told herself she would not ask the question, but the words burst from her before she could stop herself. ‘You said you knew Nighthand. How?’

‘Oh, yes.’ Carla leaned closer to Irian. ‘I knew Nighthand better than anyone in the world. For more than a year, we travelled the oceans together. He had a crew – a man called Warren, the ratatoska and me. He ignored me at first. But eventually, he came to pay me attention. I was young, and new to the waters, and I wanted to make a fortune. He taught me to bargain, how to trade. I was an asset to the ship – men agreed terms with me they would not agree with Nighthand. And I, in turn, came to love him. I loved his reckless courage and his strength. I loved his skill with a knife and the beauty of his face. He knew: there is no way he did not know.’

‘Are you sure? I think it’s unlikely,’ said Irian.

But Carla was not looking for conversation – she slammed a hand against the cage. ‘You do not know! You weren’t there.’

‘I apologise,’ said Irian. She kept her hand on Koo, out of sight.

‘I waited for a year to tell him that I loved him. And do you know what he did? He laughed. I was so humiliated that I couldn’t speak. He saw, at last, that I was serious, and still he did not cease to laugh. He told me that Berserkers do not love. He dismissed me, as if I were nothing.’

Irian looked, long and hard, at the woman. ‘He should not have laughed. But what did you want him to do? Lie?’

Carla’s voice was like a dam bursting. ‘I wanted him to love me!’ She leaned forwards so that her face was against the bars, and she spat the words. ‘I loved that man, worthless as he is! You don’t know, do you, what it is to love and be rejected?’

Irian stood, her lips together, silent.

‘It is like being in a cage. The bars are humiliation; the floor is desire; the roof is rage. Hence …’ And she gestured at the cage in which she held Irian prisoner. ‘Poetic justice, I thought.’ She looked down at the snake on her wrist. ‘It is in this cage, with you, that Nighthand will die.’

The Tiger In The Mirror

Christopher woke on the Neverfear feeling ravenously hungry. They sat at the table in the galley and ate what they could find. It turned out that Jacques, tasked with stocking the boat in Lithia, had ordered almost nothing but chillis: three sacks of them and a box of salt. But there was some bread and butter, and some dried fire-fish, tiny as Christopher’s little finger, and a single slice of ham.

‘Well, I don’t know what humans eat!’ said Jacques. ‘Such things are beneath my notice! I had to guess.’ He demanded that Christopher crush the chillis with a pestle and mortar into balls, which he ate slowly, licking them and huffing in pleasure. ‘It is the dragon equivalent of ice cream,’ he said. ‘Delectable.’

‘My father loves fire-fish,’ said Anya quietly as they ate. ‘So does Koo. I always save him the tails.’

They were quiet for a while.

‘Christopher – what happens if we fail?’

‘We won’t,’ he said.

‘But if we do?’

‘They’ll kill Irian. That’s why we can’t fail. We’ll do whatever it takes.’

Whatever it takes: those words are often spoken, but very rarely are they meant. Usually they mean something else: We’ll do what feels reasonable and safe within the limits of tradition and the approval of those in authority and fashion, plus a careful consideration of profit and loss and a sensible amount of energy. That is not what Christopher Forrester meant. He meant: Whatever it takes. He would travel across the world for Irian Guinne: the woman who had given him a home in the Archipelago.

Ratwin came suddenly bounding down the steps of the boat into the galley kitchen. ‘It is heres! It is heres! The bird came and tooks the belt! It lefts the final task! Opens it! Opens it!’

This is your final task. Bring me a golden apple of the Hesperides orchard.

Do not loiter. There is very little time. Irian Guinne is alive. She will not remain so if you fail.