Chapter 364
The allied fleet riding on the black water, a lantern on every deck. The Marka and the Upp Igen side by side on the silver road, a plank laid across between their rails. On the Upp Igen's bowsprit, beside the scarred fist, a small figure in a white scarf with her knees drawn up, looking down the road at the dark trunk. And then, blink, a second figure beside her: crimson hair, barefoot, already there.
side by side on the bowsprit, not looking at each other.
the white scarf (her mother's) lifting in the night wind.
looking down the road again, at the bark a mile and a mile away.
Kompis sitting against the mast, half asleep, one hand on the dog against his leg. Mingus lifting his head. Ears up. Looking past Kompis, across the plank, to the Upp Igen's bowsprit.
Mingus getting up. Shaking himself. Trotting across the plank between the two ships, down the Upp Igen's deck, past sleeping Up-Again sailors in their chalk rings, to the bow. Sitting down on the planks below the bowsprit, below the girl in the white scarf. Looking up at her.
turning his head from Svala, slowly, and looking down the road. Past the Gate. Past the chain. All the way to the dark trunk and the pool at its foot. A long, steady, thoughtful look. Then back at her.
on the plank between the ships, stopped dead, understanding before anyone else.
coming down the Upp Igen's deck, fast, his voice cracking.
(Mingus looks back at him. His tail moves once on the planks.)
sliding down off the bowsprit, bewildered.
kneeling on the deck. His forehead against the dog's forehead. His hands in the gold fur behind the ears.
(Mingus licks his nose. Once. Thorough.)
behind them, quiet, one hand on the mast.
sitting back on his heels. Wiping his face with the heel of his hand. The dark ring on his palm from Nagel's iron catching the lantern.
Mingus turning, and jumping off the Upp Igen's bow, not into the sea but onto the road: four paws landing on the glowing silver, the light rippling out under them in rings. Shaking his ears. And trotting away down the middle of the road, tail up, toward the Gate.
On deck after deck, people at the rails. Lanterns lifted. A troll holding a lamp-bearer child on his shoulder so she can see. Fishermen standing up in their boats. Nobody calling out. A whole fleet watching one dog go.
at the Marka's wheel, his lips moving, counting heads out of a lifetime's habit.
Night at the foot of the world tree. A silver road laid dead straight on black water, from a thousand lifted lanterns at the bottom of the spread to the dark wall of the Order's line at the top. And in the middle of the road, very small, alone, a golden retriever trotting, tail up, ears flopping, his gold the warmest thing on the page.
Ahead of him, the Gate: the Great Chain slung across it, every link as tall as a man; the two black-and-silver Gateposts with twelve hundred grey figures leaning out over the rails on either side, every faceless head turned down, every grey palm lowering toward the road. The four flagships' lanterns. And beyond, the mile of black water, the bark rising out of it forever, the pale pool at its foot, and high on the trunk, the Arena, open to the stars.
(No balloon. No SFX. Only the paws.)
Mingus trotting under the chain. And the grey hands coming down from both sides, dozens of them, a forest of them, settling on his back, his head, his ears, his feathered tail, light as hands on a child's hair. And beside every palm, faint grey letters trying to form, D—, and breaking, one after another, like frost on a warm window.
mid-trot, a grey palm flat on top of his head. Shaking his ears, the way he shakes off rain. Not looking up. Trotting on.
A young Order marine in a black coat with a lit chair on the breast, levelling a long musket down at the gold shape on the road. Finger on the trigger.
grey side-whiskers, the brass speaking-trumpet under his arm, putting two fingers on the musket's barrel and pushing it gently down.
(He watches it go, with an odd look on his old face, as if he once had one.)
The open mile. The silver road running on alone across the black water, and the small gold shape trotting down it, the trunk rising and rising until it fills the whole panel above him.
Mingus reaching the end of the road and climbing out onto the great root over the pool of cork-foam. Shaking himself, nose to tail, a spray of white froth. Turning round three times on the bark. And sitting down, at the very end of the root, facing the fleet, his tail going on the wood.
on the Upp Igen's masthead, the scope at her eye, a crimson tear running.
at the bow, both hands over her mouth, laughing and crying at the same time.
Kompis sitting back down against the mast where the dog was. His left hand going out to the warm place at his side, out of habit. Finding the deck. And the bottom border of the panel plain: no golden pulse line along it. Just ink.
sitting down beside him without a word, unfolding the worn paper from her bindings, reading the names off it, very quietly, and Kompis saying them with her, a beat behind, because he carries them too.
On every Order sail from horizon to horizon, over the painted chairs, the square black letters writing themselves fresh, huge, final:
GO HOME.
From the sides of the Gateposts and of every black-and-silver ship down the whole length of the line: grey longboats sliding out into the dark, dozens, then hundreds, no oars, no sails, grey figures standing perfectly still in them, all gliding the same way, drawn toward the fleet like iron filings toward a lodestone.
on his feet, eyes gold, no dog at his heel. Seeing the hunters' searching lines from every longboat bending toward the fleet: toward a half-mended net, a half-said prayer, a child half asleep, a promise half kept. Everything. Every deck.
beside him, Aska's ember glowing in his closed fist against the dark, the dark he's afraid of, every hunter's grey face turned toward them.