As if that were an invitation, she ventured into the room. She didn’t close the door behind her. The rectangle of light fell mostly on the floor, illuminating dropped clothing. ‘It’s so dark in here,’ she said apologetically. ‘And close.’

  She meant smelly. He’d scarcely stirred out of the room for three days, and when he did, he spoke to no one and returned to his bed as soon as he could. Davvie, the hunter’s boy, had been bringing him meals and then taking them away again. At first, he’d been in too much pain to be hungry. And now he was too despondent to eat.

  ‘Davvie said he thought you were feeling better.’

  ‘I’m not.’ Couldn’t she just go away? He didn’t want to talk to her, didn’t want to confide his problems to anyone. Davvie was bad enough, with his pestering, prying questions and his voluntary biography of his own unremarkable life. At thirteen years old, how could the boy imagine he had done anything that could possibly interest anyone other than himself? All of the boy’s meandering stories seemed to be leading up to some point that Sedric couldn’t grasp and the boy couldn’t seem to make. He suspected that Carson was using the boy to spy on him. He’d woken twice to find the hunter sitting quietly beside his bed. And once, he’d struggled out of a nightmare and opened his eyes to that other hunter, Jess, crouched on the floor nearby. Why all three of them were so fascinated with him, he didn’t know. Not unless they had guessed his secret.

  At least he could order the boy out of his room and he obeyed. He doubted that tactic would work on Alise, but abruptly decided to try it. ‘Just go away, Alise. When I feel well enough to deal with people, I’ll come out.’

  Instead, Alise came into the room and sat down on his shoe trunk. ‘I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be alone so much, especially when we still don’t know what made you so ill.’ Her fingers tangled in her lap like writhing serpents. He looked away from them.

  ‘Carson said it was something I ate. Or drank.’

  ‘That makes sense, except that we’ve all had the same food and drink that you’ve had, and no one else was affected.’

  There was one drink she hadn’t shared. He pushed the thought aside. Don’t think about anything that could incriminate you, or bring those alien thoughts back into your mind.

  He hadn’t answered her. She was looking down at her hands. She spoke as if the words were teeth she were spitting out. ‘I’m sorry I dragged you along on this, Sedric. I’m sorry I ran off to help the dragons that day and wouldn’t listen to what you had to say. You’re a friend; you’ve been my friend for a very long time. Now you’re ill and we’re so far from any real healers.’ She halted for a moment and he could tell she was trying to hold back tears. Strange, how little he cared about that. Perhaps if she knew the real danger he faced and was moved by it, he would feel more sympathy for how she struggled with her guilt.

  ‘I’ve talked to Leftrin and he says it’s not too late. He said that even though we’ve travelled farther up river, he thinks Carson could still take one of the smaller boats and get us safely back to Cassarick before autumn closes in. It wouldn’t be easy, and we’d be camping out along the way. But I’ve persuaded him.’ She paused, choking on emotion, and then went on in a voice so tight that her words almost squeaked.

  ‘If you want me to take you back, I’ll do it. We’ll leave today if you say so.’ If he said so.

  It was too late now. Too late even on that morning when he’d demanded she go back with him, though he hadn’t known it then. ‘Too late.’ He hadn’t realized he’d whispered the words until he saw her reaction.

  ‘Sa’s mercy, Sedric. Are you that ill?’

  ‘No.’ He spoke quickly to stop her words. He truly had no idea how ill he was, or if ‘ill’ was a way to describe it. ‘No, nothing like that, Alise. I only mean it’s too late for us to attempt to make our way back to Cassarick in one of the small boats. Davvie has warned me, numerous times, that the autumn rains will soon be falling, and that when they start to come down, our journey upstream is going to be more difficult. Perhaps then Captain Leftrin will recognize how foolish our mission is and turn back with the barge. In any case, I don’t wish to be in a small boat on a torrential river with rain pouring down all around us. Not my idea of camping weather.’

  He’d almost managed to find his normal tone and voice. Maybe if he seemed normal, she’d go away. ‘I’m very tired, if you don’t mind,’ he said abruptly.

  Alise stood up, looking remarkably unattractive in trousers that only emphasized the female swell of her hips. The shirt she wore was beginning to show signs of hard use. He could tell she had washed it, but the water she had used had left it grey rather than snowy white. The sun was taking a toll on her, bleaching her red hair to a carroty orange that frayed out around her pins, and making her freckles darker. She’d never been a beauty by Bingtown standards. Much more of the sun and water, and he wondered if Hest would take her back at all. It was one thing to have a mousy wife, and another to have one who was simply a fright. He wondered if she ever thought of the possibility that when she returned, Hest might not take her back. Probably not. She had been raised to believe that life was meant to be a certain way, and even when all evidence was to the contrary, she couldn’t see it differently. She’d never suspected that he and Hest were more than excellent friends. To Alise, he was still her childhood friend, erstwhile secretary to her husband and temporarily serving as her assistant. She so firmly believed that the world was determined by her rules that she could not see what was right in front of her.

  And so she smiled gently at him. ‘Get some rest, dear friend,’ she said, closing the door quietly behind her, shutting him into his oversized packing crate and leaving him in the dark with his thoughts.

  He rolled to face the wall. The back of his neck itched. He scratched it furiously, feeling dry skin under his nails. She wasn’t the only one whose appearance was being ruined. His skin was dry, his hair as coarse as a horse’s tail now.

  He wished he could blame everything on Alise. He couldn’t. Once Hest had banned him, dooming him to be her companion, Sedric had done all he could to seize any opportunity the trip might present. He was the one who had schemed to take advantage of every opportunity to take a scrap of dragon flesh, a scale, a drop of blood. He’d planned so carefully how he would preserve his collection; Begasti Cored would be waiting to hear from him, anticipating that his own fortune would be founded on being the man to facilitate supplying such forbidden merchandise to the Duke of Chalced.

  In some of his daydreams, he returned to Bingtown to show Hest his loot, and Hest helped him to get the best prices for his wares. In those dreams, they sold the goods and never returned to Bingtown, establishing themselves as wealthy men in Chalced, or Jamaillia, or the Pirate Islands, perhaps even beyond, in the near-mythical Spice Islands. In others, he kept his newly-gained wealth a secret until he had established a luxurious hideaway in a distant place. In those dreams, he and Hest took ship by night in secret and sailed off to a new life together, free of lies and deceptions.

  And, of late, he’d had other daydreams. They had been bitter but sharp-edged with sweetness, too. He’d imagined returning to Bingtown to discover that Hest had replaced him with that damn Redding. In those dreams he took his wealth and established himself in Chalced, only to reveal to Hest later all that he might have had, if only he’d valued Sedric more, if only he’d been true of heart.

  Now all of those dreams seemed silly and shallow, the stuff of adolescent fancy. He pulled the itchy wool blanket up over his shoulders and closed his eyes more tightly. ‘I may never go back to Bingtown,’ he said aloud. He tried to force himself to confront that. ‘Even if I do, I may never be completely sane again.’

  For a moment, he let go his grip on himself as Sedric. Instantly, she was hip-deep in chill river water, wading against the cold current. On her belly, he felt the tar plugs that Leftrin had smeared over her injuries. He felt her dim groping towards him, a plea for companionship and comfort. He didn’t want to give it. But he had never been a hard-hearted man. When she invaded his mind, pleading, he had to reach back. ‘You are stronger than you know,’ he told her. ‘Keep moving. Follow the other ones, my copper beauty. Soon there will be better days for you, but for now you must be strong.’

  A flow of warm gratitude engulfed him. It would have been so easy to drown in it. Instead, he let it ebb past him and encouraged her to focus what little mind she had on keeping up the gruelling pace. In the small corner of his mind that still belonged solely to himself, he wondered, was there any way to be free of this unwanted sharing? If the copper dragon died, would he feel her pain? Or only the sweet release of freedom?

  Alise went back to the galley table. She sat down opposite Leftrin and his perpetual mug of black coffee. All around them, the work of moving the barge went on, like the busy comings and goings of an insect hive. The tillerman was at his tiller, the pole crew moved up and down the decks in their steady rhythm. From the deckhouse window, she watched the endless circuit of Hennesey and Bellin on the starboard side of the barge. Grigsby, the ship’s yellow cat, perched on the railing and watched the water. Carson had risen before dawn and set off up the river to do his day’s hunting for the dragons. Davvie had stayed aboard. The boy had developed a peculiar fixation on Sedric and his wellbeing. He could not tolerate anyone else preparing the sick man’s meals or waiting on him. She found it both endearing and annoying that a lad from such a rough background would be so fascinated by an elegant young Trader. Leftrin had twice muttered against it, but she could not grasp the nature of his complaint, and so had ignored it.

  Usually by this hour, she and Leftrin would be left in relative peace and isolation. Today, the hunter Jess had lingered, a near-silent yet very annoying presence on the barge. No matter where she went, he was nearby. Yesterday, twice she had looked up to find him staring at her. He’d met her gaze and nodded meaningfully, as if there were something they agreed upon. For the life of her, she couldn’t work out what he was about. She’d have discussed it with Leftrin, except that Jess always seemed to be lurking just within earshot.

  The hunter made her uncomfortable. She’d become accustomed to how the Rain Wilds had marked Leftrin. She accepted it as a part of him now and scarcely noticed it except for the moments when a flash of sunlight would strike a gleam from the scaling in his brows. Then it seemed exotic, not repulsive. But Jess was marked in less flattering ways. He reminded her, not of a dragon nor even a lizard, but of a snake. His nose was flattening into his face, his nostrils becoming slit-like in the process. His eyes seemed set too far apart, as if they were seeking to be on the sides of his head instead of the front. She’d always taken pride that she didn’t judge folk by their appearances. But she could not look at Jess and feel comfortable, let alone have a real conversation with him.

  So in the man’s presence, she kept her discussion to generalities and expected topics. She said brightly, ‘Well, Sedric seems a bit better today. I did ask him if he’d like to return to Cassarick in one of the small boats, but he said he didn’t. I think he feels the trip would be too dangerous, with the autumn rains coming on.’

  Leftrin lifted his eyes to hers. ‘So you’ll both be continuing with the expedition, no matter how long it takes?’ She heard a hundred questions in his voice and tried to answer them all.

  ‘I think we will. I know I want to see this through to the end.’

  Jess laughed. He was leaning against the frame of the galley door, apparently looking out over the river. He didn’t turn to either of them and made no other comment. Her glance sought Leftrin’s again. He met her gaze, but gave no sign of a reaction to the man’s odd behaviour. Perhaps she was overreacting. She changed the subject.

  ‘You know, until I came for this visit, I never truly understood what the Rain Wilders faced in trying to build settlements here. I suppose I always imagined that in all this vast valley, somewhere they would have found some truly dry ground. But there isn’t, is there?’

  ‘Bog and slough and marsh,’ Leftrin confirmed for her. ‘No other place in the world like it, as far as I know. There are a few charts from the old days when settlers first came here. They tried to explore. Some show a big lake upriver of us, one that is said to spread as far as the eye can see. Others charted over a hundred tributaries that feed the Rain Wild River, some big, some small. They all wander back and forth in their beds. Some years two become one, and a year later, there are three streams where one river used to dump into the river. Two years after that, it’s just all marsh, no defined streams or river at all.

  ‘The forest ground sometimes looks solid, and sometimes folk have found a patch they think is dry and tried to settle on it. But the more traffic there is, the sooner the “dry ground” starts to give way. Pretty soon the ground water breaks through to the surface and from there, well, it goes marshy pretty fast.’

  ‘But you do think that somewhere upriver, there will be an area of truly dry land for the dragons to settle on?’

  ‘Your guess is as good as mine. But I think there must be. Water flows downhill, and all this water comes from somewhere. Trouble is, can we navigate that far, or does it all turn into marsh before we get there? I think we’re about as far upriver as anyone has ever come by ship. Tarman can go where others can’t. But if we hit a place that’s too shallow for Tarman, well, that’s where our journey will end.’

  ‘Well, I hope we at least find a better beach to camp on tonight. Thymara has said that she is worried about the dragons’ feet and claws. The constant immersion is bad for them. She said that one of Sintara’s claws cracked and she had to trim and bind it for her. She said she treated it with tar. Perhaps we should do all the dragons’ claws, to prevent damage.’

  Leftrin scowled at the idea. ‘I don’t have that much tar to spare. I think we’ll just have to hope for a drier camping spot tonight.’

  ‘We should trim their claws,’ Jess abruptly announced, pushing his way into both the room and the conversation. He shoved the end bench out from the table and sat down heavily on it. ‘Think about it, Cap. We dull the dragons’ claws down for them. Cut them a bit, tar them up. Do everybody a world of good, you take my drift.’ He looked from Leftrin to Alise and back again, grinning at both of them. He had small teeth, set wide in a generous mouth. It looked like a baby’s innocent smile set in a man’s face; it was disconcerting, even unsettling to her. So was Leftrin’s reaction to it.

  ‘No.’ He spoke the word flatly. ‘No, Jess. And that’s my last word. Don’t push it. Not here, not now. Not with the keepers, either.’ He narrowed his eyes meaningfully.

  Jess leaned back, bracing his back against the wall and swinging his boots up onto the bench in front of him. ‘Superstitious?’ he asked Leftrin with a knowing grin. ‘I’d have pegged you for a man of the world, Cap. Not someone trapped in all those old Rain Wild notions. It’s awfully provincial of you. Those keepers, some of them recognize that sometimes we need to make new rules to make the best of a situation.’

  Leftrin slowly stood, leaned both his fists on the table, knuckles down and shoulders tensed as he put his face close to the hunter’s. He spoke in a low voice. ‘You’re an ass, Jess. An ass and a fool. You don’t even know what you’re suggesting. Why don’t you go do what you were paid to do?’

  The way Leftrin’s body blocked Jess’ access to her suggested he was protecting her. She wasn’t sure from what but felt profoundly grateful he was there. Alise had never seen the captain so clearly enraged and yet so controlled. It frightened her, and at the same time it spurred a powerful surge of attraction towards him. This, she suddenly knew, was the sort of man she wanted in her life.

  Yet despite Leftrin’s intensity, Jess seemed unfazed. ‘Go do what I was “paid” to do? Isn’t that exactly what we’re talking about here, Captain? Getting paid. And sooner rather than later. Perhaps we should all sit down and have a chat about the best way to make that happen.’ He leaned around Leftrin to shoot Alise a knowing grin. She was appalled. What was he talking about?

  ‘There is nothing to discuss!’ Leftrin’s voice rattled the windows.

  Jess’ gaze went back to Leftrin. His voice lowered suddenly, taking the note of a warning snarl. ‘I’m not going to be cheated out of this, Leftrin. If she wants a share, she’ll have to go through me. I’m not going to stand by and watch you take a new partner and cut me out for the sake of making a sweet little deal for yourself.’

  ‘Get out.’ From a roar, Leftrin’s voice had dropped to a near whisper. ‘Get out now, Jess. Go hunting.’

  Perhaps he knew he’d pushed Leftrin to his limit. The captain hadn’t verbalized a threat but killing hung in the air. Every beat of her thundering heart seemed to shake Alise. She couldn’t draw a breath. She was terrified of what might happen next.

  Jess swung his feet to the floor so that his boots landed on the deck with a thump. He stood, taking his time, like a cat that stretches before it turns its back on the slavering dog. ‘I’ll go,’ he offered lightly. ‘Until another time,’ he added, as he walked out the door. Around the corner but still within hearing, he added, ‘We all know there will be another time.’

  Leftrin leaned across the table to reach the door’s edge. He slammed it so hard that every cup on the table jumped. ‘That bastard,’ he snarled. ‘That traitorous bastard.’

  Alise found she was hugging herself and trembling. Her voice shook as she said, ‘I don’t understand. What was he talking about? What does he want to discuss with me?’

  Leftrin was as angry as he’d ever been in his life, and by his fury, he knew that the damn hunter had woken fear in him as well. It wasn’t just that the man was misjudging Alise in such a base way. It was that his assumptions threatened to ruin Leftrin’s good image in her eyes.

  The questions he didn’t dare answer hung in the air between them, razor-edged knives that would cut them both to pieces. He took the only safe course. He lied to her. ‘It’s all right, Alise. Everything will be fine.’