blind. They’d probably creep about and he’d never know where they were until the rock hit. He put all his concentration into listening for stealthy footsteps. But when the second voice spoke, it was not far from where the first had originated. He recognized it right away by the Jamaillian accent. Mingsley.
‘I thought it was. It never moved nor spoke at all the last time I was here. Dav — my intermediary assured me that it was alive still, but I doubted him. Well. This puts a whole new slant on this.’ He cleared his throat. ‘The Ludlucks have been reluctant to deal, and now I see why. I thought I was bidding on dead wood. My offer was far too low. I shall have to approach them again.’
‘I think I’ve changed my mind.’ The woman’s voice was low. Paragon couldn’t decide what emotion she was repressing. Disgust? Fear? He could not be sure. ‘I don’t think I want anything to do with this.’
‘But you seemed so intrigued earlier,’ Mingsley objected. ‘Don’t be squeamish now. So the figurehead is alive. That only increases our possibilities.’
‘I am intrigued by wizardwood,’ she admitted reluctantly. ‘Someone brought me a tiny piece to work on once. The customer wanted me to carve it into the shape of a bird. I told him, as I tell you, that the work I do is determined by the wood I am given, not by any whim of my own or the customers. The man urged me to try. But when I took the wood from him, it felt… evil. If you could steep wood with an emotion, I’d say that one was pure malice. I couldn’t bear to even touch it, let alone carve it. I told him to take it away.’
Mingsley chuckled as if the woman had told an amusing story. ‘I’ve found,’ he said loftily, as if speaking in generalities, ‘that the finely-tuned sensibilities of an artist are best soothed with the lovely sound of coins being stacked. I am sure we can get past your reservations. And I can promise you that the money from this would be incredible. Look at what your work brings in now, using ordinary wood. If you fashioned beads from wizardwood, we could ask… whatever we wanted. Literally. What we would be offering buyers has never been available to them before. We’re two of a kind in this. Outsiders, seeing what all the insiders have missed.’
‘Two of a kind? I am not at all sure we can even talk.’ There was no compromise to the woman’s tone, but Mingsley seemed deaf to it.
‘Look at it,’ he gloated. ‘Fine straight grain. Silvery colour. Plank after plank and I haven’t spotted a single knot. Not one! Wood like that, you can do anything with it. Even if we remove the figurehead, have you restore it, and sell it separately, there is still enough wizardwood in this hulk to found an industry. Not just your beads and charms; we have to think bigger than that. Chairs and bedsteads and tables, all elaborately carved. Ah! Cradles. Imagine the status of that, rocking your first-born to sleep in a cradle all carved from wizardwood. Or,’ the man’s voice suddenly grew even more enthused, ‘perhaps you might carve the headboard of the cradle with women’s faces. We could find out how to quicken them, teach them to sing lullabies, and we’d have a cradle that could sing a child to sleep!’
‘The thought makes my blood cold,’ the woman said.
‘You fear this wood then?’ Mingsley gave a short bark of laughter. ‘Don’t succumb to Bingtown superstition.’
‘I don’t fear wood,’ the woman snapped back. ‘I fear people like you. You charge into things blindly. Stop and think. The Bingtown Traders are the most astute merchants and traders this part of the world has ever seen. There must be a reason why they do not traffic in this wood. You’ve seen for yourself that the figurehead lives. But you don’t ask how or why! You simply want to make tables and chairs of the same substance. And finally, you stand before a living being and blithely speak of chopping up his body to make furniture.’
Mingsley made an odd sound. ‘We have no real assurances that this is a live being,’ he said tolerantly. ‘So it moved and it spoke. Once. Jumping jacks on sticks move, as do puppets on strings. Parrots talk. Shall we give them all the status of a human?’ His tone was amused.
‘And now you are willing to spout whatever nonsense you must to get me to do your will. I’ve been down to the North wall where the liveships tie up. As have you, I’ll wager. The ships I saw there are clearly alive, clearly individuals. Mingsley. You can lie to yourself and convince yourself of anything you wish. But don’t expect me to accept your excuses and half-truths as reasons I should work for you. No. I was intrigued when you told me there was a dead liveship here, one whose wood could be salvaged. But even that was a lie. There is no point to me standing out here in the rain with you any longer. I’ve decided this is wrong. I won’t do it.’
Paragon heard her striding away, heard Mingsley call after her, ‘You’re stupid. You’re walking away from more money than you can even imagine.’
Her footsteps halted. Paragon strained his ears. Would she come back? Her voice alone came, pitched in a normal tone but carrying clearly. ‘Somehow,’ she said coldly, ‘you have confused profitable and not profitable with right and wrong. I, however, have not.’
Then he could hear her walking away again. She strode like an angry man. The rain began to pelt even harder; the drops would have stung human flesh. He heard Mingsley grunt with distaste at the new downpour.
‘Artistic temperament,’ he scoffed to himself. ‘She’ll be back.’ A pause. Then, ‘Ship. You, ship. Are you truly alive?’
Paragon chose not to reply.
‘It’s not smart to ignore me. It’s only a matter of time before I own you. It’s in your own best interests to tell me what I need to know. Are you separate from the ship, or truly a part of it?’
Paragon faced the pounding rain and did not reply.
‘Would it kill you if I cut you free of your ship?’ Mingsley asked in a low voice. ‘For that is what I intend to do.’
Paragon did not know the answer to that. Instead, he invited Mingsley, ‘Why don’t you come close enough to try?’
After a short time, he heard the man leave.
He waited there, in the stinging rain. When he heard her speak again, he did not start. He did turn his head slowly, to hear her better.
‘Ship? Ship, may I come closer?’
‘My name is Paragon.’
‘Paragon, may I come closer?’
He considered it. ‘Aren’t you going to tell me your name?’ he finally countered.
A short hesitation. ‘I am called Amber.’
‘But that is not your name.’
‘I’ve had a number of names,’ she said after a time. ‘This is the one that suits me best, here and now.’
She could, he reflected, simply have lied to him and said it was her name. But she had not. He extended an open hand toward the sound of her voice. ‘Amber,’ he accepted her. It was a challenge, too. He knew how huge his hand was in comparison to a human’s. Once his fingers closed around her hand, he’d be able to jerk her arm out if its socket. If he chose to.
He listened to her breathe, to the sound of the rain pocking the packed sand of the beach. Abruptly she took two quick steps towards him and set her gloved left hand in his. He closed his immense fingers over her small ones. ‘Paragon,’ she said breathlessly.
‘Why
