Tome of the Undergates - Sam Sykes

What good did she do by remaining with them?

When she turned around, Quillian was close to her, much closer than she had ever seen the woman. Her features became clearer: there was softness between her hard lines, a quiver in her eyes, as though they struggled desperately to remember how women were supposed to look.

The realisation came swiftly upon her. Before that moment, she had never seen the Serrant in such a position: no sword at her hip, no oaths or battle cries on her tongue, no sounds of battle in the background. It was not Knight-Serrant Quillian that stood before her, it was simply Quillian, woman.

‘There is good to be done,’ Asper whispered, ‘here and now.’

Quillian’s hand twitched, the bronze knuckles rattling against her gauntlet. It rose up to her torso and froze there, quivering as though it wanted to go higher.

Then something flashed across her face, so swift that Asper might not have caught it had she not been so close. Quillian’s eyes widened for a moment, then shut tightly. When they opened again, they were soft, quivering, the beginnings of a tear forming in the corner of one eye. She bit her lower lip so hard that Asper feared blood might gush out at any moment.

‘Forgive me, Priestess,’ she said, her voice suddenly stern and brimming with duty once more, ‘I must see to the needs of the Lord Emissary.’

The Serrant departed with a haste Asper had never seen before: a loud, clunky, stumbling gait down the stairs of the helm. She even apologised after bumping into one of the sailors before vanishing into the companionway. And yet, even though the woman was gone, the tension remained thick and oppressive around the priestess.

The questions still lingered in the air, echoing in her head. Behind her, the sun had risen halfway out of the ocean, still unanswering.

‘Someone has a little infatuation, hm?’

Asper blinked and suddenly noticed him: a tall, black stain against the pristine ocean. Tucked in the corner of the helm, Denaos stood, hands at his groin, an arcing flight of golden, foul-smelling angels singing over the railing.

‘How long have you been there?’ she asked, raising a brow.

‘Quite some time,’ he replied swiftly. ‘And it appears I’ll be here for some time more.’ The golden shaft suddenly died in the blink of an eye. ‘You’d be surprised how little attention a man urinating requires in delicate situations.’

‘Given that said attention would require looking at said man, I’m really not.’ She formed a glare. ‘How much did you over-’

‘Wait!’ His voice was shrill and hurried. ‘Turn around.’

‘What?’

‘Turn around! Don’t look at me!’ He offered a bashful smile. ‘I can’t go if you look.’

‘You can’t be-’

‘Do it.’

The order came with such firmness that she found herself hard pressed to do anything but obey. Shortly after returning her gaze to the familiar sight of the sluggish sun, the sound of water singing acrid yellow tunes filled her ears, accompanied by a sigh so filled with relief it bordered on perverse.

‘Oh, sweet Silf, that’s better,’ he moaned. ‘This is what I get for drinking the cheap stuff.’

‘I thought men outgrew that.’

‘Oh, no one ever outgrows their soil habits.’

‘Their what?’

‘Soil habits,’ he repeated. ‘Pot practices, golden means, tinkle techniques if you like. Everyone has their own that they discover at birth and they can never get rid of them.’ The sound of water stopped; there was a grunt before it resumed. ‘For example, did you know that Dreadaeleon, before checking to make certain no one is looking, removes his breeches entirely, no matter which business he has to do?’

She thought she ought to protest that revelation, if only for propriety’s sake. However, she found herself silent; she had seen the wizard do that before. A new, slightly more unnerving image flashed behind her eyes.

‘Gariath doesn’t even take the time to prepare. He just lifts his leg and goes wherever he pleases.’ He snorted. ‘Must be why he wears a kilt, eh?’

‘So, you’ve seen everyone …’ she coughed, ‘make water?’

‘Everyone except Kataria,’ he replied. ‘It’s true what they say about the shicts. They always go in a secret place.’ The sound of water rose suddenly as he tilted upwards. ‘Disgusting.’

‘Huh.’ She chose not to comment on that. ‘So, you’ve even seen-’

‘Oh, absolutely.’ Without waiting for further prodding, he continued with an obscene vigour, ‘I’ve seen you plenty of times. Now, you’re what I’ve heard called the “chamber-pot philosopher”, granted said title through the long contemplations while squatting.’

Her ears went aflame, face going a deeper shade of crimson than had ever been seen amidst roses. She found her mouth open, without a retort, even though it seemed that she ought to have a particularly scathing one. Still, she whirled about to face him, only to be met with a shriek of protest.

‘Don’t look!’ he screeched. ‘Turn around, turn around, turn around!’

She did so with only a mild stammer of outrage, more for her own benefit than for his. Undoubtedly, seeing her coloured so would give him some bizarre form of pleasure she preferred not to think about.

A breeze, harsh against her cheek, swept over the ship. Asper stood still, facing the lazy, half-risen sun and listening to the vile symphony of water that showed no signs of fading, slowing or otherwise sparing her the unpleasantness.

‘So, do you think you’ll do it?’ His voice was surprisingly soft, nearly drowned by his functions.

‘Do. . what?’

‘Leave.’ He grunted slightly, as if forcing himself to concentrate. ‘It’s fairly obvious by this point that you’ve considered it.’

‘You overheard.’

‘“Overhearing” implies a certain degree of innocent accident. I was genuinely and intentionally spying, I assure you.’

‘Unsurprising.’

‘Few people are anything but, I find. As for myself, there aren’t many surprises left.’ His sigh was slow and contemplative. ‘Maybe that’s why I linger around you degenerates.’

‘For surprises,’ she repeated, sneering to herself. ‘I find that hard to believe.’

‘So you should. You know me well enough to know that you don’t know me nearly well enough to accept that answer.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Still, everyone needs a purpose for what they do, don’t they?’

Another breeze swept over the deck. The tinge of salt was heavy, the song of distant gulls growing louder. The sun was rising stronger now, with more fervour, as though it, too, had heard the rogue and taken the man’s advice. That gave her a bitter pause as she bit her lower lip.

‘I’ve been wondering about my purpose.’ She surprised herself with the weakness of her own voice; somehow, she thought she would admit it with more conviction.

‘That’s funny.’ He hummed. ‘I’ve always envied the clergy for their conviction. I thought the reason you took oaths was to give yourself purpose.’

‘Oaths are a guide, a reminder of our. . of my faith and my duty.’

‘A reminder.’ He tasted the words. ‘That seems acceptable, considering what Quillian’s say on her flank.’ He added quickly, ‘I know you’d like to turn around and raise an eyebrow at that, but I must encourage you to resist. I’m … sort of in the middle of something.’

‘Still?’ She sighed, but kept her back turned, regardless. ‘You. . can read Quillian’s oaths?’

‘Bits. Dreadaeleon might know more. Suffice it to say, I can pick out parts that are quite interesting to me when she deigns to doff that armour of hers.’ Leather creaked as he adjusted himself. ‘Hers would seem to suggest a reminder of duty.’

She paused, her lips pursing thoughtfully, then asked, ‘Does duty necessarily equate to purpose?’

‘That’s a decent question,’ he admitted. ‘I became an adventurer to avoid most accepted forms of duty. I like to think I manage to serve that purpose.’

‘Don’t lie to me,’ she snapped. ‘You became an adventurer because you were a fugitive.’

‘True, but that’s not saying much, is it? Prison sentences are a form of duty.’

‘For you, perhaps.’ Her sigh was long, tired and laden with thought. ‘I need more. I need. . to know that I’m doing the right and proper thing.’

‘You’ll never figure that out,’ he answered decisively. ‘There’s no way to know what the right and proper thing is, you see. Ask a Karnerian, a Sainite, a shict and a dragonman the same question, they’ll all tell you something different.’

‘I suppose,’ she grunted. ‘Then again, I suppose I shouldn’t be consulting a felon about matters of spirituality and moral rightness.’

‘Moral righteousness, perhaps not, but I find myself in a unique position to analyse most matters of faith due to my general offensiveness to all Gods, religions and servicemen and — women thereof.’

‘Fine, then.’ Her patience was a pot of water, boiling as the sun insultingly decided to rise with a hot and yellow unpleasantness. ‘What is the right thing, if you’re such a genius? What are we doing here? What are we about to do?’

The question was only half-posed to the rogue; she stared and addressed no small part of it to the sun. It was fully risen now, Talanas’s great, golden Eye broad and fully awake, ready to accept her struggle. Yet still no answer came and, as the water rippled beneath it and cast its shifting hues upon the sky, even the great fiery disc itself seemed to blink.

‘We’re about to go on an adventure.’

His voice was soft, the words spoken with no particular zeal, yet it echoed in her mind. She turned and found herself jumping with a start as she looked into his dark eyes. He stood before her, perfectly still and unmoving, barely a finger’s length of space between them. He did not blink.

‘And. . what does that mean?’ she asked.

‘It means that whatever happens is incidental.’

‘What do you-’

‘We kill a demon, we get a book, we get rich.’ He held up his hands in a shrug. ‘By that same token, we use that money for whatever good we think it’ll do, we prevent that book from being used in anything wicked and whatever demons die as a result will not result in more people dying like Moscoff.’

The image of the boy was another wound in her mind: his still corpse, drowned on dry land, the death that should not have been.

‘And, as it is an adventure. .’ His hands slid down past his waist, tightening his belt and adjusting his breeches. ‘Whether you choose to come or stay, and should you find your purpose — or not — as a result, is also incidental.’

With that, he turned towards the stairs of the helm. At the top, he cast a glance over his shoulder. A smile creased his lips, so swiftly and suddenly as to cause her to start.

‘Something to think about the next time you squat.’

With silent footsteps, he was gone.

She strained to hear his boots upon the wood, strained to hear over the sounds of sailors rising on the deck and gulls upon the wind. She strained to hear, as though hoping he would mutter some last bit of advice, some solid stone of wisdom that would crush her with the weight of decision.