The Floating City Read online

  She shook the thought from her head, and folded a lock of her dark hair back behind her ear as she turned back from the window to the table before her. There were documents and debt notes spread out on it. Her husband had left her a wealthy woman and she had discovered she had a strong head for business, probably acquired from her father. She knew there were those who said that only a fool could lose her husband’s fortune, but, truth be told, any fool could make his or her fortune during times of plenty. It took a particularly wise person to make their fortune during the lean and hard times. And she had no illusions that they were now living in such times.

  The Othmen had all kinds of nefarious enchantment at their control which they used to attack vessels of the Floating City. Some survivors talked of sea monsters that arose from the sea and wrapped themselves around ships. Others told of giant multi-armed beasts that snatched sailors off the decks and devoured them. And others told of temptress creatures, like semi-clad women, that wooed ships onto the rocks where they sang from before climbing over the sides of the ships to reveal fangs in their mouths as they attacked the crew.

  And now the Othmen were threatening to invade their city. They had slain the youngest of the Seers within the city itself, leaving only three aged pairs to protect them. And who knew how many foul monsters swam in the canals already? And who even knew what dark powers the Othmen might possess to turn against them? Most of the citizens were in fear of their lives every time they stepped into a boat these days.

  And yet the Othmen still enjoyed the hospitality of the city, meeting with the Council of Ten like there were no hostilities. No threats to city shipping. No threats to the lives of the citizens. She had heard the lies of the envoy of the Othmen herself. There were no such things as monsters. Ships were lost to inclement weather, not Othmen attacks. The conquering of the Floating City’s territories to the east was simply legitimate reclaiming of land that was once their own.

  The envoy of the Othmen was a Graecian nobleman who had once been the envoy of the Floating City to the Othmen. Clearly they offered him more wealth, since he now spread their lies as easily as he had once spread them for the city, telling everyone they had nothing to fear from the Othmen. They just wanted better trade terms than they had previously enjoyed. The worm! And to add insult to injury, he was now laying suit to her! She could see the lust in his toad-like eyes when they met, though never quite knowing if it was lust for her body or for her wealth. Either way it made her skin crawl.

  She picked up the small card on the table before her and cast it aside. He had come calling again. She had left him downstairs waiting at least half a candle’s length already, but she knew she could not put it off for much longer. She would have to admit him to the room and listen to his lies and accept whatever gifts he pressed upon her. Probably stolen from the ships of her fellow citizens.

  It was like he was laying siege, she thought, coming with an army of flattering words and gifts in an attempt to breach her defences and rob her of her independence. She would rather set an army of soldiers upon him and drive him not just from her house but from the city. But who knew what vengeance that would provoke from the Othmen? It would give her satisfaction, but would imperil the city.

  She gritted her teeth and considered her options. There were not many. What would she do if she were on a ship at sea and a slimy man-like creature rose up before her? She’d fight, of course. With every weapon available.

  She turned again and looked out the window. The horizon seemed further away than usual. Made her stretch her gaze to look beyond it. Perhaps there was an answer. Her best weapon was her guile, she mused, and she could surely outmanoeuvre a man whose brain was filled with lust. She thought on it a moment longer until a plan began to form in her mind. Then she called to her handmaiden, Nerissa. “Show the envoy in,” she said. “Tell him I am quite ready for him.”

  V

  ELSEWHERE IN THE FLOATING CITY

  The shadows seemed to move on the dark canal water. It rippled in a way that was strange enough for the lone figure in the boat to stop and turn to regard it. He scanned the water carefully as the ripple disappeared, and waited to see if it returned. It did not. He pulled on the single oar at the rear of the vessel and it moved forward. Very slowly.

  He watched the water on all sides of the boat, noting every movement on its moonlit surface, observing those that looked like currents or wind and those that did not. That was one lone swirl in front of him and ahead to the right. A counter-clockwise movement of the water as something was moving beneath it, or perhaps sinking lower there. Then it stopped.

  He pushed the oar, moving the boat forward a little more. Eyes still on the water. One stroke. Then another. Now the water’s surface moved a little to the left and behind him. A good position to attack from, he thought. He pushed the oar again, less carefully, almost as if a challenge. The water calmed. Then it bubbled, much closer to him.

  He took a hand from the oar and reached into the long dark cloak he wore, resting it on the handle of an ornate weapon. “It is not yet the time to face each other,” he whispered and the bubbling stopped. He let his boat drift a little and then reached up and took hold of the oar again. He pushed it once. Then pulled it back towards him. Then pushed it again.

  He had the feeling that he was being watched. Stalked. But he refused to adopt the stance of prey. When the movement on the water appeared again, he steered the boat directly towards it. As a hunter would. The movement ceased more quickly this time. He rowed to where it had last been and brought the boat to a halt. He stayed there a moment and then turned the boat around again, pointing it back towards the mist-shrouded lights ahead of him.

  He only turned his head once, to see the swirling of the water following him from a distance as he rowed his boat right into the canals of the Floating City. He tied it up to a striped pole that jutted up out of the water and leaped across to land lightly on one of the stone paths of the city. He looked back and saw two red eyes regarding him from the dark water and reached into his cloak and drew out his weapon, pointing it at the creature. But the eyes submerged into the water again – and did not return.

  The figure returned his weapon to the darkness inside his cloak, knowing he would see the creature again before too long. If it had followed him all the way from the mainland to the Floating City it would as likely follow him whenever he crossed one of the many canals of the city as well. And then a thought came to him, that perhaps the creature had not been following him, but was shepherding him into the city.

  VI

  THE STORY OF GIULIETTA

  Giulietta was having one of her tantrums. “I don’t want to have a ball anymore,” she said. “I want you to cancel it. I want to stay up here in my room and I never want to talk to you again. I hate you. I hate you. I hate you!”

  Her father, Signor Montecchi, sighed heavily, as his daughter thrust her head under her silken pillow. He was one of the most powerful men in the Floating City, a member of the Council of Ten, a wealthy merchant and had dozens of servants to do his every bidding, but his three daughters were beyond his ability to control. On days like this he wished they were young girls again. They had been so easy then. Or perhaps he just liked to think so. They had been adopted when he and his wife discovered they could not have children of their own, but they had always been raised as if they were their own. And they certainly had their own strong wills.

  First it was Disdemona insisting she marry that Moorish soldier. Then Isabella insisting she marry that aloof merchant Bassanio – who died at sea soon after, leaving her a widow, albeit a very rich one. And now Giulietta, behaving like she was still a child, although she was about to celebrate her coming of age. At least she wasn’t making demands of whom she was going to marry. He and his wife might have some success in matchmaking for at least one of his children, he hoped.

  “Giulietta,” he said sternly. “Enough of this. The ball is going to happen. Hundreds of guests are going to attend and if you d
o not attend I will put a mask onto your handmaiden and tell everyone it is you!”

  Giulietta lifted the pillow from her head and stared at her father in outrage. “You cannot!” she said. And then she hissed, “Maria has fat ankles! You cannot tell people she is me.”

  “Then if you do not agree to attend the ball everyone in the Floating City will believe that you have fat ankles,” he said.

  She moaned as if he had driven a spike into her chest and fell back to the bed in a faint at the thought of having fat ankles. “I will go, but only on one condition,” she said at last.

  “Of course,” he said.

  “Promise me?”

  “Yes, I promise you.”

  “I want a new dress for the ball. Something special.”

  “Oh,” he said. “I see.” The one thing his wife had expressly forbidden him to agree to was if Giulietta asked him for another expensive dress, as she had a whole wardrobe full of them that had hardly been worn. She sensed his hesitation and threw her pillow over her face. “If I can’t have a new dress I’m going to lay here and suffocate myself, and then what kind of a ball will you have? It will be a funeral and everyone will have to leave their fancy masks and gowns behind and come in plain black.”

  “I don’t believe it’s actually possible to suffocate yourself,” her father said. “Like trying to hold your breath until you pass out. You just can’t do it.”

  “I’ll be the first,” she said with a determination that unsettled him.

  “You know these are not good times to be having new dresses made,” he said, hoping at least to be able to tell his wife that he had made some attempt to talk her out of it. “The Othmen and their pirates are attacking merchant ships so that they come back empty.”

  “One small dress won’t make any difference,” she said.

  Her father narrowed his eyes. How small? he wondered.

  “Just one dress isn’t too much to ask for, is it?” she asked, peeping out from her pillow, and giving him her sad eyes.

  He shook his head a little. The Council of Ten should put his daughter in charge of the city’s defences. She was a genius with tactics and probing for weaknesses to get what she wanted.

  “I’ll be the best behaved daughter ever and do whatever you want of me.”

  “Whatever I want?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she said. “All evening at the ball, whatever you ask me to do, I will do it.”

  Her father tried to keep the smile off his face. This might just turn out better than he had expected. He would be able to go back to his wife and report that he had conceded ground in order to gain a major victory.

  “I will have to think about it,” he said. “And I should discuss it with your mother too, you know.”

  She sat up again quickly. “No,” she said. “You don’t need to discuss it with mother. You’re the lord of the house, aren’t you? And you’re a councillor. Whatever you say becomes law, doesn’t it?”

  “Well, it’s not quite as simple as that,” he said.

  “But you have the power to say yes to a dress though, don’t you?”

  “Well…” He was starting to enjoy this, he found. Baiting his own daughter into a trap she didn’t know she was creating for herself. “Perhaps if your mother agrees.”

  “But she doesn’t understand me like you do,” she said.

  He really should start grooming her for a life in politics of some kind, he thought. Well, as much as a woman was ever allowed to be involved in politics in this city. “On one condition then,” he said, trying to sound doubtful.

  “Don’t worry,” she said. “I will do whatever it is you ask of me. I promise.”

  He turned his head this way and that, as if considering a very weighty topic, and said, “All right then. But let’s not let your mother know straight away.”

  “Oh, I love you, I love you, I love you,” she said, springing from the bed and wrapping her arms around his neck. He smiled and patted her on the back, each thinking they had outmanoeuvred the other.

  “It will be a very memorable ball,” he said. “Did I mention that the Seers will be coming?”

  VII

  ELSEWHERE IN THE FLOATING CITY

  The ship had been blown off course during the night and, come first light, the navigator was desperately trying to take their bearings from the sun, but it was still as cloudy as it had been during the night and he could make no accurate readings. If they had drifted too far to the east they would be in very dangerous waters, they all knew, and all eyes scanned the horizon sharply for any sign of friend or foe.

  But it was not a ship they first sighted. It was an island. And as they came closer they saw a man on the beach, waving to them like he was possessed. As the shore was very rocky, the ship could not risk coming too close, but the man saw this and, grabbing a piece of wood, threw himself into the water and using it as a float, swam out to their ship.

  Everyone on board was surprised to find that he was one of their countrymen, and when asked to tell them what had happened to him, he had an amazing tale to share. He told them first though that they should turn their ship around at once before the evil necromancer who lived on the island could call up a storm to drive them onto the rocks.

  He told them that the old man had control of an Othmen Djinn to do his bidding. An evil and base creature – more animal than not – that ate his comrades one by one in the night. The necromancer also had a beautiful daughter, he said, who could turn to mist. Everything on the island was put there to torment men.

  “Did you see any Othmen?” they asked him.

  “No,” he said. “Yours is the first ship that I have seen. I have been living on olives and roots and drinking water from muddy puddles, afraid to sleep at night for fear of the evil Djinn.”

  The captain and ship’s crew followed his advice and turned the ship around at once and sailed far from the island of Othmen enchantment. But the poor man expired from his ordeal before the ship could return to the Floating City.

  Vincenzo the scribe laid his quill down and stretched his cramped fingers, then rolled his neck to and fro. “No sea monsters?” asked a voice behind him.

  Vincenzo spun around in his chair to see a hooded stranger standing behind him, wrapped in a long dark cloak. “Who are you?” he asked at once.

  The stranger sighed. “It’s always who are you? Not how did you do that? Or how did you get in here?”

  “How did you get in here?” asked Vincenzo.

  “Too late,” the stranger said. “Only one question.” Then he stepped across and picked up the document that the scribe had been working on. “I thought you had been commissioned to write a history of the Montecchi family?” he said.

  Vincenzo scowled. “You’ve been sent by Signor Montecchi?”

  “No,” said the stranger.

  “Then how do you know about the family history?”

  “How do you know about the island of Othmen enchantment?”

  “I was told it,” Vincenzo said.

  “Hmm,” said the hooded stranger. “So you’ve no reason to doubt it, then?”

  “Why would I doubt it?”

  “Why indeed?” asked the stranger. “It’s a pity that the man who told it was half mad with thirst and torment and died before you could hear it from his lips though.”

  Vincenzo looked around his small room. The door, next to an overflowing bookcase, was still barred, though his small window was open. He felt like asking once more, “How did you get in here?” but instead he asked, “What are you implying? Are you suggesting that it’s not all the truth?”

  “The truth can be many things,” said the stranger.

  Vincenzo scowled again. “The truth is the truth,” he said. “There is only one truth.”

  “Ah, only one truth? That’s an interesting idea.”

  Vincenzo didn’t quite know what to make of this man, but had decided that if he had come to harm him he probably would have done so already. “If you are not sent
from Signor Montecchi, then why are you here?”

  “I’ve come to bring you a gift,” he said.

  “Well, give it and be gone. I’m a busy man.”

  The hooded stranger stepped closer and drew a curved knife from his belt. It looked to Vincenzo like those that he had heard the Othmen carried. Had he been wrong in thinking he had not come to harm him?

  “What is this?” the stranger asked him.

  Vincenzo’s stare moved between the blade and the stranger’s face, trying to find his eyes. “It is a knife,” he said. Then he added respectfully, “Signor.”

  “Is it?” the stranger asked. “Just because it looks like a knife, is it therefore a knife?”

  “You are talking in riddles,” Vincenzo said.

  “What does it feel like?” the stranger asked and, almost faster than the scribe could follow, the blade was pressed against Vincenzo’s bare neck. He gulped and felt the sharp edge cutting into his flesh.

  “Please, signor,” he protested. “I am but a humble scribe.”

  “No false modesty please,” the stranger said. “I asked you a question. What does it feel like?”

  “It feels like a knife,” said Vincenzo. His hands moved around shakily, grasping at nothing in the air, as if no longer under his control.

  “And what looks like a knife and feels like a knife must surely act like a knife, correct?” the stranger asked.

  Vincenzo could not answer.

  “Correct?” the stranger asked again.

  Vincenzo closed his eyes tightly and shook his head just a little. “I don’t know.”

  “And how does a knife act?” the stranger asked, very slowly.

  Vincenzo was trying to stop his throat from gulping, certain the blade had already drawn some blood. It was sharper than a razor. He wanted to ask the man why he was doing this to him. Was trying to think why anybody would want to kill him. Knew it could only be because he was writing about the Othmen. He was searching to find some words that might make the stranger remove the knife from his throat, when the man suddenly said. “A knife acts like this!” And he drew the blade across Vincenzo’s throat.