Carnelian stared. 'Offered before? But… our exile…?'

'Exiles are as varied in their kinds as precious stones. It seems in keeping with Lord Suth's fabled eccentricity that he should choose to retire so far and to such a forbidding shore.'

'Choose…?' said Carnelian. It was as if lightning had flashed before his eyes.

Jaspar drew back, his head leaning to one side. 'Surely you knew, Carnelian, that your father's exile has always been self-imposed?'

Carnelian was not even sure where he was. He jerked a nod, fumbled on his mask. 'Lord… excuse me.'

Jaspar's blue face was frowning as he watched Carnelian disappear into the funnel.

The sea folded into hills and valleys and the ship slid heavily up and down the slopes. Carnelian lay in the cabin, falling in and out of sleep, brooding. Soon the vomit was burning up into his mouth and he forgot everything else as his stomach turned itself out onto the floor. Tain was suffering as much and Carnelian ordered him to stop trying to clean up the mess. They shared the misery, just wanting to die. They were not alone. Above the ship's timber-groan they could hear the retching coming from the cabins round about.

Carnelian heard the knock, then Tain talking to someone, and sat up to see who it was. When he saw his father's huge frame squeezing into the cabin he was appalled. He was wound into his sheets. Both he and they were streaked with body paint and soaked with sweat. Filth puddled the floor. He knew the cabin stank. He tried to smooth his hair and rubbed at his face with a corner of the sheet. He swung his feet out, winced as the stuff oozed between his toes, then began to stand up, an apology on his lips.

Stay, his father signed. He was crammed into the other half of the cabin. The ceiling crushed him down so that he was almost doubled up. This is not the time for ceremony, Carnelian. I am just a father come to see his son.' Suth looked round the cabin, then reached behind his head to release his mask. His face was haggard, his eyes bruise-rimmed red. 'You look ill, my son.'

Carnelian stared. His father looked terrible. He covered his dismay with a wan smile. 'It is mosdy the waves. Does the wave-sickness also ail my Lord?' For a moment he forgot the resentment he had been feeling towards his father.

'No… well, yes, as you say, the waves.' Braced against the ceiling and a bulkhead, his father seemed a part of the swaying cabin. 'It occurred to me I might bring you some relief.' He handed Carnelian a small silver box. Its lid was wrought with a crying eye: the moon's cypher. Opening it, Carnelian saw it was filled with a red-brown powder whose acridity stung his nose.

'It is made from the juice of young poppies. Get Tain to hide its bitterness in honey. Give him some. Its dreams will deaden you both to the storms.'

Carnelian searched his father's weary face.

Take care you do not consume too much. Poppy has a power over men's minds.' His father looked as if he were seeing something far away. 'And dreams can be as enslaving as the legions.'

'You should not have incommoded yourself, my Lord. A servant could have brought me this.'

His father almost smiled. 'You see behind the mask, my son. You force me to own that I come to make a peace between us. This is no time for us to be at war. There are dangers coming that we should better meet with our shields locked together.'

Carnelian felt his heart melting. He wanted to open himself up. He wanted to lean on his father's strength, to trust him. But he wore the discomfort of Jaspar's words like wet clothes. 'May I ask my Lord a question?'

His father's brows lifted.

Carnelian clamped his teeth together. The taste of vomit was still in his mouth but his question lay more bitter on his tongue. He spat it out. 'Was our exile freely chosen?'

His father's face darkened. 'Who told you this?'

'It is true then!'

Father and son glared at each other. Then Suth's eyes fell as if his head had grown suddenly heavy. Cold fear flushed up Carnelian's chest. The Master, hanging his head in shame? He had never expected to see that. He closed up, withdrawing back into the bunk in a hunch. His father looked up with dull eyes. 'Long ago, I swore before the Wise a blood oath that brought us here. All you need to know is that I have been released from it.'

The sadness in his father's face punished Carnelian. The massive shoulders seemed to be curving under the whole weight of the decks above. Carnelian felt how unworthy had been his doubts.

His father made an elegant gesture to take in the cabin. 'Shall I send one of my servants to clean this?'

'No, Father, Tain will manage well enough.'

'I can see how well he is managing, but it is up to you.' He turned to leave. There is one task that Tain should be capable of. You are no longer a boy. Have him shave your head. Wait until it is calm. It is not becoming to a Lord to have his head a mass of scars.'

Tain was mopping up the last of the vomit. His face scrunched up as he wiped it off his hands. He looked up at Carnelian hunched on his bunk. 'You know, Crail's worse off than either of us.' He busied himself rubbing the cloth between his fingers.

Carnelian dropped his hands from his eyes and glanced down. He felt a pang of guilt. He had altogether forgotten the old man. 'Surely he's being looked after?'

Tain looked uncertain. 'You know the tyadra. How likely do you think it is that they'd make good nursemaids?'

'Well then, he must come here where we can look after him.'

Tain's eyes were all whites. 'In here?'

'Why not?'

'Well, it might have escaped my Master's attention but there's very little space.'

'If you don't think that you can squeeze in here with us then you could always take Crail's place in the other cabin.'

Tain frowned.

'Go on, Tain, I'm sure you don't like the idea of him suffering uncared for any better than I do.'

'I suppose,' said Tain. He went out and returned soon after with a sly grin. 'He's refused.'

'I bet you didn't try very hard.'

'I did! You know what he's like.'

'Well, go back and don't bother saying anything more to him. Tell the others in his cabin that I want him carried in here and that it's a command not a request.'

A little later Carnelian could hear grumbling and scuffing in the hall. He had risen, made himself presentable, and knocked together another makeshift bed on the floor. He stood shakily on the tilting floor and had to look away from the lantern's swing. Everything was lurching. Tain came in and held the door open. A guardsman backed into the cabin. Carnelian could see another over his shoulder. The first man had to trample one of the floor beds. When they were both in they turned. Crail hung between them like a rope bridge. Though sallow and feverish, he still managed a scowl. The guardsmen began to lower him towards the floor.

'Not there,' said Carnelian. 'Put him on the bunk.'

'But, Carnie, you can't sleep on the floor,' said Tain. The faces round him were aghast.

'Look at the bunk,' Carnelian said. 'Go on, look at it! Now look at me. I'm sure you can all see there's a difference in our lengths. I haven't slept comfortably since coming aboard this accursed scow. Now, if none of you object,' he gave them all a bow, 'I'd like to sleep stretched out on the floor.'

Some of them blushed. It made Carnelian queasy to look at their swaying. He turned away. When he looked back, Crail had already been put in the bunk. The old man's face puckered into a grimace that folded his chameleon tattoo into the wrinkles. 'I knew I shouldn't have come,' he grated. 'I told the Master I didn't want to be a burden.'

Tain's eyes rolled up to the ceiling. The other men slipped out. Carnelian and Tain arranged the beds that now took up almost all the floor. They settled down with groans of relief. The old man was still grumbling. Carnelian offered them each a morsel of poppied honey. Crail turned his face away. Carnelian forced it on him. Take it. If it's good enough for a Master it's good enough for you.' The old man gave in but put it into his mouth as if he were being poisoned.