“Pernicus. Billerand found him half a glass ago.”
“I was mooching around,” the mustachioed first mate said, “checking the cargo. It’s all I’m up to these days.”
Murad knelt and examined the corpse. Pernicus’ eyes were wide open, the mouth agape in a last scream.
Had he heard it? Or had that been part of his dream?
The man’s neck had been almost entirely bitten through; Murad could see the clammy tube of the windpipe, the ragged ends of arteries, a white-shard of vertebra.
Lower down the intestines had spilled out like a coil of greasy rope. There were chunks missing from the body. The marks of teeth were plain to see.
“Sweet Ramusio!” Murad whispered. “What did this?”
“A beast of some kind,” Hawkwood said firmly. “Something came down here in the middle watch—one of the crew thought he glimpsed it. Pernicus liked to work his magic from the hold because it was more peaceful than the gundeck or the waist. It came down here after him.”
“Did the man say what it was like?” Murad asked.
“Big and black. That’s all he could say. He thought he had imagined it. There is nothing like that aboard the ship.”
A dream or nightmare of a great, black-furred weight atop him. Could it have been real?
Murad mastered his confusion and straightened up out of the foul water.
“Is it still aboard, do you think?”
“I don’t know. I want a thorough search of the ship. If whatever did this is on board, we’ll find it and kill it.”
Murad remembered the log of the Cartigellan Faulcon. It could not be. The same thing could not be happening again. Such things were not possible.
“I have sent for the mage, Bardolin. He may be able to enlighten us,” Hawkwood added.
“Do the passengers know what has happened?”
“They know Pernicus is dead. I could not stop that from leaking out, what with the loss of the wind, and all. But they don’t know the manner of his death.”
“Keep it that way. We don’t want a panic on board.”
The four of them stood round the corpse in silence for a moment. It occurred to all of them in the same instant that the beast could be here with them now, lurking among the shadows. Di Souza was shifting uneasily, his drawn sword winking in the lantern light.
“Someone’s coming,” he said. Another globe of light was approaching and two men were clambering over the cargo towards them.
“That’s far enough, Masudi!” Hawkwood called. “Go back. Bardolin, you come forward alone.”
The mage splashed towards him, and they could make out Masudi’s lantern growing smaller as he returned the way he had come.
“Well, gentlemen,” Bardolin began, and bent to the corpse much as Murad had done.
“Well, Mage?” Murad asked coolly, having regained his poise.
Bardolin’s face was as pale as Mateo’s had been. “When did this happen?”
“Sometime before the dawn, we think,” Billerand told him gruffly. “I found him here, as he lies.”
“What did it?” Murad demanded.
The mage turned the limbs, examining the lacerated flesh with an intensity that was disturbing to the more squeamish among them. Sequero looked away.
“How were the horses last night?” Bardolin asked.
Sequero frowned. “A bit restless. They took a long time to quieten down.”
“They smelled it,” the mage said. He got to his feet with a low groan.
“Smelled what?” Murad demanded impatiently. “What did this, Bardolin? What manner of beast? It was not a man, that’s plain.”
Bardolin seemed reluctant to speak. He was staring at the mangled corpse with his face as grim as a gravestone.
“It was not a man, and yet it was. It was both, and neither.”
“What gibberish is this?”
“It was a werewolf, Lord Murad. There is a shape-shifter aboard this ship.”
“Saint’s preserve us!” di Souza said into the shocked silence.
“Are you sure?” Hawkwood asked.
“Yes, Captain. I have seen such wounds before.” Bardolin seemed downcast and strangely bitter, Murad thought. And not as shocked as he ought to be.
“So it is not just an animal,” Hawkwood was saying. “It changes back and forth. It could be anyone, any one of the ship’s company.”
“Yes, Captain.”
“What are we to do?” di Souza asked plaintively.
No one answered him.
“Speak to us, Mage,” Murad grated. “What can we do to find the beast and kill it?”
“There is nothing you can do, Lord Murad.”
“What do you mean?”
“It will be wearing its human face again now. We will simply have to be watchful, to wait for it to strike again.”
“What kind of plan is that?” Sequero snapped. “Are we cattle, to wait for the slaughter?”
“Yes, Lord Sequero, we are. That is exactly what we are to this thing.”
“Is there no way of telling who is the werewolf?” Billerand asked.
“Not that I know of. We will simply have to be vigilant, and there are certain precautions we can take also.”