Read Online The Night of the Swarm (Chathrand Voyage 4) by Robert V.S. Redick - Free Book Online

company – even the doctor has at last chosen sides. I must expect the worst from both of them.
    No one looked healthy, in point of fact. No one but the ghosts. Three had slithered into the chamber when the door was ajar. Captain Kurlstaff was among them, his pink blouse faded, his painted
lips the colour of a man’s intestines, his battleaxe huge and unwieldy in the crowded room. He watched the living with interest. He was the only one of the
Chathrand
’s former
commanders with whom Rose deigned, at times, to consult, although today the old pervert merely stood and stared.
    At least Kurlstaff had the decency not to sabotage the meeting. Captain Spengler was rummaging in the chart locker behind Rose’s head. And Maulle, the pig, had actually taken a chair, in
which he slouched and squirmed and bit his fingernails. The man had the worst facial tic Rose had ever seen; when it happened his face compressed like a sponge, and a puff of chalk powder lifted
from his ancient wig.
    ‘Sir?’ said Chadfallow.
    Rose pivoted away from the ghosts. ‘So the Shaggat is mad,’ he said. ‘Is that news, Doctor? Have you nothing else to report?’
    Chadfallow took a careful breath. ‘The Shaggat is seventy-four years old. And he has just suffered traumas that would strain the faculties of any man. The touch of the Nilstone. The
killing fire that ran up his arm. The transmutation into a dead statue, through Pazel’s Master-Word, and this morning’s reversal. But above all, he is disturbed by the loss of the
Stone. To gain it was his lifelong obsession. He thinks the Gods themselves chose him to wield it, along with that lesser artefact, Sathek’s Sceptre. And because he cannot have had any sense
of time’s passage while enchanted, he must perceive that the Stone has just been taken from him.’ Chadfallow shook his head. ‘His mind is warped beyond all healing, now. What you
saw is likely all that remains.’
    Old Dr Rain cleared his throat. ‘He exhibits a certain
unease
, Captain Rose. That is to say, he is uneasy.’
    Rose turned him a choleric stare. The old medic looked quickly at Chadfallow.
    ‘I cut off the dead hand,’ said Chadfallow. ‘He felt nothing. Below the wrist the limb was dry and brittle. It’s a wonder it did not break during that wrestling
match.’
    ‘It did not break, because I did not break it,’ said Ott. ‘What else?’
    Chadfallow shrugged. ‘His body is otherwise sound. The man is a war elephant. You’ve heard the legend about the arrow that broke off in his chest, the head of which was never
extracted? I saw the scar, I felt the hard nub with my fingers. The wound was two inches above his heart. There are flecks of iron embedded in his left eyeball, too, and signs that his feet were
blistered by walking through fire, or over coals. He is indestructible, in a word. Only his mind has failed, and that utterly.’
    Rain cleared his throat again. ‘In professional terms – that is, in proper language, medical language—’
    ‘Stop your fidgeting, dog!’ snapped Rose. He was addressing Captain Maulle, but Rain flinched as if struck.
    Haddismal was scowling. ‘The Shaggat’s mad, but he ain’t an animal. The good doctor exaggerates.’
    ‘Agreed,’ said Ott. ‘You’re distorting your own diagnosis, Chadfallow, because you wish our cause to fail. In violation of your medical oath, to say nothing of your oath
to His Supremacy.’
    Chadfallow bristled. ‘You saw it yourselves,’ he said. ‘That man raged for six minutes without a glance at his own maimed foot. He might have bled to death without noticing the
wound.’
    ‘And blary good riddance,’ said Mr Fiffengurt, the quartermaster, unable to contain himself.
    Sandor Ott turned his gaze on Fiffengurt. ‘Another proud son of Arqual,’ he said. ‘What has happened to all your friends, traitor?’
    Fiffengurt’s bad eye drifted. But the other was clear and sharp, and he trained it now on Sandor Ott.
    ‘My friends are