Veracity (38 page)

The fact that Onni was the only one to have sighted the land, or even to have known about it, didn't really surprise me. Our course hadn't exactly been foremost on their minds over the days prior to that, and I'm not even sure Knut had taken any readings. Instead they were busy worrying about whether they should kill me or not, which, oddly enough, stood to be the one thing that might save me. I'm sure they had no idea that Onni had veered toward the peninsula, because they didn't really have a reason to look at the charts or worry about distances anymore; the sail worked, as did the fishing gear - we were out of danger. But as it stood, as soon as we reached land, I would be released, dropped onto some random island, free to walk away, which was something that, perhaps most of them, didn't want to see happen. No. Instead they needed time to carry out their plan, and maybe even time to convince a few others of its necessity. If anything, they wanted to stall a bit, because, as I'd already ascertained, it would have been far too obvious to do it that night. They wouldn't dare be so bold. I was sure of it.

I listened to the noises in the galley slowly diminish, and then came the sounds of a few people wandering into their quarters to go to sleep - all of them perfectly quiet as they passed by my room - then a few more, and finally, the last of them. Doors closed, latches shut, and bunks squeaked as people found the most comfortable position to fall asleep. Then, finally, it was quiet, except for the predictable to and fro creaking of the ship, which was accompanied once in a while by Onni's movements on the upper deck, and someone, somewhere, snoring contently.

I lay on my bed, wide awake, thinking about the brand new life I would be given before the night was through; amazed that it was all going to come to me without costing anyone a single thing.

29

As the time passed, my mood faded, and the darkness seemed to press up closer against my face, smothering me with restlessness. The muted black had no end, no beginning, it was just empty, which, somehow, as if time needed a reference of space before it could advance, seemed to make the hours slow to a crawl.

Finally, at one point, I noticed the circular rim of my window giving off a point of light. I walked over and saw that a sliver of moon was rising out of the ocean. Perfect, I thought to myself. Let alone was it a respite from the oppressive darkness, it would also give me the light I would need in the ideal scenario that I was still holding in my mind; the one that had me drifting away undetected, uninjured, and no one on the ship having inflicted an inkling of harm to one another. I grinned through the glass.

After following the path of soundlessness back to my bed, I lay there for what felt like a few more hours, though might have only been a few minutes. I spent that time wondering how I could thank Onni, what I could say before slipping into the water, what momentous phrase I could whisper that would stay with him for the rest of his life. I wanted to find the right words that would let him know both how completely indebted I was to him, and the fact that I would always remember what he'd done for me, what he'd risked. And I was turning over different phrases in my head, even thinking about the intonation I would use, when it happened.

There was a creak in the floorboards along the gangway. Just one. Then nothing. It had come from the end of the gangway that Onni wouldn't be using. I lay there, not breathing, my body stiff.

Silence. Absolutely nothing. Just the gentle rocking of the boat, the wooden groans accompanying the oscillation of the ship's weight as it shifted on the sea. There was nothing else, no sounds haphazardly shoved between the predictable ones, nothing breaking the endless rhythm. I had imagined it. I was being foolish. Paranoid.

I ventured a guarded breath.

Another creak. But this time, it was much closer and just off from the rhythm of the ocean. Whoever it was, was advancing with the sounds of the ship to go undetected. I bent all of my attention at the door to listen.

Another. Only this time, I distinctly heard two separate pieces of wood being weighted, two complaints from the aged joints in the floor as someone passed over them.

These were my murderers, there were two of them, and they were already nearing my door.

The truth is, I don't remember thinking much. Everything I did, the strategy that I formed, the set of tasks that slotted into my head - which I knew I would have to move through as quickly and quietly as possible - were all automatic, instinctive.

I stepped on one of the memorized locations on the floor in front of my bed and arranged the sheets to appear something like a sleeping body - at least at a glance. And as I did this, I worked in the same noisy time intervals that my rivals were working in, with the same precision, all of us fluttering into movement with the creaking of the ship; a clatter of noises one moment, silence the next.

I turned to look behind me and saw the latch twitch slightly. Someone had his hand on it, probably to help find the key sticking out of the lock in the dark.

I crept through the room, stepping in all of the right places, and crouched to sit in the darkness, away from the dull light of the window, and beside one of the shelves near the door that had kept the cases. I had time enough to notice my heart thumping, and to flinch at the sound of one of my toes cracking.

They were doing a perfect job at unlocking the door. Slowly, the mechanical parts rotated, and didn't so much click out of place, but settled there, with only miniscule dripping sounds like sprinkled water on grass. There was only one definitive click near the end, timed well with the creaks of the boat. They obviously intended on taking me by surprise. I would have been stirred out of sleep with the sensation of cold metal against my throat and a finger over my lips.

The latch began to rotate, then stopped. The door opened in one quick swing, also timed with the creaking of the ship. A knife entered the room, followed by a body. Then the second person, hunched forward and moving in the same way. I recognized their profiles. Toivo turned to close the door as quietly as he'd opened it, while Knut continued toward the bed. They were both easing into flat-footed steps, distributing their weight evenly on the floor.

Knut was in reaching distance of my sheets and about to touch them and discover the illusion; Toivo was lagging behind, a little apprehensively, his arm extended out to the side. It was my side; the knife was almost right in front of me.

I stood, aware that I was in Toivo's periphery, and moved toward him. I only had to step on two of the silent spots before I reached his hand with my face. I grabbed onto the knife with one hand and onto his wrist with the other. He flinched, jerking his grip toward himself, so I had to follow his arm with my head before I could sink my teeth into his hand. I felt a joint of one of his fingers dislocate in my mouth, could taste the sharp metallic flavour of blood.

Suddenly, the knife was in my hand. He'd let out a stifled whimpering sound when I bit him, and was now covering his mouth - which had momentarily betrayed his code of silence - with both of his hands, his good one massaging the injured. He looked at me, baffled, seeming to need time to take in what was happening. He was awestruck, useless. I grabbed him by the hair, and instead of pulling him toward me, only really succeeded in pulling myself toward him. But I adapted quickly, circling around him from behind and putting the knife to his neck, exposing it more by pulling back on his hair. He didn't resist. He was petrified.

Knut, of course, had realized what was happening, and was waiting for an opportunity to do something about it. I didn't give him one. I turned Toivo to better face Knut and pressed the knife up tightly against his throat (a little too tightly actually, as I felt a warm liquid creep down the blade and over the handle of the knife, oozing into my fingers).

I spoke to Knut in a whisper, though my words were quick, commanding. "Put your knife on the bed. Now."

He didn't think about it for a second. He twisted around and tossed it onto the sheets, probably knowing that I would have ended Toivo's life without the slightest hesitation - I had nothing to lose. He turned back to look at me again, waiting for the next order. I gave it to him. "Kneel down facing the wall. Don't make a sound." I took the knife from Toivo's neck and jabbed it lightly into the back of his head, "You too." Both of them knelt as they had been told.

I moved onto the next task, my mind still numb, still blank. Stepping forward onto one of the silent spots on the floor, I grabbed Toivo by the hair, and waited for the ship to creak. Just before it did, I brought my fist down, with the blunt handle of the knife protruding from the bottom of it, and struck him on the top of the head with a furious blow. His body went limp. I lowered it to the ground as gently as I could, wads of his hair coming out in clumps as he settled to the floor. I let go, throwing the sticky tangles to the ground beside him.

I stepped over to Knut, who was mumbling something under his breath, and clenched his hair in my fist, raising the handle of the knife above my head. The moment the ship groaned, I brought it down on the top of his skull. But he wasn't unconscious. And suddenly, he spoke with a completely normal volume; his words, which were mumbled drunkenly, sounded like hollers in the quiet of the room. "Ow. Thah... tha hurtz." I hit him again, hard; but still, he was awake. He was beginning to moan, trying to turn his head, maybe even trying to get up, his fingernails scratching against the grain of the wood on the floor. I brought the knife down again, as hard as my body would allow. Finally, he was quiet. He had become a heavy weight in my hand, and I lowered him to the ground by his fine blonde hair, which was quickly being blackened with a runny darkness.

I stepped back from them with a kind of cold satisfaction, looking down at the shapes that they made heaped together on the floor, their limbs sprawling out from under them at unnatural angles, like the fallen boughs of trees.

I turned and walked to the bed, stepping carefully in the memorized places. I put the knife that was in my hand beside the other one, a blotch of darkness from my fingers smearing onto the white sheets. But before I turned to leave, I hesitated, thinking of the noises that Knut had made. They might have woken someone. And more importantly, if that someone was awake, they could be listening carefully for movement, waiting for just one other unfamiliar sound before they roused cautiously from bed and gathered some others to investigate. And with that thought, my hand hovered above the handle of the knife for a moment more. Yes. I scooped it back into my hand and turned from the bed. Just in case.

Across the room again, to the door. I turned the latch as quietly as Knut had, and slipped into the gangway. Closing it, I made a louder click than I would have liked. Then I waited for the ship to moan in its rhythm before I moved, doing exactly as Knut and Toivo had done: a few fast steps, then stopping, waiting, then a few more. As I passed by one of the doors, I could hear movement on the other side. I swallowed, dug my fingernails into the handle of the knife. Someone was urinating against the side of a bucket. This wasn't good.

I crept on until I gained the stairs, easing onto them two at a time, still in keeping with the predictable flux of noise. Then I was through the hatch, on the upper deck, and in the cool breeze and brightly shadowed night.

I looked around for Onni, but couldn't see him nor did I have time to find him; he could have been anywhere. I imagined that he was nestled in one of the dark corners, stealing a half hour of sleep - like every one of us did on night watches. It looked like my well-chosen words would have to go unsaid, which, I must admit, didn't really bother me at the time. The only thing I really cared about was getting into the water before anyone came up the stairs behind me.

I followed the direction of the wind to the horizon and could see some low-lying cloud crawling toward us, which, if Onni was correct, was actually land. I hoped he was right.

I tiptoed over to the container that held the life raft, which was mounted near the gunwale, and carefully unlatched it. I'd almost succeeded in taking it out in perfect silence when I knocked one of the buckles of the plastic container, causing it to rattle a bit. I cringed at the sound; then stood and skulked to the rope ladder, cradling the heavy bundle protectively in my arms, as if someone were going to steal it from me. I had to put it down on the deck while I fed the ladder into the water, which I lowered with painful slowness, my body moving automatically, hand over hand, a few fingerprints of blood marking the rungs, the knife making subtle clicking sounds with every contact that it had with the wood, until finally, it was all in, stretching out into the wake, cutting frothing lines in the black water. I was almost there. I was almost free. I only had to climb down the ladder and let go. It was that simple.

But I stopped. Or, rather, everything in my body stopped. I was immobile. It wasn't that I had heard something behind me, it was that the air at my back had become still, maybe even slightly warmed. Someone was there. Someone was about to stop me from escaping, after I had gotten so close to it that I'd almost tasted it. The ladder was in the water, the life raft out of its container and beside me, the land in the distance, the wind blowing in the perfect direction; every last thing was aligned in my favour. I knew that this window of opportunity would never come up again. Never. And if I missed it, I would die. The back of my eyes warmed. I tightened my grip on the knife. I
would not
miss it.

In one quick motion, I stood up, spun around, and swiped the knife through the air as hard as I could.

He was so close to me, that I thought my wrist would strike him before the blade would. He flung his hands high and forward, sucking his stomach in, trying to get as far from the metal as possible. As soon as I had followed through with the swing, his hands shot to his lower stomach, covering it. Neither of us really moved after that.

"Shit!" I heard my voice whisper, "Shit!" It was Onni.