The Curhouse councilors were nervous in the moonship. They followed the Brucolac in a huddle, trying not to show discomfort as they scurried after him. Conscious of his guests’ requirements for light, the Brucolac had lit torches in the corridors. He had chosen not to use gaslights, taking a small malicious pleasure in the ostentation, and in the knowledge that the shadows the torches cast would flutter as unpredictable and predatory as bats in the ship’s narrow passages.

The circular meeting room was set in the ship’s broadest mast-tower, looking out over the deck fifty feet up. It was opulent and unwelcoming, inlaid with jet and pewter and finely worked lead. There were no candles or flames here, but an icy light picked out the interior with scientific clarity: moon- and starlight were gathered on the ship’s masts, amplified, and sent through mirrored shafts like veins to bleed out into the chamber. The strange illumination stripped the scene of any color.

"Gentlemen, ladies," said the Brucolac in his guttural whisper. He smiled and pulled back his mass of hair; tasted the air with his long, serpentine tongue; and indicated that his guests should sit around the darkwood table. He watched them find places- human, hotchi, llorgiss, and others all watching him warily.

"We have been outmaneuvered," the Brucolac continued. "I suggest we consider our response."

Dry Fall seemed much like Garwater. The decks of a hundred skiffs and barges and hulks were lit up against the darkness, and bustled with the sound of pubs and playhouses.

But looming silently over them all was the Uroc ’s distorted silhouette. It watched over the convivials of Dry Fall without comment or censure or enthusiasm, and they responded, glancing at it now and then with a kind of wary, uneasy pride. They had more freedom and more say than those who lived in Garwater, they reminded themselves; more protection than Thee-And-Thine; more autonomy than Shaddler.

The Dry Fallers knew that many citizens of other ridings regarded the goretax as a price too high, but that was squeamish stupidity. It was the recently press-ganged who were most vociferous about that, Dry Fallers pointed out-superstitious outsiders who had not yet learned Armadan ways.

There were no floggings in Dry Fall, the inhabitants reminded such newcomers. Their goods and entertainments were subsidized for all those who carried a Dry Fall seal. For matters of importance, the Brucolac held meetings where everyone could have a say. He protected them. There was nothing like the anarchic, violent rule that existed elsewhere in the city. Dry Fall was safe, civilized, its streets well maintained. The goretax was a reasonable trade.

They were protective of their riding, and insecure. The Uroc was their talisman, and no matter how raucous and chaotic the evening, they would glance occasionally at its skyline as if for reassurance.