Free The Black Lung Captain by Chris Wooding

expected anything else.
    Gimble was a thin, scowling felow who said little. Tarworth was short, baby-faced and eager. Ucke had a more eccentric appearance.
    He was bulky, with hair sticking out everywhere, and he had offensively bad teeth in al shapes, sizes and angles. When Pinn rudely commented on them, Ucke informed the group that they were actualy a false set. Dentures. He'd made them himself from teeth he'd colected from a multitude of bar brawls.
    Once the introductions were done, they shouldered their packs, checked their guns and made ready to set off.
    'Now I don't want none of you believin' al that talk you might have heard about Kurg,' Grist told them. 'There'l be beasts, for sure, but probably not half as horrible as the tales tel.' He slapped Hodd on the shoulder. 'This man's been in there and come out without a scratch. If he can do it, then us rum sons of bitches ought to be able to. What's in there should be afraid of us, not the other way about!'
    Yes, he came out without a scratch, thought Crake. It was the rest of his expedition that died.
    Crake loathed Hodd on sight. Frey had told him about his first meeting with the explorer, which was enough to convince Crake that they were dealing with a shiftless rich boy who'd spent his life living on Daddy's money, utterly detached from the realities of the world. Crake had grown up amongst the aristocracy, and he was never afraid to apply stereotypes. In his experience, they turned out to be true more often than not.
    Besides, Hodd reminded Crake of himself, and Crake hated that.
    Crake had been that way, once. A life of privilege, sheltered from trouble by his father's money. Mixing only with his own kind. He treated lowlier folk with politeness because that was what people with good breeding did, but they weren't the same as him. He couldn't have said why, and he'd never have admitted it aloud, but they just weren't.
    It had been the discovery of daemonism at university which had prompted his awakening. Before long, he'd grown bored with the vacant twitterings of the social classes. While they were talking about mergers and marriages, inheritances and infidelities, he'd been communicating with entities from another dimension. In the face of that, their preoccupations seemed rather juvenile.
    But he'd stil possessed the arrogance of the aristocracy. The knowledge that no matter what he did, he'd never not be rich. Whatever trouble he got into, someone would look after him.
    Maybe that was why he did what he did. He'd not known what sorrow or torment or hardship meant until then. But he learned those lessons wel in the time that folowed.
    'Right,' said Hodd, clapping his hands. 'Are we al ready?'
    Belts were tightened, coats buttoned, bootlaces tied and retied. Pinn took a few test steps to check the weight of his pack.
    'Off we go, then!' Hodd cried.
    'Where are we headed?' Jez asked.
    That stumped Hodd for a moment. 'Er ... to the crashed Azryx aircra—'
    'No, I mean . . . Don't you have a map? Directions?' Jez asked. 'You said it would be over a day's walk. I just wondered how you were intending to find it again.' She looked around the group and shrugged. 'Sorry. Navigator. I just want to know.'
    Hodd smiled broadly and tapped his head. 'It's al in here, Miss.'
    'You remember the way,' Jez said, doubtfuly. She eyed the forested flanks of the mountains that surrounded them. 'Are you sure? Once we're in there, we'l get pretty badly lost if you're wrong.'
    'Be assured, I never forget a route,' he said. 'I've possessed a rather remarkable talent for pathfinding ever since I was a child. It was what inspired me to be an explorer, actualy.'
    'And what did Daddy think about that?' Crake asked, and immediately regretted it. He didn't want to have a conversation with this buffoon, but he'd been unable to resist a bitter jibe. It had just come out.
    Hodd missed Crake's tone and the implied insult entirely. 'He was rather disappointed, actualy,' he said, looking downcast.