Before They Are Hanged (30 page)

“It’s persistent,” muttered Vitari, shoving her back against the wall with her boot. “You’d have to give it that.”

“Fools!” hissed Shickel. “You cannot resist what comes! God’s right hand is falling upon this city, and nothing can save it! All your deaths are already written!” A particularly bright detonation flared across the sky, casting orange light onto the Practicals’ masked faces. A moment later the thunder of it echoed around the room. Shickel began to laugh, a crazy, grating cackle. “The Hundred Words are coming! No chains can bind them, no gates can keep them out! They are coming!”

“Perhaps.” Glokta shrugged. “But they will come too late for you.”

“I am dead already! My body is nothing but dust! It belongs to the Prophet! Try as you might, you will learn nothing from me!”

Glokta smiled. He could almost feel the warmth of the flames, far below, on his face.

“That sounds like a challenge.”

One of Them

Ardee smiled at him, and Jezal smiled back. He grinned like an idiot. He could not help it. He was so happy to be back where things made sense. Now they need never be parted. He wanted only to tell her how much he loved her. How much he missed her. He opened his mouth but she pressed her finger to his lips. Firmly.

“Shhh.”

She kissed him. Gently at first, then harder.

“Uh,” he said.

Her teeth nipped at his lip. Playful, to begin with.

“Ah,” he said.

They bit harder, and harder still.

“Ow!” he said.

She sucked at his face, her teeth ripping at his skin, scraping on his bones. He tried to scream, but nothing came out. It was dark, his head swam. There was a hideous tugging, an unbearable pulling on his mouth.

“Got it,” said a voice. The agonising pressure released.

“How bad is it?”

“Not as bad as it looks.”

“It looks very bad.”

“Shut up and hold that torch higher.”

“What’s that?”

“What?”

“That there, sticking out?”

“His jaw, fool, what do you think it is?”

“I think I’m going to be sick. Healing is not among my remarkable—”

“Shut your fucking hole and hold the torch up! We’ll have to push it back in!” Jezal felt something pressing on his face, hard. There was a cracking sound and an unbearable lance of pain stabbed through his jaw and into his neck, like nothing he had ever felt before. He sagged back.

“I’ll hold it, you move that.”

“What, this?”

“Don’t pull his teeth out!”

“It fell out by itself!”

“Damn fool pink!”

“What’s happening?” said Jezal. But all that came out was a kind of gurgle. His head was throbbing, pulsing, splitting with pain.

“He’s waking up now!”

“You stitch then, I’ll hold him.” There was a pressure round his shoulders, across his chest, folding him tight. His arm hurt. Hurt terribly. He tried to kick but his leg was agony, he couldn’t move it.

“You got him?”

“Yes I’ve got him! Get stitching!”

Something stabbed into his face. He had not thought the pain could grow any worse. How wrong he had been.

“Get off me!” he bellowed, but all he heard was, “thugh.”

He struggled, tried to wriggle free, but he was folded tight, and it only made his arm hurt more. The pain in his face got worse. His upper lip, his lower lip, his chin, his cheek. He screamed and screamed and screamed, but heard nothing. Only a quiet wheezing. When he thought his head would surely explode, the pain grew suddenly less.

“Done.”

The grip was released and he lay back, floppy as a rag, helpless. Something turned his head. “That’s good stitching. That’s real good. Wish you’d been around when I got these. Might still have my looks.”

“What looks, pink?”

“Huh. Best get started on his arm. Then there’s the leg to set an’ all.”

“Where did you put that shield?”

“No,” groaned Jezal, “please…” Nothing but a click in his throat.

He could see something now, blurry shapes in the half-light. A face loomed towards him, an ugly face. Bent and broken nose, skin torn and crossed with scars. There was a dark face, just behind it, a face with a long, livid line from eyebrow to chin. He closed his eyes. Even the light seemed painful.

“Good stitching.” A hand patted the side of his face. “You’re one of us, now, boy.”

Jezal lay there, his face a mass of agony, and the horror crept slowly through every limb.

“One of us.”

PART II

“He is not fit for battle that has never seen his own blood flow, who has not heard his teeth crunch under the blow of an opponent, or felt the full weight of his adversary upon him.”

Roger of Howden

Heading North

So the Dogman was just lying there on his face, wet to the skin and trying to keep still without freezing solid, looking out across the valley from the trees, and watching Bethod’s army marching. He couldn’t see that much of them from where he was lying, just a stretch of the track over a ridge, enough to see the Carls tramping by, painted shields bright on their backs, mail glistening with specks of melted snow, spears sticking up high between the tree trunks. Rank after rank of ’em, marching steady.

They were a good way off, but he was taking quite a risk even getting this close. Bethod was just as careful as ever. He’d got men out all around, up on the ridges and the high points, anywhere where he thought someone could get a sight of what he was up to. He’d sent a few scouts south and some others east, hoping to trick anyone was watching, but he hadn’t got the Dogman fooled. Not this time. Bethod was heading back the way he’d come. He was heading north.

Dogman breathed in sharp, and gave a long, sad sigh. By the dead, he felt tired. He watched the tiny figures filing past through the pine branches. He’d spent all those years scouting for Bethod, keeping an eye on armies like this one for him, helping him win battles, helping to make him a King, though he’d never dreamed it at the time. In some ways everything had changed. In others it was just the same as ever. Here he was still, face down in the muck with a sore neck from looking up. Ten years older and not a day better off. He could hardly remember what his ambitions used to be, but this hadn’t ever been among ’em, he was sure of that. All that wind blown past, all that snow fallen, all that water flowed by. All that fighting, all that marching, all that waste.

Logen gone, and Forley gone, and the candle burning down fast on the rest of ’em.

Grim slithered through the frozen scrub beside him, propped himself on his elbows and peered out towards the Carls moving on the road. “Huh,” he grunted.

“Bethod’s moving north,” whispered Dogman.

Grim nodded.

“He’s got scouts out all over, but he’s heading north, no doubt. We’d best let Threetrees know.”

Another nod.

Dogman lay there in the wet. “I’m getting tired.”

Grim looked up, lifted an eyebrow.

“All this effort, and for what? Everything the same as ever. Whose side is it we’re on now?” Dogman waved his hand over at the men slogging down the road. “We supposed to fight all this lot? When do we get a rest?”

Grim shrugged his shoulders, squeezed his lips together like he was thinking about it. “When we’re dead?”

And wasn’t that the sorry truth.

Took Dogman a while to find the others. They were nowhere near where they should’ve been by now. Being honest, they weren’t far from where they were when he left. Dow was the first one he saw, sat on a big stone with the usual scowl on his face, glaring down into a gully. Dogman came up next to him, saw what he was looking at. The four Southerners, clambering over the rocks, slow and clumsy as new-born calves. Tul and Threetrees were waiting for them at the bottom, looking mighty short on patience.

“Bethod’s heading north,” said Dogman.

“Good for him.”

“Not surprised?”

Dow licked his teeth and spat. “He’s beat every clan that dared face him, made himself a King where there wasn’t one before, gone to war with the Union and he’s giving ’em a kicking. He’s turned the world on its head, the bastard. Nothing he does surprises me now.”

“Huh.” Dogman reckoned he was right enough there. “You lot ain’t got far.”

“No we ain’t. This is some right fucking baggage you’ve saddled us with here, and no mistake.” He watched the four of ’em fumbling their way down the gully below, shaking his head like he’d never seen such a waste of flesh. “Some right fucking baggage.”

“If you’re telling me to feel shamed ’cause I saved some lives that day, I don’t. What should I have done?” asked Dogman. “Left ’em to die?”

“That’s one idea. We’d be moving twice the speed without ’em, and eating a deal better and all.” He flashed a nasty grin. “There’s only one that I could find a use for.”

Dogman didn’t have to ask which one. The girl was at the back. He could hardly see a woman’s shape to her, all wrapped up as she was against the cold, but he could guess it was under there, and it made him nervous. Strange thing, having a woman along. Quite the sorry rarity, since they went north over the mountains, all them months ago. Even seeing one seemed like some kind of a guilty treat. Dogman watched her clambering on the rocks, dirty face half turned towards them. Tough-looking girl, he thought. Seemed like she’d had her share of knocks.

“I reckon she’d struggle,” Dow muttered to himself. “I reckon she’d kick some.”

“Alright, Dow,” snapped Dogman. “Best calm yourself down, lover. You know how Threetrees feels about all that. You know what happened to his daughter. He’d cut your fucking fruits off if he heard you talking that way.”

“What?” Dow said, all innocence. “I’m just talking, aren’t I? You can’t hardly blame me for that. When’s the last time any one of us had a woman?”

Dogman frowned. He knew exactly when it was for him. Pretty much the last time he was ever warm. Curled up with Shari in front of the fire, smile on his face wide as the sea. Just before Bethod chucked him and Logen and all the rest of them in chains, then kicked ’em out into exile.

He could still remember that last sight of her, mouth open wide with shock and fright as they dragged him from the blankets, naked and half asleep, squawking like a rooster that knows it’s about to get its neck twisted. It had hurt, to be dragged away from her. Not as bad as Scale kicking him in the fruits had hurt, mind you. A painful night, all in all, one he’d never thought to live through. The sting from the kicks had faded with time, but the ache of losing her never had done, quite.

Dogman remembered the smell of her hair, the sound of her laugh, the feel of her back, pressed warm and soft against his belly while she slept. Well-used memories, picked over and worn thin like a favourite shirt. He remembered it like it was last night. He had to make himself stop thinking about it. “Don’t know that my memory goes back that far,” he grunted.

“Nor mine,” said Dow. “Ain’t you getting tired of fucking your hand?” He peered back down the slope and smacked his lips. Had a light in his eyes that Dogman didn’t much like the look of. “Funny, how you don’t miss it so bad until you see it right in front of you. It’s like holding out the meat to a hungry man, so close he can smell it. Don’t tell me you ain’t thinking the same thing.”

Dogman frowned at him. “I don’t reckon I’m thinking quite the same as you are. Stick your cock in the snow if you have to. That should keep you cooled off.”

Dow grinned. “I’ll have to stick it in something soon, I can tell you that.”

“Aaargh!” came a wail from down the slope. Dogman started for his bow, staring to see if some of Bethod’s scouts had caught them out. It was just the Prince, slipped and fallen on his arse. Dow watched him rolling on his back, face all squashed up with scorn.

“He’s some new kind o’ useless, that one, eh? All he does is slow us down to half the rate we need, whine louder than a hog giving birth, eat more ’n his share and shit five times a day.” West was helping him up, trying to brush some of the dirt off his coat. Well, not his coat. The coat that West had given him. Dogman still couldn’t see why a clever man would do a damn fool thing like that. Not as cold as it was getting now, middle of winter an’ all. “Why the hell would anyone follow that arsehole?” asked Dow, shaking his head.

“They say his father’s the King o’ the Union his self.”

“What does it matter whose son y’are, if you ain’t worth no more than a turd? I wouldn’t piss on him if he was burning, the bastard.” Dogman had to nod. Neither would he.

They were all sat in a circle round where the fire would’ve been, if Threetrees had let them have one. He wouldn’t, of course, for all the Southerners’ pleading. He wouldn’t, no matter how cold it got. Not with Bethod’s scouts about. It would have been good as shouting they were there at the tops of their voices. Dogman and the rest were on one side—Threetrees, Dow and Tul, Grim propped on his elbow like none of this had aught to do with him. The Union were opposite.

Pike and the girl were putting a brave enough face on being cold, tired and hungry. There was something to them told the Dogman they were used to it. West looked like he was near the end of his rope, blowing into his cupped hands like they were about to turn black and fall off. Dogman reckoned he should’ve kept his coat on, rather than give it to the last of the band.

The Prince was sitting in the midst, holding his chin high, trying to look like he wasn’t knackered, covered in dirt, and starting to smell as bad as the rest of ’em. Trying to look like he might be able to give orders that someone might listen to. Dogman reckoned he’d made a mistake there. A crew like his chose leaders because of what they’d done, not whose son they were. They chose leaders with some bones to them, and from that point of view they’d sooner have taken a telling from the girl than from this prick.

“It is high time that we discussed our plans,” he was whining. “Some of us are labouring in the dark.” Dogman could see Threetrees starting to frown already. He didn’t like having to drag this idiot along, let alone pretend he cared a shit for his opinion.

It didn’t help much that not everyone could make sense of everyone else. Of the Union, only West spoke Northern. Of the Northmen, only Dogman and Threetrees spoke Union. Tul might’ve caught the sense of what was being said, more or less.

Dow weren’t even catching that. As for Grim, well, silence means pretty much the same in every tongue.

“What’s he saying now?” growled Dow.

“Something about plans, I reckon,” said Tul back to him.

Dow snorted. “All an arsehole knows about is shit.” Dogman saw West swallowing. He knew what was being said well enough, and he could tell some folk were running short on patience.

The Prince wasn’t near so clever, though. “It would be useful to know how many days you think it will take us to get to Ostenhorm—”

“We’re not going south,” said Threetrees in Northern, before his Highness even finished talking.

West stopped blowing into his hands for a moment. “We’re not?”

“We haven’t been since we set out.”

“Why?”

“Because Bethod’s heading back north.”

“That’s a fact,” said Dogman. “I seen him today.”

“Why would he turn back?” asked West. “With Ostenhorm undefended?”

Dogman sighed. “I didn’t stick around to ask. Me and Bethod ain’t on the best of terms.”

“I’ll tell you why,” sneered Dow. “Bethod ain’t interested in your city. Not yet anyhow.”

“He’s interested in breaking you up into pieces small enough to chew on,” said Tul.

Dogman nodded. “Like that one you was with, that he just finished spitting out the bones of.”

“Excuse me,” snapped the Prince, no idea what was being said, “but it might help if we continued in the common tongue—”

Threetrees ignored him and carried on in Northern. “He’s going to pull your army into little bits. Then he’s going to squash ’em one by one. You think he’s going south, so he hopes your Marshal Burr will send some men south. He’ll catch ’em napping on his way back north, and if they’re few enough he’ll cut ’em to pieces like he did those others.”

“Then,” rumbled Tul, “when all your pretty soldiers are stuck back in the mud or run back across the water…”

“He’ll crack the towns open like nuts in winter, no rush, and his Carls will make free with the contents.” Dow sucked his teeth, staring across at the girl. Staring like a mean dog might stare at a side of bacon. She stared right back, which was much to her credit, the Dogman thought. He doubted he’d have had the bones to do the same in her position.

“Bethod’s going north and we’ll be following.” Threetrees said it in a way that made it clear it weren’t a matter for discussion. “Keep an eye on him, hope to move fast and keep ahead, so that if your friend Burr comes blundering through these woods, we can warn him where Bethod’s at before he stumbles on him like a blind man falling down a fucking well.”

The Prince slapped angry at the ground. “I demand to know what is being said!”

“That Bethod is heading north with his army,” hissed West at him through gritted teeth. “And that they intend to follow him.”

“This is intolerable!” snapped the fool, tugging at his filthy cuffs. “That course of action puts us all in danger! Please inform them that we will be setting out southwards without delay!”

“That’s settled, then.” They all turned to see who spoke, and got quite the shock. Grim, talking Union as smooth and even as the Prince himself. “You’re going south. We’re going north. I need to piss.” And he got up and wandered off into the dark. Dogman stared after him, mouth open. Why did he need to learn someone else’s language when he never spoke more than two words together in his own?

“Very well!” squawked the Prince, shrill and panicky. “I should have expected no better!”

“Your Highness!” hissed West at him. “We need them! We won’t make it to Ostenhorm or anywhere else without their help!”

The girl’s eyes slid sideways. “Do you even know which way south is?” Dogman stifled a chuckle, but the Prince weren’t laughing.