The Blade Itself (53 page)

West found himself moving forward, fast. “What?” he snarled. “What was that?” His expression must have been dire indeed: he saw the colour draining from Vallimir’s face.

“I… I—”

“You think I need Burr to fight my battles, you fucking gutless worm?” Before he knew it he had moved again, and Vallimir stumbled back towards the wall, flinching sideways and raising one arm as if to ward off an expected blow. It was the most West could do to stop his hands from grabbing hold of the little bastard and shaking him until his head came off. His own skull was throbbing, pounding. He felt as though the pressure would pop his eyes right out of his head. He dragged in long, slow breaths through his nose, clenched his fists until they hurt. The anger slowly subsided, back below the point where it threatened to take sudden control of his body. It only pulsed now, squeezing at his chest.

“If you have something to say on the subject of my sister,” he whispered softly, “then you can say it. Say it now.” He let his left hand drop slowly to sit on the hilt of his sword. “And we can settle this outside the city walls.”

Major Vallimir shrank back still further. “I heard nothing,” he whispered, “nothing at all.”

“Nothing at all.” West looked down into his white face for a moment longer, then stepped away. “Now if you would be so good as to reopen the forges for me? We have a great deal of work to get through.”

Vallimir blinked for a moment. “Of course. I will have them lit at once.”

West turned on his heel and stalked off, knowing the man was glowering daggers at his back, knowing that he had made yet another bad situation worse. One more high-born enemy among the many. The really galling thing was that the man was right. Without Burr, he was as good as finished. He had no family apart from that
sister
of his. Damn it, his head hurt. “Why me?” he hissed to himself. “Why?”

There was still a lot to do today, enough for a whole day’s work on its own, but West could take no more. His head hurt so badly that he could hardly see. He had to lie down in the dark, with a wet cloth over his face, if only for an hour, if only for a minute. He fumbled in his pocket for his key, his other hand clamped over his aching eyes, his teeth locked together. Then he heard a sound on the other side of the door. A faint clink of glass. Ardee.

“No,” he hissed to himself. Not now! Why the hell had he ever given her a key? Cursing softly, he raised his fist to knock. Knocking on his own door, that was where he was now. His fist never made it to the wood. A most unpleasant image began to form in the back of his mind. Ardee and Luthar, naked and sweaty, writhing around on his carpet. He turned his key swiftly in the lock and shoved the door open.

She was standing by the window, alone and, he was relieved to see, fully dressed. He was less pleased to see her filling a glass right to the brim from the decanter though. She raised an eyebrow at him as he burst through the door.

“Oh, it’s you.”

“Who the hell else would it be?” snapped West. “These are my rooms, aren’t they?”

“Somebody’s not in the best of moods this morning.” A bit of wine slopped over the rim of her glass and onto the table. She wiped it up with her hand and sucked her fingers, then took a long swig from the glass for good measure. Her every movement niggled at him.

West grimaced and shoved the door shut. “Do you have to drink so much?”

“I understand that a young lady should have a beneficial pastime.” Her words were careless, as usual, but even through his headache West could tell there was something strange going on. She kept glancing towards the desk, then she was moving towards it. He got there first, snatched up a piece of paper from the top, one line written on it.

“What’s this?”

“Nothing! Give it me!”

He held her away with one arm and read it:

The usual place, tomorrow night

—
A.

West’s skin prickled with horror. “Nothing? Nothing?” He shook the letter under his sister’s nose. Ardee turned away from him, flicking her head as you might at a fly, saying nothing, but slurping noisily from her glass. West ground his teeth.

“It’s Luthar, isn’t it?”

“I didn’t say so.”

“You didn’t have to.” The paper crumpled up into a tiny ball in his white-knuckled hand. He half turned towards the door, every muscle tensed and trembling. It was the most he could do to stop himself dashing out and throttling the little bastard right now, but he was just able to make himself think for a moment.

Jezal had let him down, and badly, that ungrateful shit. But it was hardly that shocking—the man was an ass. You keep your wine in a paper bag you shouldn’t be too upset when it leaks. Besides, Jezal wasn’t the one writing the letters. What good would stepping on his neck do? There would always be more empty-headed young men in the world.

“Just where are you going with this, Ardee?”

She sat down on the settle and glared at him frostily over the rim of her glass. “With what, brother?”

“You know with what!”

“Aren’t we family? Can’t we be candid with each other? If you have something to say you can out and say it! Where do you think I’m going?”

“I think you’re going straight to shit, since you ask!” He squeezed his voice back down with the greatest of difficulty. “This business with Luthar has gone way too far. Letters? Letters? I warned him, but it seems he wasn’t the problem! What are you thinking? Are you thinking at all? It has to stop, before people start to talk!” He felt a suffocating tightness in his chest, took a deep breath, but his voice burst out anyway. “They’re damn well talking already! It stops now! Do you hear me?”

“I hear you,” she said carelessly, “but who cares what they think?”

“I care!” He nearly screamed it. “Do you know how hard I have to work? Do you think I’m a fool? You know what you’re about, Ardee!” Her face was turning sullen, but he forged on. “It’s not as though this is the first time! Must I remind you, your luck with men has not exactly been the best!”

“Not with the men in my family, at least!” She was sitting bolt upright now, face tight and pale with anger. “And what would you know about my luck? We’ve hardly talked in ten years!”

“We’re talking now!” shouted West, flinging the crumpled bit of paper across the room. “Have you thought how this might turn out? What if you were to get him? Have you considered that? Would his family be charmed by the blushing bride, do you think? At best they’d never speak to you. At worst they’d cut you both off!” He pointed a shaking finger at the door. “Haven’t you noticed he’s a vain, arrogant swine! They all are! How would he manage, do you think, without his allowance? Without his friends in high places? He wouldn’t know where to begin! How could you be happy with each other?” His head was ready to split in half, but he ranted on. And what happens if, as is far more likely, you can’t get him? What then? You’d be finished, have you thought on that? You’ve come close enough before! And you’re supposed to be the clever one! You’re making a laughing-stock of yourself!” He almost choked on his rage. “Of both of us!”

Ardee gave a gasp. “Now we see it!” she nearly screamed at him. “No one cares a shit for me, but if
your
reputation is in danger—”

“You fucking stupid bitch!” The decanter flew spinning across the room. It crashed against the wall not far from Ardee’s head, sending fragments of glass flying and wine running down the plaster. It made him more furious. “Why don’t you fucking listen?”

He was across the room in an instant. Ardee looked surprised, just for a moment, then there was a sharp click—his fist catching her in the face as she got up. She didn’t fall far. His hands caught her before she hit the ground, yanked her up then flung her back against the wall.

“You’ll be the end of us!” Her head smacked against the plaster—once, twice, three times. One hand grabbed hold of her neck.

Teeth bared. Body crushed her against the wall. A little snort in her throat as the fingers began to squeeze.

“You selfish, useless… fucking… whore!”

Hair was tangled across her face. He could only see a narrow slice of skin, the corner of a mouth, one dark eye.

The eye stared back at him. Painless. Fearless. Empty, flat, like a corpse.

Squeeze. Snort. Squeeze.

Squeeze…

West came to his senses with a sickening jolt. The fingers snapped open, he jerked the hand away. His sister stayed upright against the wall. He could hear her breathing. Short gasps. Or was that him? His head was splitting. The eye was still staring at him.

He must have imagined it. Must have. Any second now he would wake up, the nightmare would be over. A dream. Then she pushed the hair out of her face.

Her skin was candle wax, pasty white. The trickle of blood from her nose looked almost black against it. The pink marks stood out vivid on her neck. The marks the fingers made. His fingers. Real, then.

West’s stomach churned. His mouth opened but no sound came out. He looked at the blood on her lip, and he wanted to be sick. “Ardee…” He was so disgusted he half vomited as he said the word. He could taste the bile at the back of his mouth, but his voice wouldn’t stop gurgling away. “I’m sorry… I’m so sorry… Are you alright?”

“I’ve had worse.” She reached up slowly and touched her lip with a finger-tip. The blood smeared out across her mouth.

“Ardee…” One hand reached out to her, then he jerked it back, afraid of what it might do. “I’m sorry…”

“He was always sorry. Don’t you remember? He’d hold us and cry afterwards. Always sorry. But it never stopped him the next time. Have you forgotten?”

West gagged, choked back vomit again. If she’d wept, and ranted, and beat him with her fists, it would have been easier to bear. Anything but this. He tried never to think about it, but he hadn’t forgotten. “No,” he whispered, “I remember.”

“Did you think he stopped when you left? He got worse. Only then I’d hide on my own. I used to dream that you’d come back, come back and save me. But when you did come back it wasn’t for long, and things weren’t the same between us, and you did nothing.”

“Ardee… I didn’t know—”

“You knew, but you got away. It was easier to do nothing. To pretend. I understand, and do you know, I don’t even blame you. It was some kind of comfort, back then, to know you got away. The day he died was the happiest of my life.”

“He was our father—”

“Oh yes. My bad luck. Bad luck with men. I cried at the grave like a dutiful daughter. Cried and cried until the mourners feared for my reason. Then I lay in bed awake, until everyone was sleeping. I crept out of the house, I went back to the grave, I stood a while looking down… then I fucking pissed on it! I pulled up my shift, and I squatted down, and I pissed on him! And all the while I was thinking—I’ll be nobody’s dog any more!”

She wiped the blood from her nose on the back of her hand. “You should have seen how happy I was when you sent for me! I read the letter over and over. The pathetic little dreams all came alive again. Hope, eh? What a fucking curse! Off to live with my brother. My protector. He’ll look out for me, he’ll help me. Now maybe
I
can have a life! But I find you different than I remembered. All grown up. First you ignore me, then you lecture me, then you hit me, and now you’re sorry. Truly your father’s son!”

He groaned. It was as if she was sticking a needle in him, right in his skull. Less than he deserved. She was right. He had failed her. Long before today. While he had been playing with swords and kissing the arses of people who despised him, she had been suffering. A little effort was all it would have taken, but he could never face it. Every minute he had spent with her he felt the guilt, like a rock in his gut, weighing him down, unbearable.

She stepped away from the wall. “Perhaps I’ll go and pay a call on Jezal. He may be the shallowest idiot in the whole city, but I don’t think he’d ever raise a hand to me, do you?” She pushed him out of the way and made for the door.

“Ardee!” he caught hold of her arm. “Please… Ardee… I’m sorry…”

She stuck her tongue out, curled it into a tube, and blew bloody spit through it. It splattered softly down the front of his uniform. “That’s for your sorry, bastard.”

The door banged shut in his face.

Each Man Worships Himself

Ferro stared at the big pink through narrowed eyes, and he stared back. It had been going on for a good while now, not all the time, but most of it. Staring. They were all ugly, these soft white things, but this one was something special.

Hideous.

She knew that she was scarred, and weathered by sun and wind, worn down by years in the wilderness, but the pale skin on this one’s face looked like a shield hard used in battle—chopped, gouged, torn, dented. It was surprising to see the eyes still alive in a face so battered, but they were, and they were watching her.

She had decided he was dangerous.

Not just big, but strong. Brutal strong. Twice her weight maybe, and his thick neck was all sinew. She could feel the strength coming off him. She wouldn’t have been surprised if he could lift her with one hand, but that didn’t worry her too much. He’d have to get a hold on her first. Big and strong can make a man slow.

Slow and dangerous don’t mix.

Scars didn’t worry her either. They just meant he’d been in a lot of fights, they didn’t say whether he’d won. It was other things. The way he sat—still but not quite relaxed. Ready. Patient. The way his eyes moved—cunning, careful, from her to the rest of the room, then back to her. Dark eyes, watching, thoughtful. Weighing her up. Thick veins on the backs of his hands, but long fingers, clever fingers, lines of dirt under the nails. One finger missing. A white stump. She didn’t like any of it. Smelled like danger.

She wouldn’t want to fight this one unarmed.

But she’d given her knife over to that pink on the bridge. She’d been on the very point of stabbing him, but at the last moment she’d changed her mind. Something in his eyes had reminded her of Aruf, before the Gurkish stuck his head on a spear. Sad and level, as if he understood her. As if she was a person, and not a thing. At the last moment, despite herself, she’d given the blade away. Allowed herself to be led in here.

Stupid!

She regretted it now, bitterly, but she’d fight any way she could, if she had to. Most people never realise how full the world is of weapons. Things to throw, or throw enemies on to. Things to break, or use as clubs. Wound-up cloths to strangle with. Dirt to fling in faces. Failing that, she’d bite his throat out. She curled her lips back and showed him her teeth to prove it, but he seemed not to notice. Just sat there, watching. Silent, still, ugly, and dangerous.

“Fucking pinks,” she hissed to herself.

The thin one, by contrast, hardly seemed dangerous at all. Ill-looking, with long hair like a woman’s. Awkward and twitchy, licking his lips. He would sneak the odd glance at her, but look away as soon as she scowled over at him, swallowing, the knobbly lump in his neck squirming up and down. He seemed scared, no threat, but Ferro kept him in the corner of her eye while she watched the big one. Best not to dismiss him entirely.

Life had taught her to expect surprises.

That just left the old man. She didn’t trust a one of these pinks, but she trusted this bald one least of all. Many deep lines on his face, round his eyes, round his nose. Cruel lines. Hard, heavy bones in his cheeks. Big thick hands, white hairs on the backs of them. If she had to kill these three, for all the danger that the big one seemed to offer, she decided she would kill this bald one first. He had the look of a slaver in his eye, staring at her up and down, all over. A cold look, judging what she might be worth.

Bastard.

Bayaz, Yulwei called him, and the two old men seemed to know each other well. “So, brother,” the bald pink was saying in the Kantic tongue, though it was plain enough they weren’t related, “how is it in the great Empire of Gurkhul?”

Yulwei sighed. “Only a year since he seized the crown, and Uthman has broken the last of the rebels, and brought the governors firmly to heel. Already, the young Emperor is more feared than ever his father was. Uthman-ul-Dosht, his soldiers call him, and proudly. Almost all of Kanta is in his grip. He reigns supreme all round the Southern Sea.”

“Aside from Dagoska.”

“True, but his eyes are bent on it. His armies swarm toward the peninsula, and his agents are ever busy behind Dagoska’s great walls. Now that there is war in the North, it cannot be long before he feels the time is ripe to lay siege to the city, and when he does, I do not think it can stand long against him.”

“Are you sure? The Union still controls the seas.”

Yulwei frowned. “We saw ships, brother. Many great ships. The Gurkish have built a fleet. A powerful one, in secret. They must have begun years ago, during the last war. I fear the Union will control the seas but little longer.”

“A fleet? I had hoped to have a few more years in which to prepare.” The bald pink sounded grim. “My plans only become the more urgent.”

She was bored with their talk. She was used to being always on the move, keeping always one stride ahead, and she hated to stand still. Stay too long in one place, and the Gurkish would find you. She wasn’t interested in being an exhibit for these curious pinks to stare at. She sauntered off around the room while the two old men made endless words, scowling and sucking her teeth. She swung her arms around. She kicked at the worn boards of the floor. She poked at the cloths on the walls, and peered behind them, ran her fingers along the edges of the furniture, clicked her tongue and snapped her teeth together.

Making everyone nervous.

She passed by the big ugly pink in the chair, almost close enough for her swinging hand to touch his pitted skin. Just to show him that she didn’t care a shit for his size, or his scars, or anything else. Then she strutted over to the nervous one. The skinny pink with the long hair. He swallowed as she came close.

“Sssss,” she hissed at him. He muttered something and shuffled away, and she stepped up to the open window in his place. Looking out, turning her back on the room.

Just to show the pinks she didn’t care a shit for any of them.

There were gardens outside the window. Trees, plants, wide sweeps of lawn neatly arranged. Groups of fat, pale men and women lazed around in the sun on the carefully cut grass, stuffing their sweaty faces with food. Swilling down drink. She scowled down at them. Fat, ugly, lazy pinks, with no God but eating and idleness.

“Gardens,” she sneered.

There had been gardens in Uthman’s palace. She used to look at them from the tiny window of her room. Her cell. Long before he became Uthman-ul-Dosht. When he had only been the Emperor’s youngest son. When she had been one among his many slaves. His prisoner. Ferro leaned forward and spat out of the window.

She hated gardens.

She hated cities altogether. Places of slavery, fear, degradation. Their walls were the walls of a prison. The sooner she was gone from this accursed place the happier she would be. Or the less unhappy, at least. She turned away from the window, and scowled again. They were all staring at her.

The one called Bayaz was the first to speak. “It certainly is quite a striking thing you’ve discovered, brother. You wouldn’t miss her in a crowd, eh? Are you sure she’s what I’m looking for?”

Yulwei looked at her for a minute. “As sure as I can be.”

“I’m standing right here,” she growled at them, but the bald pink went on talking as though she couldn’t hear.

“Does she feel pain?”

“But little. She fought an Eater on the road.”

“Really?” Bayaz chuckled softly to himself. “How badly did it hurt her?”

“Badly, but in two days she was walking, in a week she was healed. She shows not a scratch from it. That is not normal.”

“We have both seen many things that are not normal in our times. We must be sure.” The bald man reached into a pocket. Ferro watched suspiciously as he pulled out his fist, placed it on the table. When he took it away two smooth, polished stones lay on the wood.

The bald man leaned forward. “Tell me, Ferro, which is the blue stone?”

She stared at him, hard, then down at the stones. There was no difference between them. They were all watching her, closer than ever now, and she ground her teeth.

“That one.” She pointed to the one on the left.

Bayaz smiled. “Exactly the answer I was hoping for.” Ferro shrugged her shoulders. Lucky, she thought, to guess the right one. Then she noticed the look on the big pink’s face. He was frowning at the two stones, as though he didn’t understand.

“They both are red,” said Bayaz. “You see no colours at all, eh, Ferro?”

So the bald pink had played a trick on her. She wasn’t sure how he could have known, but she was sure she didn’t like it. No one plays tricks on Ferro Maljinn. She started to laugh. A rough, ugly, unpractised gurgling.

Then she sprang across the table.

The look of surprise was just forming on the old pink’s face as her fist crunched into his nose. He gave a grunt, chair tipping backwards, sprawling out onto the floor. She scrambled across the table to get at him, but Yulwei grabbed hold of her leg and dragged her back. Her clawing hands missed the bald bastard’s neck and hauled the table over on its side instead, the two stones skittering away across the boards.

She shook her leg free and went for the old pink as he staggered up from the floor, but Yulwei caught her arm and pulled her back again, all the while yelling, “Peace!” He got her elbow in his face for his trouble, and sagged back against the wall with her on top of him. She was first up, ready to go at the bald bastard again.

By now the big one was on his feet though, and moving forward, still watching her. Ferro smiled at him, fists clenched at her sides. Now she would see how dangerous he really was.

He took another step.

Then Bayaz put an arm out to stop him. He had his other hand clasped to his nose, trying to staunch the flow of blood. He started to chuckle.

“Very good!” He coughed. “Very fierce, and damn quick too. Without a doubt, you’re what we’re after! I hope you will accept my apologies, Ferro.”

“What?”

“For my awful manners.” He wiped blood from his upper lip. “I deserved no less, but I had to be sure. I am sorry. Am I forgiven?” He looked somehow different now, though nothing had changed. Friendly, considerate, honest. Sorry. But it took more than that to win her trust. A lot more.

“We’ll see,” she hissed.

“That’s all I ask. That, and that you give Yulwei and I a moment to discuss some… matters. Matters best discussed in private.”

“It’s alright, Ferro,” said Yulwei, “they are friends.” She was damn sure they weren’t her friends, but she allowed him to shepherd her out of the door behind the two pinks. “Just try not to kill any of them.”

This room was much like the other. They had to be rich, these pinks, for all they didn’t look it. Great big fireplace, made of dark veined stone. Cushions, and soft cloth round the window, covered in flowers and birds in tiny stitches. There was a painting of a stern man with a crown on his head, frowning down at Ferro from the wall. She frowned back at him. Luxury.

Ferro hated luxury even more than she hated gardens.

Luxury meant captivity more surely than the bars of a cage. Soft furniture spelled danger more surely than weapons. Hard ground and cold water was all she needed. Soft things make you soft, and she wanted no part of that.

There was another man waiting in there, walking round and round with his hands behind his back, as though he didn’t like to stand still too long. Not quite a pink, his leathery skin was somewhere between hers and theirs in tone. Head shaved, like a priest. Ferro didn’t like that.

She hated priests most of all.

His eyes lit up when he saw her though, for all her sneering at him, and he hurried over. A strange little man in travel-worn clothes, the top of his head came up no higher than Ferro’s mouth. “I am Brother Longfoot,” flapping his hands around all over the place, “of the great order of Navigators.”

“Lucky for you.” Ferro turned her shoulder towards him, straining her ears to hear what the two old men were saying beyond the door, but Longfoot was not deterred.

“It is lucky! Yes, yes, it most certainly is! God has truly blessed me! I declare that never, in all of history, has a man been so well suited to his profession, or a profession to a man, as I, Brother Longfoot, am suited to the noble science of Navigation! From the snow-covered mountains of the far North, to the sun-drenched sands of the utmost South, the whole world is my home, truly!”

He smiled at her with a look of sickening self-satisfaction. Ferro ignored him. The two pinks, the big one and the scrawny one, were talking to each other on the far side of the room. They spoke in some language she didn’t understand. Sounded like pigs grunting. Talking about her maybe, but she didn’t care. They went out another door, leaving her alone with the priest, still flapping his lips.

“There are few nations within the Circle of the World to which I, Brother Longfoot, am a stranger, and yet I am at a loss as to your origins.” He waited expectantly, but Ferro said nothing. “You would like me to guess, then? Indeed, it is a riddle. Let me see… your eyes have the shape of the people of distant Suljuk, where the black mountains rise sheer from the sparkling sea, indeed they do, and yet your skin is—”

“Stop your mouth, cunt.”