Best Served Cold

by Джо Аберкромби

  Friendly jerked away from a clumsy axe-swing that hit the wall and sent chips of marble spinning, found he was backing up the steps. They were both tiring now, slowing. A man can only fight, sweat, bleed for so long. Shivers came after him, breathing hard, shield up in front.

  Backing up steps is a bad enough idea when they’re not scattered with bodies. Friendly was so busy watching Shivers he put his boot down on a corpse’s hand, twisted his ankle. Shivers saw it, jabbed with his axe. Friendly couldn’t get his leg out of the way in time and the blade tore a gash out of his calf, half-dragged him over. Shivers growled as he lifted his axe high. Friendly lurched forwards, slashed Shivers’ forearm with his knife, left a red-black wound, blood running. The Northman grunted, fumbled his axe, the heavy weapon clattering down beside them. Friendly chopped at his skull with the cleaver but Shivers got his shield arm in the way, the two of them getting tangled, the blade only slitting Shivers’ scalp, blood bubbling from the wound, pattering over them both. The Northman grabbed Friendly’s shoulder with his bloody hand, dragging him close, good eye bulging with crazy rage, steel eye spattered shining red, lips twisted in a mad snarl as he tipped his head backwards.

  Friendly drove his knife into Shivers’ thigh, felt the metal slide in to the hilt. Shivers gave a kind of squeal, pain and fury together. His forehead smashed into Friendly’s mouth with a sick crunch. The hall reeled around, the steps hit Friendly in the back, his skull cracked against marble. He saw Shivers loom over him, thought it would be a good idea to bring the cleaver up. Before he could do it, Shivers rammed his shield down, metal rim clanging against stone. Friendly felt the two bones in his forearm break, cleaver dropping from his numb fingers and clattering down the steps.

  Shivers reached down, specks of pink spit flicking from his clenched teeth with each moaning breath, fist closing around the grip of his axe. Friendly watched him do it, feeling no more than a mild curiosity. Everything was bright and blurry, now. He saw the scar on the Northman’s thick wrist, in the shape of a number seven. Seven was a good number, today, just as it had been the first day they met. Just as it always was.

  “Excuse me.” Shivers froze for a moment, his one eye sliding sideways. He reeled around, axe coming after. A man stood behind him, a lean man with pale hair. It was hard to see what happened. The axe missed, Shivers’ shield shattered in a tangle of flying wood, he was snatched off his feet and sent tumbling across the chamber. He crashed into the far wall with a gurgle, bounced off and rolled slowly down the opposite set of steps, flopping over once, twice, three times, and lying still at the bottom.

  “Three times,” gurgled Friendly through his split lips.

  “Stay,” said the pale man, stepping around him and off up the stairway. It was not so difficult to obey. Friendly had no other plans. He spat a lump of tooth out of his numb mouth, and that was all. He lay there, blinking slowly, staring up at the winged women on the ceiling.

  Seven of them, with seven swords.

  * * *

  A rapid spectrum of emotions had swept over Morveer during the past few moments. Triumphant delight, as he had seen Cosca drink from his flask and all unknowing doom himself. Horror and a pointless search for a hiding place as the old mercenary declared his intention to visit the latrine. Curiosity, as he then saw Victus produce a loaded flatbow from beneath the table and train it on his general’s back. Triumph once again as he watched Victus consume his own fatal measure of spirit. Finally he was forced to clamp one hand over his mouth to smother his amusement as the poisoned Cosca flung himself clumsily at his poisoned opponent and the two men wrestled, fell to the floor and lay still in a final embrace.

  The ironies positively piled one upon the next. Most earnestly they had attempted to kill each other, never realising that Morveer had already done both their jobs for them.

  With the smile still on his face he slid his mounted needle from its hidden pocket within the lining of his mercenary’s jerkin. Caution first, always. In case any trace of life remained in either of the two murderous old mercenaries, the lightest prick with this shining splinter of metal, coated with his own Preparation Number Twelve, would extinguish it for good and to the general benefit of the world. Morveer carefully eased the latrine door open with the gentlest of creaks, and on pointed toes crept out into the room beyond.

  The table was tipped over on its side, coins and cards widely scattered. Cosca lay on his back beside it, left hand hanging nerveless, his flask not far away. Victus was draped on top of him, small flatbow still gripped in one fist, the clasp at its end spotted with red blood. Morveer knelt beside the deceased, hooked his free hand under Victus’ corpse and with a grunting effort rolled it off.

  Cosca’s eyes were closed, his mouth open, blood streaked his cheek from a wound on his forehead. His skin was waxy pale with the unmistakable sheen of death.

  “A man can change, eh?” sneered Morveer. “So much for your promises!”

  To his tremendous shock, Cosca’s eyes snapped suddenly open.

  To his even more tremendous shock, an indescribably awful pain lanced up through his stomach. He took in a great shuddering breath and gave vent to an unearthly howl. Looking down, he perceived that the old mercenary had driven a knife into his groin. Morveer’s breath whooped in again. Desperately he raised his arm.

  There was a faint slapping sound as Cosca seized his wrist and wrenched it sharply sideways, causing the needle to sink into Morveer’s neck. There was a pregnant pause. They remained frozen, a human sculpture, the knife still in Morveer’s groin, the needle in his neck, gripped by his hand, gripped by Cosca’s hand. Cosca frowned up. Morveer stared down. His eyes bulged. His body trembled. He said nothing. What could one possibly say? The implications were crushingly obvious. Already the most potent poison of which he was aware, carried swiftly from neck to brain, was causing his extremities to become numb.

  “Poisoned the grape spirit, eh?” hissed Cosca.

  “Fuh,” gurgled Morveer, unable now to form words.

  “Did you forget I promised you never to drink again?” The old mercenary released the knife, reached across the floor with his bloody hand, retrieved his flask, spun the cap off with a practised motion and tipped it up. White liquid splashed out across the floor. “Goat’s milk. I hear it’s good for the digestion. The strongest thing I’ve had since we left Sipani, but it would hardly do to let everyone know it. I have a certain reputation to uphold here. Hence all the bottles.”

  Cosca shoved Morveer over. The strength was rapidly fading from his limbs and he was powerless to resist. He flopped limp across Victus’ corpse. He could scarcely feel his neck. The agony in his groin had faded to a dull throb. Cosca looked down at him.

  “Didn’t I promise you I’d stop? What kind of a man do you take me for, that I’d break my word?”

  Morveer had no breath left to speak, let alone scream. The pain was fading in any case. He wondered, as he often had, how his life might have differed had he not poisoned his mother, and doomed himself to life in the orphanage. His vision was clouding, blurring, growing dark.

  “I need to thank you. You see, Morveer, a man can change, given the proper encouragement. And your scorn was the very spur I needed.”

  Killed by his own agent. It was the way so many great practitioners of his profession ended their lives. And on the eve of his retirement, too. He was sure there was an irony there somewhere…

  “Do you know the best thing about all this?” Cosca’s voice boomed in his ears, Cosca’s grin swam above him. “Now I can start drinking again.”

  * * *

  One of the mercenaries was pleading, blubbering, begging for his life. Monza sat against the cold marble slab of the tabletop and listened to him, breathing hard, sweating hard, weighing the Calvez in her hand. It would be little better than useless against the heavy armour of Orso’s guards, even if she’d fancied taking on that many at once. She heard the damp squelch of a blade rammed into flesh and the pleading was cut off in a long screa
m and a short gurgle.

  Not really a sound to give anyone confidence.

  She peered round the edge of the table. She counted seven guards still standing, one ripping his spear free of a dead mercenary’s chest, two turning towards her, heavy swords ready, one working an axe from Secco’s split skull. Three were kneeling, busily cranking flatbows. Behind them stood the big round table on which the map of Styria was still unrolled. On the map was a crown, a ring of sparkling gold sprouting with gem-encrusted oak leaves, not unlike the one that had killed Rogont and his dream of Styria united. Beside the crown, dressed in black and with his iron-shot black hair and beard as neatly groomed as ever, stood Grand Duke Orso.

  He saw her, and she saw him, and the anger boiled up, hot and comforting. One of his guards slipped a bolt into his flatbow and levelled it at her. She was about to duck behind the slab of marble when Orso held out one arm.

  “Wait! Stop.” That same voice that she had never disobeyed in eight hard years. “Is that you, Monzcarro?”

  “Damn right it is!” she snarled back. “Get ready to fucking die!” Though it looked as if she might be going first.

  “I’ve been ready for some time,” he called out softly. “You’ve seen to that. Well done! My hopes are all in ruins, thanks to you.”

  “You needn’t thank me!” she called. “It was Benna I did it for!”

  “Ario is dead.”

  “Hah!” she barked back. “That’s what happens when I stab a worthless cunt in the neck and throw him from a window!” A flurry of twitches crawled up Orso’s cheek. “But why pick him out? There was Gobba, and Mauthis, and Ganmark, and Faithful-I’ve slaughtered the whole crowd! Everyone who was in this room when you murdered my brother!”

  “And Foscar? I’ve heard no word since the defeat at the fords.”

  “You can stop listening!” Said with a glee she hardly felt. “Skull smashed to pulp on a farmhouse floor!”

  The anger had all gone from Orso’s face and it hung terribly slack. “You must be happy.”

  “I’m not fucking sad, I’ll tell you that!”

  “Grand Duchess Monzcarro of Talins.” Orso tapped two fingers slowly against his palm, the sharp snaps echoing off the high ceiling. “I congratulate you on your victory. You have what you wanted after all!”

  “What I wanted?” For a moment she could hardly believe what she was hearing. “You think I wanted this? After the battles I fought for you? The victories I won for you?” She was near shrieking, spitting with fury. She ripped her glove off with her teeth and shook her mutilated hand at him. “I fucking wanted this? What reason did we give you to betray us? We were loyal to you! Always!”

  “Loyal?” Orso gave a disbelieving gasp of his own. “Crow your victory if you must, but don’t crow your innocence to me! We both know better!”

  All three flatbows were loaded and levelled now. “We were loyal!” she screamed again, voice cracking.

  “Can you deny it? That Benna met with malcontents, revolutionaries, traitors among my ungrateful subjects? That he promised them weapons? That he promised you would lead them to glory? Claim my place? Usurp me! Did you think I would not learn of it? Did you think I would stand idly by?”

  “What the… you fucking liar!”

  “Still you deny it? I would not believe it myself when they told me! My Monza? Closer to me than my own children? My Monza, betray me? With my own eyes I saw him! With my own eyes!” The echoes of his voice slowly faded, and left the hall almost silent. Only the gentle clanking of the four armoured men as they edged ever so slowly towards her. She could only stare, the realisation creeping slowly through her.

  We could have our own city, Benna had said. You could be the Duchess Monzcarro of… wherever. Of Talins, had been his thought. We deserve to be remembered. He’d planned it himself, alone, and given her no choice. Just as he had when he betrayed Cosca. It’s better this way. Just as he had when he took Hermon’s gold. This is for us.

  He’d always been the one with the big plans.

  “Benna,” she mouthed. “You fool.”

  “You didn’t know,” said Orso quietly. “You didn’t know, and now we are come to this. Your brother doomed himself, and both of us, and half of Styria besides.” A sad little chuckle bubbled out of him. “Just when I think I know it all, life always finds a way to surprise me. You’re late, Shenkt.” His eyes flicked to the side. “Kill her.”

  Monza felt a shadow fall across her, lurched around. A man had stolen up while they spoke, his soft work boots making not the slightest sound. Now he stood over her, close enough to touch. He held out his hand. There was a ring in his palm. Benna’s ruby ring.

  “I believe this is yours,” he said.

  A pale, lean face. Not old, but deeply lined, with harsh cheekbones and eyes hungry bright in bruised sockets. Monza’s eyes went wide, the chill shock of recognition washing over her like ice water.

  “Kill her!” shouted Orso.

  The newcomer smiled, but it was like a skull’s smile, never touching his eyes. “Kill her? After all the effort I went to keeping her alive?”

  * * *

  The colour had drained from her face. Indeed she looked almost as pale as she had done when he first found her, broken amongst the rubbish on the slopes of Fontezarmo. Or when she’d first woken after he pulled the stitches, and stared down in horror at her own scarred body.

  “Kill her?” he asked again. “After I carried her from the mountain? After I mended her bones and stitched her back together? After I protected her from your hirelings in Puranti?”

  Shenkt turned his hand over and let the ring fall, and it bounced once and tinkled down spinning on the floor beside her twisted right hand. She did not thank him, but he had not expected thanks. It was not for her thanks that he had done it.

  “Kill them both!” screamed Orso.

  Shenkt was always surprised by how treacherous men could be over trifles, yet how loyal they could be when their lives were forfeit. These last few guards still fought to the death for Orso, even though his day was clearly done. Perhaps they could not comprehend that a man so great as the Grand Duke of Talins might die like any other, and all his power so easily turn to dust. Perhaps for some men obedience became a habit they could not question. Or perhaps they came to define themselves by their service to a master, and chose to take the short step into death as part of something great, rather than walk the long, hard road of life in insignificance.

  If so, then Shenkt would not deny them. Slowly, slowly, he breathed in.

  The drawn-out twang of the flatbow string throbbed deep in his ears. He stepped out of the path of the first bolt, let it drift under his raised arm. The aim of the next was good, right for Murcatto’s throat. He plucked it from the air between finger and thumb as it crawled past, set it carefully down on a polished table as he crossed the room. He took up an idealised bust of one of Orso’s forebears from beside it-his grandfather, Shenkt suspected, the one who had himself been a mercenary. He flung it at the nearest flatbowman, just in the process of lowering his bow, puzzled. It caught him in the stomach, sank deep into his armour, folded him in half in a cloud of stone chips and tore him off his feet towards the far wall, legs and arms stretched out in front of him, his bow spinning high into the air.

  Shenkt hit the nearest man on the helmet and stove it deep into his shoulders, blood spraying from the crumpled visor, axe dropping slowly from his twisting hand. The next had an open helm, the look of surprise just forming as Shenkt’s fist drove a dent into his breastplate so deep that it bent his backplate out with a groan of twisted metal. He sprang to the table, marble floor splitting under his boots as he came down. The nearest of the two remaining archers slowly raised his flatbow as though to use it as a shield. Shenkt’s hand split it in half, string flailing, tore the man’s helmet off and sent it hurtling up into the ceiling, his body tumbling sideways, spraying blood, to crumple against the wall in a shower of plaster. Shenkt seized hold of the other archer and
tossed him out of one of the high windows, sparkling fragments tumbling down, bouncing, spinning, breaking apart, deep clangour of shattering glass making the air hum.

  The last but one had his sword raised, flecks of spit floating from his twisted lips as he gave his war cry. Shenkt caught him by the wrist, hurled him upside-down across the room and into his final comrade. They were mangled together, a tangle of dented armour, crashed into a set of shelves, gilded books ripped open, loose papers spewing into the air, gently fluttering down as Shenkt breathed out, and let time find its course again.

  The spinning flatbow fell, bounced from the tiles and clattered away into a corner. Grand Duke Orso stood just where he had before, beside the round table with its map of Styria, the sparkling crown sitting in its centre. His mouth fell open.

  “I never leave a job half-done,” said Shenkt. “But I was never working for you.”

  * * *

  Monza got to her feet, staring at the bodies tangled, scattered, twisted about the far end of the hall. Papers fluttered down like autumn leaves, from a bookcase shattered around a mass of bloody armour, cracks lancing out through the marble walls all about it.

  She stepped around the upended table. Past the bodies of mercenaries and guards. Over Secco’s corpse, his smeared brains gleaming in one of the long stripes of sunlight from the high windows.

  Orso watched her come in silence, the great painting of him proudly claiming victory at the Battle of Etrea looming ten strides high over his shoulder. The little man and his outsized myth.

  The bone-thief stood back, hands spattered with blood to the elbow, watching them. She didn’t know what he had done, or how, or why. It didn’t matter now.