The Cold Commands alffh-2

by Richard Morgan

  So. The urge to shiver made it easier to fake the Yhelteth accent, kept his jaw tight and guttural on the Naomic syllables. Fifty outlaws, hiding in the forest. Sounds pretty vague to me. That all they ve got?

  Eye-patch shook his head excitedly, flung thin, hanging threads of greasy hair about his pallid features. Behind the vertical scar that sat above and below the patch as if skewering it, he was younger than Ringil had noticed at first.

  No, man, that s not all. They re saying these guys had, like, this sorcerer for a leader, some magicked-up fuck down from Trelayne, carrying a Black Folk blade. They say he s already wanted up north for treason, already got a twenty-five-thousand-florin price on his head.

  Twenty-five thousand Ringil let his voice die off in carefully textured disbelief. That does not seem likely.

  I m serious, man. They took some prisoners, got them up at the Keep and they re putting them to the question. Some of the slaves, too. That s the word coming down. Fucking sorcerer, man. The young bounty hunter nodded in at the clerks. Go ask for yourself, you don t believe me.

  Ringil tipped him a skeptical look, then shrugged and stepped past, over the threshold of the opened doors and into the lamplit confines of the office.

  The clerk looked up as he came in. Yes?

  Man outside says you re hunting a sorcerer.

  That s unconfirmed. The clerk put his quill aside and knuckled tiredly at one eye. We had a raid on a caravan coming down the Trelayne road last night, attackers still at large. Probably a lot of them. We re waiting on names.

  How much you paying for heads?

  Fifty per. Hundred if you bring them in alive. Maybe get you more later if the caravan owners put up a reward.

  Alive? Ringil pulled a face. In Tlanmar, they pay me seventy per, dead or alive. That s Empire elementals, too, comes out at a hundred and twenty florins worth, near enough.

  The clerk shrugged. So go back to working for Tlanmar. Here, you ll get fifty florins per head, a hundred per captured prisoner. You want on the list or not?

  Ringil made a show of grumpy indecision, caught the bounty hunters in the corner of the room nudging one another and grinning at the display. He judged the performance a success, cleared his throat, and made an ungracious gesture.

  Well, then. I will go on your list, yes. Laraninthal of Shenshenath. Captain, retired, Sixty-second Imperial Levy. Put me down.

  Some fucking retirement, said one of the bounty hunters quietly.

  Eh, pal?

  Low, noncommittal laughter among the others. Ringil turned to face the speaker. Saw a League military-issue cloak and tunic that had both seen better days, a sword sheathed in leather at the man s belt and another slung naked across his back. The man s features and close-shaven skull were scarred in a couple of places with blade damage, and part of one ear was chopped away. But there was no challenge in his face, and the comment seemed to have been meant without harm.

  I served a cause, Ringil said stiffly, sticking to the role. I served my Emperor and defended my people. That was payment enough for me.

  The shaven-headed man nodded. Yeah. And now you re hunting bandits in a foreign land for fifty florins a pop.

  There s no brawling in here, the clerk warned. Start anything and your name comes off the list. That goes for you too, Klithren.

  The bounty hunter waved it off. No one s brawling, inkspurt. Just working men here, trading air and waiting on the names so we can get to work. Right, Shenshenath?

  Ringil nodded curtly, turned back to the desk. About this sorcerer. Outside they re saying he s worth twenty-five thousand florins up in Trelayne.

  I already told you, said the clerk, writing laboriously, not looking up. That s not confirmed. All we know for the moment is that the leader of the attack was a northerner and he may have used a Kiriath blade.

  Got a description?

  Yeah. Tall, scary, and a scarred face.

  More dry chuckling among the bounty hunters. It was a sketch that would have fit at least three of the men in the room, and probably half of those who stood outside as well. It was a caricature for a campfire tale.

  Well, so are you these days, Gil. So are you.

  The clerk scratched to a halt on the ledger page and reached to dip his quill. He glanced up at Ringil, as if surprised to see him still standing there.

  That s it, we re done. You re on the list. Come back at first light or take a seat and wait, your choice.

  Do you expect names before dawn?

  The Keep does a pretty good line in questioning, Ringil s shaven-headed new friend offered. I doubt any of the road scum they took are going to stand up for long. Some ll be injured, some just cowards. They ll break right down.

  No doubt.

  Ringil had seen prisoners put to the question before, and some of them most assuredly not cowards. In the end, it made no difference. Everybody broke.

  Yeah. Broke and said just exactly whatever the fuck they thought their torturers wanted to hear. I did it, yes, I m guilty, oh yes. With poison, yes, that s right. With a blade, yes, just as you say, a blade I threw in the sea. With black magic I did it, yes, yes, you re right, magic and the help of miniature fucking pixies.

  He had the measure of the men he d hired and then abandoned, Gil, let s not forget that bit and he knew most would give up everything they knew at the first searing application of heated iron to their flesh. Fortunate, then, that they knew so little. Scarcity of detail would anger the interrogators, who in a case like this would be under a lot of pressure to deliver results, and the awful logic of that situation would roll right along, would push them way past the norms to make sure there really was no more to be gleaned. So their captives would have to go on suffering despite their initial confessions, would go on screaming out whatever names or facts still floated intact in the stew of their terror and pain along with any of a hundred crazed embellishments based on the hit-and-miss exhortations of their tormentors. Truth or lie, sane or not, the captives would offer up anything, any shrieking, sobbing, shuddering stream of contradictory gibberish they believed might take away the agony, might just please stop this dungeon-dim nightmare of crushed and split and fire-scorched flesh.

  So yeah they d say it was a northern sorcerer with a magical blade and scars on his face; they d say it was an imperial renegade in full Kiriath mail at the head of a squad of border skirmishers; they d say it was fucking steppe nomads if you halfway suggested it to them. Any grains of truth in it all would be stamped and mangled beyond useful recognition.

  Rumors and lies and campfire smoke, he summarized later for Eril, over spiced wine and cleared platters in the tavern.

  Right now, that s all they ve got.

  The Marsh Brotherhood enforcer nodded. Think it ll stay that way?

  For a while, yeah. They think they ve got a couple of dozen demoralized bad guys hiding out in the forest somewhere. Lot of tough, impatient bounty hunters are going to think that s too good a chance to miss. Come morning, they ll be riding out to see if they can t get an early piece of the action.

  Eril snapped a long shard of bone out of the fowl carcass on the table between them, lounged back, and commenced picking his teeth. Watching, Ringil surprised himself with a sudden, forceful recollection of Egar doing much the same thing, and equally surprising, equally abrupt he felt his eyes moisten. the fuck? He hadn t thought about the Dragonbane in months.

  He blinked down the moisture in his eyes. This fucking flu.

  Eril took the bone shard out of his mouth, pointed pensively at his companion with it. And if they send to Trelayne? Confirm the price on your head and get sketches posted around town?

  Ringil shook his head, tried wearily to keep his thoughts together. Going to take a while, even if they do. Use a bonded courier there and back, it s still the best part of a week. A lot more if they let it run through normal channels. Meantime, they ve got a few other, more pressing concerns.

  His companion frowned. Such as?

  Such as trying to
keep the murder of an imperial legate quiet. Right now, I guarantee you, they re shitting milk and sugared biscuits up at the Keep. They need all the time and quiet they can buy just to work out how they handle the Tlanmar garrison commander when he finally comes calling. This is a frontier town. They ve got a lot to lose if that boils down badly.

  No one mentioned the legate down there in the square, huh?

  No one. Like it never happened.

  Eril grunted. He was a career criminal; he understood the dynamic. Ringil poured them both more wine.

  Yeah, like that. And there s something else. He set down the flagon, picked up his goblet, and studied its contents without much enthusiasm. Hinerion, as Shend had been fond of whinging, wasn t exactly famed for its viticulture. These guys have got the best part of a thousand captured slaves milling around now with no apparent owner. That s a lot of quick cash for the city if they can parcel it out before anyone gets down here from Trelayne to claim ownership.

  Oho.

  Yeah. My best guess? Sometime in the next couple of days, you re going to see an open auction for city coffers. And I doubt very much they ll be sending any bonded couriers to Trelayne until that s done.

  Gives us some time, huh?

  Yeah. Ringil sipped his wine. Grimaced and put it down again. Gives us some time. So you see anything good in the harbor?

  The Marsh Brotherhood enforcer gestured with his bone shard at the cheap glass panes of the window they sat beside. The snug was on the ground floor of the inn, and it was full dark outside by now; but even through the grubby, distorted glass and the lanternlit gloom beyond, you could make out gathered thickets of mast-tops over the roofs of the intervening houses.

  There s a caravel flying marsh daisy pennants tied up at the south dock. Couldn t make out the name from here, even with the spyglass, but she doesn t look familiar. A shrug. No reason she should. Half the merchantmen out of Trelayne fly those pennants now, just to scare off pirates.

  But they ve got to be paying dues, right?

  Dues, yeah. Eril pulled a sour face. But that doesn t have to mean much of anything anymore. When I was coming up in the city, you knew the name and rig of every keel flying the daisy, and you knew the crew on those ships would be solid Brotherhood to a man. These days Another shrug. He stabbed at the fowl carcass with his bone shard, left it sticking there. These days, it s like every other fucking thing. Comes down to haggling.

  Ringil tried to muster some enthusiasm. Eating seemed to have pushed back his fever a little, and the marsh daisy vessel had the gossamer feel of luck come calling. Dark Lady Firfirdar, seated on her iron throne, blowing the ghost seed off her fingers and into their path, so it danced and lit their way.

  Well, look, he said reasonably, holding off a deep, rolling urge to shiver. At a minimum she s out of Trelayne, and going back there at some point. Now with that, and maybe some haggling like you say, or just a judicious bit of leaning on the captain I d say we re nearly home dry.

  Eril nodded. Lean on him s right. I ll fucking

  Quick rapping at the snug door. Both men stiffened and swung to face the sound. Eril s hand slipped under his coat without fuss. Ringil loosened his sleeve where the dragon-tooth dagger was stowed.

  Yes?

  The door opened a crack. The boy who d served them earlier stuck his head and one scrawny shoulder around the jamb.

  My lord Laraninthal? Stumbling over the Tethanne syllables, nervousness taut in the hurried tones. His face was pale and sweaty in the lamplight. A cool combat tension soaked into Ringil s limbs, settled there.

  Yes?

  Uh, somebody here to see you, sir. It s uh The boy swallowed, licked his lips. They re soldiers, my lord.

  CHAPTER 14

  He found the pawnshop easily enough there were several on that stretch of the An-Monal road, but only a couple offered rooms above. Counting the time spent to climb one of the staircases in the dizzying Kiriath architecture and then walk the Black Folk Span across, the whole search took him not much more than an hour.

  The pawnbroker, a wiry old man with a patched eye, bought the line about family the same way the Lizard s Head publican had. He waved Egar through musty gloom and out again to the shop s backyard. Rickety outside stairs went up the wall above them to a row of doors under the eaves.

  Second room, he said wheezily. Tell him I ll need him tonight.

  Egar went up the stairs. Laid knuckles on sun-bleached wood a couple of times.

  Fuck do you want? someone bellowed, in bad Tethanne.

  Sounds like a hangover in there. Egar grinned and called back through the door in Majak.

  Is that any way to talk to a brother?

  Sudden quiet. He thought he heard the creak of someone moving off a cot. Sensed the weapon lifted stealthily from its resting place against the wall.

  Harath? Let s not get off on the wrong foot here, son.

  The voice behind the door came back, matching Egar s change of tongue.

  What do you want, brother?

  Youthful sneer and an Ishlinak twang on it, blunted somewhat by time away from the steppes. And the thick, unmistakable smolder of mistrust. Egar chose his words carefully.

  Could take a while to explain that. How bout I buy you some belly lining and a pint?

  That fuck Alnarh send you? He wants me dead, he should have the balls to come down here and do the work himself.

  No one sent me. I got some questions I d like to ask you, is all. About the fight down at the Lizard s Head.

  Footfalls across the boards inside. Egar judged the other man was still a good three feet back from the door, and probably off to one side. It was the same basic precaution he would have taken himself. If the door got smashed suddenly inward, you d want the space.

  I m not a big fan of the Citadel myself, see. Thought maybe you could help me out.

  Silence. A floorboard creaked. Harath cleared his throat.

  I didn t get your name, brother.

  Egar. Of the Skaranak. They call me the Dragonbane.

  Coughed laughter. Yeah, right.

  Look. A spurt of genuine anger licked through him. You going to open this fucking door or what?

  A final quiet, but the tone of it had changed, and Egar knew he was getting in. He waited. A bolt slatted back. The bleached wood paneling swung inward a grudging handbreadth and a young Majak face glowered out from around the jamb. Wispy beard, long unkempt hair across the bloodshot eyes. Harath of the Ishlinak stared blearily at the Dragonbane for a couple of seconds, but seemed not to see a threat.

  Anyone tells you I started that fight, they re a fucking liar.

  Egar nodded. Why I came to ask your side. Want to let me in?

  The younger man shrugged gracelessly and shoved the door wide. Backed up a couple of paces and held out both arms like a seller displaying his wares or a man as he submits to being frisked by the City Guard.

  Sure. Mind your head.

  The room behind the door was hot and cramped, jammed under the eaves as it was. Stoop height only except in the very center. Harath filled the space simply by virtue of standing up in it he was a big lad, still slim with youth but built in the shoulders and thighs from a lifetime of horsemanship and staff lance practice. Behind him, Egar saw a low cot under a tiny window, stained and tangled sheets, a threadbare cloth curtain that did little more than strain the sunlight blasting into the room. A chamber pot sat in one corner, but the bearish reek of the room was general.

  Share hearth and heart s truth, break bread and sup under a shared sky. The ritual disarming welcome phrases didn t really work once you got down off the steppe and into a city, but Harath mumbled through them nonetheless. The warmth of my fire is yours.

  As grateful kin, I take my place.

  Yeah, well Harath showed the skinning knife he d been holding at his back. Made an apologetic gesture with it. He stuffed the blade into the sheath on his belt and stood there yawning slept-in shirt and breeches, hair a tangled mess even by Majak standards. Nig
ht-before breath that Egar could smell on the yawn from a yard away. Can t be too careful, you know. Can t even trust the brothers in this fucking place. And I don t mean Majak across the board, guys like you cuz that s always been a bit iffy, right? I m talking my own fucking Ishlinak blood-bond kin here.

  Egar pulled a face he hoped was sympathetic. Mostly, he was trying not to breathe too much of Harath s secondhand air.

  Hard to believe, something like that. Yeah.

  Believe it, old-timer. Harath wandered back to the cot and sat down hard enough to make the timbers crack. This fucking city. Gets its teeth into you, you know. Sometimes wish I d never set eyes on the place. Fucking Alnarh, I knew him back in Ishlin-ichan. Knew his kin out on the steppe. Sure, he was a bit of a mouthy prick, even then, but you could always trust him in a scrap. Trust him to get a brother s back.

  I hear he s a convert now, Egar hazarded.

  What s that about?

  Yeah, it s fucked up. Harath scratched at his belly through the shirt. I mean, we all did it, the cash was too good to turn down. No conversion, no commission, so we figure what the fuck, it s only like marrying some Voronak tart or something; you got to make libations to all their pointy-faced little ice gods, else you re never going to hear the end of it from her family, right? Same thing here. There s this number you do, offering up your blade to that book they ve got. Bunch of reciting, some incense, and you re in.

  So what went wrong?

  Fuck knows. We had this squabble a few months back over a slave girl. Waggle-arsed little package from up in the League, you know what they re like, right?

  Egar nodded absently lurid images of Ishgrim dancing behind his eyes.

  The Ishlinak mustered a weary grin. Had udders on her like you wouldn t believe, brother. And when I jumped her, well, Alnarh took that hard. He s a jealous fuck at the best of times. But, nah Harath sank fists in his own hair, dragged the heels of his hands down his face. Shook his head. He was acting weird way before that. It s like he was buying into the Revelation for real. When he talked about it, he got this look in his eye. Starts telling us to stop using Dweller names around him when we curse. Some shit about offending the angels. I mean, come on. I expected the others to call him on it, couple of them are way closer kin than I can lay claim to, I think Larg s a full cousin or something. But they just let it go. And then when Menkarak comes calling, it s a whole