The Trouble with Peace

by Joe Abercrombie

  She was right, as always. Selest had enjoyed success after success since she invested in that scheme of Kaspar dan Arinhorm’s, the one that Savine had so pointedly turned down. Her own interests in Angland’s mines had taken quite the beating since he began to install his new pumps across the province.

  And those were far from her only disappointing investments of late. Once she made businesses bloom just by smiling at them. Now every apple she bit into turned out rotten. She was not left alone, that was sure. But her fan was busier beckoning the suitors in than waving them off.

  She was obliged to talk to old Ricart dan Sleisholt, who had some mad fantasy of making power by damming the Whiteflow. You could tell at a glance he was one of life’s losers, the shoulders of his jacket liberally dusted with dandruff, but it was vital that she look busy. While he blathered on, she sifted the flood of conversation around her for opportunities as a prospector sifts the Far Country’s icy streams for gold.

  “… cutlery and drapery and crockery and clocks. People have money and they want things…”

  “… heard Valint and Balk called in his loans. Magnate in the morning, beggar by afternoon. Salutary lesson for all of us…”

  “… property in Valbeck. You wouldn’t believe the price I got on some vacant land. Well, I say vacant, but these scum are easily moved…”

  “… impossible to know which way the Closed Council is going to fall on tax. There’s a hell of a hole in the finances. The entire treasury’s a hole…”

  “… told ’em if they wouldn’t do the work, I’d bring in a crowd of brown bastards who would, and they soon got back to their machines…”

  “… nobles furious, commoners furious, merchants furious, my wife isn’t furious yet, but it never takes much…”

  “And so you see, Lady Savine,” Sleisholt was working up to a grand finale, “the power of the Whiteflow is languishing unharnessed, like a stallion unbridled, and—”

  “If I may!” Curnsbick caught Savine’s elbow and steered her nimbly away.

  “Unbridled, Lady Savine!” Sleisholt called after her. “I am available to discuss it further at your convenience!” And he dissolved into a coughing fit which faded into the chatter.

  “Thank the Fates for you,” murmured Savine. “I thought I’d never escape that old dunce.”

  Curnsbick glanced away while rubbing significantly at his nose. “You have a little something just here.”

  “Fuck.” She dipped behind her fan to wipe a trace of powder from the rim of her sore nostril.

  When she came up, Curnsbick was looking worriedly at her from under his grey brows, still flecked with a few stubborn ginger hairs. “Savine, I count you as one of my closest friends.”

  “How lovely of you.”

  “I know you have a generous heart—”

  “You know more than me, then.”

  “—and I have the highest regard for your instincts, your tenacity, your wit—”

  “It takes no great wit to sense a ‘but’ coming.”

  “I’m worried for you.” He lowered his voice. “I hear rumours, Savine. I’m concerned about… well, about your judgement.”

  Her skin was prickling unpleasantly under her dress. “My judgement?” she whispered, forcing her smile a tooth wider.

  “This venture in Keln that just collapsed, I warned you it wasn’t viable. Vessels that size—”

  “You must be delighted at how right you were.”

  “What? No! I could scarcely be less so. You must have sunk thousands into financing the Crown Prince’s Division.” It had been closer to millions. “Then I hear Kort’s canal is hampered by labour problems.” Utterly mired in them was closer to it. “And it’s no secret you lost heavily in Valbeck—”

  “You have no fucking idea what I lost in Valbeck!” He stepped back, startled, and she realised she had her fist clenched tight around her folded fan and was shaking it in his face. “You… have no idea.” She was shocked to find the pain of tears at the back of her nose, had to snap her fan open again so she could dab at her lids, struggling not to smudge her powder. Never mind her judgement, it was getting to the point where she could hardly trust her own eyes.

  But when she glanced up, Curnsbick was not even looking at her. He was staring across the busy foyer towards the door.

  The eager chatter fell silent, the crowd split and through the midst came a young man with a vast retinue of guards, officers, attendants and hangers-on, sandy hair carefully arranged to give the impression of not having been arranged at all, white uniform heavy with medals.

  “Bloody hell,” whispered Curnsbick, gripping Savine’s elbow, “it’s the bloody king!”

  Whatever the criticisms—and there were more than ever, regularly circulated in pamphlets revelling in the tawdry details—no one could deny that King Orso looked the part. He reminded Savine of his father. Of their father, she realised, with an ugly twisting of disgust. He chuckled, slapped arms, shook hands, traded jokes, the same beacon of slightly absent good humour King Jezal had once been.

  “Your Majesty,” frothed Curnsbick, “the Solar Society is illuminated by your presence. I fear we had to begin the addresses without you.”

  “Never fear, Master Curnsbick.” Orso clapped him on the shoulder like an old friend. “I can’t imagine I would have been much help with the technical details.”

  The great machinist produced the most mechanical of laughs. “I am sure you know our sponsor, Lady Savine dan Glokta.”

  Their eyes met only for an instant. But an instant was enough.

  She remembered how Orso used to look at her. That mischievous glint in his eye, as if they were players in a delightful game no one else knew about. Before she learned they had a father in common, when he was still a crown prince and her judgement was considered unimpeachable. Now his stare was flat, and dead, and passionless. A mourner at the funeral of someone he had hardly known.

  He had asked her to marry him. To be his queen. And all she had wanted was to say yes. He had loved her, and she had loved him.

  Their eyes only met for an instant. But an instant was all she could stand.

  She sank into the deepest curtsy she could manage, wishing she could keep sinking until the tiled floor swallowed her. “Your Majesty…”

  “Lady Selest!” she heard Orso say, his heel clicking sharply as he turned away. “Perhaps you might show me around?”

  “I’d be honoured, Your Majesty.” And the bubbling of Selest dan Heugen’s victorious laughter was as painful as boiling water in Savine’s ears.

  It was a slight no one in the entire foyer could have missed. Had Orso knocked her down and trodden on her throat, he could scarcely have done more damage. Everyone was whispering as she stood. Scorned, by the king, at her own function.

  She walked to the doors through swimming faces, smile plastered to her burning cheeks, and stumbled down the steps into the twilit street. Her stomach roiled. She pulled at her collar, but she could sooner have torn through a prison wall with her fingernails than loosened that triple stitching.

  “Lady Savine?” came Zuri’s concerned voice.

  She tottered around the corner of the theatre into the darkness of an alley, doubled up helpless and sprayed vomit down the wall. Puking made her think of Valbeck. Everything made her think of Valbeck.

  She straightened, dashing the burning snot from her nose. “Even my own stomach is betraying me.”

  A strip of light down the side of Zuri’s dark face made one eye gleam. “When did your menses last come?” she asked, softly.

  Savine stood for a moment, her breath ragged. Then she gave a hopeless shrug. “Just before Leo dan Brock’s visit to Adua. Whoever would have thought I’d miss the monthly agonies?”

  Probably her ragged breaths should have turned to choking sobs, and she should have fallen into Zuri’s arms and wept at the colossal mess she had made of herself. Curnsbick was right to worry, the old fool. Her judgement had turned to shit and here was the result
.

  But instead of sobbing, she started to chuckle. “I’m puking,” she said, “in a piss-smelling alley, in a dress that cost five hundred marks, with a bastard on the way. I’m fucking ridiculous.”

  The laughter faded, and she leaned against the wall, scraping her sour tongue clean on her teeth. “The higher you climb, the further you have to fall, and the greater the spectacle when you hit the ground. What wonderful drama, eh? And they don’t even have to pay for a ticket.” She clenched her fists. “They all think I’m going down. But if they think I’m going down without a fight, they should—”

  She doubled over and brought up more sick. Just an acrid trickle this time. Retching and giggling at once. She spat it out and wiped her face on the back of her glove. Her hand was shaking again.

  “Calm,” she muttered at herself, clenching her fists. “Calm, you absolute fucker.”

  Zuri looked worried. And she never looked worried. “I will ask Rabik to bring the carriage around. We should get you home.”

  “Oh, come, come, the night is young.” Savine fished out her box for another pinch of pearl dust. Just to get over the humps. Just to keep things moving. She headed for the street. “I’ve a mind to watch Master Broad work.”

  A Routine

  “So… you’re happy here, then?”

  Liddy laughed. There’d been weeks when Broad had hardly seen her smile. These days, she laughed all the time. “Gunnar, we lived in a cellar.”

  “A stinking cellar,” said May, grinning, too. It was hard to imagine with the sunset streaming into their dining room through the three big windows.

  “We ate peelings and drank from puddles,” said Liddy, forking another slice of meat onto Broad’s plate.

  “We queued to shit in a hole,” said May.

  Liddy winced. “Don’t say that.”

  “I did it, didn’t I? Why fuss over saying so?”

  “It’s the manner of expression I’m objecting to.” Liddy was getting to act like a proper lady and enjoying every moment. “But yes, we did it. Why wouldn’t we be happy now?” She pushed across the gravy jug. Broad had never guessed there was such a thing as a special kind of jug for gravy, let alone imagined he might own one.

  He smiled, too. Made himself smile. “’Course. Why wouldn’t we be happy now?” He scooped up a forkful of peas, even managed to get a few in his mouth before they all fell off.

  “You’re not much good with a fork,” said May.

  Broad nudged his food around the plate with it. Just holding the damn thing made his hand hurt. Felt too delicate for his aching fingers. “You reach an age it’s hard to learn new ways, I reckon.”

  “You’re too young to be stuck in the past.”

  “I don’t know.” Broad frowned as he prodded at that slice of meat, a little blood seeping. “The past has a way of holding on.”

  An awkward pause at that. “Tell us you’re staying home tonight,” said Liddy.

  “Wish I could. Got to head over to the diggings.”

  “At this time?”

  “Won’t take long, I hope.” Broad set down his cutlery and stood. “Got to make sure the work keeps going.”

  “Lady Savine can’t do without you, eh?”

  May proudly puffed up her chest. “Told me she relies on him more and more.”

  “Well, tell her she has to share you with your family.”

  Broad snorted as he came around the table. “You bloody tell her.”

  Liddy was still smiling as she tipped her face up, lips soft against his. She’d put weight on. They all had, since the lean times in Valbeck. She had that curve to her figure and that glow to her cheek she’d had when they first courted. That same smell she’d had when they first kissed. All that time passed, and he loved her just the same.

  “Worked out all right,” she said, fingertips light on his cheek. “Didn’t it?”

  “No thanks to me.” He had to talk around a lump in his throat. “I’m sorry. For all the trouble I brought—”

  “That’s behind us,” said Liddy, firm. “We work for a fine lady now. No trouble here.”

  “No,” said Broad. “No trouble.” And he trudged towards the door.

  “Don’t work too hard, Da!” called May. When he looked back, she was smiling at him, and that smile caught at something. Like there was a hook in his chest and whatever she did tugged at it. He smiled back. Raised an awkward hand in farewell. Then he saw the tattoo on the back and jerked it down. Worked it into the cuff of his fine new jacket.

  He made sure he shut the door firmly behind him.

  Broad strode through a forest of flaking iron columns, across the darkened warehouse floor towards an island of lamplight, footfalls echoing in all that inky emptiness.

  Halder stood with his arms folded and his face in shadow. He was one of those men who liked his silence. Bannerman leaned against a pillar near him, that cocky tilt to his hips. He was one of those men who always had too much to say.

  Their guest sat in one of three battered old chairs, hands tied to the back, ankles to the legs. Broad stopped in front of him, frowning down. “You’re Gaunt?”

  “I’m Gaunt.” Didn’t try to deny it, at least. Sometimes they did. Broad didn’t blame them.

  “Funny name for him,” said Bannerman, looking at Gaunt like he was naught but a lump of clay. “’Cause he’s quite sturdy, really. Wouldn’t call him fat. But I wouldn’t call him gaunt.”

  “Have some respect, eh?” said Broad as he took his jacket off. “We can do this without being disrespectful.”

  “What difference does it make?”

  Broad draped the jacket over the back of a chair and stroked the fine cloth flat with the side of his hand. “Makes some to me.”

  “We’re not here to make friends.”

  “I know why we’re here.” Broad met Bannerman’s eye, and held it till he licked his lips and looked away. Then he shifted the chair around so it faced Gaunt and sat. He pushed his lenses up his nose, then clasped his hands. He found it helped to have a routine. Like when he swept the brewery in Valbeck. Just a job to get done, like any other.

  Gaunt watched him all the while. Scared eyes, of course. Sweat on his forehead. Determined, though. Tough man to break, most likely. But anything breaks if you squeeze it hard enough.

  “My name’s Broad.” He saw Gaunt looking at the tattoo on the back of his hand. He let it hang there. “Used to be in the army.”

  “We all did,” said Bannerman.

  “You know who we work for now?”

  Gaunt swallowed. “For Kort?”

  “No.”

  Gaunt swallowed again, harder. “For Savine dan Glokta.”

  “That’s right. We hear you’ve been organising, Master Gaunt. We hear you’ve persuaded the workers to down tools.”

  Bannerman made a disapproving tut, tut, tut noise with his tongue.

  “Way things are in the diggings,” said Gaunt, “the hours they work and the pay they get, they didn’t need much persuading.”

  Broad nudged his lenses down to rub at the sore bridge of his nose, then nudged them back up. “Look. You seem a decent man so I’m giving you every chance I can. But Lady Savine wants her canal finished. She’s paid for it. And I can tell you for a fact… it’s a bad idea to get between her and what she’s paid for. A bad idea.”

  Gaunt leaned forward. Far as he could tied to the chair. “A lad died the other day. Crushed by a beam. Fourteen years old.” He strained around to glance up at Bannerman. “You know that?”

  “I heard,” said Bannerman, and from the way he was looking at his nails, hadn’t cared a shit.

  “It’s a damn shame.” Broad snapped his aching fingers to bring Gaunt’s eyes back to him. “The question is, how’s you getting crushed going to help him?”

  Gaunt stuck his chin up, still defiant. Broad liked him. They could’ve been on the same side. He supposed they had been, not that long ago. “I can help the others. The likes of you wouldn’t understand.” />
  “I might surprise you. I was in Valbeck, brother, with the Breakers. Fought the good fight there. Thought I did, anyway. Before that, I was in Styria. Thought I fought the good fight there, too. Been fighting good fights all my life. You know what it’s got me?”

  “Nothing?” said Bannerman.

  Broad frowned up at him. “You love to spoil the punchline, don’t you?”

  “You need some new material.”

  “Daresay you’re right. Trouble with the good fight, I find… once the fight starts, the good stops.” Broad began rolling up his sleeves while he thought about what to say. Slowly. Carefully. Helped to have a routine. He told himself this was for May, and for Liddy. Wondered what they’d say if they knew about it and didn’t like the answer. That’s why they couldn’t know. Not ever.

  “I’ve killed… I think… maybe fifty men. Maybe more. Prisoners, some of ’em. Just following orders, but… I did it, still. Kept a count at first, then I tried to lose count, but, well…” Broad looked down at the little patch of ground between Gaunt’s boots. “I’ll be honest, I was drunk for a lot of it. Drunk as I could get. Bit of a blur. I remember this one fellow, in the wars. Styrian, I guess, kept gabbling at me, and I hadn’t a clue what he was saying. I threw him off the wall. Wall of Musselia this was so, what, thirty strides high?” He glanced up at Halder. “You were at Musselia, weren’t you?”

  Halder nodded. “Closer to twenty.”

  “High enough, anyway. He hit this cart.” Broad stuck his hand into his ribs, trying to show where. “And it folded him right in half, sideways. Left him in a shape no living man should ever be. I mean, his feet were pointing backwards. He started making this noise.” Broad slowly shook his head. “I swear, it was the noise hell makes. And he wouldn’t stop. You see some shit out there. Changes the way you look at things.”

  “It does,” said Halder.

  Gaunt was staring at him. “You think that’s something to boast of?”

  “Boast of?” Broad stared back, over the rims of his lenses, so Gaunt was just a sparkly blur in the lamplight. “Fuck, no. I wake up with the sweats. I cry, sometimes. In the quiet times. Don’t mind admitting it.”