Two forces, once in vicious opposition, now found themselves virtual bedmates, although neither could decide which of them had their legs pried open first. The simple facts are these: the original hierarchical structure of the Tiste Edur tribes proved well-suited to the Letherii system of power through wealth. The Edur became the crown, settling easy upon the bloated gluttony of Lether, but does a crown possess will? Does the wearer buckle beneath its burden? Another truth is now, in hindsight, self-evident. As seamless as this merging seemed to be, a more subtle, far deadlier conjoining occurred below the surface: that of the specific flaws within each system, and this blending was to prove a most volatile brew.
– The Hiroth Dynasty (Volume XVII), The Colony, a History of Lether, Dinith Arnara
‘Where is this one from?’
Tanal Yathvanar watched the Invigilator slowly rotating the strange object in his pudgy hands, the onyx stones in the many rings on the short fingers glimmering in the shafts of sunlight that reached in through the opened window. The object Karos Invictad manipulated was a misshapen collection of bronze pins, the ends bent into loops that were twisted about one another to form a stiff cage. ‘Bluerose, I believe, sir,’ Tanal replied. ‘One of Senorbo’s. The average duration for solving it is three days, although the record is just under two-’
‘Who?’ Karos demanded, glancing up from where he sat behind his desk.
‘A Tarthenal half-blood, if you can believe that, sir. Here in Letheras. The man is reputedly a simpleton, yet possesses a natural talent for solving puzzles.’
‘And the challenge is to slide the pins into a con-figuration to create a sudden collapse.’
‘Yes sir. It flattens out. From what I have heard the precise number of manipulations is-’
‘No, Tanal, do not tell me. You should know better.’ The Invigilator, commander of the Patriotists, set the object down. ‘Thank you for the gift. Now,’ a brief smile, ‘have we inconvenienced Bruthen Trana long enough, do you think?’ Karos rose, paused to adjust his crimson silks-the only colour and the only material he ever wore-then collected the short sceptre he had made his official symbol of office, black bloodwood from the Edur homeland with silver caps studded in polished onyx stones, and gestured with it in the direction of the door.
Tanal bowed then led the way out into the corridor, to the broad stairs where they descended to the main floor, then strode through the double doors and out into the compound.
The row of prisoners had been positioned in full sunlight, near the west wall of the enclosure. They had been taken from their cells a bell before dawn and it was now shortly past midday. Lack of water and food, and this morning’s searing heat, combined with brutal sessions of questioning over the past week, had resulted in more than half of the eighteen detainees losing consciousness.
Tanal saw the Invigilator’s frown upon seeing the motionless bodies collapsed in their chains.
The Tiste Edur liaison, Bruthen Trana of the Den-Ratha tribe, was standing in the shade, more or less across from the prisoners, and the tall, silent figure slowly turned as Tanal and Karos approached.
‘Bruthen Trana, most welcome,’ said Karos Invictad. ‘You are well?’
‘Let us proceed, Invigilator,’ the grey-skinned warrior said.
‘At once. If you will accompany me, we can survey each prisoner assembled here. The specific cases-’
‘I have no interest in approaching them any closer than I am now,’ Bruthen said. ‘They are fouled in their own wastes and there is scant breeze in this enclosure.’
Karos smiled. ‘I understand, Bruthen.’ He leaned his sceptre against a shoulder then faced the row of detainees. ‘We need not approach, as you say. I will begin with the one to the far left, then-’
‘Unconscious or dead?’
‘Well, at this distance, who can say?’
Noting the Edur’s scowl, Tanal bowed to Bruthen and Karos and walked the fifteen paces to the line. He crouched to examine the prone figure, then straightened. ‘He lives.’
‘Then awaken him!’ Karos commanded. His voice, when raised, became shrill, enough to make a foolish listener wince-foolish, that is, if the Invigilator was witness to that instinctive reaction. Such careless errors happened but once.
Tanal kicked at the prisoner until the man managed a dry, rasping sob. ‘On your feet, traitor,’ Tanal said in a quiet tone. ‘The Invigilator demands it. Stand, or I will begin breaking bones in that pathetic sack you call a body.’
He watched as the prisoner struggled upright.
‘Water, please-’
‘Not another word from you. Straighten up, face your crimes. You are Letherii, aren’t you? Show our Edur guest the meaning of that.’
Tanal then made his way back to Karos and Bruthen.
The Invigilator had begun speaking. ‘… known associations with dissenting elements in the Physicians’ College-he has admitted as much. Although no specific crimes can be laid at this man’s feet, it is clear that-’
‘The next one,’ Bruthen Trana cut in.
Karos closed his mouth, then smiled without showing his ‘ teeth. ‘Of course. The next is a poet, who wrote and distributed a call for revolution. He denies nothing and indeed, you can see his stoic defiance even from here.’
‘And the one beside him?’
‘The proprietor of an inn, the tavern of which was frequented by undesirable elements-disenchanted soldiers, in fact-and two of them are among these detainees. We were informed of the sedition by an honourable whore-’
‘Honourable whore, Invigilator?’ The Edur half smiled.
Karos blinked. ‘Why, yes, Bruthen Trana.’
‘Because she informed on an innkeeper.’
‘An innkeeper engaged in treason-’
‘Demanding too high a cut of her earnings, more likely. Go on, and please, keep your descriptions of the crimes brief.’
‘Of course,’ Karos Invictad said, the sceptre gently tapping on his soft shoulder, like a baton measuring a slow march.
Tanal, standing at his commander’s side, remained at attention whilst the Invigilator resumed his report of the specific transgressions of these Letherii. The eighteen prisoners were fair representations of the more than three hundred chained in cells below ground. A decent number of arrests for this week, Tanal reflected. And for the most egregious traitors among them waited the Drownings. Of the three hundred and twenty or so, a third were destined to walk the canal bottom, burdened beneath crushing I weights. Bookmakers were complaining these days, since no-one ever survived the ordeal any more. Of course, they did not complain too loudly, since the true agitators among them risked their own Drowning-it had taken but a few of those early on to mute the protestations among the rest.
This was a detail Tanal had come to appreciate, one of Karos Invictad’s perfect laws of compulsion and control, emphasized again and again in the vast treatise the Invigilator was penning on the subject most dear to his heart. Take any segment of population, impose strict;yet clear definitions on their particular characteristics, then target them for compliance. Bribe the weak to expose the strong. Kill the strong, and the rest are yours. Move on to the next segment.
Bookmakers had been easy targets, since few people liked them-especially inveterate gamblers, and of those there were more and more with every day that passed.
Karos Invictad concluded his litany. Bruthen Trana nodded, then turned and left the compound.
As soon as he was gone from sight, the Invigilator faced Tanal. ‘An embarrassment,’ he said. ‘Those unconscious ones.’
‘Yes sir.’
A change of heads on the outer wall.’
At once, sir.’
‘Now, Tanal Yathvanar, before anything else, you must come with me. It will take but a moment, then you can return to the tasks at hand.’
They walked back into the building, the Invigilator’s short steps forcing Tanal to slow up again and again as they made their way to Karos’s office.
The most powerful man next to the Emperor himself look his place once more behind the desk. He picked up the cage of bronze pins, shifted a dozen or so in a flurry of precise moves, and the puzzle collapsed flat. Karos Invictad smiled across at Tanal, then flung the object onto the desk. ‘Despatch a missive to Senorbo in Bluerose. Inform him of the time required for me to find a solution, then add, from me to him, that I fear he is losing his touch.’
‘Yes, sir.’
Karos Invictad reached out for a scroll. ‘Now, what was our agreed percentage on my interest in the Inn of the Belly-up Snake?’
‘I believe Rautos indicated forty-five, sir.’
‘Good. Even so, I believe a meeting is in order with the Master of the Liberty Consign. Later this week will do. For all our takings of late, we still possess a strange paucity in actual coin, and I want to know why.’
‘Sir, you know Rautos Hivanar’s suspicions on that matter.’
‘Vaguely. He will be pleased to learn I am now prepared to listen more closely to said suspicions. Thus, two issues on the agenda. Schedule the meeting for a bell’s duration. Oh, and one last thing, Tanal.’
‘Sir?’
‘Bruthen Trana. These weekly visits. I want to know, is he compelled? Is this some Edur form of royal disaffection or punishment? Or are the bastards truly interested in what we’re up to? Bruthen makes no comment, ever. He does not even ask what punishments follow our judgements. Furthermore, his rude impatience tires me. It may be worth our while to investigate him.’
Tanal’s brows rose. ‘Investigate a Tiste Edur?’
‘Quietly, of course. Granted, they ever give us the appearance of unquestioning loyalty, but I cannot help but wonder if they truly are immune to sedition among their own kind.’
‘Even if they aren’t, sir, respectfully, are the Patriotists the right organization-’
‘The Patriotists, Tanal Yathvanar,’ said Karos sharply, ‘possess the imperial charter to police the empire. In that charter no distinction is made between Edur and Letherii, only between the loyal and the disloyal.’
‘Yes sir.’ ‘
‘Now, I believe you have tasks awaiting you.’
Tanal Yathvanar bowed, then strode from the office. * * *
The estate dominated a shelf of land on the north bank of Lether River, four streets west of Quillas Canal. Stepped walls marking its boundaries made their way down the hank, extending Out into the water-on posts to ease the current’s tug-more than two boat-lengths. Just beyond rose two mooring poles. There had been flooding this season. An infrequent occurrence in the past century, Kautos Hivanar noted as he leafed through the Estate Compendium-a family tome of notes and maps recording the full eight hundred years of Hivanar blood on this land.
He settled back in the plush chair and, with contemplative languor, finished his balat tea.
The house steward and principal agent, Venitt Sathad, quietly stepped forward to return the Compendium to the wood and iron chest sunk in the floor beneath the map table, then replaced the floorboards and unfurled the rug over the spot. His tasks completed, he stepped back to resume his position beside the door.
Rautos Hivanar was a large man, his complexion florid, his features robust. His presence tended to dominate a room, no matter how spacious. He sat in the estate’s library now, the walls shelved to the ceiling. Scrolls, clay tablets and bound books filled every available space, the gathered learning of a thousand scholars, many of whom bore the
H ivanar name.
As head of the family and overseer of its vast financial holdings, Rautos Hivanar was a busy man, and such demands on his intellect had redoubled since the Tiste Edur conquest-which had triggered the official formation and recognition of the Liberty Consign, an association of the wealthiest families in the Lether Empire-in ways he could never have imagined before. He would be hard-pressed to explain how he found all such activities tedious or enervating. Yet that was what they had become, even as his suspicions slowly, incrementally, resolved into certainties; even as he began to perceive that, somewhere out there, there was an enemy-or enemies-bent on the singular task of economic sabotage. Not mere embezzlement, an activity with which he was personally very familiar, but something more profound, all-encompassing. An enemy. To all that sustained Rautos Hivanar, and the Liberty Consign of which he was Master; indeed, to all that sustained the empire itself, regardless of who sat upon the throne, regardless even of those savage, miserable barbarians who were now preening at the very pinnacle of Letherii society, like grey-feathered jackdaws atop a hoard of baubles.
Such comprehension, on Rautos Hivanar’s part, would once have triggered a most zealous response within him. The threat alone should have sufficed to elicit a vigorous hunt, and the notion of an agency of such diabolical purpose-one, he was forced to admit, guided by the most subtle genius-should have enlivened the game until its pursuit acquired the power of obsession.
Instead, Rautos Hivanar found himself seeking notations among the dusty ledgers for evidence of past floodings, pursuing an altogether more mundane mystery that would interest but a handful of muttering academics. And that, he admitted often to himself, was odd. Nonetheless, the compulsion gathered strength, and at night he would lie beside the recumbent, sweat-sheathed mass that was his wife of thirty-three years and find his thoughts working ceaselessly, struggling against the currents of time’s cyclical flow, seeking to clamber his way back, with all his sensibilities, into past ages. Looking. Looking for something…
Sighing, Rautos set down the empty cup, then rose.
As he walked to the door, Venitt Sathad-whose family line had been Indebted to the Hivanars for six generations now-stepped forward to retrieve the fragile Cup, then set off in his master’s wake.
Out onto the waterfront enclosure, across the mosaic portraying the investiture of Skoval Hivanar as Imperial Ceda three centuries past, then down the shallow stone stairs to what, in drier times, was the lower terrace garden.
But the river’s currents had swirled in here, stealing away soil and plants, exposing a most peculiar arrangement of boulders set like a cobbled street, framed in wooden posts arranged in a rectangle, the posts little more than rotted stumps now, rising from the flood’s remnant pools.
At the edge of the upper level, workers, under Rautos’s direction, had used wood bulwarks to keep it from collapsing, and to one side sat a wheelbarrow filled with the multitude of curious objects that had been exposed by the floodwaters. These items had littered the cobbled floor.
In all, Rautos mused, a mystery. There was no record whatsoever of the lower terrace garden’s being anything but what it was, and the notations from the garden’s designer-from shortly after the completion of the estate’s main buildings-indicated the bank at that level was nothing more than ancient flood silts.
The clay had preserved the wood, at least until recently, so there was no telling how long ago the strange construct had been built. The only indication of its antiquity rested with the objects, all of which were either bronze or copper. Not weapons, as one might find associated with a barrow, and if tools, then they were for activities long forgotten, since not a single worker Rautos had brought to this place was able to fathom the function of these items-they resembled no known tools, not for stone working, nor wood, nor the processing of foodstuffs.
Rautos collected one and examined it, for at least the hundredth time. Bronze, clay-cast-the flange was clearly visible-the item was long, roundish, yet bent at almost right angles. Incisions formed a cross-hatched pattern about the elbow. Neither end displayed any means of attachment-not intended, therefore, as part of some larger mechanism. He hefted its considerable weight in his hand. There was something unbalanced about it, despite the centrally placed bend. He set it down and drew out a circular sheet of copper, thinner than the wax layer on a scrier’s tablet. Blackened by contact with the clays, yet only now the edges showing signs of verdigris. Countless holes had been punched through the sheet, in no particular pattern, yet each hole was perfectly uniform, perfectly round, with no lip to indicate from which side it had been punched.
‘Venitt,’ he said, ‘have we a map recording the precise locations of these objects when they were originally found?’
‘Indeed, Master, with but a few exceptions. You examined it a week past.’
‘I did? Very well. Set it out once more on the table in the library, this afternoon.’
Both men turned as the gate watcher appeared from the narrow side passage along the left side of the house. The woman halted ten paces from Rautos and bowed. ‘Master, a message from Invigilator Kards Invictad.’
‘Very good,’ Rautos replied distractedly. ‘I will attend to it in a moment. Does the messenger await a response?’
‘Yes, Master. He is in the courtyard.’
‘See that refreshments are provided.’
The watcher bowed then departed.
‘Venitt, I believe you must prepare to undertake a journey on my behalf.’
‘Master?’
‘The Invigilator at last perceives the magnitude of the threat.’
Venitt Sathad said nothing.
‘You must travel to Drene City,’ Rautos said, his eyes once more on the mysterious construct dominating the lower terrace. ‘The Consign requires a most specific report of the preparations there. Alas, the Factor’s own missives are proving unsatisfactory. I require confidence in those matters, if I am to apply fullest concentration to the threat closer to hand.’
Again, Venitt did not speak.
Rautos looked out onto the river. Fisher boats gathered in the bay opposite, two merchant traders drawing in towards the main docks. One of them, bearing the flag of the Esterrict family, looked damaged, possibly by fire. Rautos brushed the dirt from his hands and turned about, making his way back into the building, his servant falling into step behind him.
‘I wonder, what lies beneath those stones?’
‘Master?’
‘Never mind, Venitt. I was but thinking out loud.’
The Awl’dan camp had been attacked at dawn by two troops of Atri-Preda Bivatt’s Bluerose cavalry. Two hundred skilled lancers riding into a maelstrom of panic, as figures struggled out from the hide huts, as the Drene-bred war-dogs, arriving moments before the horse-soldiers, closed on the pack of Awl herder and dray dogs, and in moments the three breeds of beast were locked in a vicious battle.
The Awl warriors were unprepared, and few had time to even so much as find their weapons before the lancers burst into their midst. In moments, the slaughter extended out to encompass elders and children. Most of the women fought alongside their male kin-wife and husband, sister and brother, dying together in a last blending of blood.
The engagement between the Letherii and the Awl took all of two hundred heartbeats. The war among the dogs was far more protracted, for the herder dogs-while smaller and more compact than their attackers-were quick and no less vicious, while the drays, bred to pull carts in summer and sleds in winter, were comparable with the Drene breed. Trained to kill wolves, the drays proved more than a match for the war-dogs, and if not for the lancers then making sport of killing the mottle-skinned beasts, the battle would have turned. As it was, the Awl pack finally broke away, the survivors fleeing onto the plain, eastward, a few Drene wardogs giving chase before being recalled by their handlers.
Whilst lancers dismounted to make certain there were no survivors among the Awl, others rode out to collect the herds of myrid and rodara in the next valley.
Atri-Preda Bivatt sat astride her stallion, struggling to control the beast with the smell of blood so heavy in the morning air. Beside her, sitting awkward and in discomfort on the unfamiliar saddle, Brohl Handar, the newly appointed Tiste Edur Overseer of Drene City, watched the Letherii systematically loot the encampment, stripping corpses naked and drawing tlieir knives. The Awl bound their jewellery-mostly gold-deep in the braids of their hair, forcing the Letherii to slice away those sections of the scalp to claim their booty. Of course, there was more than just expedience in this mutilation, for it had been extended to the collecting of swaths of skin that had been decorated in tattoos, the particular style of the Awl rich in colour and often outlined in stitched gold thread. These trophies adorned the round-shields of many lancers.
The captured herds now belonged to the Factor of Drene, Letur Anict, and as Brohl Handar watched the hundreds of myrid come over the hill, their black woolly coats making them look like boulders as they poured down the hillside, it was clear that the Factor’s wealth had just risen substantially. The taller rodara followed, blue-backed and long-necked, their long tails thrashing about in near-panic as wardogs on the herd’s flanks plunged into feint attacks again and again.
The breath hissed from the Atri-Preda’s teeth. ‘Where is the Factor’s man, anyway? Those damned rodara are going to stampede. Lieutenant! Get the handlers to call off their hounds! Hurry!’ The woman unstrapped her helm, pulled it free and set it atop the saddle horn. She looked across at Brohl. ‘There you have it, Overseer.’
‘So these are the Awl.’
She grimaced, looked away. A small camp by their standards. Seventy-odd adults.’
‘Yet, large herds.’
Her grimace became a scowl. ‘They were once larger, Overseer. Much larger.’
‘I take it then that this campaign of yours is succeeding in driving away these trespassers.’
‘Not my campaign.’ She seemed to catch something in his expression for she added, ‘Yes, of course, I command the expeditionary forces, Overseer. But I receive my orders horn the Factor. And, strictly speaking, the Awl are not trespassers.’
‘The Factor claims otherwise.’
‘Letur Anict is highly ranked in the Liberty Consign.’
Brohl Handar studied the woman for a moment, then said, ‘Not all wars are fought for wealth and land, Atri-Preda.’
‘I must disagree, Overseer. Did not you Tiste Edur invade pre-emptively, in response to the perceived threat of lost land and resources? Cultural assimilation, the end of your independence. There is no doubt in my mind,’ she continued, ‘that we Letherii sought to obliterate your civilization, as we had done already with the Tarthenal and so many others. And so, an economic war.’
‘It does not surprise me, Atri-Preda, that your kind saw it that way. And I do not doubt that such concerns were present in the mind of the Warlock King. Did we conquer you in order to survive? Perhaps.’ Brohl considered saying more, then he shook his head, watching as four wardogs closed on a wounded cattle dog. The lame beast fought back, but was soon down, kicking, then silent and limp as the wardogs tore open its belly.
Bivatt asked, ‘Do you ever wonder, Overseer, which of us truly won that war?’
He shot her a dark look. ‘No, I do not. Your scouts have found no other signs of Awl in this area, I understand. So now the Factor will consolidate the Letherii claim in the usual fashion?’
The Atri-Preda nodded. ‘Outposts. Forts, raised roads. Settlers will follow.’
‘And then, the Factor will extend his covetous intentions, yet further east.’
‘As you say, Overseer. Of course, I am sure you recognize the acquisitions gift the Tiste Edur as well. The empire’s territory expands. I am certain the Emperor will be pleased.’
This was Brohl Handar’s second week as governor of Drene. There were few Tiste Edur in this remote corner of Rhulad’s empire, less than a hundred, and only his three staff members were from Brohl’s own tribe, the Arapay. The annexation of Awl’dan by what amounted to wholesale genocide had begun years ago-long before the Edur conquest-and the particulars of rule in far Letheras seemed to have little relevance to this military campaign. Brohl Handar, the patriarch of a clan devoted to hunting tusked seals, wondered-not for the first time-what he was doing here.
Titular command as Overseer seemed to involve little more than observation. The true power of rule was with Letur Anict, the Factor of Drene, who ‘is highly ranked in the Liberty Consign’. Some kind of guild of merchants, he had learned, although he had no idea what, precisely, was liberating about this mysterious organization. Unless, of course, it was the freedom to do as they pleased. Including the use of imperial troops to aid in the acquisition of ever more wealth.
‘Atri-Preda.’
‘Yes, Overseer?’
‘These Awl-do they fight back? No, not as they did today. I mean, do they mount raids? Do they mass their warriors on the path to all-out war?’
She looked uncomfortable. ‘Overseer, there are two… well, levels, to this.’
‘Levels. What does that mean?’
‘Official and… unofficial. It is a matter of perception.’
‘Explain.’
‘The belief of the common folk, as promulgated through imperial agents, is that the Awl have allied themselves with the Ak’ryn to the south, as well as the D’rhasilhani and the two kingdoms of Bolkando and Saphinand-in short, all the territories bordering the empire-creating a belligerent, warmongering and potentially overwhelming force-the Horde of the Bolkando Conspiracy-that threatens the entire eastern territories of the Lether Empire. It is only a matter of time before that horde is fully assembled, whereupon it will march. Accordingly, every attack launched by the Letherii military serves to diminish the numbers the Awl can contribute, and furthermore, the loss of valuable livestock in turn weakens the savages. Famine may well manage what swords alone cannot-the entire collapse of the Awl.’
‘I see. And the unofficial version?’
She glanced across at him. ‘There is no conspiracy, Overseer. No alliance. The truth is, the Awl continue to light among themselves-their grazing land is shrinking, after all. And they despise the Ak’ryn and the D’rhasilhani, and have probably never met anyone from Bolkando or Saphinand.’ She hesitated, then said, ‘We did clash with a mercenary company of some sort, two months past-the disastrous battle that spurred your appointment, I suspect. They numbered perhaps seven hundred, and after a half-dozen skirmishes I led a force of six thousand Letherii in pursuit. Overseer, we lost almost three thousand soldiers in that final battle. If not for our mages…’ She shook her head. ‘And we still have no idea who they were.’
Brohl studied the woman. He had known nothing about any such clash. The reason for his appointment? Perhaps. ‘The official version you spoke of earlier-the lie-justifies the slaughter of the Awl, in the eyes of the commonry. All of which well serves the Factor’s desire to make himself yet richer. I see. Tell me, Atri-Preda, why does Letur Anict need all that gold? What does he do with it?’
The woman shrugged. ‘Gold is power,’
‘Power over whom?’
‘Anyone, and everyone.’
‘Excepting the Tiste Edur, who are indifferent to the Letherii idea of wealth.’
She smiled. Are you, Overseer? Still?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘There are Hiroth in Drene-yes, you have met them. Each claims kinship with the Emperor, and upon that claim they have commandeered the finest estates and land. They have hundreds of Indebted as slaves. Soon, perhaps, there will be Tiste Edur among the membership of the Liberty Consign.’
Brohl Handar frowned. On a distant ridge stood three Awl dogs, two drays and one smaller cattle dog, watching as the herds were driven through the destroyed encampment-the livestock bawling in the stench of spilled blood and wastes. He studied the three silhouettes on the ridge. Where would they go now, he wondered. ‘I have seen enough.’ He tugged his horse round, too tight on the reins, and the beast’s head snapped up and it snorted, backing as it turned. Brohl struggled to keep his balance.
If the Atri-Preda was amused she was wise enough not to show it.
In the sky overhead, the first carrion birds had appeared,
The South Jasp River, one of the four tributaries of Lether River leading down from the Bluerose Mountains, was flanked on its south bank by a raised road that, a short distance ahead, began its long climb to the mountain pass, beyond which lay the ancient kingdom of Bluerose, now subject to the Letherii Empire. The South Jasp ran fast here, the momentum of its savage descent from the mountains not yet slowed by the vast plain it now found itself crossing. The icy water pounded over huge boulders left behind by long-extinct glaciers, flinging bitter-cold mist into the air that drifted in clouds over the road.
The lone figure awaiting the six Tiste Edur warriors and their entourage was if anything taller than any Edur, yet thin, wrapped in a black sealskin cloak, hood raised. Two baldrics criss-crossed its chest, from which hung two Letherii longswords, and the few wisps of long white hair that had pulled free in the wind were now wet, adhering to the collar of the cloak.
To the approaching Merude Edur, the face within that cowl looked pallid as death, as if a corpse had just dragged itself free of the numbing river, something long frozen in the white-veined reaches of the mountains that awaited them.
The lead warrior, a veteran of the conquest of Letheras, gestured for his comrades to halt then set out to speak to the stranger. In addition to the other five Edur, there were ten Letherii soldiers, two burdened wagons, and forty slaves shackled one to the next in a line behind the second wagon.
‘Do you wish company,’ the Merude asked, squinting to see more of that shadowed face, ‘for the climb to the pass? It’s said there remain bandits and renegades in the heights beyond.’
‘I am my own company.’
The voice was rough, the accent archaic.
The Merude halted three paces away. He could see more of that face, now. Edur features, more or less, yet white as snow. The eyes were… unnerving. Red as blood. ‘Then why do you block our path?’
‘You captured two Letherii two days back. They are mine.’
The Merude shrugged. ‘Then you should have kept them chained at night, friend. These Indebted will run at any opportunity. Fortunate for you that we captured them. Oh, yes-of course I will return them into your care. At least the girl-the man is an escaped slave from the Hiroth, or so his tattoos reveal. A Drowning awaits him, alas, but I will consider offering you a replacement. In any case, the girl, young as she is, is valuable. I trust you can manage the cost of retrieving her.’
‘I will take them both. And pay you nothing.’
Frowning, the Merude said, ‘You were careless in losing them. We were diligent in recapturing them. Accordingly, we expect compensation for our efforts, just as you should expect a certain cost for your carelessness.’
‘Unchain them,’ the stranger said.
‘No. What tribe are you?’ The eyes, still fixed unwavering upon his own, looked profoundly… dead. ‘What has happened to your skin?’ As dead as the Emperor’s. ‘What is your name?’
‘Unchain them now.’
The Merude shook his head, then he laughed-a little weakly-and waved his comrades forward as he began drawing his cutlass.
Disbelief at the absurdity of the challenge slowed his effort. The weapon was halfway out of its scabbard when one of the stranger’s longswords flashed clear of its sheath and opened the Edur’s throat.
Shouting in rage, the other five warriors drew their blades and rushed forward, while the ten Letherii soldiers quickly followed suit.
The stranger watched the leader crumple to the ground, blood spurting wild into the river mist descending onto the road. Then he unsheathed his other longsword and stepped to meet the five Edur. A clash of iron, and all at once the two Letherii weapons in the stranger’s hands were singing, a rising timbre with every blow they absorbed.
Two Edur stumbled back at the same time, both mortally wounded, one in the chest, the other with a third of his skull sliced away. This latter one turned away as the fighting continued, reaching down to collect the fragment of scalp and bone, then walked drunkenly back along the road.
Another Edur fell, his left leg cut out from beneath him. The remaining two quickly backed away, yelling at the Letherii who were now hesitating three paces behind the fight.
The stranger pressed forward. He parried a thrust from the Edur on the right with the longsword in his left hand-sliding the blade under then over, drawing it leftward before a twist of his wrist tore the weapon from the attacker’s hand; then a straight-arm thrust of his own buried his point in the Edur’s throat. At the same time he reached over with the longsword in his right hand, feinting high. The last Edur leaned back to avoid that probe, attempting a slash aimed at clipping the stranger’s wrist. But the longsword then deftly dipped, batting the cutlass away, even as the point drove up into the warrior’s right eye socket, breaking the delicate orbital bones on its way into the forebrain.
Advancing between the two falling Edur, the stranger cut down the nearest two Letherii-at which point the remaining eight broke and ran, past the wagons-where the drivers were themselves scrambling in panicked abandonment-and then alongside the row of staring prisoners. Running, flinging weapons away, down the road.
As one Letherii in particular moved opposite one of the slaves, a leg kicked out, tripping the man, and it seemed the chain-line writhed then, as the ambushing slave leapt atop the hapless Letherii, loose chain wrapping round the neck, before the slave pulled it taut. Legs kicked, arms thrashed and hands clawed, but the slave would not relent, and eventually the guard’s struggles ceased.
Silchas Ruin, the swords keening in his hands, walked up to where Udinaas continued strangling the corpse. ‘You can stop now,’ the albino Tiste Andii said.
‘I can,’ Udinaas said through clenched teeth, ‘but I won’t. This bastard was the worst of them. The worst.’
‘His soul even now drowns in the mist,’ Silchas Ruin said, turning as two figures emerged from the brush lining the ditch on the south side of the road.
‘Keep choking him,’ said Kettle, from where she was chained farther down the line. ‘He hurt me, that one.’
‘I know,’ Udinaas said in a grating voice. ‘I know.’
Silchas Ruin approached Kettle. ‘Hurt you. How?’
‘The usual way,’ she replied. ‘With the thing between his legs.’
‘And the other Letherii?’
The girl shook her head. ‘They just watched. Laughing, always laughing.’
Silchas Ruin turned as Seren Pedac arrived.
Seren was chilled by the look in the Tiste Andii’s uncanny eyes as Silchas Ruin said, ‘I will pursue the ones who flee, Acquitor. And rejoin you all before day’s end.’
She looked away, her gaze catching a momentary glimpse of Fear Sengar, standing over the corpses of the Merude Tiste Edur, then quickly on, to the rock-littered plain to the south-where still wandered the Tiste Edur who’d lost a third of his skull. But that sight as well proved too poignant. ‘Very well,’ she said, now squinting at the wagons and the horses standing in their yokes. ‘We will continue on this road.’
Udinaas had finally expended his rage on the Letherii body beneath him, and he rose to face her. ‘Seren Pedac, what of the rest of these slaves? We must free them all.’
She frowned. Exhaustion was making thinking difficult. Months and months of hiding, fleeing, eluding both Edur and Letherii; of finding their efforts to head eastward blocked again and again, forcing them ever northward, and the endless terror that lived within her, had driven all acuity from her thoughts. Free them. Yes. But then…
‘just more rumours,’ Udinaas said, as if reading her mind, as if finding her thoughts before she did. ‘There’s plenty of those, confusing our hunters. Listen, Seren, they already know where we are, more or less. And these slaves-they’ll do whatever they can to avoid recapture. We need not worry overmuch about them.’
She raised her brows. ‘You vouch for your fellow Indebted, Udinaas? All of whom will turn away from a chance to buy their way clear with vital information, yes?’
‘The only alternative, then,’ he said, eyeing her, ‘is to kill them all.’
The ones listening, the ones not yet beaten down into mindless automatons, suddenly raised their voices in proclamations and promises, reaching out towards Seren, chains rattling. The others looked up in fear, like myrid catching scent of a wolf they could not see. Some cried out, cowering in the stony mud of the road.
‘The first Edur he killed,’ said Udinaas, ‘has the keys.’
Silchas Ruin had walked down the road. Barely visible in the mist, the Tiste Andii veered into something huge, winged, then took to the air. Seren glanced over at the row of slaves-none had seen that, she was relieved to note. ‘Very well,’ she said in answer to Udinaas, and she walked up to where Fear Sengar still stood near the dead Edur.
‘I must take the keys,’ she said, crouching beside the first fallen Edur.
‘Do not touch him,’ Fear said.
She looked up at him. ‘The keys-the chains-’
‘I will find them,’ he said.
Nodding, she straightened, then stepped back. Watched as he spoke a silent prayer, then settled onto his knees beside the body. He found the keys in a leather pouch tied to the warrior’s belt, a pouch that also contained a handful of polished stones. Fear took the keys in his left hand and held the stones in the palm of his right. ‘These,’ he said, ‘are from the Merude shore. Likely he collected them when but a child.’
‘Children grow up,’ Seren said. ‘Even straight trees spawn crooked branches.’
‘And what was flawed in this warrior?’ Fear demanded, glaring up at her. ‘He followed my brother, as did every other warrior of the tribes.’
‘Some eventually turned away, Fear.’ Like you.
‘What I have turned away from lies in the shadow of-what I am now turned towards, Acquitor. Does this challenge my loyalty towards the Tiste Edur? My own kind? No. That is something all of you forget, conveniently so, again and again. Understand me, Acquitor. I will hide if I must, but I will not kill my own people. We had the coin, we could have bought their freedom-’
‘Not Udinaas.’
He bared his teeth, said nothing.
Yes, Udinaas, the one man you dream of killing. If not for Silchas Ruin… ‘Fear Sengar,’ she said. ‘You have chosen to travel with us, and there can be no doubt-none at all-that Silchas Ruin commands this meagre party. Dislike his methods if you must, but he alone will see you through. You know this.’
The Hiroth warrior looked away, back down the road, blinking the water from his eyes. ‘And with each step, the cost of my quest becomes greater-an indebtedness you should well understand, Acquitor. The Letherii way of living, the burdens you can never escape. Nor purchase your way clear.’
She reached out for the keys.
He set them into her hand, unwilling to meet her eyes.
We’re no different from those slaves. She hefted the weight of the jangling iron in her hand. Chained together. Yet… who holds the means of our release?
‘Where has he gone?’ Fear asked.
‘To hunt down the Letherii. I trust you do not object to that.’
‘No, but you should, Acquitor.’
I suppose I should at that. She set off to where waited the slaves.
A prisoner near Udinaas had crawled close to him, and Seren heard his whispered question: ‘That tall slayer-was that the White Crow? He was, wasn’t he? I have heard-’
‘You have heard nothing,’ Udinaas said, raising his arms as Seren approached. ‘The three-edged one,’ he said to her. ‘Yes, that one. Errant take us, you took your time.’
She worked the key until the first shackle clicked open. ‘You two were supposed to be stealing from a farm-not getting rounded up by slave-trackers.’
‘Trackers camped on the damned grounds-no-one was smiling on us that night.’
She opened the other shackle and Udinaas stepped out from the line, rubbing at the red weals round his wrists. Seren said, ‘Fear sought to dissuade Silchas-you know, if those two are any indication, it’s no wonder the Edur and the Andii fought ten thousand wars.’
Udinaas grunted as the two made their way to where stood Kettle. ‘Fear resents his loss of command,’ he said. That it is to a Tiste Andii just makes it worse. He’s still not convinced the betrayal was the other way round all those centuries back; that it was Scabandari who first drew the knife.’
Seren Pedac said nothing. As she moved in front of Kettle she looked down at the girl’s dirt-smeared face, the ancient eyes slowly, lifting to meet her own.
Kettle smiled. ‘I missed you.’
‘How badly were you used?’ Seren asked as she removed the large iron shackles.
‘I can walk. And the bleeding’s stopped. That’s a good sign, isn’t it?’
‘Probably.’ But this talk of rape was unwelcome-Seren had her own memories haunting her every waking moment. ‘There will be scars, Kettle.’
‘Being alive is hard. I’m always hungry, and my feet hurt.’
1 hate children with secrets-especially ones with secrets they’re not even aware of. Find the right questions; there’s no other way of doing this. ‘What else bothers you about being among the living again, Kettle?’ And… how? Why?
‘Feeling small.’
Seren’s right arm was plucked by a slave, an old man who reached out for the keys with pathetic hope in his eyes. She handed them to him. ‘Free the others,’ she said. He nodded vigorously, scrabbling at his shackles. ‘Now,’ Seren said to Kettle, ‘that’s a feeling we all must accept. Too much of the world defies our efforts to conform to what would please us. To live is to know dissatisfaction and frustration.’
‘I still want to tear out throats, Seren. Is that bad? I think it must be.’
At Kettle’s words, the old man shrank away, redoubling his clumsy attempts at releasing himself. Behind him a woman cursed with impatience.
Udinaas had climbed onto the bed of the lead wagon and was busy looting it for whatever they might.need. Kettle scrambled to join him.
‘We need to move out of this mist,’ Seren muttered. ‘I’m soaked through.’ She walked towards the wagon. ‘Hurry up with that, you two. If more company finds us here, we could be in trouble.’ Especially now that Silchas Ruin is gone. The Tiste Andii had been the singular reason for their survival thus far. When hiding and evading the searchers failed, his two swords found voice, the eerie song of obliteration. The White Crow.
It had been a week since they last caught sight of Edur and Letherii who were clearly hunters. Seeking the traitor, Fear Sengar. Seeking the betrayer, Udinaas. Yet Seren Pedac was bemused-there should have been entire armies chasing them. While the pursuit was persistent, it was dogged rather than ferocious in its execution. Silchas had mentioned, once, in passing, that the Emperor’s K’risnan were working ritual sorceries, the kind that sought to lure and trap. And that snares awaited them to the east, and round Letheras itself. She could understand those to the east, for it was the wild lands beyond the empire that had been their destination all along, where Fear-for some reason he did not care to explain-believed he would find what he sought; a belief that Silchas Ruin did not refute. But to surround the capital city itself baffled Seren. As if Rhulad is frightened of his brother.
Udinaas leapt down from the lead wagon and made his way to the second one. ‘I found coin,’ he said. ‘Lots. We should take these horses, too-we can sell them once we’re down the other side of the pass.’
‘There is a fort at the pass,’ Seren said. ‘It may be un-garrisoned, but there’s no guarantee of that, Udinaas. If we arrive with horses-and they recognize them…’
‘We go round that fort,’ he replied. ‘At night. Unseen.’
She frowned, wiped water from her eyes. ‘Easier done without horses. Besides, these beasts are old, too broken-they won’t earn us much, especially in Bluerose. And when Wyval returns they’ll probably die of terror.’
‘Wyval’s not coming back,’ Udinaas said, turning away, his voice grating. ‘Wyval’s gone, and that’s that.’
She knew she should not doubt him. The dragon-spawn’s spirit had dwelt within him, after all. Yet there was no obvious explanation for the winged beast’s sudden disappearance, at least none that Udinaas would share. Wyval had been gone for over a month.
Udinaas swore from where he crouched atop the bed of the wagon. ‘Nothing here but weapons.’
‘Weapons?’
‘Swords, shields and armour.’
‘Letherii?’
‘Yes. Middling quality.’
‘What were these slavers doing with a wagon load of weapons?’
Shrugging, he climbed back down, hurried past her and began unhitching the horses. ‘These beasts would’ve had a hard time on the ascent.’
‘Silchas Ruin is coming back,’ Kettle said, pointing down the road.
‘That was fast.’
Udinaas laughed harshly, then said, ‘The fools should have scattered, made him hunt each one down separately. Instead, they probably regrouped, like the stupid good soldiers they were.’
From near the front wagon, Fear Sengar spoke. Your Mood is very thin, Udinaas, isn’t it?’
‘Like water,’ the ex-slave replied.
For Errant’s sake, Fear, he did not choose to abandon your brother. You know that. Nor is he responsible for Rhulad’s madness. So how much of your hatred for Udinaas comes from guilt! Who truly is to blame for Rhuladl For the Emperor of a Thousand Deaths?
The white-skinned Tiste Andii strode from the mists, an apparition, his black cloak glistening like snakeskin.
Swords sheathed once more, muting their cries-iron voices reluctant to fade, they would persist for days, now. How she hated that sound.
Tanal Yathvanar stood looking down at the naked woman on his bed. The questioners had worked hard on her, seeking the answers they wanted. She was badly broken, her skin cut and burned, her joints swollen and mottled with bruises. She had been barely conscious when he’d used her last night. This was easier than whores, and cost him nothing besides. He wasn’t much interested in beating his women, just in seeing them beaten. He understood his desire was perversion, but this organization-the Patriotists-was the perfect haven for people like him. Power and immunity, a most deadly combination. He suspected that Karos Invictad was well aware of Tanal’s nightly escapades, and held that knowledge like a sheathed knife.
It’s not as if I’ve killed her. It’s not as if she’ll even remember this. She’s destined for the Drownings in any case-what matter if I take some pleasure first? Soldiers do the same. He had dreamed of being a soldier once, years ago, when in his youth he had held to misguided, romantic notions of heroism and unconstrained freedom, as if the first justified the second. There had been many noble killers in the history of Lether. Gerun Eberict had been such a man. He’d murdered thousands-thieves, thugs and wastrels, the depraved and the destitute. He had cleansed the streets of Letheras, and who had not indulged in the rewards? Fewer beggars, fewer pickpockets, fewer homeless and all the other decrepit failures of the modern age. Tanal admired Gerun Eberict-he had been a great man. Murdered by a thug, his skull crushed to pulp-a tragic loss, senseless and cruel.
One day we shall find that killer.
He turned away from the unconscious woman, adjusted’ his light tunic so that the shoulder seams were even and straight, then closed the clasps of his weapon belt. One of the Invigilator’s requirements for all officers of the I’atriotists: belt, dagger and shortsword. Tanal liked the weight of them, the authority implicit in the privilege of wearing arms where all other Letherii-barring soldiers-were forbidden by proclamation of the Emperor.
As if we might rebel. The damned fool thinks he won that war. They all do. Dimwitted barbarians.
Tanal Yathvanar walked to the door, stepped out into the corridor, and made his way towards the Invigilator’s office. The second bell after midday sounded a moment before he knocked on the door. A murmured invitation bade him enter.
He found Rautos Hivanar, Master of the Liberty Consign, already seated opposite Karos Invictad. The large man seemed to fill half the room, and Tanal noted that the Invigilator had pushed his own chair as far back as possible, so that it was tilted against the sill of the window. In this space on his side of the desk, Karos attempted a posture of affable comfort.
‘Tanal, our guest is being most insistent with respect to his suspicions. Sufficient to convince me that we must devote considerable attention to finding the source of the threat.’
‘Invigilator, is the intent sedition or treason, or are we dealing with a thief?’
‘A thief, I should think,’ Karos replied, glancing over at Rautos Hivanar.
The man’s cheeks bulged, before he released a slow sigh. ‘I am not so sure. On the surface, we appear to be facing an obsessive individual, consumed by greed and, accordingly, hoarding wealth. But only as actual coin, and this is why it IS proving so difficult to find a trail. No properties, no “Mentation, no flouting of privilege. Now, as subtle consequence, the shortage of coin is finally noticeable, true, no actual damage to the empire’s financial structure has occurred. Yet. But, if the depletion continues,’ he shook his head, ‘we will begin to feel the strain.’
Tinal cleared his throat, then asked, ‘Master, have you assigned agents of your own to investigate the situation?’
Rautos frowned. ‘The Liberty Consign thrives precisely because its members hold to the conviction of being the most powerful players in an unassailable system. Confidence is a most fragile quality, Tanal Yathvanar. Granted, a few who deal specifically in finances have brought to me their concerns. Druz Thennict, Barrakta Ilk, for example. But there is nothing as yet formalized-no true suspicion that something is awry. Neither man is a fool, however.’ He glanced out of the window behind Karos Invictad. ‘The investigation must be conducted by the Patriotists, in utmost secrecy.’ The heavy-lidded eyes lowered, settling on the Invigilator. ‘I understand that you have been targeting academics and scholars of late.’
A modest shrug and lift of the brows from Karos Invictad. ‘The many paths of treason.’
‘Some are members of established and respected families in Lether.’
‘No, Rautos, not the ones we have arrested.’
‘True, but those unfortunate victims have friends, Invigilator, who have in turn appealed to me.’
‘Well, my friend, this is delicate indeed. You tread now on the thinnest skin of ground, with naught but mud beneath.’ He sat forward, folding his hands on the desk. ‘But I shall look into it nonetheless. Perhaps the recent spate of arrests has succeeded in quelling the disenchantment among the learned, or at least culled the most egregious of their lot.’
‘Thank you, Invigilator… Now, who will conduct you investigation?’
‘Why, I will attend to this personally.’
‘Venitt Sathad, my assistant who awaits in the courtyarc below, can serve as liaison between your organization and myself for this week; thereafter, I will assign someone else.’
‘Very good. Weekly reports should suffice, at least to start.’
‘Agreed.’
Rautos Hivanar rose, and after a moment Karos Invictad followed suit.
The office was suddenly very cramped, and Tanal edged back, angry at the intimidation he felt instinctively rising within him. I have nothing to fear from Rautos Hivanar. Nor Karos. I am their confidant, the both of them. They trust me.
Karos Invictad was a step behind Rautos, one hand on the man’s back as the Master opened the door. As soon as Rautos stepped into the hallway, Karos smiled and said a few last words to the man, who grunted in reply, and then the Invigilator closed the door and turned to face Tanal.
‘One of those well-respected academics is now staining your sheets, Yathvanar.’
Tanal blinked. ‘Sir, she was sentenced to the Drowning-’
‘Revoke the punishment. Get her cleaned up.’
‘Sir, it may well be that she will recall-’
‘A certain measure of restraint,’ Karos Invictad said in a Cold tone, ‘is required from you, Tanal Yathvanar. Arrest some daughters of-those already in chains, damn you, and have your fun with them. Am I understood?’
‘Y-yes sir. If she remembers-’
‘Then restitution will be necessary, won’t it? I trust you keep your own finances in order, Yathvanar. Now, begone horn my sight.’
As Tanal closed the door behind him, he struggled to draw breath. The bastard. There was no warning off her, was there! Whose mistake was all this? Yet, you think to make me pay /or it. All of it. Blade and Axe take you, Invictad, I won’t suffer alone.
I won’t.
‘I depravity holds a certain fascination, don’t you think?’
‘No.’
‘After all, the sicker the soul, the sweeter its comeuppance.’
‘Assuming there is one.’
‘There’s a centre point, I’m sure of it. And it should b dead centre, by my calculations. Perhaps the fulcrum itself is flawed.’
‘What calculations?’
‘Well, the ones I asked you to do for me, of course. Where are they?’
‘They’re on my list.’
‘And how do you calculate the order of your list?’
‘That’s not the calculation you asked for.’
‘Good point. Anyway, if he’d just hold all his legs still, we could properly test my hypothesis.’
‘He doesn’t want to, and I can see why. You’re trying to balance him at the mid-point of his body, but he’s designed to hold that part up, with all those legs.’
‘Are those formal observations? If so, make a note.’
‘On what? We had the wax slab for lunch.’
‘No wonder I feel I could swallow a cow with nary hiccough. Look! Hah! He’s perched! Perfectly perched!’
Both men leaned in to examine Ezgara, the insect with a head at each end. Not unique, of course, there were plenty around these days, filling some arcane niche in the compli-cated miasma of nature, a niche that had been vacant for countless millennia. The creature’s broken-twig legs kicked out helplessly.
‘You’re torturing him,’ said Bugg, ‘with clear depravity Tehol.’
‘It only seems that way’
‘No, it is that way.’
‘All right, then.’ Tehol reached down and plucked the hapless insect from the fulcrum. Its heads swivelled about, Anyway,’ he said as he peered closely at the creature, ‘that wasn’t the depravity I was talking about. How goes the construction business, by the way?’
‘Sinking fast.’
‘Ah. Is that an affirmation or decried destitution?’
‘We’re running out of buyers. No hard coin, and I’m done with credit, especially when it turns out the developers can’t sell the properties. So I’ve had to lay everyone off, including myself.’
‘When did all this happen?’
‘Tomorrow.’
‘Typical. I’m always the last to hear. Is Ezgara hungry, do you think?’
He ate more wax than you did-where do you think all the waste goes?’
‘His or mine?’
‘Master, I already know where yours goes, and if Biri ever finds out-’
‘Not another word, Bugg. Now, by my observations, and according to the notations you failed to make, Ezgara has consumed food equivalent in weight to a drowned cat. Yet he remains tiny, spry, fit, and thanks to our wax lunch today his heads no longer squeak when they swivel, which I take to be a good sign, since now we won’t be woken up a hundred times a night.’
‘Master.’
‘Yes?’
‘I low do you know how much a drowned cat weighs?’
‘Selush, of course.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘You must remember. Three years ago. That feral cat netted in the Rinnesict Estate, the one raping a flightless ornamental duck. It was sentenced to Drowning.’
‘A terrible demise for a cat. Yes, I remember now. The yowl heard across the city’
That’s the one. Some unnamed benefactor took pity on the sodden feline corpse, paying Selush a small fortune to dress the beast for proper burial.’
‘You must be mad. Who would do that and why?’
‘Tor ulterior motives, obviously. I wanted to know how much a drowned cat weighs, of course. Otherwise, how valid the comparison? Descriptively, I’ve been waiting to use it for years.’
Three.’
‘No, much longer. Hence my curiosity, and opportunism., Prior to that cat’s watery end, I feared voicing the comparison, which, lacking veracity on my part, would invite ridicule.’
‘You’re a tender one, aren’t you?’- ‘Don’t tell anyone.’
‘Master, about those vaults.’
‘What about them?’
‘I think extensions are required.’
Tehol used the tip of his right index finger to stroke thej insect’s back-or, alternatively, rub it the wrong way. ‘Already? Well, how far under the river are you right now?’
‘More than halfway.’
‘And that is how many?’
‘Vaults? Sixteen. Each one three man-heights by two.’
‘All filled?’
‘All.’
‘Oh. So presumably it’s starting to hurt.’
‘Bugg’s Construction will be the first major enterprise to collapse.’
‘And how many will it drag down with it?’
‘No telling. Three, maybe four.’
‘I thought you said there was no telling.’
‘So don’t tell anyone.’
‘Good idea. Bugg, I need you to build me a box, to very specific specifications which I’ll come up with later.’
‘A box, Master. Wood good enough?’
‘What kind of sentence is that? Would good enough.’
‘No, wood, you know, the burning kind.’
‘Yes, would that wood will do.’
‘Size?’
‘Absolutely. But no lid.’
‘Finally, you’re getting specific.’
‘I told you I would.’
‘What’s this box for, Master?’
‘I can’t tell you, alas. Not specifically. But I need it soon.’
‘About the vaults…’
‘Make ten more, Bugg. Double the size. As for Bugg’s Construction, hold on for a while longer, amass debt, evade the creditors, keep purchasing materials and stockpiling them in storage buildings charging exorbitant rent. Oh, and embezzle all you can.’
‘I’ll lose my head.’
‘Don’t worry. Ezgara here has one to spare.’
‘Why, thank you.’
‘ Doesn’t even squeak, either.’
That’s a relief. What are you doing now, Master?’
‘What’s it look like?’
‘You’re going back to bed.’
‘And you need to build a box, Bugg, a most clever box. Remember, though, no lid.’
‘Can I at least ask what it’s for?’
Tehol settled back on his bed, studied the blue sky over-head for a moment, then smiled over at his manservant-who just happened to be an Elder God. ‘Why, comeuppance, Bugg, what else?’