Return of the Crimson Guard (25 page)

‘Educating you,’ he said. But his eyes were on Amaron and the smile that had been playing about his mouth was gone. It seemed to Ghelel that the man was now uncertain of something.
He's wondering why Amaron is letting him talk!
Yes, she had been wondering as well. She drew strength from the man's doubt.

‘Yes? To what end?’

The Claw laughed his derision. ‘You stupid child! Can't you see you'll end up exactly like her? You say you hate Laseen yet to succeed in the path you have chosen you must pick up the tools of power – the very tools you pretend to scorn!’

Amaron cleared his throat. ‘That's enough, I think. M'Lady … ?’

‘Yes.’ Ghelel pulled a hand across her face. Yes, more than enough. She turned and left the cell. The Claw did not call after her. Amaron locked the cell and followed. At the stairs, she stopped and stood waiting, hugging herself. He stopped as well and studied her with what she thought a dispassionate evaluative gaze.

‘Why did you allow that? Why not have him killed?’

A slow thoughtful shrug. ‘You would have heard this accusation eventually. Better directly now than whisperings later when you
might wonder if I had tried to cover it up. This way there is a chance – a small chance – that you might come to trust me.’

Right now she could hardly trust herself to speak. ‘You play a dangerous game, Amaron,’ she managed, her voice dry and hoarse. He was a solid shape in the darkness, silent for a time.

‘That is the only kind worth playing.’

Ghelel studied the man, his aged, lined dark face that had seen, what, a century of service? Yes, she could see how the old ogre must've liked this one. ‘No killings in my name, Amaron. That I will not allow.’ He frowned, considering.

‘Hard to guarantee. But I will promise this – I'll ask first.’

Ghelel hugged herself even more tightly, as if afraid of what might happen should she let go. ‘Yes. You can ask. But I swear. Not the way it used to be. It will not be like that.’

Amaron nodded. And as Ghelel climbed the stairs, still hugging herself, it seemed to her that in the man's slow assent she read the surety on his part that, eventually, things would slide that way – if only through their own accumulating weight.
Please Burn and Fanderay preserve her from that! Please preserve her!

* * *

The night of the meeting, Hurl watched Storo push himself from his seat in the Rod and Sceptre after the gongs of the wandering street watch rang the half-night call. The squad had all cleared out long before then. No sense hanging around exactly where anyone watching would want you to be. She and Sunny had a corner across the way, eyeing the Cap'n as he wandered – well, swayed, really – drunk as a Dal Hon trader up the street. They followed far back.

Sunny and me, we're army sappers, she reflected. What in Hood's name do we know about following people and bein’ sneaky ‘n’ all? Truth is – nothing. Zilch. But then we're not supposed to be
successful.
We're the stalking horse. Leastways, that was how Silk explained it once. We're here because the people watching expect someone to be here, and so here we are. Simple. Ha. Truth is, she wouldn't be here at all if it weren't for the fact that Sunny was the meanest saboteur in a fight any of them knew and she's the only one he'll listen to.

Sunny tapped Hurl on the arm, motioned ahead; the Captain was heading west around the main curve of the Outer Round to the Idryn River. They slowed their pace to keep the distance. The Round
wasn't nearly as quiet or deserted as Hurl imagined it would be at this hour. This section of the way was a run-down night market. Torches burned at stalls and at the open doors of inns and taverns. Benches and stools spilled out across the cobbles holding the most resilient drunks while she and Sunny stepped over the less hardy. Whores called from fires at tall iron braziers. Their ages looked to Hurl to vary directly with their distance from the light. Some shops appeared to never close: a blacksmith hammered on into the night. The lonesome ringing reminded Hurl of her youth in Cawn, her own father downstairs hunched over, tapping at his smithing. A sound that ached of sadness and waste to her. A lifetime of sweat and scrimping wiped away by a noble who refused his debts, leaving her family imprisoned. Joining up or whoring had been the only two legal choices left for her – that was, if she didn't want to starve.

They passed a Seti horse-minder standing watch with his sons over his charges all roped together while a pack of the mongrel Seti dogs roamed the Round snarling at everyone. In the chaos it seemed a miracle to Hurl that they didn't lose the Captain, but the man was making no effort to hide.

All around them in the dark she imagined a constant dance of positions and vantages. Silk was out there in the night, maybe overhead on the domed rooftops these Heng architects seemed to favour. Jalor and Rell were also following, but on a far lower profile – Jalor because that son of the Seven Cities could move like a cat, while Rell, well, that guy was just amazing – none of the squad could figure out why he was wasting his time with them. Storo had tried to promote him more times than Hurl could recall but he wasn't having it. The young fellow would just look away all shamefaced whenever the subject of promotion or commendation came up. As for Shaky, Hurl suspected the bastard had just plain slunk off on everyone like he always did.

Now, Hurl knew the Captain was on his way to meet a crew he'd warned them was the ruthless gang of pirates he'd started out with long ago. A gang he said was outlawed by the Empress. Were they watching to see whether Storo had reported the contact to Fist Rheena? Hurl's back itched trying this alley-work. This was Silk's trade, not hers.

‘They're gonna try to turn him,’ she whispered to Sunny as the Captain angled on to the main way to the riverfront warehouses. Sunny grunted his assent. ‘Will he, do you think?’

‘Will he what?’ Sunny growled.

‘Turn.’

Sunny pulled Hurl to a plaster wall. Tut it this way,’ he said, smiling his toothy leer, and he opened the cloak he wore over his armour. Pockets and bags held sharpers, cussors, smokers, crackers and burners – their entire treasure hoard, piled up over the years.

She gaped. ‘Dammitall! When did you dig them up?’

‘Right after you turned your back.’ He closed the cloak. ‘That's your problem, Hurl. You're too trusting.’ He grinned again. ‘Need me to take care of you.’

Hurl thought of her own two measly sharpers. ‘Well, hand some over!’

He pushed himself from the wall. ‘Cap'n's gettin’ too far ahead …’

Clamping down hard on her urge to cuff the bastard, she followed with hands tight and hot on the grip of the crossbow she carried flat under her cloak. Grisan scum! How dare he! Then she slowed, thinking,
He'd taken all of it?
Truthfully? What a hole that would make. Maybe take out an entire fortress …

Ahead, the Captain yanked open a slim door to a gable-roofed warehouse and disappeared inside. A faint glow of lantern-light shone from its barred windows. Sunny edged his way down a side alley. Hurl followed, her back itching worse than ever: wouldn't whoever was waiting inside have sentinels on the roof armed with bows? Swordsmen posted in the alley? Sunny didn't hesitate, but then he never did. Even on the battlefield. He waved her to a narrow side-door, rolled his eyes. It was secured by a bronze lock-plate bolted to planks with an iron padlock. Solid enough for everyday. Whoever was inside might even feel confident of its strength. But against a trained Malazan engineer armed with Moranth alchemicals it was a joke. Hurl took out her tools.

While she worked Hurl thought again of her father. He'd been a smith. A whitesmith specializing in acid etching. She'd been his unofficial apprentice all her youth – unofficial because of course no girl could apprentice. Never mind she was ten times better at the work than her doltish brothers. At least, she thought, he'd given her that much – if only that. She brought those skills with her when she signed up and the Malazans shipped her fast as they could to the engineering academy. There the instructors introduced her to Moranth alchemy and it was love at first smell.

The most dilute mixture Hurl could manage on the spot did the job. She gave Sunny the nod and he levered a knife-blade into the wood surrounding the lock-plate. It gave like wet leather. He had to fight a bit at the end to open the door as the planks were thick and the acid barely weakened the innermost finger's breadth. All the
while Hurl covered the alley with her crossbow, wondering why they weren't yet full of arrows. This wasn't how she'd be guarding some kind of secret meet.

Sunny hissed to wave her in. She pulled the door closed behind them. They were in a thin passage between crates and barrels piled almost as high as the ceiling. The light was a weak wash of distant lanterns and starlight from high barred windows. Glaring, Sunny raised his knife. Pitting and staining marred the iron blade. She shrugged, mouthed, ‘Shoulda used an old one.’

Sunny took breath to snarl something but Hurl motioned to the maze of passages ahead and that silenced him. Grumbling far beneath his breath, he took the lead. Hurl smiled – just the way she wanted him for a fight, feeling ornery.

Voices murmured ahead from the dark. They edged closer. Hurl's back was on fire now. No way they should have been able to get this close. They must be walking into an ambush. She was about to signal Sunny when he stopped before a turn in the passage. He pointed up. Hurl studied the stacked crates –
possible.
It looked possible. She let her crossbow hang from the strap around her neck and one shoulder. She unpinned and dropped her cloak. A twist and the weapon hung at her back. Sunny covered her while she heaved herself up to the first slim ledge.

The climb itself was easy but she took it slowly, trying to be as quiet as she could. As it was, she was sure everyone in the blasted echoing warehouse heard her. At the top she lay flat, surprised that no one had been there to greet her with a thrust in the face. Where was everyone? Had they called it off?

While Sunny climbed Hurl unslung the crossbow and exchanged the bolt for one set with a sharper at its head. Reaching the top, Sunny crouched, drew his twinned long-knives. The crates rocked and creaked alarmingly beneath them. He lifted his chin to the centre of the long barn-like building and carefully made his way forward. Hurl followed, crouched as low as she could. The rafters loomed from the dark just above. They stank of tar and dust and bat droppings and trailed cobwebs that caught at Hurl's shoulders. Talking echoed from below much more clearly now; she could make out the odd word, recognize Storo's voice. Sunny lay down at the cliff-edge of their long rectangular island of stacked goods. Hurl lay beside him, peeked over the wooden lip.

In a central cleared square of bare beaten earth the Captain was leaning on a barrel and facing two men and a woman. No one Hurl knew. To her they looked seasoned, especially a silver-haired Dal
Honese fellow as broad across the beam as they come. ‘Captain now, is it?’ the big Dal Hon was saying. And he whistled. ‘My, my. Coming up in the world, are we?’

The Captain was just looking down, giving his half-smile, and rubbing his hand over his nearly bald head the way Hurl knew he did when he was dismissing what you're saying but didn't want you to know it.

‘I would have seen you a commander, Storo. You know that. A Fist even. We reward talent. That's
our
way. If your father hadn't gone down off Genabaris he'd be standing here right now saying the same thing.’

‘She
has talent,’ the Captain said, still looking down. The three strangers exchanged glances. The woman signed something to the Dal Hon fellow. Looking closer Hurl saw that though slim and sword-straight, she was an older gal herself. This crew was what in Imperial service everyone referred to as
Old Hands
and the little hairs on Hurl's arms prickled at the thought of just what they might be facing here. And what of the Captain? He knew this crew. Just what had
he
been hiding all this time?

The Dal Honese hooked his meaty hands under his arms, sighed. ‘Look, Storo. We need to know tonight. Now. For old times’ sake we've gone out of our way here. But all that only goes so far. We want you – could really use you – but we need to know.’

The Captain pulled a hand down his face to rub his unshaven jowls, grimaced. He shrugged. ‘I think you know the answer already, Orlat…’

Orlat!
Familiar, thought Hurl. She just couldn't place it. In any case, Orlat was nodding. He looked genuinely regretful himself. ‘Yeah. I know. I was just hoping you'd come to your senses. I'm sorry it has to be this way