The Blade Itself Read online

  The horse stopped and snorted, shied and took a hesitant step back. Logen sniffed the air and frowned. There were men nearby, and badly washed ones. He should have noticed it sooner but his attention had been on his feet. Quai looked down at him. ‘What is it?’

  As if in answer a man stepped out from behind a tree perhaps ten strides ahead, another a little further down the road. They were scum, without a doubt. Dirty, bearded, dressed in ragged bits of mismatched fur and leather. Not, on the whole, unlike Logen. The skinny one on the left had a spear with a barbed head. The big one on the right had a heavy sword speckled with rust, and an old dented helmet with a spike on top. They moved forward, grinning. There was a sound behind and Logen looked over his shoulder, his heart sinking. A third man, with a big boil on his face, was making his way cautiously down the road toward them, a heavy wood axe in his hands.

  Quai leaned down from his saddle, eyes wide with fear. ‘Are they bandits?’

  ‘You’re the fucking seer,’ hissed Logen through gritted teeth.

  They stopped a stride or two in front. The one with the helmet seemed to be in charge. ‘Nice horse,’ he growled. ‘Would you lend it to us?’ The one with the spear grinned as he took hold of the bridle.

  Things had taken a turn for the worse alright. A moment ago that had hardly seemed possible, but fate had found a way. Logen doubted that Quai would be much use in a fight. That left him alone against three or more, and with only a knife. If he did nothing him and Malacus would end up robbed, and more than likely killed. You have to be realistic about these things.

  He looked the three bandits over again. They didn’t expect a fight, not from two unarmed men—the spear was sideways on, the sword pointed at the ground. He didn’t know about the axe, so he’d have to trust to luck with that one. It’s a sorry fact that the man who strikes first usually strikes last, so Logen turned to the one with the helmet and spat the spirit in his face.

  It ignited in the air and pounced on him hungrily. His head burst into spitting flames, the sword clattered to the ground. He clawed desperately at his face and his arms caught fire as well. He reeled screaming away.

  Quai’s horse startled at the flames and reared up, snorting. The skinny man stumbled back with a gasp and Logen leaped at him, grabbed the shaft of the spear with one hand and butted him in the face. His nose crunched against Logen’s forehead and he staggered away with blood streaming down his chin. Logen jerked him back with the spear, swung his right arm round in a wide arc and punched him in the neck. He went down with a gurgle and Logen tore the spear from his hands.

  He felt movement behind him and dropped to the ground, rolling away to his left. The axe whistled through the air above his head and cut a long slash in the horse’s side, spattering drops of blood across the ground and ripping the buckle on the saddle girth open. Boil-face tottered away, spinning around after his axe. Logen sprang at him but his ankle twisted on a stone and he tottered like a drunkard, yelping at the pain. An arrow hummed past his face from somewhere in the trees behind and was lost in the bushes on the other side of the road. The horse snorted and kicked, eyes rolling madly, then took off down the road at a crazy gallop. Malacus Quai wailed as the saddle slid off its back and he was flung into the bushes.

  There was no time to think about him. Logen charged at the axe-man with a roar, aiming the spear at his heart. He brought his axe up in time to nudge the point away, but not far enough. The spear spitted him through the shoulder, spun him round. There was a sharp crack as the shaft snapped, Logen lost his balance and pitched forward, bearing Boil-face down into the road. The spear-point sticking out of his back cut a deep gash into Logen’s scalp as he fell on top of him. Logen seized hold of the axe-man’s matted hair with both hands, pulled his head back and mashed his face into a rock.

  He lurched to his feet, head spinning, wiping blood out of his eyes just in time to see an arrow zip out of the trees and thud into a trunk a stride or two away. Logen hurtled at the archer. He saw him now, a boy no more than fourteen, reaching for another arrow. Logen pulled out his knife. The boy was nocking the arrow to his bow, but his eyes were wide with panic. He fumbled the string and drove the arrow through his hand, looking greatly surprised.

  Logen was on him. The boy swung the bow at him but he ducked below it and jumped forward, driving the knife up with both hands. The blade caught the boy under the chin and lifted him into the air, then snapped off in his neck. He dropped on top of Logen, the jagged shard of the knife cutting a long gash in his arm. Blood splattered everywhere, from the cut on Logen’s head, from the cut on Logen’s arm, from the gaping wound in the boy’s throat.

  He shoved the corpse away, staggered against a tree and gasped for breath. His heart was pounding, the blood roaring in his ears, his stomach turning over. ‘I am still alive,’ he whispered, ‘I am still alive.’ The cuts on his head and his arm were starting to throb. Two more scars. It could have been a lot worse. He scraped the blood from his eyes and limped back to the road.

  Malacus Quai was standing, staring ashen-faced at the three corpses. Logen took him by the shoulders, looked him up and down. ‘You hurt?’

  Quai only stared at the bodies. ‘Are they dead?’

  The corpse of the big one with the helmet was still smoking, making a disgustingly appetising smell. He had a good pair of boots on, Logen noticed, a lot better than his own. The one with the boil had his neck turned too far around to be alive, that and he had the broken spear through him. Logen rolled the skinny one over with his foot. He still had a look of surprise on his bloody face, eyes staring up at the sky, mouth open.

  ‘Must’ve crushed his windpipe,’ muttered Logen. His hands were covered in blood. He grabbed one with the other to stop them from trembling.

  ‘What about the one in the trees?’

  Logen nodded. ‘What happened to the horse?’

  ‘Gone,’ muttered Quai hopelessly. ‘What do we do?’

  ‘We see if they’ve got any food.’ Logen pointed to the smoking corpse. ‘And you help me get his boots off.’

  Fencing Practice

  ‘Press him, Jezal, press him! Don’t be shy!’

  Jezal was only too willing to oblige. He sprang forward, lunging with his right. West was already off balance and he stumbled back, all out of form, only just managing to parry with his short steel. They were using half-edged blades today, to add a little danger to the proceedings. You couldn’t really stab a man with one, but you could give him a painful scratch or two, if you tried hard enough. Jezal intended to give the Major a scratch for yesterday’s humiliation.

  ‘That’s it, give him hell! Jab, jab, Captain! Jab, jab!’

  West made a clumsy cut, but Jezal saw it coming and swatted the steel aside, still pressing forward, jabbing for all he was worth. He slashed with the left, and again. West blocked desperately, staggered back against the wall. Jezal had him at last. He cackled with glee as he lunged forward again with the long steel, but his opponent had come suddenly and surprisingly alive. West slipped away, shoved the lunge aside with disappointing firmness. Jezal stumbled forward, off balance, gave a shocked gasp as the point of his sword found a gap between two stones and his steel was wrenched out of his numb hand, lodged there wobbling in the wall.

  West darted forward, ducked inside Jezal’s remaining blade and slammed into him with his shoulder. ‘Ooof,’ said Jezal as he staggered back and crashed to the floor, fumbling his short steel. It skittered across the stones and Lord Marshal Varuz caught it smartly under his foot. The blunted point of West’s sword hovered over Jezal’s throat.

  ‘Damn it!’ he cursed, as the grinning Major offered him his hand.

  ‘Yes,’ murmured Varuz with a deep sigh, ‘damn it indeed. An even more detestable performance than yesterday’s, if that’s possible! You let Major West make a fool of you again!’ Jezal slapped West’s hand away with a scowl and got to his feet. ‘He never once lost control of that bout! You allowed yourself to be drawn in, and then disar
med! Disarmed! My grandson would not have made that mistake, and he is eight years old!’ Varuz whacked at the floor with his stick. ‘Explain to me please, Captain Luthar, how you will win a fencing match from a prone position, and without your steels?’

  Jezal sulked and rubbed the back of his head.

  ‘No? In future, if you fall off a cliff carrying your steels, I want to see you smashed to bits at the bottom, gripping them tightly in your dead fingers, do you hear me?’

  ‘Yes, Marshal Varuz,’ mumbled a sullen Jezal, wishing the old bastard would take a tumble off a cliff himself. Or perhaps the Tower of Chains. That would be adequate. Maybe Major West could join him.

  ‘Over-confidence is a curse to the swordsman! You must treat every opponent as though he will be your last. As for your footwork,’ and Varuz curled his lip with disgust, ‘fine and fancy coming forward, but put you on the back foot and you quite wither away. The Major only had to tap you and you fell down like a fainting schoolgirl.’

  West grinned across at him. He was loving this. Absolutely loving it, damn him.

  ‘They say Bremer dan Gorst has a back leg like a pillar of steel. A pillar of steel they say! It would be easier to knock down the House of the Maker than him.’ The Lord Marshal pointed over at the outline of the huge tower, looming up over the buildings of the courtyard. ‘The House of the Maker!’ he shouted in disgust.

  Jezal sniffed and kicked at the floor with his boot. For the hundredth time he entertained the notion of giving it up and never holding a steel again. But what would people say? His father was absurdly proud of him, always boasting about his skill to anyone who would listen. He had his heart set on seeing his son fight in the Square of Marshals before a screaming crowd. If Jezal threw it over now his father would be mortified, and he could say goodbye to his commission, goodbye to his allowance, goodbye to his ambitions. No doubt his brothers would love that.

  ‘Balance is the key,’ Varuz was spouting. ‘Your strength rises up through the legs! From now on we will add an hour on the beam to your training. Every day.’ Jezal winced. ‘So: a run, exercises with the heavy bar, forms, an hour of sparring, forms again, an hour on the beam.’ The Lord Marshal nodded with satisfaction. ‘That will suffice, for now. I will see you at six o’clock tomorrow morning, ice cold sober.’ Varuz frowned. ‘Ice. Cold. Sober.’

  ‘I can’t do this forever, you know,’ said Jezal as he hobbled stiffly back towards his quarters. ‘How much of this horrible shit should a man have to take?’

  West grinned. ‘This is nothing. I’ve never seen the old bastard so soft on anyone. He must really like you. He wasn’t half so friendly with me.’

  Jezal wasn’t sure he believed it. ‘Worse than this?’

  ‘I didn’t have the grounding that you’ve had. He made me hold the heavy bar over my head all afternoon until it fell on me.’ The Major winced slightly, as though even the memory was painful. ‘He made me run up and down the Tower of Chains in full armour. He had me sparring four hours a day, every day.’

  ‘How did you put up with it?’

  ‘I didn’t have a choice. I’m not a nobleman. Fencing was the only way for me to get noticed. But it paid off in the end. How many commoners do you know with a commission in the King’s Own?’

  Jezal shrugged. ‘Come to think of it, very few.’ As a nobleman himself, he didn’t think there should be any.

  ‘But you’re from a good family, and a Captain already. If you can win the Contest there’s no telling how far you could go. Hoff—the Lord Chamberlain, Marovia—the High Justice, Varuz himself for that matter, they were all champions in their day. Champions with the right blood always go on to great things.’

  Jezal snorted. ‘Like your friend Sand dan Glokta?’

  The name dropped between them like a stone. ‘Well . . . almost always.’

  ‘Major West!’ came a rough voice from behind. A thickset sergeant with a scar down his cheek was hurrying over to them.

  ‘Sergeant Forest, how are you?’ asked West, clapping the soldier warmly on the back. He had a touch with peasants, but then Jezal had to keep reminding himself that West was little better than a peasant himself. He might be educated, and an officer, and so forth, but he still had more in common with the sergeant than he did with Jezal, once you thought about it.

  The sergeant beamed. ‘Very well, thank you, sir.’ He nodded respectfully to Jezal. ‘Morning, Captain.’

  Jezal favoured him with a terse nod and turned away to look up the avenue. He could think of no possible reason why an officer would want to be familiar with the common soldiers. Furthermore, he was scarred and ugly. Jezal had no use whatever for ugly people.

  ‘What can I do for you?’ West was asking.

  ‘Marshal Burr wishes to see you, sir, for an urgent briefing. All senior officers are ordered to attend.’

  West’s face clouded. ‘I’ll be there as soon as I can.’ The sergeant saluted and strode off.

  ‘What’s all that about?’ asked Jezal carelessly, watching some clerk chase around after a paper he had dropped.

  ‘Angland. This King of the Northmen, Bethod.’ West said the name with a scowl, as though it left a bitter taste. ‘They say he’s defeated all his enemies in the North, and now he’s spoiling for a fight with The Union.’

  ‘Well, if it’s a fight he wants,’ said Jezal airily. Wars were a fine thing, in his opinion, an excellent opportunity for glory and advancement. The paper fluttered past his boot on the light breeze, closely followed by the puffing clerk. Jezal grinned at him as he hurried past, bent almost double in his clumsy efforts to try and grab it.

  The Major snatched up the grubby document and handed it over. ‘Thank you, sir,’ said the clerk, his sweaty face quite pitiful with gratitude, ‘thank you so much!’

  ‘Think nothing of it,’ murmured West, and the clerk gave a sycophantic little bow and hurried away. Jezal was disappointed. He had been rather enjoying the chase. ‘There could be war, but that’s the least of my troubles right now.’ West breathed a heavy sigh. ‘My sister is in Adua.’

  ‘I didn’t know you had a sister.’

  ‘Well I do, and she’s here.’

  ‘So?’ Jezal had little enthusiasm for hearing about the Major’s sister. West might have pulled himself up, but the rest of his family were distinctly beneath Jezal’s notice. He was interested in meeting poor, common girls he could take advantage of, and rich, noble ones he might think about marrying. Anything in between was of no importance.

  ‘Well, my sister can be charming but she is also a little . . . unconventional. She can be something of a handful in the wrong mood. Truth be told, I’d prefer to take care of a pack of Northmen than her.’

  ‘Come now, West,’ said Jezal absently, hardly taking any notice of what he was saying, ‘I’m sure she can’t be that difficult.’

  The Major brightened. ‘Well, I’m relieved to hear you say that. She’s always been keen to see the Agriont for herself, and I’ve been saying for years that I’d give her a tour if she ever came here. We’d arranged it for today in fact.’ Jezal had a sinking feeling. ‘Now, with this meeting—’

  ‘But I have so little time these days!’ whinged Jezal.

  ‘I promise I’ll make it up to you. We’ll meet you at my quarters in an hour.’

  ‘Hold on . . .’ But West was already striding away.

  Don’t let her be too ugly, Jezal was thinking as he slowly approached the door to Major West’s quarters and raised his unwilling fist to knock. Just don’t let her be too ugly. And not too stupid either. Anything but an afternoon wasted on a stupid girl. His hand was halfway to the door when he became aware of raised voices on the other side. He stood guiltily in the corridor, his ear drawing closer and closer to the wood, hoping to hear something complimentary about himself.

  ‘. . . and what about your maid?’ came Major West’s muffled voice, sounding greatly annoyed.

  ‘I had to leave her at the house, there was a lot to do. Nobody’s been t
here in months.’ West’s sister. Jezal’s heart sank. A deep voice, she sounded like a fat one. Jezal couldn’t afford to be seen walking about the Agriont with a fat girl on his arm. It could ruin his reputation.

  ‘But you can’t just wander about the city on your own!’

  ‘I got here alright, didn’t I? You’re forgetting who we are, Collem. I can make do without a servant. To most of the people here I’m no better than a servant anyway. Besides, I’ll have your friend Captain Luthar to look after me.’

  ‘That’s even worse, as you damn well know!’

  ‘Well I wasn’t to know that you’d be busy. I would’ve thought you’d make the time to see your own sister.’ She didn’t sound an idiot, which was something, but fat and now peevish too. ‘Aren’t I safe with your friend?’

  ‘He’s a good enough sort, but is he safe with you?’ Jezal wasn’t sure what the Major meant by that little comment. ‘And walking about the Agriont alone, and with a man you hardly know? Don’t play the fool, I know you better than that! What will people think?’

  ‘Shit on what they think.’ Jezal jerked away from the door. He wasn’t used to hearing ladies use that sort of language. Fat, peevish and coarse, damn it. This might be even worse than he’d feared. He looked up the corridor, considering making a run for it, already working out his excuse. Curse his bad luck, though, someone was coming up the stairs now. He couldn’t leave without being seen. He would just have to knock and get it over with. He gritted his teeth and pounded resentfully at the door.

  The voices stopped suddenly, and Jezal put on an unconvincing friendly grin. Let the torture begin. The door swung open.

  For some reason, he had been expecting a kind of shorter, fatter version of Major West, in a dress. He had been greatly mistaken. She was perhaps slightly fuller of figure than was strictly fashionable, since skinny girls were all the rage, but you couldn’t call her fat, not fat at all. She had dark hair, dark skin, a little darker than would generally be thought ideal. He knew that a lady should remain out of the sun whenever possible, but looking at her, he really couldn’t remember why. Her eyes were very dark, almost black, and blue eyes were turning the heads this season, but hers shone in the dim light of the doorway in a rather bewitching manner.