by Scott Lynch
A half dozen bravos stood facing the Gentlemen Bastards, crossbows leveled. These men and women wore leather bracers and leather doublets over silk tunics reinforced with light metal bands; their necks were girded with stiff leather collars. A more genteel foyer would have been decorated with glow-lamps and flower arrangements; the walls of this one held wicker baskets of crossbow quarrels and racks of spare blades.
“Ease up,” said a young woman standing behind the gaggle of guards. “I know they’re suspicious as hell, but I don’t see a Gray King among ’em.”
She wore men’s breeches and a loose black silk blouse with billowing sleeves, under a ribbed leather dueling harness that looked to have seen more use than storage. Her iron-shod boots (a taste she had never lost) clicked against the floor as she stepped between the sentries. Her welcoming smile didn’t quite reach all the way to her eyes, which darted nervously behind the lenses of her plain, black-rimmed optics.
“My apologies for the reception, loves,” said Nazca Barsavi, addressing all the Bastards but placing a hand on Locke’s left shoulder. She was a full two inches taller than he was. “And I know it’s cramped in here, but I need the four of you to wait around. Garristas only. Papa’s in a mood.”
There was a muffled scream from behind the doors that led to the inner chambers of the Floating Grave, followed by the faint murmur of raised voices—shouts, cursing, another scream.
Nazca rubbed her temples, pushed back a few stray curls of her black hair, and sighed. “He’s making a vigorous case for … full disclosure from some of the Full Crowns. He’s got Sage Kindness in there with him.”
“Thirteen gods,” said Calo. “We’re happy to wait.”
“Indeed.” Galdo reached into his coat and pulled out a slightly soggy deck of playing cards. “We can certainly keep ourselves entertained out here. Indefinitely, if need be.”
At the sight of a Sanza brother offering cards, every guard in the room took a step back; some of them visibly struggled with the idea of raising their crossbows again.
“Oh, not you bastards, too,” said Galdo. “Look, those stories are all bullshit. Everyone else at that table was just having a very unlucky night.…”
Past the wide, heavy doors was a short passage, unguarded and empty. Nazca slid the foyer doors closed behind herself and Locke, then turned to him. She reached and slicked back his wet hair. The corners of her mouth were turned down. “Hello, pezon. I see you haven’t been eating.”
“I eat regular meals.”
“You should try eating for quantity as well as consistency. I believe I once mentioned that you looked like a skeleton.”
“And I believe I’d never before seen a seven-year-old girl pushy drunk in public.”
“Well. Perhaps I was pushy drunk then, but today I’m just pushy. Papa’s in a bad way, Locke. I wanted to see you before you saw him—he has some … things he wishes to discuss with you. I want you to know that whatever he asks, I don’t want you to … for my sake … well, please just agree. Please him, do you understand?”
“No garrista who loves life has ever tried to do otherwise. You think I’m inclined to walk in on a day like today and deliberately twist his breeches? If your father says ‘bark like a dog,’ I say ‘What breed, Your Honor?’ ”
“I know. Forgive me. But my point is this. He’s not himself. He’s afraid now, Locke. Absolutely, genuinely afraid. He was morose when Mother died, but damn, now he’s … he’s crying out in his sleep. Taking wine and laudanum every day to keep his temper in check. Used to be I was the only one not allowed to leave the Grave, but now he wants Anjais and Pachero to stay here, too. Fifty guards on duty at all times. The duke’s life is more carefree. Papa and my brothers were up shouting about it all night.”
“Well, ah … look, I’m sorry, but I don’t think I can help you with that. But just what is it you think he’s going to ask me?”
Nazca stared at him, mouth half-open as though she were preparing to speak; then she seemed to think better of it, and her lips compressed back into a frown.
“Dammit, Nazca, I’d jump in the bay and try to blackjack a shark if you wanted, really, but you’d have to tell me how big it was and how hungry it was first. Savvy?”
“Yes, look, I just … it’ll be less awkward if he does it himself. Just remember what I said. Hear him. Please him, and you and I can sort things out later. If we get a later.”
“What do you mean, ‘If we get a later’? Nazca, you’re worrying me.”
“This is it, Locke. This is the bad one. The Gray King is finally getting to Papa. Tesso had sixty knives, any ten of which were with him all the time. Tesso was deep into Papa’s good graces; there were big plans for him in the near future. But Papa’s had things his way for so long I … I can’t rightly say if he knows what to do about this. So he just wants to fold everything up and hide us here. Siege mentality.”
“Hmmmm.” Locke sighed. “I can’t say that what he’s done so far is imprudent, Nazca. He’s—”
“Papa’s mad if he thinks he can just keep us all here, locked up in this fortress forever! He used to be at the Last Mistake half the nights of the week. He used to walk the docks, walk the Mara, walk the Narrows any time he pleased. He used to throw out coppers at the Procession of the Shades. The duke of Camorr can lock himself in his privy and rule legitimately; the capa of Camorr cannot. He needs to be seen.”
“And risk assassination by the Gray King?”
“Locke, I’ve been stuck inside this fucking wooden tub for two months, and I tell you—we’re no safer here than we would be bathing naked at the dirtiest fountain in the darkest courtyard in the Cauldron.” Nazca had folded her arms beneath her breasts so tightly that her leather cuirass creaked. “Who is this Gray King? Where is he? Who are his men? We don’t have a single idea—and yet this man reaches out and kills our people at leisure, however he sees fit. Something is wrong. He has resources we don’t understand.”
“He’s clever and he’s lucky. Neither of those things lasts forever; trust me.”
“Not just clever and lucky, Locke. I agree there are limits to both. So what does he have up his sleeves? What does he know? Or who? If we are not betrayed, then it must be that we are overmatched. And I am reasonably certain that we are not yet betrayed.”
“Not yet?”
“Don’t play stupid with me, Locke. Business could go on after a fashion with Papa and myself cooped up here. But if he won’t let Anjais and Pachero out to run the city, the whole regime will go to hell. The garristas might think it prudent for some of the Barsavis to stay here; they’ll think it cowardice for all of us to hide. And they won’t just talk behind our backs; they’ll actively court another capa. Maybe a pack of new capas. Or maybe the Gray King.”
“So, naturally, your brothers will never let him trap them here.”
“Depends on how mad and crazy the old man gets. But even if they stay free to roam, that’s only the lesser part of the problem solved. We are, again, overmatched. Three thousand knives at our command, and the ghost still has the twist on us.”
“What do you suspect? Sorcery?”
“I suspect everything. They say the Gray King can kill a man with just a touch. They say that blades won’t cut him. I suspect the gods themselves. And so my brothers think I’m crazy.
“When they look at the situation all they see is a regular war. They think we can just outlast it, lock the old man and the baby sister up and wait until we know where to hit back. But I don’t see that. I see a cat with his paw over a mouse’s tail. And if the cat’s claws haven’t come out yet, it’s not because of anything the mouse has done. Don’t you get it?”
“Nazca, I know you’re agitated. I’ll listen. I’m a stone. You can yell at me all you like. But what can I do for you? I’m just a thief, I’m your father’s littlest thief. If there’s a gang smaller than mine I’ll go play cards in a wolf shark’s mouth. I—”
“I need you to start helping me calm Papa down, Loc
ke. I need him back to something resembling his normal self so I can get him to take my points seriously. That’s why I’m asking you to go in there and take pains to please him. Especially please him. Show him a loyal garrista who does whatever he’s told, the moment he’s told. When he starts to lay reasonable plans for the future again, I’ll know he’s coming back to a state of mind I can deal with.”
“Interesting,” said Locke. “And, uh, daunting.”
“Papa used to say someday I’d appreciate having a gracious man to order around. Believe me, Locke, I do. So … here we are.”
At the end of the short passage was another set of heavy wooden doors, nearly identical to the ones that led back to the reception hall. These doors, however, were barred and locked with an elaborate Verrari clockwork device attached to crossbars of polished iron. A dozen keyholes were visible in the lockbox at the center of the doors; Nazca withdrew two keys that hung on a chain around her neck and briefly put her body between Locke and the doors, so he couldn’t see the apertures she chose. There was a cascading series of clicks and the noise of machinery within the doors; one by one the hidden bolts unshot themselves and the gleaming crossbars slid open until the doors finally cracked open in the middle.
Another scream, loud and vivid without the closed door to muffle it, sounded from the room beyond.
“It’s worse than it sounds,” said Nazca.
“I know what Sage does for your father, Nazca.”
“Knowing’s one thing. Usually Sage just does one or two at a time. Papa’s got the bastard working wholesale today.”
6
“I’VE MADE it clear that I don’t enjoy this,” said Capa Barsavi, “so why do you force me to persist?”
The dark-haired young man was secured to a wooden rack. He hung upside down with metal shackles around his legs, with his arms tied downward at their maximum extension. The Capa’s heavy fist slammed into the prisoner’s side just beneath his armpit; the sound was like a hammer slapping meat. Droplets of sweat flew and the prisoner screamed, writhing against his restraints.
“Why do you insult me like this, Federico?”Another punch to the same spot, with the heavy old man’s first two knuckles cruelly extended. “Why won’t you even have the courtesy to give me a convincing lie?” Capa Barsavi lashed Federico’s throat with the flat of one hand; the prisoner gasped for breath, snorting wetly as blood and spit and sweat ran down into his nose.
The heart of the Floating Grave was something like an opulent ballroom with curving sides. Warm amber light came from glass globes suspended on silver chains. Stairs ran to overhead galleries, and from these galleries to the silk-canopied deck of the old hulk. A small raised platform against the far wall held the broad wooden chair from which Barsavi usually received visitors. The room was tastefully decorated in a restrained and regal fashion, and today it stank of fear and sweat and soiled breeches.
The frame that held Federico folded downward from the ceiling; an entire semicircle of the things could be pulled down at need, for Barsavi occasionally did this sort of business in a volume that rewarded the standardization of procedures. Six were now empty and spattered with blood; only two still held prisoners.
The capa looked up as Locke and Nazca entered; he nodded slightly and gestured for them to wait against the wall. Old Barsavi remained bullish, but he wore his years in plain view. He was rounder and softer now, his three braided gray beards backed by three wobbly chins. Dark circles cupped his eyes, and his cheeks were the unhealthy sort of red that came out of a bottle. Flushed with exertion, he had thrown off his overcoat and was working in his silk undertunic.
Standing nearby with folded arms were Anjais and Pachero Barsavi, Nazca’s older brothers. Anjais was like a miniature version of the Capa, minus thirty years and two beards, while Pachero was more of a kind with Nazca, tall and slender and curly-haired. Both of the brothers wore optics, for whatever eye trouble the old Madam Barsavi had borne had been passed to all three of her surviving children.
Leaning against the far wall were two women. They were not slender. Their bare, tanned arms were corded with muscle and crisscrossed with scars, and while they radiated an air of almost feral good health they were well past the girlishness of early youth. Cheryn and Raiza Berangias, identical twins, and the greatest contrarequialla the city of Camorr had ever known. Performing only as a pair, they had given the Shifting Revel almost a hundred performances against sharks, devilfish, death-lanterns, and other predators of the Iron Sea.
For nearly five years, they had been Capa Barsavi’s personal bodyguards and executioners. Their long, wild manes of smoke-black hair were tied back under nets of silver that jangled with sharks’ teeth. One tooth, it was said, for every man or woman the Berangias twins had killed in Barsavi’s service.
Last but certainly not least alarming in this exclusive gathering was Sage Kindness, a round-headed man of moderate height and middle years. His short-cropped hair was the butter yellow of certain Therin families from the westerly cities of Karthain and Lashain; his eyes always seemed to be wet with emotion, though his expression never changed. He was perhaps the most even-tempered man in Camorr—he could pull fingernails with the mellow disinterest of a man polishing boots. Capa Barsavi was a very capable torturer, but when he found himself stymied the Sage never disappointed him.
“He doesn’t know anything!” The last prisoner, as yet untouched, hollered at the top of his voice as Barsavi slapped Federico around some more. “Capa, Your Honor, please, none of us know anything! Gods! None of us remember!”
Barsavi stalked across the wooden floor and shut the second prisoner up by giving his windpipe a long, cruel squeeze. “Were the questions addressed to you? Are you eager to get involved in the proceedings? You were quiet enough when I sent your other six friends down into the water. Why do you cry for this one?”
“Please,” the man sobbed, sucking in air as Barsavi lightened his grip just enough to permit speech, “please, there’s no point. You must believe us, Capa Barsavi, please. We’d have told you anything you wanted if only we knew. We don’t remember! We just don’t—”
The Capa silenced him with a vicious cuff across the face. For a moment, the only sound in the room was the frightened sobbing and gasping of the two prisoners.
“I must believe you? I must do nothing, Julien. You give me bullshit, and tell me it’s steamed beef? So many of you, and you can’t even come up with a decent story. A serious attempt to lie would still piss me off, but I could understand it. Instead you cry that you don’t remember. You, the eight most powerful men in the Full Crowns, after Tesso himself. His chosen. His friends, his bodyguards, his loyal pezon. And you cry like babies to me about how you don’t remember where any of you were last night, when Tesso just happened to die.”
“But that’s just how it is, Capa Barsavi, please, it’s—”
“I ask you again, were you drinking last night?”
“No, not at all!”
“Were you smoking anything? All of you, together?”
“No, nothing like that. Certainly not … not together.”
“Gaze, then? A little something from Jerem’s pervert alchemists? A little bliss from a powder?”
“Tesso never permitted—”
“Well then.” Barsavi drove a fist into Julien’s solar plexus, almost casually. While the man gasped in pain, Barsavi turned away and held up his arms with theatrical joviality. “Since we’ve eliminated every possible earthly explanation for such dereliction of duty, short of sorcery or divine intervention … Oh, forgive me. You weren’t enchanted by the gods themselves, were you? They’re hard to miss.”
Julien writhed against his bonds, red-faced, shaking his head. “Please …”
“No gods, then. Didn’t think so. I was saying … well, I was saying that your little game is boring the hell out of me. Kindness.”
The round-headed man lowered his chin to his chest and stood with his palms out, facing upward, as though he were about t
o receive a gift.
“I want something creative. If Federico won’t talk, let’s give Julien one last chance to find his tongue.”
Federico began screaming before Barsavi had even finished speaking—the high, sobbing wail of the conscious damned. Locke found himself clenching his teeth to keep himself from shaking. So many meetings with slaughter as a backdrop … The gods could be perverse.
Sage Kindness moved to a small table to the side of the room, on which there was a pile of small glasses and a heavy cloth sack with a drawstring. Kindness threw several glasses into the sack and began banging it against the table; the sound of breaking, jangling glass wasn’t audible beneath Federico’s wild hollering, but Locke could imagine it easily enough. After a few moments, Kindness seemed satisfied, and walked slowly over to Federico.
“Don’t, don’t, no, don’t don’t please no no …”
With one hand holding the desperate young man’s head still, Kindness rapidly drew the bag up over the top of his head, over his face, all the way to Federico’s neck, where he cinched the drawstring tight. The bag muffled Federico’s screams, which had become high and wordless again. Kindness then began to knead the bag, gently at first, almost tenderly; the torturer’s long fingers pushed the jagged contents of the sack up and around Federico’s face. Red stains began to appear on the surface of the bag; Kindness manipulated the contents of the sack like a sculptor giving form to his clay. Federico’s throat mercifully gave out just then, and for the next few moments the man choked out nothing more than a few hoarse moans. Locke prayed silently that he had already fled beyond pain to the temporary refuge of madness.
Kindness increased the vigor with which he massaged the cloth. He pressed now where Federico’s eyes would be, and on the nose, and the mouth, and the chin. The bag grew wetter and redder until at last Federico’s twitching stopped altogether. When Kindness took his hands off the bag they looked as though he’d been pulping tomatoes. Smiling sadly, he let his red hands drip red trails on the wood, and he walked over to Julien, staring intently, saying nothing.