The Malazan Empire

by Steven Erikson

  Chalas, the watchman of the yard, was sprawled on a bench on the other side, where Cul opened out onto Burl Square, his leather-wrapped clout resting on his thighs. Red-shot eyes found Tehol. ‘Nice skirt,’ the guard said.

  ‘You’ve lightened my step, Chalas.’

  ‘Happy to oblige, Tehol.’

  Tehol paused, hands on hips, and surveyed the crowded square. ‘The city thrives.’

  ‘No change there…exceptin’ the last time.’

  ‘Oh, that was a minor sideways tug, as far as currents go.’

  ‘Not to hear Biri talk of it. He still wants your head salted and in a barrel rolling out to sea.’

  ‘Biri always did run in place.’

  Chalas grunted. ‘It’s been weeks since you last came down. Special occasion?’

  ‘I have a date with three women.’

  ‘Want my clout?’

  Tehol glanced down and studied the battered weapon. ‘I wouldn’t want to leave you defenceless.’

  ‘It’s my face scares ’em away. Exceptin’ those Nerek. Got past me, those ones did.’

  ‘Giving you trouble?’

  ‘No. The rat count’s way down, in fact. But you know Biri.’

  ‘Better than he knows himself. Remind him of that, Chalas, if he starts thinking of giving them trouble.’

  ‘I will.’

  Tehol set out, winding through the seething press in the square. The Down Markets opened out onto it from three sides; a more decrepit collection of useless items for sale Tehol had yet to see. And the people bought in a frenzy, day after blessed day. Our civilization thrives on stupidity. And it only took a sliver of cleverness to tap that idiot vein and drink deep of the riches. Comforting, if slightly depressing. The way of most grim truths.

  He reached the other side, entered Red Lane. Thirty strides on and he came opposite the arched entrance to Huldo’s. Down the shadowed walkway and back into the courtyard’s sunlight. A half-dozen tables, all occupied. Repose for the blissfully ignorant or those without the coin to sample the pits in Huldo’s inner sanctum, where various sordid activities were conducted day and night, said activities occasionally approaching the artistic expression of the absurd. One more example, Tehol reflected, of what people would pay for, given the chance.

  The three women at a table in the far corner stood out for not just the obvious detail—they were the only women present—but for a host of subtler distinctions. Handsome is…just the right word. If they were sisters it was in sentiment only, and for the shared predilection for some form of martial vigour, given their brawn, and the bundled armour and covered weapons heaped beside the table.

  The one on the left was red-haired, the fiery tresses sun-bleached and hanging in reluctant ripples down onto her broad shoulders. She was drinking from a clay-wrapped bottle, disdaining or perhaps not understanding the function of the cup that had accompanied it. Her face belonged to a heroic statue lining a colonnade, strong and smooth and perfect, her blue eyes casting a stony regard with the serene indifference of all such statues. Next to her, and leaning with both forearms on the small tabletop, was a woman with a hint of Faraed blood in her, given the honeyed hue of her skin and the faint up-tilt of her dark eyes. Her hair was either dark brown or black, and had been tied back, leaving clear her heart-shaped face. The third woman sat slouched back in her chair, left leg tipped out to one side, the right incessantly jittering up and down—fine legs, Tehol observed, clad in tight rawhide, tanned very nearly white. Her head was shaved, the pale skin gleaming. Wide-set, light grey eyes lazily scanning the other patrons, finally coming to rest on Tehol where he stood at the courtyard’s threshold.

  He smiled.

  She sneered.

  Urul, Huldo’s chief server, edged out from a nearby shadow and beckoned Tehol over.

  He came as close as he dared. ‘You’re looking…well, Urul. Is Huldo here?’

  The man’s need for a bath was legendary. Patrons gave their orders with decisive brevity and rarely called Urul over for more wine until the meal was finished. He stood before Tehol now, brow gleaming with oily sweat, hands fidgeting over the wide sash of his belt. ‘Huldo? No, Errant be praised. He’s on the Low Walk at the Drownings. Tehol, those women—they’ve been here all morning! They frighten me, the way they scowl whenever I get close.’

  ‘Leave them to me, Urul,’ Tehol said, risking a pat on the man’s damp shoulder.

  ‘You?’

  ‘Why not?’ With that, Tehol adjusted his skirt, checked his sleeves, and threaded his way between the tables. Halting before the three women, he glanced round for a chair. He found one and dragged it close, then settled with a sigh.

  ‘What do you want?’ asked the bald one.

  ‘That was my question. My servant informs me that you visited my residence this morning. I am Tehol Beddict…the one who sleeps on his roof.’

  Three sets of eyes fixed on him.

  Enough to make a stalwart warlord wilt…but me? Only slightly.

  ‘You?’

  Tehol scowled at the bald woman. ‘Why does everyone keep asking that? Yes, me. Now, by your accent, I’d hazard you’re from the islands. I don’t know anyone in the islands. Accordingly, I don’t know you. Not to say I wouldn’t like to, of course. Know you, that is. At least, I think so.’

  The red-haired woman set her bottle down with a clunk. ‘We’ve made a mistake.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that—’

  ‘No,’ the bald woman said to her companion. ‘This is an affectation. We should have anticipated a certain degree of…mockery.’

  ‘He has no trousers.’

  The dark-eyed woman added, ‘And his arms are lopsided.’

  ‘Not quite accurate,’ Tehol said to her. ‘It’s only the sleeves that are somewhat askew.’

  ‘I don’t like him,’ she pronounced, crossing her arms.

  ‘You don’t have to,’ the bald woman said. ‘Errant knows, we’re not going to bed him, are we?’

  ‘I’m crushed.’

  ‘You would be,’ the red-haired woman said, with an unpleasant smile.

  ‘Bed him? On the roof? You must be insane, Shand.’

  ‘How can not liking him be unimportant?’

  The bald woman, the one named Shand, sighed and rubbed her eyes. ‘Listen to me, Hejun. This is business. Sentiments have no place in business—I’ve already told you that.’

  Hejun’s arms remained crossed, and she shook her head. ‘You can’t trust who you don’t like.’

  ‘Of course you can!’ Shand said, blinking.

  ‘It’s his reputation I’m not happy with,’ said the third, as yet unnamed, woman.

  ‘Rissarh,’ Shand said, sighing again, ‘it’s his reputation what’s brought us here.’

  Tehol clapped his hands. Once, loud enough to startle the three women. ‘Excellent. Rissarh with the red hair. Hejun, with Faraed blood. And Shand, no hair at all. Well,’ he set his hands on the table and rose, ‘I’m content with that. Goodbye—’

  ‘Sit down!’

  The growl was so menacing that Tehol found himself seated once more, the prickle of sweat beneath his woollen shirt.

  ‘That’s better,’ Shand said in a more mellow tone. She leaned forward. ‘Tehol Beddict. We know all about you.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘We even know why what happened happened.’

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘And we want you to do it again.’

  ‘You do?’

  ‘Yes. Only this time, you’ll have the courage to go through with it. All the way.’

  ‘I will?’

  ‘Because we—myself, Hejun and Rissarh—we’re going to be your courage. This time. Now, let’s get out of here, before that server comes back. We’ve purchased a building. We can talk there. It doesn’t smell.’

  ‘Now that’s a relief,’ Tehol said.

  The three women rose.

  He did not.

  ‘I told you,’ Hejun said to Shand. ‘It’s not going to
work. There’s nothing left in there. Look at him.’

  ‘It’ll work,’ Shand said.

  ‘Hejun is, alas, right,’ Tehol said. ‘It won’t.’

  ‘We know where the money went,’ Shand said.

  ‘That’s no secret. Riches to rags. I lost it.’

  But Shand shook her head. ‘No you didn’t. Like I said, we know. And if we talk…’

  ‘You keep saying you know something,’ Tehol said, adding a shrug.

  ‘As you said,’ she replied, smiling, ‘we’re from the islands.’

  ‘But not those islands.’

  ‘Of course not—who’d go there? And that’s what you counted on.’

  Tehol rose. ‘As they say, five wings will buy you a grovel. All right, you’ve purchased a building.’

  ‘You’ll do it,’ Shand insisted. ‘Because if it comes out, Hull will kill you.’

  ‘Hull?’ Finally Tehol could smile. ‘My brother knows nothing about it.’

  He savoured the pleasure, then, in seeing these three women knocked off balance. There, now you know how it feels.

  ‘Hull may prove a problem.’

  Brys Beddict could not hold his gaze on the man standing before him. Those small, placid eyes peering out from the folds of pink flesh seemed in some way other than human, holding so still that the Finadd of the Royal Guard imagined he was looking into the eyes of a snake. A flare-neck, coiled on the centre of the river road when the rains are but days away. Up from the river, three times as long as a man is tall, head resting on the arm-thick curl of its body. ’Ware the plodding cattle dragging their carts on that road. ’Ware the drover stupid enough to approach.

  ‘Finadd?’

  Brys forced his eyes back to the huge man. ‘First Eunuch, I am at a loss as to how to respond. I have neither seen nor spoken with my brother in years. Nor will I be accompanying the delegation.’

  First Eunuch Nifadas turned away, and walked noiselessly to the high-backed wooden chair behind the massive desk that dominated the chamber of his office. He sat, the motion slow and even. ‘Be at ease, Finadd Beddict. I have immense respect for your brother Hull. I admire the extremity of his conviction, and understand to the fullest extent the motivation behind his…choices in the past.’

  ‘Then, if you will forgive me, you are further down the path than I, First Eunuch. Of my brother—of my brothers—I understand virtually nothing. Alas, it has always been so.’

  Nifadas blinked sleepily, then he nodded. ‘Families are odd things, aren’t they? Naturally, my own experience precludes many of the subtleties regarding that subject. Yet, if you will, my exclusion has, in the past, permitted me a certain objectivity, from which I have often observed the mechanisms of such fraught relationships with a clear eye.’ He looked up and fixed Brys once more with his regard. ‘Will you permit me a comment or two?’

  ‘Forgive me, First Eunuch—’

  Nifadas waved him silent with one plump hand. ‘No need. I was presumptuous. Nor have I explained myself. As you know, preparations are well along. The Great Meeting looms. I am informed that Hull Beddict has joined Buruk the Pale and Seren Pedac on the trail to Hiroth lands. Further, it is my understanding that Buruk is charged with a host of instructions—none issued by me, I might add. In other words, it is likely that those instructions not only do not reflect the king’s interests, but in fact may contradict our Sire’s wishes.’ He blinked again, slow and measured. ‘Precarious, agreed. Unwelcome, as well. My concern is this. Hull may…misunderstand…’

  ‘By assuming that Buruk acts on behalf of King Diskanar, you mean.’

  ‘Just so.’

  ‘He would then seek to counter the merchant.’

  Nifadas sighed his agreement.

  ‘Which,’ Brys continued, ‘is itself not necessarily a bad thing.’

  ‘True, in itself not necessarily a bad thing.’

  ‘Unless you intend, as the king’s official representative and nominal head of the delegation, to counter the merchant in your own way. To deflect those interests Buruk has been charged with presenting to the Edur.’

  The First Eunuch’s small mouth hinted at a smile.

  Nothing more than that, yet Brys understood. His gaze travelled to the window behind Nifadas. Clouds swam blearily through the bubbled, wavy glass. ‘Not Hull’s strengths,’ he said.

  ‘No, we are agreed in that. Tell me, Finadd, what do you know of this Acquitor, Seren Pedac?’

  ‘Reputation only. But it’s said she owns a residence here in the capital. Although I have never heard if she visits.’

  ‘Rarely. The last time was six years ago.’

  ‘Her name is untarnished,’ Brys said.

  ‘Indeed. Yet one must wonder…she is not blind, after all. Nor, I gather, unthinking.’

  ‘I would imagine, First Eunuch, that few Acquitors are.’

  ‘Just so. Well, thank you for your time, Finadd. Tell me,’ he added as he slowly rose, indicating the audience was at an end, ‘have you settled well as the King’s Champion?’

  ‘Uh, well enough, First Eunuch.’

  ‘The burden is easily shouldered by one as young and fit as you, then?’

  ‘Not easily. I would make no claim to that.’

  ‘Not comfortable, but manageable.’

  ‘A fair enough description.’

  ‘You are an honest man, Brys. As one of the king’s advisers, I am content with my choice.’

  But you feel I need the reminder. Why is that? ‘I remain honoured, First Eunuch, by the king’s faith, and of course, yours.’

  ‘I will delay you no longer, Finadd.’

  Brys nodded, turned and strode from the office.

  A part of him longed for the days of old, when he was just an officer in the Palace Guard. When he carried little political weight, and the presence of the king was always at a distance, with Brys and his fellow guardsmen standing at attention along one wall at official audiences and engagements. Then again, he reconsidered as he walked down the corridor, the First Eunuch had called him because of his blood, not his new role as King’s Champion.

  Hull Beddict. Like a restless ghost, a presence cursed to haunt him no matter where he went, no matter what he did. Brys remembered seeing his eldest brother, resplendent in the garb of Sentinel, the King’s Reed at his belt. A last and lasting vision for the young, impressionable boy he had been all those years ago. That moment remained with him, a tableau frozen in time that he wandered into in his dreams, or at reflective moments like these. A painted image. Brothers, man and child, the two of them cracked and yellowed beneath the dust. And he would stand witness, like a stranger, to the boy’s wide-eyed, adoring expression, and would follow that uplifted gaze and then shift his own uneasily, suspicious of that uniformed soldier’s pride.

  Innocence was a blade of glory, yet it could blind on both sides.

  He’d told Nifadas he did not understand Hull. But he did. All too well.

  He understood Tehol, too, though perhaps marginally less well. The rewards of wealth beyond measure had proved cold; only the hungry desire for that wealth hissed with heat. And that truth belonged to the world of the Letherii, the brittle flaw at the core of the golden sword. Tehol had thrown himself on that sword, and seemed content to bleed to death, slowly and with amiable aplomb. Whatever final message he sought in his death was a waste of time, since no-one would look his way when that day came. No-one dared. Which is why, I suspect, he’s smiling.

  His brothers had ascended their peaks long ago—too early, it turned out—and now slid down their particular paths to dissolution and death. And what of me, then? I have been named King’s Champion. Judged the finest swordsman in the kingdom. I believe I stand, here and now, upon the highest reach. There was no need to take that thought further.

  He reached a T-intersection and swung right. Ten paces ahead a side door spilled light into the corridor. As he came opposite it a voice called to him from the chamber within.

  ‘Finadd! Come quick.’
>
  Brys inwardly smiled and turned. Three strides into the spice-filled, low-ceilinged room. Countless sources of light made a war of colours on the furniture and tables with their crowds of implements, scrolls and beakers.

  ‘Ceda?’

  ‘Over here. Come and see what I’ve done.’

  Brys edged past a bookcase extending out perpendicularly from one wall and found the King’s Sorceror behind it, perched on a stool. A tilted table with a level bottom shelf was at the man’s side, cluttered with discs of polished glass.

  ‘Your step has changed, Finadd,’ Kuru Qan said, ‘since becoming the King’s Champion.’

  ‘I was not aware of that, Ceda.’

  Kuru Qan spun on his seat and raised a strange object before his face. Twin lenses of glass, bound in place side by side with wire. The Ceda’s broad, prominent features were made even more so by a magnifying effect from the lenses. Kuru Qan set the object against his face, using ties to bind it so that the lenses sat before his eyes, making them huge as he blinked up at Brys.

  ‘You are as I imagined you. Excellent. The blur diminishes in importance. Clarity ascends, achieving preeminence among all the important things. What I hear now matters less than what I see. Thus, perspective shifts. The world changes. Important, Finadd. Very important.’

  ‘Those lenses have given you vision? That is wonderful, Ceda!’

  ‘The key was in seeking a solution that was the antithesis of sorcery. Looking upon the Empty Hold stole my sight, after all. I could not effect correction through the same medium. Not yet important, this detail. Pray indeed it never becomes so.’

  Ceda Kuru Qan never held but one discourse at any one time. Or so he had explained it once. While many found this frustrating, Brys was ever charmed.

  ‘Am I the first to be shown your discovery, Ceda?’

  ‘You would see its importance more than most. Swordsman, dancing with place, distance and timing, with all the material truths. I need to make adjustments.’ He snatched the contraption off and hunched over it, minuscule tools flicking in his deft hands. ‘You were in the First Eunuch’s chamber of office. Not an altogether pleasing conversation for you. Unimportant, for the moment.’