by K. J. Parker
Yes, but it was stupid plan. It wasn’t going to work. A good man dead, all that risk, and nothing to show for it whatsoever. Maybe that was the idea. Maybe his true masters, in the East, had told him: we want you to go to the West and sell them on this incredibly stupid plan, and it’ll go wrong and the Blemyans will be furious and come in on our side – only that wasn’t going to be the result. There would be the most appalling trouble in Blemya for a while, and then things would carry on exactly the same. So where the hell was the point?
It had been a stupid plan. Which raised two colossal issues. One: was Oida really that stupid? Part of her yearned to say yes, of course, he’s an arrogant clown, shallow as silver plating, so full of it that he simply didn’t see how bad the plan was; a clown and a coward, curled up in a ball, whimpering to the fire god because of a silly little storm. She wanted that to be true, so she was fairly sure it wasn’t. And two: the great men of the lodge and the great men of the Western empire had given their blessing to this stupid plan, blinded by Oida’s fiery glow or just too thick to see it wouldn’t work. Now that—
“Hello, you.” She looked up. She hadn’t seen him since the storm. He’d brought her a plate of scrambled eggs. She realised she was quite hungry.
“Can’t face anything myself,” he said, sitting cross-legged on the deck beside her. “God, I hate the sea.”
She laughed. “I don’t think it likes you terribly much.” He handed her a little wooden spoon. The man who thinks of everything. “Can I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
She prodded at the eggs with the spoon. “When were you last in the East?”
“Let me think.” He thought. “I came straight on from Belroch to Beloisa.”
She looked at him. “You just strolled through the front line like nothing was happening?”
“Good God, no. I had a safe passage. Not that I needed it, because the country all round there was pretty much deserted.”
“But you had a bit of paper, if you’d needed it.”
“Well, yes. Not a problem. Why do you ask?”
She smiled. “What’s it like in the East?”
He took a moment to reply. “Different,” he said, “but more or less the same. They have women priests there, for one thing. And grace comes at the end of the meal, not the beginning. And they celebrate Ascension on the three-quarter moon, not the full, and the jam is poured over your pancakes, not served separately in a little dish. And if two people are shown to have conspired to kill someone but you can’t prove which of them actually struck the fatal blow, they’re both acquitted of murder but convicted of attempt, but they’re both hanged just the same anyway; and they can try you up to three times for same crime, which I can’t say I approve of. On the other hand, a son can’t be forced to testify against his mother, and vice versa, which is quite civilised. Oh, and the country people use tanned bulls’ scrotums for putting their money in, and in town they carry their small change in their mouths, which is pretty startling the first time you buy something from a street trader. You lift your head up for yes, and nod down for no, it’s quite important to remember that. Summer solstice used to be a big festival where all the servants and apprentices went home to their families in the country and they used to burn a straw lion at sunrise and give each other presents, but that’s terribly old-fashioned now. And only prostitutes carry handkerchiefs stuffed up their sleeves. That’s the same in Blemya, by the way, which is why you kept getting all those funny looks.” He shrugged. “That sort of thing, anyway. Otherwise, they’re more or less like the West. About what you’d expect; five hundred years as all one big happy family, then ninety years apart hating each other to death. Why the sudden interest? Thinking of going there?”
“Just interested,” she said. “As in, if they’re really not all that different from us, what are we slaughtering each other for?”
He sighed. “Honour,” he said. “Moral imperatives, to defend our country and our way of life. Money, of course, and eternal glory, and to defend our trading interests. Because we’re right and they’re wrong. Because evil must be resisted, and sooner or later there comes a time when men of principle have to make a stand. Because war is good for business and it’s better to die on our feet than live on our knees. Because the fire god is on our side, and it’s our duty to Him. Because they started it. But at this stage in the proceedings,” he added, with a slightly lopsided grin, “mostly from force of habit.”
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Having worked in journalism and the law, K. J. Parker now writes and makes things out of wood and metal.
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BY K. J. PARKER
The Fencer trilogy
Colours in the Steel
The Belly of the Bow
The Proof House
The Scavenger trilogy
Shadow
Pattern
Memory
The Engineer trilogy
Devices and Desires
Evil for Evil
The Escapement
The Company
The Folding Knife
The Hammer
Sharps
The Two of Swords (e-novellas)
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Contents
Cover
Title Page
Welcome
Dedication
13: Poverty
About the Author
By K. J. Parker
About Orbit Short Fiction
Orbit Newsletter
Copyright
Copyright
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Copyright © 2015 by K. J. Parker
Cover design by Kirk Benshoff
Cover copyright © 2015 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher constitute unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
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First ebook edition: April 2015
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ISBN 978-0-316-26577-5
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