Colours in the Steel f-1

by K. J. Parker

  ‘Go on, please.’

  Gorgas inclined his head. ‘Like most of the farms in the Mesoge, it was owned by one of the old city houses; our landlords were the Ferian family. I expect you know of them. I believe they’ve declined rather a lot over the last few years, but back when we were children they were still a force to be reckoned with.’

  ‘I’ve heard of them,’ Alexius said.

  ‘Well,’ Gorgas took a deep breath, as if preparing for an effort. ‘About eighteen years ago, when we were all still living on the farm, the landlord’s son and a cousin of his came out for a holiday in the country. The story was that they were interested in buying racehorses, but I think it was more the case that they’d made the city a bit too warm for their own good and had to get away for a while, the way the sons of the nobility do from time to time. They soon got through their money, so they were reducing to billeting themselves on the tenants; not much fun for them, and even less for us. They were bored stiff inside a week; nothing to do all day but mope around the farmhouse with the goats, or go for long walks. They drank a lot and chivvied a few of the local girls, but they found them all a bit unappetising and stopped bothering after a bit.

  ‘Except,’ Gorgas said, frowning a little, ‘for my sister. They liked her all right; she wasn’t a great beauty or anything like that, but she was lively and had a sharp sense of humour, which made her a bit more like what they were used to at home. It didn’t help that she thoroughly loathed and despised her husband – he was a pleasant enough man, but a peasant from his boots upwards, and they couldn’t have children, which upset her. Anyway, these city boys took to hanging around her all the time. Gallas, her husband, didn’t seem to mind too much; it was obvious nothing much was happening and anyway, you’d have to have run off Gallas’ pigs or set fire to his beard before he’d lose his temper, or even notice. Our father and Bardas didn’t like it at all, though. And I-’ Gorgas turned his head away a little. ‘I wanted more than anything else to get out of the Mesoge and go to the city. When those two young fools showed up, I suddenly saw a chance.’

  He sat silently for a while, not moving; then, abruptly, he resumed his story. ‘It was quite obvious our sister had the same idea,’ he said, ‘because as soon as she realised the two boys were interested in her, she started stringing them along, but without ever actually coming across; the message being, she was only too happy to play any games they liked, but only if they took her back to the city with them. Unfortunately, the two lads were too thick to see what she was doing; as far as they were concerned, she was leading them on and then mucking them about. They didn’t like that; too complicated for their simple minds, and not really worth the effort. They made it clear that unless she did the right thing by them, they’d move on to the next farm up the valley. Our sister wasn’t going to give in unless she got what she wanted; adultery for its own sake was never one of her vices. And all I could see was my chance of getting out of agriculture slipping away from me, unless I could sort something out quickly.

  ‘It was the day when they announced they were leaving. Father made it perfectly obvious that he’d be delighted to see them go; likewise Bardas and Clefas, and our brother-in-law Gallas, who for once displayed a vestigial trace of backbone. Our sister flounced off looking enigmatic, and the two lads were sitting out on the porch waiting for their horses to be saddled up. As far as I was concerned, it was then or never. So I went up to them and started commiserating – obliquely, of course – about my sister’s treatment of them.

  ‘They said, plenty more where that came from, or words to that effect. I said they were quitting too easily; they’d got the signals all wrong, I told them, it was no good waiting for her to surrender gracefully like a good little pleasant girl, they had to go out and take what they wanted. I gave them the impression that that was how she always did business, and she’d been waiting for them to make their move and was just as puzzled as they were.

  ‘They believed me, of course, and said that was a different kettle of fish entirely, and why hadn’t I said anything before? Then they asked if I had any idea where she might have gone off to. Now, I knew she’d gone down to the river to do her washing, so I tried telling them how to find the place. They said they couldn’t make sense of my directions, so why didn’t I show them the way? That was fine by me, so off we went; me thinking that this was it, that I’d finally earned my passage out.

  ‘There she was, just as I’d guessed. At first they tried to be nice; but when my sister realised that there was nothing in it for her she started getting stroppy, calling them names, and then when the Ferian boy tried to grab hold of her, she slugged him quite hard across the face with a stone and drew blood. That made them both lose their temper, and they stopped being nice after that.

  ‘Well, I reckoned they could do without me, and I was making myself scarce when to my horror I saw people coming; Father and Bardas and Gallas, who’d heard screaming, and were running up with mattocks in their hands. That didn’t suit me at all; the last thing I wanted was for my prospective patrons to get beaten up, or to explain exactly where they’d got their false information from. Maybe I panicked; but no, I’m being too soft on myself. I knew exactly what I was doing. I always have, all my life.

  ‘The lads had left their horses tied up near where I was standing, and one of them had a bow and a quiver on his saddle. I grabbed these and ducked behind some rocks, and when Father and the others came running past I shot Gallas, killed him outright.

  ‘The idea was to make them think it was an ambush by bandits and scare them off; might have worked, too – that sort of thing did happen occasionally – except that Bardas saw me and called out my name. I knew I was for it then, and there was nothing else I could do. I’d have to deal with all of them and then try and sort out a story later. So I shot Father and Bardas – I thought I’d killed them both, but I was careless – and then I went down to the river and picked off the Ferian lad. The other one – did I tell you his name? Cleras Hedin – ran for it and I was well and truly stuck then. I had to get him, but there was my sister to deal with as well. My idea was to make it look like we’d surprised the rapists at their work and there’d been a general battle, with me the only survivor. That wouldn’t wash unless I polished off the lot, and now there was one halfway down the valley, and my sister standing in the river all bloody, screaming her head off at me.

  ‘I did panic a bit then; I shot Sis, assumed I’d done the job, and then dashed off after young Hedin. There were only two arrows left by then and I missed with both of them, so in the end I had to run him down and sort him out with a lump of wood. By the time I got back, I was less than thrilled to discover that I was two corpses short; Bardas and my sister. I followed the blood back towards the house; but as soon as I came round the side of the hill I saw Clefas and Zonaras running out towards me with their own bows in their hands, and I decided to cut my losses and get out. I made it to the lads’ horses, jumped up and didn’t stop till I was well clear. And that’s the last I ever saw of home, or any of my brothers.’

  He looked up, grinning bleakly. ‘I warned you, it’s not a terribly nice story,’ he said. ‘I’m the villain of the piece, obviously enough, but none of the survivors come out of it exactly smelling of roses. Do you want me to go on?’

  ‘You mean there’s more?’ Alexius said.

  ‘Oh, yes. You’re sure? Well, then. The next bit, by the way, is obviously hearsay, based on what my sister’s told me since. I’m inclined to believe she’s telling the truth. She’s not very nice either, but I’ve never known her tell a deliberate lie.

  ‘Apparently, once the dust had settled and all the bodies had been buried – actually, the Ferians were rather good about it all; they accepted the blame for the rape and set that off against the two killings, where most noble families would’ve had the survivors strung up without a second thought; so fair play to them – as I was saying, once everybody was buried or recovered from their wounds, Bardas started getting at
our sister, saying it was all her fault for being a whore in the first place. He was upset, obviously; and since I wasn’t there and the two city boys were both dead, she was the next likely candidate for a scapegoat.

  ‘And then when it turned out she was pregnant, he really lost his cool and tried to throw her out on her ear. Well, the other two weren’t having that, so Bardas flung out in a temper and went storming off to join the army. The others expected he’d be back inside a month, but apparently he was spotted by our mother’s brother, Uncle Maxen, who’d been in the service all his life and had worked his way up to being General. So Bardas didn’t come back after all; and that really annoyed Clefas and Zonaras, who were now having to do the work of six men just to keep the farm ticking over and pay the rent.

  ‘They started taking it out on our sister; and Clefas always tended to make his point with the back of his hand rather than reasoned argument. She stuck it out till she was nearly due with the baby; then Clefas had a bit too much to drink one night and went for her with a knife. She didn’t hang about after that; and the only place she could go was the city, where she hoped she could get something out of the dead father’s people, the Hedins.’ Gorgas lifted his head and looked Alexius in the eye. ‘She’s always been adamant that it was the Hedin lad, not young Ferian, who was the kid’s father. I’m perfectly happy to take her word for it; she ought to know, after all, and, like I said, she doesn’t tell lies.

  ‘Well, the Hedin family wasn’t anything like as grand as the Ferians. Nothas Hedin started off as a goldsmith, branched out into banking, and about this time was making a comfortable living. His boys knew the Ferians through racing, I think; Nothas Hedin was a miserable old devil but when it came to horses he used to spend like there was no tomorrow, and the Ferians were the same. They weren’t happy about the situation but they took my sister in and told her she could stay there till the baby was born, and then they’d ship her off somewhere overseas where she’d be looked after and nobody’d have to look at her and be reminded of all the trouble she’d caused.

  ‘I’d reached the city myself by that time, and was making a sort of living hanging around with a bunch of other lowlifes who did naughty things for money. You couldn’t really call them assassins, they weren’t as grand as that. We used to beat people up in dark alleys, set fire to shops, things like that. Anyway; quite by chance I found out that my sister was in town, and my first thought was that it was time for me to move on. I hadn’t worried too much about the Ferians or the Hedins catching up with me for what I’d done, because of course I wasn’t calling myself Gorgas Loredan, and until Sis came to town there wasn’t anybody in the city who could recognise me. By that stage, though, I’d had enough of travel and adventure to last me for a while, so I hung about and waited to see what happened. I started snooping around one of the maids from the Hedin household so as to find out the news, and what I heard was that although Sis wasn’t exactly pleased with me, quite reasonably enough, she was absolutely livid with Bardas, Clefas and Zonaras, and Bardas most of all. So I plucked up my courage and went to see her.

  ‘I think she was so taken aback at seeing me that she forgot to yell bloody murder until after I’d had a chance to be reasonable; and so, after a few mutual recriminations for form’s sake, we came to a sort of state of armed truce. After all, we were the only family either of us had still got, and the fact is that we’d always had a sort of special relationship back from when we were kids. I won’t say it was forgive and forget exactly; but she had the baby to think of and I was feeling pretty sick about the whole business and badly wanted someone not to hate me to death, so we agreed I’d try and make it up to her as best I could, and we’d see if we couldn’t find some way to make the future a degree less crappy for both of us.

  ‘To cut a long story short; I managed to scrape a little money together – you don’t want to know how – and we set off for the Island. After a bit of soul-searching Sis left the kid with the Hedin family; they were happy to bring it up as one of theirs provided Mummy promised to go away and never come back. Sis was fairly upset about it at the time, but we agreed a baby’d really get in our way, considering the line of business we planned on going into. I’ll say this for my sister, once she’s decided what has to be done, she doesn’t let sentiment stand in her way.

  So we went to the Island and set up in the moneylending racket; did very well at it, too, after a very shaky start. As to what made us turn the corner, that’s another story; one that might interest you, Patriarch, some other time, because it sort of impinges on your line of work. Anyway, after a while we found we were making a go of things, our lives were settling down and somehow or other we’d managed to show all the fuck-ups a clean pair of heels; not bad going, considering. It was then that we both decided that our – what shall we call it: our mutual non-aggression pact in the face of a common enemy, namely Life? Something like that – our understanding, if you like, had more or less outlived its usefulness and it’d be in both our interests if we divvied up and went our separate ways while we were still on speaking terms. It was a good idea, I think. When you can feel a major bust-up looming ahead of you, it’s not a bad idea to get out of each other’s way before the stones start to fly.

  ‘We moved all the way out to Scona and set up a proper bank, all respectable and above board. I have to admit, she’s the one with the brains in our family. I’m not doing badly myself, but she’s made a real success of the business, and as far as I can see she owns virtually everything and everybody on that side of the bay. Big fish and small pond, maybe; still not too dusty for a peasant’s daughter from the Mesoge. And, as I remind her from time to time, if it wasn’t for me she might well still be back on Gallas’ farm hoeing turnips and mucking out goats. She won’t admit it, but at least she doesn’t throw things at me when I say it any more.’

  Alexius sat very still, like a rabbit facing a snake. The sheer presence of the man was appalling and fascinating. ‘And what about the child?’ he said at last. ‘Your sister’s son, the one she left behind?’

  ‘Daughter, actually. In fact, it’s her I wanted to see Bardas about, thought I have a nasty feeling I’ve left it a little bit too late.’ He sighed. ‘I’m surprised you need to ask, actually. I’d have thought as soon as you heard the name-’

  Alexius’ throat became terribly dry. ‘Hedin,’ he said.

  ‘They called the girl Iseutz,’ Gorgas continued. ‘Not the name her mother gave her, but they wanted something a bit higher class. Anyway, they brought her up with the dead boy’s young brother. His name was Teofil.’

  ‘Teofil Hedin. Iseutz Hedin.’ Alexius’ face crumpled in horror. ‘Oh, gods, that girl-’

  Gorgas nodded grimly. ‘The irony is,’ he said, ‘she doesn’t even know about Bardas and me and all the rest of it. As far as she’s concerned, Bardas is the man who killed her darling uncle Teofil, the only one who ever cared for her. Grisly, isn’t it? When it comes to luck, good and bad, our family strikes me as having had rather more than its fair share.’

  ‘Oh, gods,’ Alexius repeated. ‘She’s his niece.’

  ‘Fortunately,’ Gorgas said, ‘she still is. More by luck than judgement,’ he continued, shaking his head. ‘It’s my fault it’s got this far; as soon as we found out what was going on, I raced over here, but the first I knew of this confounded fight was when I saw it posted on the courtroom door.’

  Alexius wasn’t quite sure what to make of any of that. He wanted to know how they’d found out, for one thing. He wanted to mention the dream he’d had during the reading of the depositions, the pains in his head, chest and arms that had come and gone away again; all manner of small points that seemed to be leading in a certain direction. He wanted to ask Gorgas if he knew two Islanders called Venart and Vetriz. He wanted to find out exactly what it was about his unnamed sister’s way of doing business that might interest him because it sort of impinged on his line of work. He did none of these things.

  ‘You said you wanted me to
give Bardas a message,’ he said, as neutrally as he could manage. ‘What do you want me to tell him?’

  ‘I’m not sure, really,’ Gorgas confessed, scratching the side of his head. ‘I suppose he ought to be told about Iseutz; who she really is, and all that. It’d have been better perhaps if he’d been told before he cut off all the fingers on her right hand; or maybe not, I don’t know. Maybe if he’d known, it’d have cost him his life.’ He leant forward and went on very earnestly, ‘I love my brother, Patriarch. I always did. We were close; not as close as I was to my sister, but we grew up together, played together as kids. You can’t help loving someone under those circumstances even if you end up hating them at the same time. If you’ve got a brother or a sister, maybe you understand. And I recognise that making it up to Bardas is going to be very difficult, since this whole mess is nearly all my fault; I made no bones about that from the very start, remember. I’ve got no illusions about myself. But I’m not an evil man, Alexius, just a man who once did some evil things. Maybe I still do, from time to time. But if there’s anything I can do for my brother, I want to do it. Ideally, I’d like him to leave this city while there’s still time; come back with me if he likes, or go wherever he wants. I’d gladly make sure he never wanted for money or things. I’d even try and make peace between him and my sister, though I doubt that’d ever be possible. Whatever; you’ve got to believe me, I certainly don’t mean him any harm.’