The Return of the Black Company

by Cook, Glen

  “Mother?” The sparks from the Shadowgate generated just enough light to reveal where she stood. A form that may have been Thai Dei loomed behind her, staring into the southern night.

  “It was in my mother’s book. Part of a fairy tale nobody understood. That nobody knew where it came from anymore. Thirteen stars that form a noose.”

  I saw nothing of the sort. I said so. Mother Gota must have been stunned into another century, so out of character had she become. She grabbed me by the arm, pulled my head down, made me sight along her pointing arm. Finally, I admitted, “I see something that looks like a bottom-up water ladle right there above what must be the skyline.”

  “That is it, you fool Stone Soldier. Three stars are hidden by the earth.” She remained particularly intense.

  “You recognized it, with three stars missing, from a description in a childhood story?”

  A particularly brilliant burst amongst the leather ropes revealed the woman staring at me bedecked in an expression of profound bewilderment. It also revealed Uncle Doj behind her. He wore a look of exasperation which vanished the instant he realized I could see him.

  “Gota. There you are. Nephew. What is this display?”

  From much closer than I would have believed he could be, Thai Dei said, “The Soldiers of Darkness have stopped the leak of death.” He spoke in rapid Nyueng Bao. He used several words that were not clear to me. I counted on context to unravel their meanings.

  Uncle Doj told Mother Gota, “I have cautioned you about your tongue—”

  “I’ll caution you, you mountebank.” I think “mountebank” is what she meant. Wrapped up in the word she chose was a root meaning “fraud,” with a superlative prefix hung out front.

  It sounded like a cousin word to “priest.” Blade would have been amused. I was amused.

  Gota had restrained herself with Doj in the past. Compared to how she had berated everyone else. She deferred to Uncle usually, albeit with poor grace. Now they squabbled like children.

  I got the impression that their quarrel had nothing to do with what they really wanted to fight about. Even so, the tiff was interesting where I could follow it.

  Thai Dei’s special mission in life is to poop parties. He embarrassed those two silent long enough to get in the news that they were quarreling amidst all the Bone Warriors in the world, at least one of whom understood their blather.

  Doj responded instantly. He shut his mouth and went for a walk. I said, “I hope some nervous type don’t pick him off in the dark.” Thai Dei went after him.

  Gota shut up only because Doj’s departure left her to carry both sides of the argument. She considered starting up with me. But she recalled that, whatever I was to her daughter, I was a Soldier of Darkness, too. Anyway, I was not Nyueng Bao and only the worms of the earth are lower than that.

  I was in a peckish mood myself, having been wakened prematurely. I said, “I rather enjoyed that.”

  Gota made a sputtery noise as she stalked away.

  Of the general darkness I asked, “Anybody know anything about a constellation called the Noose? Or any stories about it?”

  Nobody knew anything. Naturally.

  Over the next several days I asked the question of everybody I ran into and always got a negative answer. Even Narayan Singh, a logical resource for information about nooses, seemed unfamiliar with the constellation. He did not say so in so many words, of course, but Lady was familiar with Deceiver lore and knew nothing, nor was she able to pry anything out of the living saint.

  Poor guy seemed destined to be the living martyr Narayan Singh. The heartline of his existence consisted of unrelenting terror.

  * * *

  After assuring myself that the Shadowgate was holding, I ambled back down to my bunker. The standard seemed almost aglow with power. Something noteworthy was going on there. I would have to go see Croaker. If my inner thigh healed enough. If I ever got any sleep.

  My in-laws were no problem. None had gone back to our nasty little bunker. I had its stone floor and stink to myself.

  I was asleep about the time I chunked my head onto my rock pillow.

  81

  For a while I just slept. In fact, I am convinced that I dreamed normal dreams, though I cannot recall them now. Then, gradually, my spirit slipped its moorings again, in a kind of tattered, fuzzy way that might have indicated difficulty letting go. I felt no resistance. But I was not trying to go anywhere, I was just drifting.

  I floated upward. It did take an effort of will but I faced southward, trying to find the noose of stars that had gotten Mother Gota exercised. Yes. There they were. But I had to climb a thousand feet to see them all and even then they were not easily discerned. They had dropped dramatically in a very short time.

  In fact, when I reflected on it, I could not understand how they might have risen high enough for me to see from the Shadowgate.

  I did not let that trouble me, though. My attention was caught by something on the plain of stone. For an instant I saw a ghost of pale light out there, about where I glimpsed that lump of darkness sometime before. Was there something out there?

  I did not go look. It never occurred to me to try. In retrospect I cannot understand why. How could the impulse not arise? How could I not actively engage the choice of investigating or not investigating? I do not know. I just sort of went hmm and continued on about my normal ghosttime ratkilling.

  I rejected impulses to search for Mogaba and Goblin. I can be lazy even when all the work I have to do is think. Finding them would take a lot of to-ing and fro-ing and calculating. And then I might not accomplish anything. So I decided to spy on Soulcatcher instead. By now she should be recovered enough to be grumbling and scheming and maybe doing something interesting.

  Or she might just be laying around sleeping.

  * * *

  Soulcatcher was just laying around sleeping. Surrounded by woods where every branch and twig boasted a complement of crows. It looked like every crow in the world had gathered around her hideout.

  It was unlikely they would starve for a while.

  They had been living well. Already the earth beneath them was buried under their droppings. Shadows drifted below, whimpering because the crows would not come down to play.

  Like a shadow myself I wormed into Catcher’s cave. I encountered the spells she had woven to keep the darkness at bay. For a time those resisted me, too, but I was different enough to find a way through.

  Catcher was sleeping? How often did that happen?

  The Daughter of Night was not asleep. And she was a sensitive child. She felt me arrive. She sat up on her bed of damp pine needles. “Mother?”

  Catcher was a light sleeper. She sprang erect, alert, turning as she sought danger. She wore the mask that had been one of her trademarks in the old days. Mostly she had done without it lately, but seldom did I see her in public. And never in the flesh.

  She resembled Lady though she had even finer features and a more sensual air. Croaker claims he resisted her seductions. Publicly I believe him. But I do not know how he managed. I would have trouble despite my devotion to Sarie.

  Maybe it was just his age.

  Catcher’s hideout was illuminated by a lamp that hung from the ceiling of the cave. It was a cousin of our shadow-repellent candles. It was not bright but its light left no place for any little death to hide.

  “What did you say?” The voice Catcher used was that of a man whose throat had been smashed and could speak in only a hoarse whisper. Except this whisper was heavy with malice, a voice in keeping with the old, dread repute of the Ten Who Were Taken. It contained the compassion of a serpent, the sympathy of a spider.

  The Daughter of Night did not react. From her response Soulcatcher might not have been there at all.

  Catcher giggled like a girl sharing whispers about boys. “Defiance is pointless. Stubbornness is meaningless. There is no one to help you.” That was the voice of despair. It rasped, too, but it was the last speech of an
old man dying of cancer. “You are mine to do with as I please. It pleases me that you tell me what you just said.”

  The child raised her eyes. There was no love for her auntie there.

  Soulcatcher laughed.

  She was a cruel thing at times.

  She made a gesture. The child shrieked, thrashed in agony. She fought her cries, not wanting to give her tormenter the pleasure, but her body could not be controlled by her will, powerful as that was.

  “You think your mother was here? You have no mother, neither my sister nor Kina.” This voice was that of an accountant reporting the week’s profits. “I am your mother now. I am your goddess. I am your only reason for living.”

  I moved my viewpoint slightly so I could see them better. Maybe my movement disturbed the lamp’s flame. Maybe a breath of wind crept in from outside. Whatever, Catcher shut up and gave a lot more attention to her surroundings.

  After a minute during which she just turned slowly, in silence, she mused, “There’s something here. And you sensed it right away.” The girlish giggle returned. “Right away. And you thought it might be Kina. But it isn’t, is it?”

  Soulcatcher made a sudden gesture with her gloved left hand, fingers dancing too fast to follow. The brat collapsed, unconscious. Catcher settled with her back to the cave wall, dragged a pair of ragged leather sacks closer. I could smell nothing out there but I bet she reeked as bad as Howler. She was vain enough to guarantee herself incredible beauty and sensuality but not vain enough to waste much time on personal hygiene.

  Maybe the smell would help me push her away if memories of Sahra did not do the trick.

  She almost caught me. It did not look like she was doing anything but stirring through her trash. And my thoughts distracted me. I saved myself because she was used to living alone, or with crows. She reasoned aloud, “If it was the freak goddess I’d smell her. And she’d try to do something stupid. But somebody else has been prowling around, too. Let’s find out who. Maybe it’s my beloved sister.” The voice that spoke those last few words was powerfully vicious.

  Her hands sprang out of one leather sack, sudden as a snake’s strike, but I was on the move, cleverly not toward the entrance. Her all but invisible net of black thread whooshed past two feet away. As soon as it fell I headed toward the exit. I did not know if she could catch me for real but I had no urge to find out.

  Soulcatcher laughed. This was no giggle. This was full-blown, malicious adult amusement. “Whatever you are, I can’t fool you. Can I?”

  She sure could. That was why I was getting out while I could. Like all the Ten must have been, she was way more scary than would seem at first exposure. The madness leaked through only slowly.

  Catcher made a series of gestures employing every finger on each hand. She spoke in one of those tongues sorcerers favor, this one probably that of her childhood. I felt a truly ugly presence approaching as I was about to slip my ghostly nose into the crack that would take me outside.

  A shadow wriggled in. It cringed. It shuddered. It responded to Catcher’s will. I did not hang around to find out what she wanted it to do.

  It was enough to know that Soulcatcher had discovered a way to manipulate shadows. Which meant that with the last Shadowmaster barely finished kicking, a new queen of the darkness was about to rise.

  She is the darkness.

  82

  “Was I right?” Croaker asked.

  “About the standard?”

  “What else?” He seemed exasperated. Maybe it was a strain, sharing quarters with Lady and the loon crew of Smoke, Singh and Longshadow.

  “Probably. You could sure feel it. And nothing got by.” I was worn out. My inner thigh ached again after the long walk over. “But I can’t prove that wasn’t because of Lady’s gimcrackery.”

  “The Lance did something, though?”

  “Oh, yeah. Everybody felt something. Some probably even decided it had something to do with the standard.” Thai Dei had remained outside, as he always did when I visited the Old Man, so I was not shy about describing the skirmish between Uncle Doj and Mother Gota.

  “Which was about this Noose constellation?”

  “That started it. I think that was just an excuse. Their conflict runs a lot deeper.”

  “And this all just started?” He smiled to himself, like me, probably, jumping straight back to Gota’s business with One-Eye.

  “And where is our pet hedge wizard?” I asked. He was not out riding Smoke, which is what I had expected him to do while I was away. Lady had the little fire chief all tied up.

  Croaker shrugged. “Out of my hair, which is all I want right now.”

  Probably off tending his distillery, which had not been found in his dugout when the rescue crews turned the place inside out, looking more for that than for poor old One-Eye.

  I said, “I had a dream. Or maybe I was out of myself. It almost turned into a nightmare.”

  “Uhm?”

  “Catcher’s figured out how to run the shadows. Just like our boy in the cage, there.” Longshadow, though, was unconscious. More so than Smoke, who insisted on groaning every few minutes.

  Croaker sighed. “I’m disappointed but I’m not surprised. It was a logical step for her. And she’s had time to work on it.”

  “You going to do something about it?”

  “Haven’t I already?”

  “You lost me, boss.”

  “She’s figured out how to manage a few shadows. Close up. But I control the source of the shadows. And I don’t have to get near her. Though I’m going to.”

  “I wouldn’t get overconfident where she’s concerned. You never know with her. Remember how she planted that demon Frogface on us.”

  “I take nothing for granted, Murgen.” He glanced at his woman, lying motionless beside Smoke. “But I try not to let paranoia cripple me.”

  He would get an argument on that from a lot of people. On the other hand, though, he had overthrown the Shadowmasters and seemed well positioned to have us survive the perfidy of our allies.

  But, Soulcatcher? I did not doubt that Smoke had been right every time he insisted She is the darkness!

  83

  One-Eye caught me outside Croaker’s place. “Her Worship still at it?”

  “Uh … You mean…?” Thai Dei’s were only one pair of uninitiated ears nearby.

  “You know what I mean, Kid.”

  “She is.”

  “Damn! I can’t get ten minutes at a time now that she’s started playing. Damned woman must be worried about her weight.”

  Took me a minute to figure that out. Then I laughed, remembering how hungry I used to get. “That could do it. If she gets totally hooked.”

  One-Eye grumbled something and stomped off. He did not go any farther than his dugout, though. He began fussing around the remains like a dog trying to dig a rabbit out of its warren, killing time while he waited to walk the ghost. I went about the business I had, mostly stalling because I had no desire to go back over to the Shadowgate. After ten minutes of slinging mud and trash One-Eye stomped back to me. “I found that little shit Goblin yesterday. Last night. He was just about to jump on the Prahbrindrah Drah. I want to know how that came out.”

  “Uhm.” Yes. I hoped he took the Prince prisoner if they had them an asskicking contest. I would rather have his sister scared of us than mad at us. Mad she would be if we sent her little brother to his funeral ghat.

  She was not the kind to jump into the flames after him.

  “That bastard was getting pretty good when he turned on us,” One-Eye said. “There’s no guarantee the runt can take him.”

  “You worried about Goblin? You?”

  “Worried? Me? Hell, no. I don’t care what happens to the little shit. But if he croaks the Prahbrindrah Drah we’re gonna be in shit so deep we’ll have to look up to see the horizon.”

  “I don’t think we can get in much deeper than we already are. They can only kill us once. And they’ve already let us know they
intend to try.”

  One-Eye snorted. No way would he admit that he was worried about Goblin though Goblin’s absence obviously made him crazy. He had not been able to feud with anyone for ages. Nobody else would play.

  I asked, “Why don’t you play a few tricks on Uncle Doj if you’re suffering some compulsion to mess with somebody who can mess right back?”

  Thai Dei developed a sudden interest in our banter. One-Eye did not cheer up. He did ask, “You figure Lady was right about him? He don’t look the part.”

  “And you do?” Like a derelict in a slum alley does. “You think she’s ever been wrong about something like that?”

  “She’s still healthy,” One-Eye grumped.

  Thai Dei wanted to know what we were talking about but could see no way to get anything out of us without giving something away himself. If he’d just been the kind who chatters incessantly he could have asked anything and nobody would have thought anything about it.

  I chuckled.

  Puzzled, One-Eye asked, “You going back over there?”

  “Got to. Boss says.”

  One-Eye glared at the distant plateau. “Damned Tals! Just had to stab us in the back. I was all set to retire as soon as we finished Longshadow. But they just had to fuck me up. And now I got to go on up there. Which I’m looking forward to like I’m looking forward to getting a hot poker shoved up my poop chute. Whoa! Here’s my chance.” He scampered toward Croaker’s dugout.

  Lady had come up to the light. She looked more haggard than ever. She must have been walking the ghost for all she was worth. She leaned on a post while she spoke softly to one of the messengers waiting for an assignment. He hurried off toward her camp. She looked at me, frowned as though she was having trouble remembering who I was. Maybe she was. I was supposed to be somewhere else.

  I decided to go there even though it was no resort for tired professional soldiers.

  84

  Mother Gota would not talk to Uncle Doj. Mother Gota would not talk to her darling baby boy. But Mother Gota and silence had been strangers for decades. So Mother Gota talked to me.