The Collected Joe Abercrombie (222 page)

Jezal started at another thunderous explosion, this one even closer. Smoke was already rising in oily smudges over the city. ‘Yes,’ he muttered, allowing himself to be led to safety. He realised that he still had his sword drawn, and sheathed it somewhat guiltily. ‘Yes of course.’

Fearlessness, as Logen Ninefingers had once observed, is a fool’s boast.

A Rock and a Hard Place

G
lokta shook with laughter, wheezing gurgles slobbering through his empty gums, the hard chair creaking under his bony arse. His coughs and his whimpers echoed dully from the bare walls of his dim living room. In a way, it sounded very much like weeping.
And perhaps it is, just a little.

Every shake of his twisted shoulders drove nails into his neck. Every jerk of his rib-cage sent flashes of pain down to the very tips of such toes as he had left. He laughed, and the laughter hurt, and the pain made him laugh all the more.
Oh, the irony! I titter with hopelessness. I chuckle with despair.

Bubbles of spit blew from his lips as he gave one last long whine.
Like a sheep’s death rattle, but less dignified.
Then he swallowed, and wiped his running eyes.
I have not laughed so hard in years. Since before the Emperor’s torturers did their work, I shouldn’t wonder. And yet it is not so very difficult to stop. After all, nothing is really very funny here, is it?
He lifted the letter, and read it again.

Superior Glokta,

My employers at the banking house of Valint and Balk are more than disappointed with your progress. It is some time now since I asked you, in person, to inform us of Arch Lector Sult’s plans. In particular, the reasons for his continuing interest in the University. Since then we have received no communication from you.

It may be that you believe the sudden arrival of the Gurkish beyond the city walls has altered the expectations of my employers.

It has not, in any way whatsoever. Nothing will.

You will report to us within the week, or his Eminence will be informed of your divided loyalties.

I need hardly add that it would be wise for you to destroy this letter.

Mauthis.

Glokta stared at the paper for a long while by the light of the single candle, his ruined mouth hanging open.
For this, I lived through months of agony in the darkness of the Emperor’s prisons? Tortured my savage way through the Guild of Mercers? Slaughtered my bloody path through the city of Dagoska? To end my days in ignominy, trapped between a bitter old bureaucrat and a bankful of treacherous swindlers? All my twisting, my lying, my bargains, and my pain. All those corpses left beside the road . . . for this?

A new wave of laughter rocked his body, twisted him up and made his aching back rattle.
His Eminence and these bankers deserve each other! Even with the city burning down around them, their games cannot stop for an instant. Games which may very well prove fatal to poor Superior Glokta, who only tried to do his crippled best.
He had to wipe a little snot from under his nose he laughed so hard at that last thought.

It almost seems a shame to burn such a horribly hilarious document. Perhaps I should take it to the Arch Lector instead? Would he see the funny side, I wonder? Would we chuckle over it together?
He reached out and held the corner of the letter to the twisting candle flame, watched fire flicker up the side, creep out through the writing, white paper curling up into black ashes.

Burn, as my hopes, and my dreams, and my glorious future burned beneath the Emperor’s palace! Burn, as Dagoska did and Adua surely will before the Emperor’s fury! Burn, as I would love to burn King Jezal the Bastard, and the First of the Magi, and Arch Lector Sult, and Valint and Balk, and the whole damned—

‘Gah!’ Glokta flailed his singed fingertips in the air then stuck them in his toothless mouth, his laughter quickly cut off.
Strange. However much pain we experience, we never become used to it. We always scramble to escape it. We never become resigned to more.
The corner of the letter was still smouldering on the floor. He frowned, and ground it out with a savage poke of his cane.

The air was heavy with the sharp tang of wood smoke.
Like a hundred thousand burnt dinners.
Even here in the Agriont, there was the slightest grey haze of it, a messy blending together of the buildings at the end of each street. Fires had been raging in the outer districts for several days now, and the Gurkish bombardment had not let up a hair, night or day. Even as Glokta walked, the breath wheezing through the gaps in his teeth with the effort of putting one foot in front of the other, there came the muffled boom of an incendiary landing somewhere in the city, the tiniest murmur of vibration through the soles of his boots.

The people in the lane froze, staring up in alarm.
Those few unlucky folk who found themselves without excuses to flee the city when the Gurkish came. Those unlucky folk who were too important, or not important
enough. An optimistic handful who thought the Gurkish siege would be another passing fad – like a rain storm or short trousers. Too late they discover their grave error
.

Glokta kept hobbling, head lowered. He had not lost a wink of sleep for the explosions rocking the city in the darkness the past week.
I was too busy losing sleep for my mind spinning round and round like a cat in a sack, trying to find some way clear of this trap. I became well-used to explosions during my holiday in charming Dagoska.
For him, the pain lancing through his arse and up his spine was considerably more worrisome.

Oh, arrogance! Who would ever have dared suggest that Gurkish boots would one day trample across the fertile fields of Midderland? That the pretty farms and sleepy villages of the Union would dance with Gurkish fire? Who could ever have expected that beautiful, thriving Adua would turn from a little piece of heaven into a little piece of hell? Glokta felt himself smiling. Welcome, everyone! Welcome! I’ve been here all along. How nice of you to join me.

He heard armoured boots tramping down the road behind him, shuffled too late out of the way of a hurrying column of soldiers and was barged roughly onto the grassy verge, left foot sliding in the mud and sending a stab of agony up his leg. The column clattered past, heedless, and Glokta grimaced after them.
People no longer have the proper level of fear for the Inquisition. They are all a great deal too afraid of the Gurkish for that.
He stepped away from the wall with a wince and a curse, stretched his neck out and carried on limping.

High Justice Marovia was framed in the largest window of his echoing office, hands clasped behind his back. His windows faced west.
The direction of the main Gurkish assault
. Above the rooftops in the distance, columns of dark smoke rose into the pale sky, blending together into a gritty pall that rendered the autumn half-light still more funereal. Marovia turned when he heard Glokta’s toeless foot creaking on the dark boards, his lined old face alive with a welcoming smile.

‘Ah, Superior Glokta! You cannot imagine my delight to hear you announced! I have missed you since your last visit. I do so enjoy your . . . forthright style. I do so admire your . . . commitment to your work.’ He flapped one lazy hand towards the window. ‘The law, I must admit, tends to be sleepy in times of war. But even with the Gurkish at the gates the noble business of his Majesty’s Inquisition continues, eh? I assume you have come once again on behalf of his Eminence?’

Glokta paused.
But only out of habit. I must turn my twisted back on the Inquisition. What would Sult call me? A traitor? No doubt, and worse besides. But every man’s first loyalty must be to himself. I have made my sacrifices.
‘No, your Worship. I have come on behalf of Sand dan Glokta.’ He limped up to a chair, slid it out and dumped himself into it without being asked.
I am far past the niceties, now.
‘Frankly, I need your help.’
Frankly, you are my last hope.

‘My help? Surely you are not without powerful friends of your own?’

‘It is my regrettable experience that powerful men can afford no friends.’

‘All too unfortunately true. You do not reach my position, or even yours, without understanding that each man stands alone, in the end.’ Marovia gazed down beneficently as he settled into his own tall chair.
Though I am far from put at ease. His smiles are every bit as deadly as Sult’s frowns, I think.
‘Our friends must be those that can make themselves useful to us. With that in mind, what help can I offer you? And more importantly, what can you offer me in return?’

‘That may take some explaining.’ Glokta winced at a cramp in his leg and forced it out straight under the table. ‘May I speak entirely honestly with you, your Worship?’

Marovia stroked thoughtfully at his beard. ‘The truth is a very rare and valuable commodity. I am astonished that a man of your experience would simply give it away. Especially to someone on the other side of the fence, so to speak.’

‘I was once told that a man lost in the desert must take such water as he is offered, regardless of the source.’

‘Lost, are you? Speak honestly, then, Superior, and we will see if I can spare something from my canteen.’

Hardly a promise of succour, but the best I might have hoped for from a man so recently a bitter enemy. And so . . .
my confession.
Glokta turned over the memories of the last couple of years in his mind.
And a filthy, a shameful, an ugly set they are. Where to begin?
‘It is some time ago, now, that I began to examine irregularities in the business of the Honourable Guild of Mercers.’

‘I well remember the unfortunate affair.’

‘During my investigations I discovered that the Mercers were financed by a bank. A very wealthy and powerful bank. Valint and Balk.’

Glokta watched carefully for a reaction, but Marovia’s eyes did not so much as flicker. ‘I am aware of the existence of such an institution.’

‘I suspected that they were implicated in the Mercers’ crimes. Magister Kault told me as much before his unfortunate demise. But his Eminence did not wish me to investigate further. Too many complications at a complicated time.’ Glokta’s left eye twitched and he felt it beginning to run. ‘My apologies,’ he muttered as he wiped it with a finger. ‘Shortly afterwards I was dispatched to Dagoska, to take charge of the defence of the city.’

‘Your particular diligence in that matter was a source of some discomfort to me.’ Marovia worked his mouth sourly. ‘My congratulations. You did an extraordinary job.’

‘I cannot entirely take the credit. The task the Arch Lector had given me was impossible. Dagoska was riddled with treason and surrounded by the Gurkish.’

Marovia snorted. ‘One sympathises.’

‘If only anyone had sympathised then, but they were busy here, trying to get the better of each other, as they always are. Dagoska’s defences were in a state entirely inadequate for the task. I could not strengthen them without money—’

‘His Eminence was not forthcoming.’

‘His Eminence would not part with a single mark. But an unlikely benefactor stepped forward in my time of need.’

‘A rich uncle? What a happy chance.’

‘Not entirely.’ Glokta licked at the salty space where his front teeth had once been.
And the secrets begin to spill like turds from a draining latrine-pit
. ‘My rich uncle was none other than the banking house of Valint and Balk.’

Marovia frowned. ‘They advanced you money?’

‘It was thanks to their generosity that I was able to keep the Gurkish out as long as I did.’

‘Bearing in mind that powerful people have no friends, what did Valint and Balk get in return?’

‘In essence?’ Glokta gave the High Justice an even stare. ‘Whatever they wanted. Shortly after returning from Dagoska I was investigating the death of Crown Prince Raynault.’

‘A terrible crime.’

‘Of which the Gurkish ambassador who hung for it was innocent.’

Marovia registered the tiniest hint of surprise. ‘You say so?’

‘Undoubtedly. But the death of the heir to the throne created other problems, problems relating to votes in the Open Council, and his Eminence was happy with the easy answer. I tried to pursue the matter, but was prevented. By Valint and Balk.’

‘You suspect that these bankers were involved in the death of the Crown Prince, then?’

‘I suspect them of all manner of things, but proof is in short supply.’
Always too many suspicions, and not enough proof.

‘Banks,’ grunted Marovia. ‘They are made of air. They spin money out of guesses, and lies, and promises. Secrets are their currency, even more than gold.’