The Collected Joe Abercrombie (23 page)

‘Doubtless ...’

‘Doubtless, yes! Tell me, how are your studies progressing?’

The wretched apprentice looked utterly confused. ‘They have been somewhat . . . interrupted?’

‘You made no progress with Juvens’
Principles of Art
while you were lost in the hills in bad weather?’

‘Er . . . no progress . . . no.’

‘And your knowledge of the histories. Did that develop far, while Master Ninefingers was carrying you back to the library?’

‘Er . . . I must confess . . . it didn’t.’

‘Your exercises and meditations though, surely you have been practising those, while unconscious this past week?’

‘Well, er . . . no, the unconsciousness was . . . er . . .’

‘So, tell me, would you say that you are ahead of the game, so to speak? Or have your studies fallen behind?’

Quai stared down at the floor. ‘They were behind when I left.’

‘Then perhaps then you could tell me where you plan to spend the day?’

The apprentice looked up hopefully. ‘At my desk?’

‘Excellent!’ Bayaz smiled wide. ‘I was about to suggest it, but you have anticipated me! Your keenness to learn does you much credit!’ Quai nodded furiously and hurried towards the door, the hem of his blanket trailing on the flags.

‘Bethod is coming,’ murmured Bayaz. ‘He will be here today.’ Logen’s smile vanished, his throat felt suddenly tight. He remembered their last meeting well enough. Stretched out on his face on the floor of Bethod’s hall at Carleon, beaten and broken and well chained up, dribbling blood into the straw and hoping the end wouldn’t be too long coming. Then, no reason given, they’d let him go. Flung him out the gates with the Dogman, Threetrees, the Weakest and the rest, and told him never to come back. Never. The first time Bethod ever showed a grain of mercy, and the last, Logen didn’t doubt.

‘Today?’ he asked, trying to keep his voice even.

‘Yes, and soon. The King of the Northmen. Hah! The arrogance of him!’ Bayaz glanced sidelong at Logen. ‘He is coming to ask me for a favour, and I would like you to be there.’

‘He won’t like that.’

‘Exactly.’

The wind felt colder than before. If Logen never saw Bethod again it would be far too soon. But some things have to be done. It’s better to do them, than to live with the fear of them. That’s what Logen’s father would have said. So he took a deep breath and squared his shoulders. ‘I’ll be there.’

‘Excellent. Then there is but one thing missing.’

‘What?’

Bayaz smirked. ‘You need a weapon.’

It was dry in the cellars beneath the library. Dry and dark and very, very confusing. They’d gone up and down steps, around corners, past doors, taking here or there a turning to the left or right. The place was a warren. Logen hoped he didn’t lose sight of the wizard’s flickering torch, or he could easily be stuck beneath the library for ever.

‘Dry down here, nice and dry,’ Bayaz was saying to himself, voice echoing down the passageway and merging with their flapping footfalls. ‘There’s nothing worse than damp for books.’ He pulled up suddenly next to a heavy door. ‘Or for weapons.’ He gave the door a gentle shove and it swung silently open.

‘Look at that! Hasn’t been opened for years, but the hinges still move smooth as butter! That’s craftsmanship for you! Why does no one care about craftsmanship anymore?’ Bayaz stepped over the threshold without waiting for an answer, and Logen followed close behind.

The wizard’s torch lit up a long, low hall with walls of rough stone blocks, the far end lost in shadows. The room was lined with racks and shelves, the floor littered with boxes and stands, everything heaped and bursting with a mad array of arms and armour. Blades and spikes and polished surfaces of wood and metal caught the flickering torchlight as Bayaz paced slowly across the stone floor, weaving between the weapons and casting around.

‘Quite a collection,’ muttered Logen, as he followed the Magus through the clutter.

‘A load of old junk mostly, but there should be a few things worth the finding.’ Bayaz took a helmet from a suit of ancient, gilded plate armour and looked it over with a frown. ‘What do you make of that?’

‘I’ve never been much for armour.’

‘No, you don’t strike me as the type. All very well on horse-back, I dare say, but it’s a pain in the arse when you’ve a journey to make on foot.’ He tossed the helmet back onto its stand, then stood there staring at the armour, lost in thought. ‘Once you’ve got it on, how do you piss?’

Logen frowned. ‘Er . . .’ he said, but Bayaz was already moving off down the room, and taking the light with him.

‘You must have used a few weapons in your time, Master Ninefingers. What’s your preference for?’

‘I’ve never really had one,’ said Logen, ducking under a rusty halberd leaning out from a rack. ‘A champion never knows what he might be called on to fight with.’

‘Of course, of course.’ Bayaz took up a long spear with a vicious barbed head, and wafted it around a bit. Logen stepped back cautiously. ‘Deadly enough. You could keep a man at bay with one of these. But a man with a spear needs a lot of friends, and they all need spears as well.’ Bayaz shoved it back on the rack and moved on.

‘This looks fearsome.’ The Magus took hold of the gnarled shaft of a huge double-bladed axe. ‘Shit!’ he said as he lifted it up, veins bulging out of his neck. ‘It’s heavy enough!’ He set it down with a thump, making the rack wobble. ‘You could kill a man with that! You could cut him clean in half! If he was standing still.’

‘This is better,’ said Logen. It was a simple, solid-looking sword, in a scabbard of weathered brown leather.

‘Oh, yes indeed. Much, much better. That blade is the work of Kanedias, the Master Maker himself.’ Bayaz handed his torch to Logen and took the long sword from the rack.

‘Has it ever occurred to you, Master Ninefingers, that a sword is different from other weapons? Axes and maces and so forth are lethal enough, but they hang on the belt like dumb brutes.’ He ran an eye over the hilt, plain cold metal scored with faint grooves for a good grip, glinting in the torchlight. ‘But a sword . . . a sword has a voice.’

‘Eh?’

‘Sheathed it has little to say, to be sure, but you need only put your hand on the hilt and it begins to whisper in your enemy’s ear.’ He wrapped his fingers tightly round the grip. ‘A gentle warning. A word of caution. Do you hear it?’

Logen nodded slowly. ‘Now,’ murmured Bayaz, ‘compare it to the sword half drawn.’ A foot length of metal hissed out of the sheath, a single silver letter shining near the hilt. The blade itself was dull, but its edge had a cold and frosty glint. ‘It speaks louder, does it not? It hisses a dire threat. It makes a deadly promise. Do you hear it?’

Logen nodded again, his eye fastened on that glittering edge. ‘Now compare it to the sword full drawn.’ Bayaz whipped the long blade from its sheath with a faint ringing sound, brought it up so that the point hovered inches from Logen’s face. ‘It shouts now, does it not? It screams defiance! It bellows a challenge! Do you hear it?’

‘Mmm,’ said Logen, leaning back and staring slightly cross-eyed at the shining point of the sword.

Bayaz let it drop and slid it gently back into its scabbard, something to Logen’s relief. ‘Yes, a sword has a voice. Axes and maces and so forth are lethal enough, but a sword is a subtle weapon, and suited to a subtle man. You I think, Master Ninefingers, are subtler than you appear.’ Logen frowned as Bayaz held the sword out to him. He had been accused of many things in his life, but never subtlety. ‘Consider it a gift. My thanks for your good manners.’

Logen thought about it a moment. He hadn’t owned a proper weapon since before he crossed the mountains, and he wasn’t keen to take one up again. But Bethod was coming, and soon. Better to have it, and not want it, than to want it, and not have it. Far, far better. You have to be realistic about these things.

‘Thank you,’ said Logen, taking the sword from Bayaz and handing him back the torch. ‘I think.’

A small fire crackled in the grate, and the room was warm, and homely, and comfortable.

But Logen didn’t feel comfortable. He stood by the window, staring down into the courtyard below, nervous and twitchy and scared, like he used to be before a fight. Bethod was coming. He was somewhere out there. On the road through the woods, or passing between the stones, or across the bridge, or through the gate.

The First of the Magi didn’t seem tense. He sat comfortably in his chair, his feet up on the table next to a long wooden pipe, leafing through a small white-bound book with a faint smile on his face. No one had ever looked calmer, and that only made Logen feel worse.

‘Is it good?’ asked Logen.

‘Is what good?’

‘The book.’

‘Oh yes. It is the best of books. It is Juvens’
Principles of Art
, the very cornerstone of my order.’ Bayaz waved his free hand at the shelves which covered two walls, and the hundreds of other identical books lined neatly upon them. ‘It’s all the same. One book.’

‘One?’ Logen’s eyes scanned across the thick, white spines. ‘That’s a pretty damn long book. Have you read it all?’

Bayaz chuckled. ‘Oh yes, many times. Every one of my order must read it, and eventually make their own copy.’ He turned the book around, so that Logen could see. The pages were thickly covered with lines of neat, but unintelligible symbols. ‘I wrote these, long ago. You should read it too.’

‘I’m really not much of a reader.’

‘No?’ asked Bayaz. ‘Shame.’ He flicked over the page and carried on.

‘What about that one?’ There was another book, sat alone on its side on the very top of one of the shelves, a large, black book, scarred and battered-looking. ‘That written by this Juvens as well?’

Bayaz frowned up at it. ‘No. His brother wrote that.’ He got up from his chair, stretched up and pulled it down. ‘This is a different kind of knowledge.’ He dragged open his desk drawer, slid the black book inside and slammed it shut. ‘Best left alone,’ he muttered, sitting back down and opening up the
Principles of Art
again.

Logen took a deep breath, put his left hand on the hilt of the sword, felt the cold metal pressing into his palm. The feel of it was anything but reassuring. He let go and turned back to the window, frowning down into the courtyard. He felt his breath catch in his throat.

‘Bethod. He’s here.’

‘Good, good,’ muttered Bayaz absently. ‘Who does he have with him?’

Logen peered at the three figures in the courtyard. ‘Scale,’ he said with a scowl. ‘And a woman. I don’t recognise her. They’re dismounting.’ Logen licked his dry lips. ‘They’re coming in.’

‘Yes, yes,’ murmured Bayaz, ‘that is how one gets to a meeting. Try to calm yourself, my friend. Breathe.’

Logen leaned back against the whitewashed plaster, arms folded, and took a deep breath. It didn’t help. The hard knot of worry in his chest only pressed harder. He could hear heavy footsteps in the corridor outside. The doorknob turned.

Scale was the first into the room. Bethod’s eldest son had always been burly, even as a boy, but since Logen last saw him he’d grown monstrous. His rock of a head seemed almost an afterthought on top of all that brawn, his skull a good deal narrower than his neck. He had a great block of jaw, a flat stub of a nose, and furious, bulging, arrogant little eyes. His thin mouth was twisted in a constant sneer, much like his younger brother Calder’s, but there was less guile here and a lot more violence. He had a heavy broadsword on his hip, and his meaty hand was never far from it as he glowered at Logen, oozing malice from every pore.

The woman came next. She was very tall, slender and pale, almost ill-looking. Her slanting eyes were as narrow and cold as Scale’s were bulging and wrathful, and were surrounded with a quantity of dark paint, which made them look narrower and colder still. There were golden rings on her long fingers, golden bracelets on her thin arms, golden chains around her white neck. She swept the room with her frosty blue eyes, each thing she noticed seeming to lift her to new heights of disgust and contempt. First the furniture, then the books, particularly Logen, and Bayaz most of all.

The self-styled King of the Northmen came last, and more magnificent than ever, robed in rich, coloured cloth and rare white furs. He wore a heavy golden chain across his shoulders, a golden circlet round his head, set with a single diamond, big as a bird’s egg. His smiling face was more deeply lined than Logen remembered, his hair and beard touched with grey, but he was no less tall, no less vigorous, no less handsome, and he’d gained much of authority and wisdom – of majesty even. He looked every inch a great man, a wise man, a just man. He looked every inch a King. But Logen knew better.

‘Bethod!’ said Bayaz, warmly, snapping his book shut. ‘My old friend! You can hardly imagine what a joy it is to see you again.’ He swung his feet off the table, and gestured at the golden chain, the flashing diamond. ‘And to see you so hugely advanced in the world! I remember the time was you were happy to visit me alone. But I suppose great men must be attended on, and I see you have brought some . . . other people. Your charming son I know, of course. I see that you’ve been eating well at least, eh, Scale?’