The Collected Joe Abercrombie (308 page)

‘Don’t worry about that. Your death will be entirely satisfying.’

He gave his weak smile, and his damp eyes drifted down to her sword. ‘Fighting left-handed?’

‘Thought I’d give you some kind of chance.’

‘The least I can do is extend to you the same courtesy.’ He flicked his sword smartly from one palm into the other, switched his guard and pointed the blade towards her. ‘Shall we—’

Monza had never been one to wait for an invitation. She lunged at him but he was ready, sidestepped it, came back at her with a sharp pair of cuts, high and low. Their blades rang together, slid and scraped, darting back and forth, glittering in the strips of sunlight between the trees. Ganmark’s immaculately polished cavalry boots glided across the cobbles as nimbly as a dancer’s. He jabbed at her, lightning fast. She parried once, twice, then nearly got caught and only just twisted away. She had to stumble back a few quick steps, take a breath and set herself afresh.

It is a deplorable thing to run from the enemy, Farans wrote, but often better than the alternative.

She watched Ganmark as he paced forwards, gleaming point of his sword moving in gentle little circles. ‘You keep your guard too low, I am afraid. You are full of passion, but passion without discipline is no more than a child’s tantrum.’

‘Why don’t you shut your fucking mouth and fight?’

‘Oh, I can talk and cut pieces from you both at once.’ He came at her in earnest, pushing her from one side of the garden to the other, parrying desperately, jabbing weakly back when she could, but not often, and to no effect.

She’d heard it said he was one of the greatest swordsmen in the world, and it wasn’t hard to believe, even with his left hand. A good deal better than she’d been at her best, and her best was squashed under Gobba’s boot and scattered down the mountainside beneath Fontezarmo. Ganmark was quicker, stronger, sharper. Which meant her only chance was to be cleverer, trickier, dirtier. Angrier.

She screeched as she came at him, feinted left, jabbed right. He sprang back, and she pulled her helmet off and flung it in his face. He saw it just in time to duck, it bounced from the top of his head and made him grunt. She came in after it but he twisted sideways and she only nicked the gold braid on the shoulder of his uniform. She jabbed and he parried, well set again.

‘Tricky.’

‘Get your arse fucked.’

‘I think I might be in the mood, once I’ve killed you.’ He slashed at her, but instead of backing off she came in close, caught his sword, their hilts scraping. She tried to trip him but he stepped around her boot, just kept his balance. She kicked at him, caught his knee, his leg buckled for the briefest moment. She cut viciously, but Ganmark had already slid away and she only hacked a chunk from some topiary, little green leaves fluttering.

‘There are easier ways to trim hedges, if that’s your aim.’ Almost before she knew it he was on her with a series of cuts, driving her across the cobbles. She hopped over the bloody corpse of one of his guards, ducked behind the great legs of the statue, keeping it between them, trying to think out some way to come at him. She undid the buckles on one side of her breastplate, pulled it open and let it clatter down. It was no protection against a swordsman of his skill, and the weight of it was only tiring her.

‘No more tricks, Murcatto?’

‘I’ll think of something, bastard!’

‘Think fast, then.’ Ganmark’s sword darted between the statue’s legs and missed by a hair as she jerked out of its way. ‘You don’t get to win, you know, simply because you think yourself aggrieved. Because you believe yourself justified. It is the best swordsman who wins, not the angriest.’

He seemed about to slide around The Warrior’s huge right leg, but came instead the other way, jumping over Salier’s corpse slumped against the pedestal. She saw it coming, knocked his sword wide then hacked at his head with small elegance but large force. He ducked just in time. The blade of the Calvez clanged against Stolicus’ well-muscled calf and sent chips of marble flying. She only just kept a hold on the buzzing grip, left hand aching as she reeled away.

Ganmark frowned, gently touched the crack in the statue’s leg with his free hand. ‘Pure vandalism.’ He leaped at her, caught her sword and drove her back, once, then twice, her boots sliding from the cobbles and up onto the turf beside, fighting all the while to tease, or trick, or bludgeon out some opening she could use. But Ganmark saw everything well before it came, handled it with the simple efficiency of masterful skill. He was scarcely even breathing hard. The longer they fought the more he had her measure, and the slimmer dwindled her chances.

‘You should mind that backswing,’ he said. ‘Too high. It limits your options and leaves you open.’ She cut at him, and again, but he flicked them dismissively away. ‘And you are prone to tilt your steel to the right when extended.’ She jabbed and he caught the blade on his, metal sliding on metal, his sword whipping around hers. With an effortless twist of his wrist he tore the Calvez from her hand and sent it skittering across the cobbles. ‘See what I mean?’

She took a shocked step back, saw the gleam of light as Ganmark’s sword darted out. The blade slid neatly through the palm of her left hand, point passing between the bones and pricking her in the shoulder, bending her arm back and holding it pinned like meat and onions on a Gurkish skewer. The pain came an instant later, making her groan as Ganmark twisted the sword and drove her helplessly down onto her knees, bent backwards.

‘If that feels undeserved from me, you can tell yourself it’s a gift from the townsfolk of Caprile.’ He twisted his sword the other way and she felt the point grind into her shoulder, the steel scrape against the bones in her hand, blood running down her forearm and into her jacket.

‘Fuck you!’ she spat at him, since it was that or scream.

His mouth twitched into that sad smile. ‘A gracious offer, but your brother was more my type.’ His sword whipped out of her and she lurched onto all fours, chest heaving. She closed her eyes, waiting for the blade to slide between her shoulder blades and through her heart, just the way it had through Benna’s.

She wondered how much it would hurt, how long it would hurt for. A lot, most likely, but not for long.

She heard boot heels clicking away from her on cobbles, and slowly raised her head. Ganmark hooked his foot under the Calvez and flicked it up into his waiting hand. ‘One touch to me, I rather think.’ He tossed the sword arrow-like and it thumped into the turf beside her, wobbling gently back and forth. ‘What do you say? Shall we make it the best of three?’

The long hall that housed Duke Salier’s Styrian masterpieces was now further adorned by five corpses. The ultimate decoration for any palace, though the discerning dictator needs to replace them regularly if he is to avoid an odour. Especially in warm weather. Two of Salier’s disguised soldiers and one of Ganmark’s officers all sprawled bloodily in attitudes of scant dignity, though one of the general’s guards had managed to die in a position approaching comfort, curled around an occasional table with an ornamental vase on top.

Another guard was dragging himself towards the far door, leaving a greasy red trail across the polished floor as he went. The wound Cosca had given him was in his stomach, just under his breastplate, and it was tough to crawl and hold your guts in all at once.

That left two young staff officers, bright swords drawn and bright eyes full of righteous hate, and Cosca. Probably they would both have been nice enough people under happier circumstances. Probably their mothers loved them and probably they loved their mothers back. Certainly they did not deserve to die here in this gaudy temple to greed simply for choosing one self-serving side over another. But what choice for Cosca other than to do his very best to kill them? The lowest slug, weed, slime struggle always to stay alive. Why should Styria’s most infamous mercenary hold himself to another standard?

The two officers moved apart, one heading for the tall windows, the other for the paintings, herding Cosca towards the end of the room and, more than likely, the end of his life. He was prickly with sweat under the Talinese uniform, the breath burning his lungs. Fighting to the death was undeniably a young man’s game.

‘Now, now, lads,’ he muttered, weighing his sword. ‘How about you face me one at a time? Have you no honour?’

‘No honour?’ sneered one. ‘Us?’

‘You disguised yourself in order to launch a cowardly attack upon our general by stealth!’ hissed the other, face pinking with outrage.

‘True. True.’ Cosca let the point of his sword drop. ‘And the shame of it stabs at me. I surrender.’

The one on the left was not taken in for a moment. The one on the right looked somewhat puzzled, though, lowered his sword for an instant. It was him that Cosca flung his knife at.

It twittered through the air and thudded into the young man’s side, doubling him over. Cosca charged in behind it, aiming for the chest. Perhaps the boy leaned forwards, or perhaps Cosca’s aim was wayward, but the blade caught the officer’s neck and, in a spectacular justification of all the sharpening, took his head clean off. It spun away, spraying spots of blood, bounced from one of the paintings with a hollow clonk and a flapping of canvas. The body keeled forwards, blood welling from the severed neck in long spurts and creeping out across the floor.

Even as Cosca yelped with surprised triumph, the other officer was on him, slashing away like a man beating a carpet. Cosca ducked, weaved, parried, jerked helplessly back from a savage cut, tripped over the headless corpse and went sprawling in the slick of blood around it.

The officer gave a shriek as he sprang to finish the work. Cosca’s flailing hand clutched for the nearest thing, gripped it, flung it. The severed head. It caught the young man in the face and sent him stumbling. Cosca floundered to his blade and snatched it up, spun about, hand, sword, face, clothes all daubed with red. Strangely fitting, for a man who had lived the life he had.

The officer was already at him again with a flurry of furious cuts. Cosca gave ground as fast as he could without falling over, sword drooping, pretending at complete exhaustion and not having to pretend all that much. He collided with the table, nearly fell, his free hand fished behind him, found the rim of the ornamental jar. The officer came forwards, lifting his sword with a yelp of triumph. It turned to a gurgle of shock as the jar came flying at him. He managed to smash it away with the hilt of his sword, fragments of pottery bursting across one side of him, but that left his blade wide for a moment. Cosca made one last desperate lunge, felt a gentle resistance as his blade punched through the officer’s cheek and out through the back of his head with textbook execution.

‘Oh.’ The officer wobbled slightly as Cosca whipped his sword back and capered sharply away. ‘Is that . . .’ His look was one of bleary-eyed surprise, like a man who had woken up drunk to find himself robbed and tied naked to a post. Cosca could not quite remember whether it was in Etrisani or Westport that had happened to him, those years all rather blended into one.

‘Whasappenah?’ The officer slashed with exaggerated slowness and Cosca stepped out of the way, let him spin round in a wide circle and sprawl over onto his side. He laboriously rolled, clambered up, blood running gently from the neat little slit beside his nose. The eye above it was flickering now, face on that side gone slack as old leather.

‘Sluviduviduther,’ he drooled.

‘Your pardon?’ asked Cosca.

‘Slurghhh!’ And he raised his quivering sword and charged. Directly sideways into the wall. He crashed into the painting of the girl surprised while bathing, tore a great gash through it with his flailing sword arm, brought the great canvas keeling down on top of him as he fell, one boot sticking out from underneath the gilded frame. He did not move again.

‘The lucky bastard,’ Cosca whispered. To die beneath a naked woman. It was the way he had always wanted to go.

The wound in Monza’s shoulder burned. The one through her left hand burned far worse. Her palm, her fingers, sticky with blood. She could barely make a fist, let alone grip a blade. No choice, then. She dragged the glove from her right hand with her teeth, reached out and took hold of the Calvez’ hilt with it, feeling the crooked bones shift as her twisted fingers closed around the grip, little one still painfully straight.

‘Ah. Right-handed?’ Ganmark flicked his sword spinning into the air, snatched it back with his own right hand as nimbly as a circus trickster. ‘I always did admire your determination, if not the goals on which you trained it. Revenge, now, eh?’

‘Revenge,’ she snarled.

‘Revenge. If you could even get it, what good would it do you? All this expenditure of effort, pain, treasure, blood, for what? Who is ever left better off for it?’ His sad eyes watched her slowly stand. ‘Not the avenged dead, certainly. They rot on, regardless. Not those who are avenged upon, of course. Corpses all. And what of the ones who take vengeance, what of them? Do they sleep easier, do you suppose, once they have heaped murder on murder? Sown the bloody seeds of a hundred other retributions?’ She circled around, trying to think of some trick to kill him with. ‘All those dead men at that bank in Westport, that was your righteous work, I suppose? And the carnage at Cardotti’s, a fair and proportionate reply?’

‘What had to be done!’

‘Ah, what had to be done. The favourite excuse of unexamined evil echoes down the ages and slobbers from your twisted mouth.’ He danced at her, their swords rang together, once, twice. He jabbed, she parried and jabbed back. Each contact sent a jolt of pain up her arm. She ground her teeth together, forced the scowl to stay on her face, but there was no disguising how much it hurt her, or how clumsy she was with it. If she’d had small chances with her left, she had none at all with her right, and he knew it already.