The Collected Joe Abercrombie (316 page)

‘No trick. I was born under a lucky star.’ Andiche scowled at Shivers, about as friendly a look as a fox spares for a chicken. ‘Who the hell’s this bandaged arsehole?’

The guard pushed in past Shivers, giving him a dirty look sideways. ‘General Carpi, sir, this Northman says he needs to speak to you.’

‘That a fact?’ Faithful spared Shivers a quick glance, then went back to stacking up his coins. ‘And why would I want to speak to the likes of him? Toss me the dice there, Victus, I ain’t done.’

‘That’s the problem with generals.’ Victus was bald as an egg and gaunt as famine, bunches of rings on his fingers and chains round his neck doing nothing to make him look prettier. ‘They never do know when they’re done.’ And he tossed the dice back down the table, couple of his fellows chuckling.

The guard swallowed. ‘He says he knows who killed Prince Ario!’

‘Oh, you do, do you? And who was that?’

‘Monzcarro Murcatto.’ Every hard face in the tent turned sharp towards Shivers. Faithful carefully set the dice down, eyes narrowed. ‘Looks like you know the name.’

‘Should we hire him for a jester or hang him for a liar?’ Victus grated out.

‘Murcatto’s dead,’ another.

‘That so? I wonder who it is I been fucking for the past month, then?’

‘If you’ve been fucking Murcatto I’d advise you to get back to it.’ Andiche grinned around him. ‘From what her brother told me, no one here can suck a cock as well as she could.’

A good few chuckles at that. Shivers wasn’t sure what he meant about her brother, but it didn’t matter none. He’d already undone the bandages, and now he dragged the lot off in one go, turned his face towards the lamplight. Such laughter as there was mostly sputtered out. He had the kind of face now put a sharp end to mirth. ‘Here’s what she’s cost me so far. For a handful of silver? Shit on that, I ain’t half the fool she takes me for, and I’ve got my pride, still. I’m done with the bitch.’

Faithful Carpi was frowning at him. ‘Describe her.’

‘Tall, lean, black hair, blue eyes, frowns a lot. Sharp tongue on her.’

Victus waved one jewel-crusted hand at him. ‘Common knowledge!’

‘She’s got a broken right hand, and marks all over. From falling down a mountain, she says.’ Shivers pushed his finger into his stomach, keeping his eyes on Faithful. ‘Got a scar just here, and one matching in her back. Says a friend of hers gave it to her. Stabbed her through with her own dagger.’

Carpi’s face had turned grim as a gravedigger’s. ‘You know where she is?’

‘Hold up just a trice, there.’ Victus looked even less happy than his chief. ‘You saying Murcatto’s alive?’

‘I’d heard a rumour,’ said Faithful.

A huge black-skinned man with long ropes of iron-grey hair stood up sharp from the table. ‘I’d heard all kinds of rumours,’ voice slow and deep as the sea. ‘Rumours and facts are two different things. When were you planning to fucking tell us?’

‘When you fucking needed to know, Sesaria. Where is she?’

‘At a farm,’ said Shivers. ‘Maybe an hour’s hard ride distant.’

‘How many does she have with her?’

‘Just four. A whining poisoner and his apprentice, hardly more’n a girl. A red-haired woman name of Vitari and some brown bitch.’

‘Where exactly?’

Shivers grinned. ‘Well, that’s why I’m here, ain’t it? To sell you the where exactly.’

‘I don’t like the smell of this shit,’ snarled Victus. ‘If you’re asking me—’

‘I’m not,’ growled Faithful, without looking round. ‘What’s your price for it?’

‘A tenth part of what Duke Orso’s offering on the head o’ Prince Ario’s killer.’

‘Just a tenth?’

‘I reckon a tenth is plenty more’n I’ll get from her, but not enough to get me killed by you. I want no more’n I can carry away alive.’

‘Wise man,’ said Faithful. ‘Nothing we hate more than greed, is there, boys?’ A couple of chuckles, but most were still looking far from happy at their old general’s sudden return from the land of the dead. ‘Alright, then, a tenth part is fair. You’ve a deal.’ And Faithful stepped forwards and slapped his hand into Shivers’, looking him right in the face. ‘If we get Murcatto.’

‘You need her dead or alive?’

‘Sorry to say, I’d prefer dead myself.’

‘Good, so would I. Last thing I want is a running score with that crazy bitch. She don’t forget.’

Faithful nodded. ‘So it seems. I reckon we can do business, you and me. Swolle?’

‘General?’ A man with a heavy beard stepped up.

‘Get three-score horsemen ready to ride, and quick, those with the fastest—’

‘Might be best to keep it to fewer,’ said Shivers.

‘That so? And how would fewer men be better?’

‘The way she tells it, she’s got friends here still.’ Shivers let his eye wander round the hard faces in the tent. ‘The way she tells it, there’s plenty o’ men in this camp wouldn’t say no to having her back in charge. The way she tells it, they won victories to be proud of with her, and with you they skulk around and scout, while Orso’s men get all the prizes.’ Faithful’s eyes darted sideways, then back. Enough to let Shivers know he’d touched a wound. There’s no chief in the world so sure of himself he don’t worry some. No chief of men like these, leastways. ‘Best keep it to a few, and them ones you’re sure of. I’ve no problem stabbing Murcatto in the back, I reckon she’s got it coming. Getting stabbed by one o’ these is another matter.’

‘Five all told, and four of ’em women?’ Swolle grinned. ‘A dozen should do it.’

Faithful kept his eyes on Shivers. ‘Still. Make it three score, like I said, just in case there’s more at the party than we’re expecting. I’d be all embarrassed to arrive at a job short-handed.’

‘Sir.’ And Swolle shouldered his way out through the tent flap.

Shivers shrugged. ‘Have it your way.’

‘Why, that I will. You can depend on it.’ Faithful turned to his frowning captains. ‘Any of you old bastards want to come out on the hunt?’

Sesaria shook his big head, long hair swaying. ‘This is your mess, Faithful. You can swing the broom.’

‘I’ve foraged enough for one night.’ Andiche was already pushing out through the flap, a few others following in a muttering crowd, some looking suspicious, some looking careless, some looking drunk.

‘I too must take my leave, General Carpi.’ The speaker stood out among all these rough, scarred, dirty men, if only ’cause nothing much about him stood out. He had a curly head of hair, no weapon Shivers could see, no scar, no sneer, no fighter’s air of menace in the least. But Faithful still chuckled up to him like he was a man needed respect.

‘Master Sulfur!’ Folding his hand in both of his big paws and giving it a squeeze. ‘My thanks for stopping by. You’re always welcome here.’

‘Oh, I am loved wherever I go. Easy to remain on good terms with the man who brings the money.’

‘Tell Duke Orso, and your people at the bank, they’ve nothing to worry on here. It’ll all be taken care of, like we discussed. Just as soon as I’ve dealt with this little problem.’

‘Life does love to throw up problems, doesn’t it?’ Sulfur gave Shivers a splinter of a smile. He had odd-coloured eyes, one blue, one green. ‘Happy hunting, then.’ And he ambled out into the dawn.

Faithful was back in Shivers’ face right away. ‘An hour’s ride, you said?’

‘If you move quick for your age.’

‘Huh. How do you know she won’t have missed you by then, slipped away?’

‘She’s asleep. Husk sleep. She smokes more o’ that shit every day. Half her time drooling with it, the rest drooling for it. She won’t be waking any time soon.’

‘Best to waste no time, though. That woman can cause unpleasant surprises.’

‘That’s a fact. And she’s expecting help. Two-score men from Rogont, coming by tomorrow afternoon. They’re planning to shadow you, lay an ambush as you turn south.’

‘No better feeling than flipping a surprise around, eh?’ Faithful grinned. ‘And you’ll be riding at the front.’

‘For a tenth part o’ the take I’ll ride at the front side-saddle.’

‘Just in front will do. Right next to me and you can point out the ground. We honest men need to stick together.’

‘That we do,’ said Shivers. ‘No doubt.’

‘Alright.’ Faithful clapped his big hands and rubbed them together. ‘A piss, then I’m getting my armour on.’

King of Poisons

‘R
oss?’came Day’s high voice. ‘You awake?’ Morveer exhaled a racking sigh. ‘Merciful slumber has indeed B released me from her soft bosom . . . and back into the frigid embrace of an uncaring world.’

‘What?’

He waved it bitterly away. ‘Never mind. My words fall like seeds . . . on stony ground.’

‘You said to wake you at dawn.’

‘Dawn? Oh, harsh mistress!’ He threw back his one thin blanket and struggled up from the prickling straw, truly a humble repose for a man of his matchless talents, stretched his aching back and clambered stiffly down the ladder to the floor of the barn. He was forced to concede that he had long been too advanced in years, not to mention too refined in tastes, for haylofts.

Day had assembled the apparatus during the hours of darkness and now, as the first anaemic flicker of dawn niggled at the narrow windows, the burners were alight. Reagents happily simmered, steam carelessly condensed, distillations merrily dripped into the collecting flasks. Morveer processed around the makeshift table, rapping his knuckles against the wood as he passed, making the glassware clink and tinkle. Everything appeared to be entirely in order. Day had learned her business from a master, after all, perhaps the greatest poisoner in all the wide Circle of the World, who would say nay? But even the sight of the good work well done could not coax Morveer from his maudlin mood.

He puffed out his cheeks and gave vent to a weary sigh. ‘No one understands me. I am doomed to be misunderstood.’

‘You’re a complex person,’ said Day.

‘Exactly! Exactly so! You see it!’ Perhaps she alone appreciated that beneath his stern and masterful exterior there were reservoirs of feeling deep as mountain lakes.

‘I’ve made tea.’ She held a battered metal mug out to him, steam curling from within. His stomach grumbled unpleasantly.

‘No. I am grateful for your kind attentions, of course, but no. My digestion is unsettled this morning, terribly unsettled.’

‘Our Gurkish visitor making you nervous?’

‘Absolutely and entirely not,’ he lied, suppressing a shiver at the very remembrance of those midnight eyes. ‘My dyspepsia is the result of my ongoing difference of opinion with our employer, the notorious Butcher of Caprile, the ever-contrary Murcatto! I simply cannot seem to find the correct approach with that woman! However cordially I behave, however spotless my intentions, she bears it ill !’

‘She’s somewhat prickly, true.’

‘In my opinion she passes beyond prickly and enters the arena of . . . sharp,’ he finished, lamely.

‘Well, the betrayal, the being thrown down the mountain, the dead brother and all—’

‘Explanations, not excuses! We all have suffered painful reverses! I declare, I am half-tempted to abandon her to her inevitable fate and seek out fresh employment.’ He snorted with laughter at a sudden thought. ‘With Duke Orso, perhaps!’

Day looked up sharply. ‘You’re joking.’

It had, in fact, been intended as a witticism, for Castor Morveer was not the man to abandon an employer once he had accepted a contract. Certain standards of behaviour had to be observed, in his business more than any other. But it amused him to explore the notion further, counting off the points one by one upon his outstretched digits. ‘A man who can undoubtedly afford my services. A man who undoubtedly requires my services. A man who has proved himself unencumbered by the slightest troublesome moral qualm.’

‘A man with a record of pushing his employees down mountains.’

Morveer dismissed it. ‘One should never be foolish enough to trust the sort of person who would hire a poisoner. In that he is no worse an employer than any other. Why, it is a profound wonder the thought did not occur sooner!’

‘But . . . we killed his son.’

‘Bah! Such difficulties are easily explained away when two men find they need each other.’ He airily waved one hand. ‘Some invention will suffice. Some wretched scapegoat can always be found to shoulder the blame.’

She nodded slowly, mouth set hard. ‘A scapegoat. Of course.’

‘A wretched one.’ One less mutilated Northman in the world would be no loss to posterity. Nor one less insane convict or abrasive torturer, for that matter. He was almost warming to the notion. ‘But I daresay for the time being we are stuck with Murcatto and her futile quest for revenge. Revenge. I swear, is there a more pointless, destructive, unsatisfying motive in all the world?’

‘I thought motives weren’t our business,’ observed Day, ‘only jobs and the pay.’

‘Correct, my dear, very correct, every motive is a pure one that necessitates our services. You see straight to the heart of the matter as always, as though the matter were entirely transparent. Whatever would I do without you?’ He came smiling around the apparatus. ‘How are our preparations proceeding?’