The Collected Joe Abercrombie (510 page)

Sarmis formed his words with fearsome precision. ‘Who are these . . . people?’

Even Cosca had been silenced by the theatre of the moment, but now, much to everyone’s dismay, he found his voice again. It sounded cracked, weak, almost ridiculous after the Legate’s, but he found it nonetheless, waving his half-emptied bottle for added emphasis. ‘I am Nicomo Cosca, Captain General of the Company of the Gracious Hand, and—’

‘And we were just leaving!’ snapped Lorsen, seizing Cosca’s elbow.

The Old Man refused to be moved. ‘Without my gold? I hardly think so!’

Dimbik did not care in the least for the way things were going. Probably no one did. There was a gentle rattle as Friendly threw his dice. The Mayor’s one-eyed thug suddenly had a knife in his hand. That did not strike him as a positive development.

‘Enough!’ hissed Lorsen, halfway now to wrestling the Old Man by his armpit. ‘When we reach Starikland every man will get a bonus! Every man!’

Sworbreck was crouching against the counter, apparently trying to vanish into the floor while madly scribbling in his notebook. Sergeant Cog was edging towards the doorway, and he had good instincts. The odds had changed, and not for the better. Dimbik had begged Cosca to wait for more men, the old fool, but he might as well have argued with the tide. And now all it would take was a loose trigger and there would be a bloodbath.

Dimbik held one hand up to the flatbowmen as to a skittish horse. ‘Easy . . .’

‘I shit on your bonus!’ snarled Cosca, struggling with scant dignity to shake Lorsen off. ‘Where’s my fucking gold?’

The Mayor was backing away, one pale hand against her chest, but Sarmis only appeared to grow in stature, his white brows drawing inwards. ‘What is this impertinence?’

‘I can only apologise,’ blathered Temple, ‘we—’

Sarmis struck him across the face with the back of his hand and knocked him to the floor. ‘Kneel when you address me!’

Dimbik’s mouth was dry, the pulse pounding in his head. That he would have to die for Cosca’s absurd ambitions seemed horribly unfair. His sash had already given its life for the dubious cause and that seemed more than sacrifice enough. Dimbik had once been told that the best soldiers are rarely courageous. That was when he had been sure it was the career for him. He started to slide one hand towards his sword, far from sure what he would do with it once it reached the hilt.

‘I will not be disappointed again!’ shrieked the Old Man, struggling to reach his own hilt with Lorsen restraining him and a half-full bottle still clutched in his other fist. ‘Men of the Gracious Hand! Draw your—’

‘No!’ Lorsen’s voice barked out like a slamming door. ‘Captain General Dimbik, take the traitor Nicomo Cosca under arrest!’

There was the very slightest pause.

Probably no more than a breath, for all it felt far longer. While everyone assessed the odds and the outcomes. While everyone judged just where the shifting power sat. While everything dropped into place in Dimbik’s mind and, no doubt, the minds of every other person present. Just a breath, and everything was rearranged.

‘Of course, Inquisitor,’ said Dimbik. The two flatbowmen raised their weapons to point them at Cosca. They looked slightly surprised that they were doing it, but they did it nonetheless.

Friendly looked up from his dice and frowned slightly. ‘Two,’ he said.

Cosca gazed slack-jawed at Dimbik. ‘So that’s how it is?’ The bottle dropped from his nerveless fingers, clattered to the floor and rolled away, dribbling liquor. ‘That’s how it is, is it?’

‘How else would it be?’ said Dimbik. ‘Sergeant Cog?’

That venerable soldier stepped forward, for once, with an impressive degree of military snap. ‘Sir?’

‘Please disarm Master Cosca, Master Friendly, and Master Sworbreck.’

‘Place them in irons for the trip,’ said Lorsen. ‘They will face trial on our return.’

‘Why me?’ squeaked Sworbreck, eyes wide as saucers.

‘Why not you?’ Corporal Bright looked the author over and, finding no weapon, he jerked the pencil from his hand, tossed it on the floor and made great show of grinding it under his heel.

‘Prisoner?’ muttered Friendly. For some reason he had the faintest smile on his face as the manacles were snapped around his wrists.

‘I’ll be back!’ snarled the Old Man, spraying spit over his shoulder as Cog dragged him wriggling away, empty scabbard flapping. ‘Laugh while you can, because Nicomo Cosca always laughs last! I’ll be revenged on the whole pack of you! I will not be disappointed again! I will—’ The door swung shut upon him.

‘Who was that drunkard?’ asked Sarmis.

‘Nicomo Cosca, your Excellency,’ muttered Temple, still on his knees and with one hand pressed to his bloody mouth. ‘Infamous soldier of fortune.’

The Legate grunted. ‘Never heard of him.’

Lorsen placed one hand upon his breast and bowed low. ‘Your Excellency, I pray that you accept my apologies for any and all inconveniences, trespasses and—’

‘You have eight weeks to leave Imperial territory,’ said Sarmis. ‘Any of you found within our borders after that time will be buried alive.’ He slapped dust from his breastplate. ‘Have you such a thing as a bath?’

‘Of course, your Excellency,’ murmured the Mayor, virtually grovelling. ‘We will do the very best we can.’ She turned her eyes to Dimbik as she ushered the Legate towards the stairs. ‘Get out,’ she hissed.

The brand-new captain general was by no means reluctant to oblige. With the greatest of relief, he and his men spilled into the street and prepared their tired mounts for the trip out of town. Cosca had been manhandled into his saddle, sparse hair in disarray, gazing down at Dimbik with a look of stunned upset.

‘I remember when I took you on,’ he muttered. ‘Drunk, and spurned, and worthless. I graciously offering my hand.’ He attempted to mime the offering of his hand but was prevented by his manacles.

Dimbik smoothed down his hair. ‘Times change.’

‘Here is justice, eh, Sworbreck? Here is loyalty! Take a good look, all of you, this is where charity gets you! The fruits of polite behaviour and thought for your fellow man!’

‘For pity’s sake, someone shut him up,’ snapped Lorsen, and Cog leaned from his saddle and stuffed a pair of socks in Cosca’s mouth.

Dimbik leaned closer to the Inquisitor. ‘It might be best if we were to kill them. Cosca still has friends among the rest of the Company, and—’

‘A point well made and well taken, but no. Look at him.’ The infamous mercenary did indeed present a most miserable picture, sitting hunched on horseback with hands manacled behind him, his torn and muddied cloak all askew, the gilt on his breastplate all peeling and rust showing beneath, his wrinkled skin blotchy with rash, one of Cog’s socks dangling from his mouth. ‘Yesterday’s man if ever there was one. And in any case, my dear Captain General . . .’ Dimbik stood tall and straightened his uniform at the title. He very much enjoyed the ring of it. ‘We need someone to blame.’

In spite of the profound pain in his stomach, the ache in his legs, the sweat spreading steadily under his armour, he remained resplendently erect upon the balcony, rigid as a mighty oak, until long after the mercenaries had filed away into the haze. Would the great Legate Sarmis, ruthless commander, undefeated general, right hand of the Emperor, feared throughout the Circle of the World, have allowed himself to display the least trace of weakness, after all?

It felt an age of agony before the Mayor stepped out onto the balcony with Temple behind her, and spoke the longed for words ‘They’re gone.’

Every part of him sagged and he gave a groan from the very bottom of his being. He removed that ridiculous helmet, wiping the sweat from his forehead with a trembling hand. He could scarcely recall having donned a more absurd costume in all his many years in the theatre. No garlands of flowers flung by an adoring audience, perhaps, as had littered the broad stage of Adua’s House of Drama after his every appearance as the First of the Magi, but his satisfaction was no less complete.

‘I told you I had one more great performance in me!’ said Lestek.

‘And so you did,’ said the Mayor.

‘You both provided able support, though, for amateurs. I daresay you have a future in the theatre.’

‘Did you have to hit me?’ asked Temple, probing at his split lip.

‘Someone had to,’ muttered the Mayor.

‘Ask yourself rather, would the terrible Legate Sarmis have struck you, and blame him for your pains,’ said Lestek. ‘A performance is all in the details, my boy, all in the details! One must inhabit the role entirely. Which occurs to me, do thank my little legion before they disperse, it was an ensemble effort.’

‘For five carpenters, three bankrupt prospectors, a barber and a drunk, they made quite an honour guard,’ said Temple.

‘That drunk scrubbed up surprisingly well,’ said Lestek.

‘A good find,’ added the Mayor.

‘It really worked?’ Shy South had limped up to lean against the door frame.

‘I told you it would,’ said Temple.

‘But you obviously didn’t believe it.’

‘No,’ he admitted, peering up at the skies. ‘There really must be a God.’

‘Are you sure they’ll believe it?’ asked the Mayor. ‘Once they’ve joined up with the rest of their Company and had time to think it over?’

‘Men believe what they want to,’ said Temple. ‘Cosca’s done. And those bastards want to go home.’

‘A victory for culture over barbarity!’ said Lestek, flicking the plume on the helmet.

‘A victory for law over chaos,’ said Temple, fanning himself with his worthless treaty.

‘A victory for lying,’ said the Mayor, ‘and only by the narrowest of margins.’

Shy South shrugged and said, with her talent for simplicity, ‘A win’s a win.’

‘All too true!’ Lestek took a long breath through his nose and, even with the pain, even though he knew he did not have long left, perhaps because he knew it, he breathed out with the deepest fulfilment. ‘As a young man I found happy endings cloying but, call me soppy, with age, I have come to appreciate them more and more.’

The Cost

S
hy scooped up water and splashed it on her face, and groaned at the cold of it, just this side of ice. She worked her fingertips into her sore eyelids, and her aching cheeks, and her battered mouth. Stayed there, bent over the basin, her faint reflection sent scattering by the drops from her face. The water was pink with blood. Hard to say where from exactly. The last few months had left her beaten as a prizefighter. Just without the prize.

There was the long rope-burn coiling around one forearm and the new cut down the other, blood spotted through the bandage. Her hands were ripped up front and back, crack-nailed and scab-knuckled. She picked at the scar under her ear, a keepsake from that Ghost out on the plains. He’d almost got the whole ear to remember her by. She felt the lumps and scabs on her scalp, the nicks on her face, some of them she couldn’t even remember getting. She hunched her shoulders and wriggled her spine and all the countless sores and grazes and bruises niggled at her like a choir of ugly little voices.

She looked down into the street and watched the children for a moment. Majud had found them some new clothes – dark suit and shirt for Pit, green dress with lace at the sleeves for Ro. Better than Shy had ever been able to buy them. They might’ve passed for some rich man’s children if it hadn’t been for their shaved heads, the dark fuzz just starting to grow back. Curnsbick was pointing to his vast new building, talking with big, enthusiastic gestures, Ro watching and listening solemnly, taking it all in, Pit kicking a stone about the mud.

Shy sniffed, and swallowed, and splashed more water on her face. Couldn’t be crying if her eyes were wet already, could she? She should’ve been leaping with joy. In spite of the odds, the hardships, the dangers, she’d got them back.

But all she could think of was the cost.

The people killed. A few she’d miss and a lot she wouldn’t. Some she’d even have called evil, but no one’s evil to themselves, are they? They were still people dead, could do no good now, could make no amends and right no wrongs, people who’d taken a lifetime to make, plucked out from the world and turned to mud. Sangeed and his Ghosts. Papa Ring and his crooks. Waerdinur and his Dragon People. Leef left under the dirt out on the plains, and Grega Cantliss doing the hanged man’s dance, and Brachio with the arrows in him, and—

She stuck her face in the cloth and rubbed, hard, like she could rub them all away, but they were stuck tight to her. Tattooed into her sure as the rebel slogans into Corlin’s arms.

Was it her fault? Had she set it all rolling when she came out here like the kicked pebble that starts the landslide? Or was it Cantliss’ fault, or Waerdinur’s, or Lamb’s? Was it everyone’s? Her head hurt from trying to pull apart the tapestry of everything happened and follow her own nasty little thread through it, sifting for blame like a fevered miner dredging at a stream-bed. No point picking at it any more than at a scab. But still, now it was behind her, she couldn’t stop looking back.