Ричард Морган - The Cold Commands

Sorcery? Priests?

Yeah, tell me about it. But you know what he’s like, Archeth. He doesn’t really see any difference between some bone-through-the-nose shaman up north and the Revelation. It’s all magic to him, it’s all evil. At heart, he’s still the same hulking romantic thug he was when he rode into town fifteen years ago. It’s all tales-around-the-campfire heroism and eternal bonds and —Imrana, gesturing wearily out the window at the city beyond— I mean, seriously, Archeth, who believes in that shit anymore?

Have Saril’s family put a bounty out on him yet?

Probably . A thin grimace. They’re not exactly keeping counsel with me at the moment. I imagine they’re still deciding whether to try to put me in the chair for this .

“The chair?” Ringil, aghast when Archeth reported back that evening. “The fucking chair ? I thought that was for traitors.”

“And for women caught in, quote, adulterous machinations against a lawful spouse , unquote. It’s an old law, very early Empire. Used to cover any kind of female adultery back in the day, but modern magistrature usually reads machinations to mean a plot against the husband’s life or property. Anyway”—she picked up her goblet and drained it, but not before he’d seen her shiver—“we have the Chamber of Confidences for traitors now, so the chair’s been gathering rust.”

“Right. Good.” He topped up her glass from the flask on the table. The house was quiet and drowsy around them, flooded with rosy evening light from the west-facing windows. “So, no chance she’ll get strapped into it, then?”

Archeth studied her new drink. “A couple of years ago, I’d have said no way it could happen. But Demlarashan is really shaking things up at court. Lot of military fanfare going around these days. And Saril Ashant is—was—a bona fide war hero.”

Ringil grunted. “Me, too. Outside of scars, what’s that good for?”

“If you’re from the rank and file, not much,” she admitted. “But add it to noble family and wealth, and you’ve got a problem. No one at court wants to be seen not backing our glorious imperial troops.”

“But Imrana has friends at court, right?”

“Imrana has allegiances. It’s not the same thing. And if they don’t catch up with Egar, then everyone’s going to be looking for someone else to take the rap.” Her lip curled in disgust. “Justice in this city is all about visible retribution—and in the end, it doesn’t much matter who’s on the receiving end so long as vengeance is seen to be done.”

“Sounds just like home. And Imrana really thinks Eg hasn’t left town?”

“From the way he was talking, she says not.”

Ringil rubbed at his chin. “Strange.”

“Well, what can I tell you?” Archeth spread her hands. “He has been acting strange the last couple of months. Especially the last couple of weeks, with Ashant back in town. You know, after all that time home on the steppe, maybe it was a mistake for him to come back here. Maybe city life doesn’t agree with him anymore.”

“Doesn’t explain why he didn’t leave town.” Ringil held his drink up to the light, frowned critically at its color. “Anyway, my guess is, what doesn’t agree with Eg most of all is not getting laid. And who could fault him on that? Eh?”

She ignored the glance he shot her, ignored the prod. “They’ve got the City Guard out in force looking for him.”

“Poor City Guard.”

“I don’t know, Gil. Those guys have changed a lot since the war. Lot of demobbed veterans in the ranks now, real hard men from the expeditionary and the sieges. They’re not the joke they used to be. And Eg’s not as young as he used to be, either.”

Ringil got up and went to stand at one of the sunset-gleaming windows. He stared out, as if he might spot the Majak perched there on one of the tiled roofs in the reddish evening light. Grinning and waving at him. Staff lance in hand.

“I back the Dragonbane against anything this city can throw at him,” he said thoughtfully. “With the possible exception of the King’s Reach. And I don’t guess Jhiral plans to waste that kind of manpower on catching just one more steppe nomad who couldn’t keep his dick in his breeches, right?”

Archeth pursed her lips. “Depends. Ashant’s family swing some weight up at the palace. And like I said, the guy was a war hero. If the Guard don’t get somewhere soon, they might push for it. They push hard enough, Jhiral may cave in.”

“Ah, that’ll be the regal majesty of the Burnished Throne in action, will it? The unbendable will of His Imperial Shininess?”

“That’s Radiance.”

“Not from where I’m standing.”

She waved the comment away, a wasp she’d been stung by too many times to care about. “Look, I’ll do what I can to forestall the King’s Reach deploying. But Demlarashan has split this city down the middle. Jhiral’s hard up against the Citadel, and right now he needs all the backing at court he can get.”

“Including, presumably, from the Ashants of this world.”

A tired nod. “Most of the nobility side with the throne because they’re shit scared of what mob religion will do if it hits the streets. That gets Jhiral the bulk of the professional military, too, the officer class and anyone loyal to them. And a fair few of the Citadel’s Mastery are with us as well, because they’re snug in bed with the nobility and don’t want their comfy little boat rocked. But they’re not anything like a majority, and they won’t be able to hold the line if this thing kicks off. You’ve got thousands of pissed-off and pious rank-and-file veterans out there, Gil. Across the Empire as a whole, it’s tens of thousands. Men who went to war on the Citadel’s say-so and came home to no change for the better.”

“Yeah, you can see their point.” He swung away from the window, as if dismissing something. Came back to the table. “So—are they organizing?”

“According to Jhiral’s spies, not yet. Not here, anyway. But they know how to fight.”

Gallows Gap flickered in his eyes like flames. “I know they do.”

“They survived the Scaled Folk, and they think that’s down to God and the Revelation, so they aren’t really afraid of anything anymore. This is what’s fueling Demlarashan. Men like that, men with a grudge, and faith, and nothing much left to lose. And it can just as easily come home to roost right here in the city. It’s another Ashnal schism just waiting to happen. And you’ve got demagogues like Menkarak and his clique, who’ll use that to bring the whole thing to the boil if they can.”

Ringil hooked up his seat by the upright slat, turned it about, and seated himself straddle-legged. Rested his arms on the back and sat there with his cloak puddled in black around him, brooding. “Can’t they take this Menkarak off the board? Sneak into his rooms one night and just slit his throat?”

“Been tried. Jhiral sent half a dozen of the Throne Eternal’s best assassins into the Citadel to get it done. None of them came back.”

A raised brow. “Just can’t get the help these days, huh?”

“It isn’t funny, Gil. The Citadel’s a volcano getting ready to blow. You put enough cracks in Jhiral’s alliances—for example, you fail to deliver when the noble family of a Demlarashan war hero come asking for favors, and—”

“Yeah, I get it.” He sighed. “All right, look. You keep the King’s Reach leashed as long as you can. Soon as I get the chance, I’m going to wander about this town a bit, see if I can get the Dragonbane to show himself. There might be time.”

“And if there isn’t?”

He peeled her an unpleasant smile. “Then to get to Egar, the King’s Reach will have to come through me.”