Joe Abercrombie - Half a King

“If she has any sense she’ll have moved on,” said Sumael.

“She had more’n her share. Too much to waste life waiting.” Rulf sniffed, and spat into the fire. “And better men than me aren’t hard to find.”

“There we can agree.” Nothing sat a little way from the fire with his stiff back to the rest of them and his naked sword on his knees, polishing the blade with a rag.

Rulf only grinned over at him. “And what about you, Nothing? You spent years scrubbing a deck, will you spend the rest of them scrubbing that sword? What will you do once we get to Vulsgard?”

Yarvi realized it was the first time since the South Wind went beneath the waves that any one of them had talked about what might come next. It was the first time it had looked as if they might make it.

“I have scores to settle. But they have kept fresh twenty years.” Nothing bent back to his frantic polishing. “It can rain blood later.”

“Anything but snow would be an improvement in the weather,” said Jaud. “I will be finding passage south, back to Catalia. Najit is the name of my village, and from its well comes the sweetest water in the world.” He clasped his hands over his stomach, and smiled the way he always did when he mentioned the place. “I mean to drink from that well again.”

“Perhaps I’ll join you,” said Sumael. “It won’t be far out of my way.”

“Your way where?” Yarvi asked. Though they had slept within reach of each other for months he hardly knew a thing about her, and found he wanted to. She frowned at him, as if wondering whether to open a door so long kept bolted, then shrugged.

“The First of Cities, I expect. I grew up there. My father was a famous man, in his way. A shipwright to the empress. His brother still is … perhaps. I hope. If he’s alive. A lot can change in the time I’ve been away.”

And she fell silent, and frowned into the flames, and so did Yarvi, worrying over what might have changed in Thorlby while he was gone.

“Well, I will not be turning down your company,” said Jaud. “Someone who actually knows where they are going can be a considerable help on a long journey. What about you, Ankran?”

“In Angulf’s Square in Thorlby there is a flesh-dealer’s shop.” Ankran growled the words at the fire, his bony face full of shadows. “The one where Shadikshirram bought me. From a man called Yoverfell.” He flinched when he said the name. The way Yarvi might have when he thought of Odem’s. “He has my wife. He has my son. I have to get them back.”

“How do you plan to do that?” asked Rulf.

“I will find a way.” Ankran made a fist, and thumped it harder and harder against his knee until it had to be painful. “I must .”

Yarvi blinked across the fire. When he first laid eyes on Ankran he had hated him. He had tricked him, watched him beaten and stolen his place. Then he had accepted him, walked beside him, taken his charity. Come to trust him. Now he found what he had never thought to. That he admired him.

All Yarvi had done was for himself. His freedom, his vengeance, his chair. What Ankran had done was for his family.

“I could help,” he said.

Ankran looked up sharply. “You?”

“I have … friends in Thorlby. Powerful friends.”

“This cook you were apprenticed to?” snorted Rulf.

“No.”

Yarvi was not sure why he chose that moment. Perhaps the closer he was bound to this band of misfits the heavier the lie sat on him. Perhaps some spot of pride had somehow survived and chose that moment to chafe. Perhaps he thought Ankran was putting the truth together anyway. Or perhaps he was just a fool.

“Laithlin,” he said. “Wife of the dead king, Uthrik.”

Jaud gave a smoking sigh, and settled down into his fur. Rulf did not bother even to chuckle. “And what are you to the Golden Queen of Gettland?”

Yarvi kept his voice level even though his heart was suddenly thumping. “Her youngest son.”

And that gave them all some pause.

Yarvi the most, for it came to him then he could have stayed a cook’s boy, and gone anywhere. Traipsed after Rulf to say hello to his wife or followed Nothing to whatever madness his cracked mind settled on. Gone with Jaud to drink from that well in far Catalia, or on with Sumael to the wonders of the First of Cities. The two of them, together …

But now there was nowhere to go but into the Black Chair. Except through the Last Door.

“My name isn’t Yorv, it’s Yarvi. And I am the rightful King of Gettland.”

There was a long silence. Even Nothing had forgotten his polishing and twisted about on his stone to stare with eyes fever-bright.

Ankran softly cleared his throat. “That would explain your shitty cooking.”

“You’re not joking, are you?” asked Sumael.

Yarvi returned her gaze, long and level. “Do you hear me laughing?”

“Then if I may ask, what was the King of Gettland doing lashed to an oar on a rotting trading galley?”

Yarvi pulled his fleece tight about his shoulders and looked into the fire, the flames taking on the shapes of things done and faces past. “Because of my hand … or the lack of it, I was to give up my birthright and join the Ministry. But my father, Uthrik, was killed. Betrayed by Grom-gil-Gorm and his minister, Mother Scaer … or so I was told. I led twenty-seven ships on a raid against them. My Uncle Odem laid the plans.” He found his voice was quivering. “Which included killing me and stealing my chair.”

“Prince Yarvi,” murmured Ankran. “Uthrik’s younger son. He had a crippled hand.” Yarvi held it up to the light and Ankran considered it, thoughtfully stroking the side of his crooked nose. “When we last passed through Thorlby there was talk of his death.”

“The announcement was made a little early. I fell from a tower, and Mother Sea washed me into the arms of Grom-gil-Gorm. I pretended to be a cook’s boy, and he put a collar on me and sold me to slavers in Vulsgard.”

“And there Trigg and I bought you,” mused Ankran, turning the story over for truth as a merchant might turn over a ring, trying to fathom how much gold was in the alloy. “Because you told me you could row.”

Yarvi could only shrug as he pushed his crippled hand back inside the warmth of his fleece. “As you can see, not the biggest lie I’ve ever told.”

Jaud puffed out his cheeks. “No doubt every man has his secrets, but that is larger than the average.”

“And a good deal more dangerous,” said Sumael, eyes narrowed. “Why break the silence?”

Yarvi thought about that for a moment. “You deserve to know the truth. And I deserve to tell it. And it deserves to be told.”

More silence. Jaud rubbed more fat into his feet. Ankran and Sumael exchanged a lingering frown. Then Rulf pushed his tongue between his lips and made a loud farting sound. “Does anyone believe this rubbish?”

“I believe.” Nothing stood, eyes black and huge, lifting his sword high. “And I now swear an oath!” He rammed the blade into the fire, sparks whirling and everyone shuffling back in surprise. “A sun-oath and a moon-oath. Let it be a chain about me and a goad within me. I will not rest until the rightful King of Gettland sits in the Black Chair once again!”

This silence was even longer, and no one was more stunned than Yarvi.

“Did you ever feel you were living in a dream?” muttered Rulf.

Jaud gave another of his sighs. “Often.”

“A nightmare,” said Sumael.

EARLY THE NEXT DAY they crested a ridge and were greeted by a sight straight out of a dream. Or perhaps a nightmare. Instead of white hills ahead they saw black, distant mountains ghostly in a haze of steam.

“The hot country,” said Ankran.