Brent Weeks - Way of Shadows

Of course, it had all been a little more involved than that. Count Drake had known the family for some time. They had taken in other slaveborn orphans over the years, but couldn’t afford to feed another. So Azoth had sworn that he would provide for her out of his wages, which were already generous, and which Master Blint had told him would increase as he became more useful. Count Drake hadn’t been enamored of keeping any secret from Master Blint, but after Azoth had explained what had happened, he’d been willing to help.

Doll Girl clung to Azoth, either not understanding or not believing what the count had just said.

Count Drake stood. “Well, I’m sure you have some things you probably wish to tell her, and I need to get the coach in order, so if you’ll excuse me?” He left them alone, and Doll Girl looked at Azoth with accusing eyes.

“You never were dumb,” he said.

She squeezed his hand, hard.

“My master ordered me not to see you. Today is the last time we ever get to see each other.” She tugged on his hand, face pugnacious. “Yes, ever,” he said. “I don’t want it to be this way, but he’ll kill me if he finds out I defied him even this much. I’m sorry. Please don’t be mad at me.”

She was crying again and there was nothing he could do.

“I have to go now. He might be back any time. I’m sorry.” He tore his eyes from her and stepped toward the door.

“Don’t leave me.”

The voice sent a lance of ice down his spine. He turned, incredulous. It was a little girl voice, exactly like you’d expect if you didn’t know Doll Girl was a mute.

“Please?” Doll Girl said. It was a pretty voice, incongruous coming out of a beaten mask of a face Rat had left her.

Azoth’s eyes filled with tears again, and he ran out the door—

Straight into someone tall and lean and as hard as if he’d been cut out of solid rock. Azoth fell on his butt and stared up in horror.

Master Blint’s face was purple with fury. “You dare?” he shouted. “After all I’ve done for you, you defy me? I just killed one of the Nine and what do you do? You walk around the killing ground for two hours, so everyone knows Blint’s apprentice was there. You may have cost me everything!”

He swept Azoth off the ground as if he were a kitten and hit him. Azoth’s tunic tore in Blint’s hand as he fell back from the force of the blow. But Blint came forward, and this time his closed fist crashed against Azoth’s jaw.

Azoth’s face rebounded off the count’s floor and he barely saw Doll Girl flying at Master Blint as the huge black sword cleared its sheath.

“Don’t hurt her!” Azoth shouted. Insanely, he threw himself at Blint and grabbed Retribution’s blade, but Blint was a force of nature. He didn’t even slow as he scooped Doll Girl up and deposited her in the hall. He locked the door, unlocked it, and relocked it in rapid succession. He turned back to Azoth, but whatever he was about to say died. The great black sword was still locked in Azoth’s hands, cutting to the bone. Except that now it wasn’t black. The blade was glowing blue.

Incandescent blue fire surrounded Azoth’s hand, burning cold into his cut fingers, spreading down the blade—

“No, not that! It’s mine!” Blint cried. He flung the sword aside as if it were an adder, away from both of them. If there had been fury in his eyes before, now it turned to absolute unreasoning rage. Azoth didn’t even see the first blow. He didn’t even know how he’d reached the floor again. Something wet and sticky was blocking out his vision.

Then the world faded into repeated heavy blows and exploding light and pain and the sharp garlicky breath of Master Blint and distant shouting and banging on a door that seemed further and further away.

Durzo gazed into the frothy brown ale as if it held answers. It didn’t, and he had a choice to make. The usual forced gaiety of the brothel swirled around him, but nobody male or female bothered him. Perhaps it was Retribution unsheathed on the table in front of him. Perhaps it was merely the look on his face.

Don’t hurt her! Azoth had yelled. As if Durzo would murder some seven-year-old girl. What kind of a monster did the boy think he was? Then he remembered beating the shit out of the boy, artlessly pounding that yielding child flesh, beating him unconscious before Count Drake broke the door down and grabbed him. He’d almost killed Count Drake for that, he’d been so wild. The count had fixed such a look on Durzo—damn Count Drake and his damn holy eyes.

That incandescent blue. Damn it. Damn all magic. In that flash of blue on Retribution, he’d seen his hope die. The hope had been dying since Vonda died, but that blue was a door slamming shut forever. It meant Azoth was worthy as Durzo was not, as if all of Durzo’s years of service were worth nothing. The boy was taking from him all that made him special. What did that leave for Durzo Blint?

Ashes. Ashes, and blood, and nothing more.

Suddenly the sword Retribution before him seemed a mockery. Retribution? Giving people what they deserve? If I really did that, I’d shove that damn blade down my own throat.

The last time he’d been so close to madness had been when Vonda died, four months and six days ago. Sighing, he swirled the ale around in the glass, but he didn’t drink. Time enough for that later. Later, after he made his decision, he’d need a drink. He’d need twelve, no matter what he decided.

He’d drunk a lot with Vonda. It pissed her sister off. Of course, the whole relationship had pissed Momma K off. She’d forbidden Durzo to see her innocent little sister. She’d forbidden Vonda to see the wetboy. Momma K, so smart in other matters, had probably done more to get their relationship going than anything. Surrounded by easy flesh, whether he paid for it or not, Gwinvere’s little sister was suddenly intriguing. He wanted to know if the virginal bit was an act.

It was. He’d been disappointed but had hidden it. It was hypocrisy, anyway, and she’d had plenty of other mysteries. Vonda didn’t always treat him well, but at least she didn’t fear him. He didn’t think she understood him enough to fear him. She seemed to just glide along on the surface of life while others had to plunge into the sewer water. Durzo hadn’t understood her, and it had entranced him.

After their affair started, he might have kept it secret. He could have; he knew Gwinvere’s schedule well enough that they could have kept things going for years. Even with Gwinvere’s insight, Durzo knew how to be inscrutable. But it hadn’t happened. Vonda had told her. Probably announced it immediately, if Durzo knew Vonda. It might have been a little callous, but Vonda didn’t know what she was doing.

“End this now, Durzo Blint,” Gwinvere had told him, quite calmly. “She’ll destroy you. I love my sister, but she will be your ruin.” It had all been words. Words to get Gwinvere’s way, as always. With all her power, it infuriated her that she couldn’t run the lives of those she really wanted to.

She’d been right, of course. Maybe not in the way she had meant it, but she’d been right. Gwinvere always had understood him better than anyone else, and he’d understood her. They were mirrors to each other. Gwinvere Kirena would have been perfect for him—if he could love what he saw in the mirror.

Why am I thinking about this? It’s all old shit. It’s all finished. There was a choice to be made: did he raise the boy and hope, or did he kill him now?

Hope. Right. Hope is the lies we tell ourselves about the future. He’d hoped before. Dared to dream about a different life, but when it came time—

“You look pensive, Gaelan Starfire,” a Ladeshian bard said, seating himself across from Durzo without waiting to be asked.