Glen Cook - With Mercy Towards None

El Murid, uncharacteristically, had an image of an unconfident roue stalking a virgin who had spurned the advances of countless lovers with more to offer. A roue who did not disguise his intent to use her once and pass her on—yet one who had staked his fortunes and ego on the successful outcome of an otherwise inconsequential affair.

And so he gained yet another perspective on this stranger who was his oldest acquaintance. There seemed to be no end to the faces of Nassef.

That night El Murid stood outside his pavillion and marvelled at the magnitude of the Host of Illumination. Its campfires covered the countryside on both banks of the river. It seemed that whole shoals of stars had descended to the plains and hills. "So many... " he murmured. "All brought here by my dreams."

Nassef had told him that he had recruited almost twenty thousand westerners. The Word, or parts thereof, stirred sympathetic resonances in some western hearts. The New Empire was battling its way from the womb.

Yasmid began tormenting him before sunrise. "Papa. Come on. Come and see what Nassef did. You won't believe it when you see it."

It was hours before his usual rising time. He preferred to work late and sleep late. He fought her till it became obvious that her determination was the greater. Accepting defeat grouchily, he rose. He dressed and followed her to the pavillion's exit.

"All right, brat. Show me this miracle and get it over with. I need my sleep."

"Can't you see, Papa? It's right there. Look at the river, Papa."

He peered down at the Scarlotti.

The river was not there.

The once vast flood had dwindled to a few lakes connected by one murky stream a dozen yards wide. Great expanses of mud lay exposed to the breeze and the rising sun. The breezes shifted while he wrestled with his awe. A foul odor assailed his nostrils.

"How in the world... ?"

Nassef came striding toward the pavillion. Weariness seemed to drag him down, yet when he saw them watching, his step took on a boyish bounce. A broad grin captured his face. "What do you think?" he shouted.

The roue has broken his beloved's maidenhead, El Murid thought. And now he comes to gloat, to adore himself publicly, to brag...

He snorted softly. "What did you do?" he demanded. "How can you dry up a river overnight?"

"You can't. What you do is impress a couple hundred thousand people and make them dig a new riverbed. I started as soon as we got here. I got the idea from The Wizards of llkazar. Where the poet tells about Varthlokkur sending the earthquake to demolish the walls and a building collapses into the Aeos and dams it and floods part of the city. I thought, why didn't they dam it upriver? Then they could have gotten in through the water gate. Then I thought, why not reroute the river? It would just spill over a dam."

Nassef babbled on. This ingenious stroke clearly meant more to him than just adding the jewel of another city to his diadem of clever conquests. He had invested of his self , like a child undertaking a severely ambitious project in hopes of winning paternal approval.

El Murid remembered Nassef once mentioning his trouble communicating with other children. He realized that in his superbly competent campaigns, and especially in this conquest, his brother-in-law was trying to make a statement to the world.

What was it? A simple, "I exist! Notice me!" Or something more complex?

Something more complex, surely. Nothing about Nassef was simple.

"Some of my men are in the city already," Nassef told him. "They went down in boats during the night and waited for the water level to fall below the bottom of the water gate grates. They've occupied the area inside. I had other men laying plank roads across the mud as the river fell. Those should be done by now. The Host should be entering the city. They should surrender before nightfall."

Nassef was overoptimistic. Led, cajoled, and bullied by stubborn Guildsmen, the defenders resisted for nine days, yielding their inner strongholds only when overwhelmed. By the fifth day Nassef was frantic. The stone and earth dam shunting the Scarlotti was weakening. And he had yet to capture one of the fortified causeways connecting the inner and outer islands with the riverbanks.

He drove his forced laborers to prodigies and kept the dam intact. On the seventh day the Invincibles captured a causeway.

That sealed the city's fate. Nassef had acquired indefinite access.

On the eighth day a messenger arrived from the Lesser Kingdoms.

Nassef had no color and was shaking when he approached El Murid afterward. "Micah... My Lord Disciple. They've slain Karim. Bin Yousif's rabble and some Guildsmen. They got him in Altea. Karim... He was like a father to me. I'd sent him on a critical secret mission. He was coming back. He may have been successful. If he was, he was bringing us the chance to finish the war before winter."

El Murid frowned as he listened. Nassef seemed lost in the chaos of his thoughts, some of which he was verbalizing. He had never seen his brother-in-law this devastated, this indecisive, this much at a loss for what to do. The possible death of Karim was not something he had calculated into his plans. His habit of anticipating contingencies had failed him. Fate had found his blind spot. He had not taken into account the mortality of himself and his intimates.

"Men die in wartime, Nassef. And they won't all be soldiers we don't know, mourned only in some remote mud hut. Meryem's passing should have taught you that."

"The lesson didn't sink in. One dirty trick... That whole campaign is going to go to Hell now. Karim was the only one who understood what I wanted. The only one who knew the whole plan. I wonder if they got anything out of him? What kind of an arrangement did he make... ? I have to go out there. I'm the only one who can keep it moving. The only one who can get that whoreson bin Yousif. I'll leave el-Kader here. He knows this project. He can finish up."

Before El Murid commented or could ask questions his brother-in-law rushed away. An hour later Mowaffak reported that Nassef had ridden east with a large band of Invincibles.

El-Kader assumed Nassef's role smoothly. He forced Dunno Scuttari's surrender the following day.

Nassef's dam collapsed the day following that. The flood severely damaged the dike facings on the city's outer island. Natives muttered about omens.

We have had too much talk about Fate and omens lately, El Murid thought. And I am as guilty as the worst of them. It's time for a sermon of admonition. We're back-sliding.

He was preparing the speech when Esmat relayed the report from the observer they had sent to Ipopotam.

"The lot? All six killed?" El Murid demanded. "That's hard to believe, Esmat. They were the best."

"Nevertheless, Lord. Our man didn't see who or how, unfortunately. He simply found them dead on the road. The natives wouldn't tell him what had happened. He returned before he suffered the same fate."

"All right. It's too late to save the next regular courier. What's our supply look like? We should be in fair shape. Things have been going well. I haven't called you much lately."

"True, Lord. I'd guess sixteen days. Longer if we ration."

"Oh. Not as good as I thought. Too tight, in fact." His nerves began to fray. "Find el-Kader."

The argument with el-Kader became bitter. Stunned by the Disciple's suggestion, the general said, "Just abandon the confrontation line, Lord? With an enemy army on its way? Why? What kind of sense is that?"

El Murid felt foolish as he replied, "The Lord wills it."

"What?" Sarcastically, el-Kader observed, "Then the Lord has become a ninny overnight. And I can't credit that. Lord, we have treaties with Ipopotam. How are we supposed to seduce our enemies if we can't keep faith with our friends?"