Джо Аберкромби - A Little Hatred - Book One (The Age of Madness)

‘Father!’ called Stour, pouring some ale and holding up the cup. ‘Fancy a drink?’ And he drained it, and set it down in the spreading puddle of the king’s blood.

‘What have you done?’ whispered Calder.

‘Chosen not to wait.’ Stour peeled Scale’s fat head from the table by one ear and dragged the chain from around his shoulders, its dangling diamond red with blood. Greenway giggled and the others grinned, all well satisfied with the outcome.

Clover had never thought to see Black Calder at a loss for words. He looked to Wonderful’s body, then to Clover, then back to his son, and bunched his fists. ‘We’ve got allies who won’t stand for this! There’ll be men who won’t stay loyal!’

‘Didn’t you hear?’ asked Stour. ‘I made a friend of the Young Lion! Won’t find a stronger ally than the Union. But if folk want to stick with my uncle, that’s fine.’ And he showed his teeth, wet eyes bulging. ‘They can go back to the fucking mud with him!’ And Stour tossed the chain over his own shoulders, the red links landing skewed and smearing blood across his white shirt. ‘They’re going to have to learn times change. And so are you. I’m King o’ the Northmen now.’

Calder’s face was pale as milk, but what could he do? Kill his son for killing his brother? Stour was the future of the North. Always had been. And with all those old warriors lying slaughtered on the bloody floor of the hall, it seemed the future had come early. A man’s worst enemies are his own ambitions, Bethod used to say, and here was the red-spattered proof. Black Calder had ruled for twenty years. With one thrust of the knife, his time was done.

‘Your grandfather’s dream—’ he whispered, like all his grand schemes could be unfucked. Like King Scale could be unkilled.

Stour gave a hiss, somewhere between disgust and boredom. ‘Folk say a lot o’ things about my grandfather, Bethod this and Bethod that, but I never even met the bastard.’ He winced as he lifted his wounded leg and propped it up on the murdered king’s fat back. ‘I got my own dreams to think about.’

Clover just stood there, the blood soaking his sleeve turning cold.

Long Live the King

Orso woke in the darkness and reached out, but she was gone.

He sat up, not sure where he was. Not sure who he had been reaching for. He rubbed at the bridge of his nose. Had he been dreaming?

Rikke had gone back to the North. Savine had gone for good. People still clambered over each other to be noticed by him, of course, to embrace him, to flatter him, to profit by him. But he was alone.

He could not remember ever feeling more so.

He was snatched from the comforting blanket of self-pity by a noise in the hall. A distant shout, muffled. Then another, closer, and the thumping of quick footsteps, past and away. He flung back the covers, swinging his bare feet to the cold floor. Shadows moved in a thin strip of light under his door, then the knob turned and it creaked open.

‘Bloody hell, Mother, don’t you ever knock?’

She looked regal as ever, face emotionless as a mask by the light of the candle she held. But she wore a dressing gown and her hair was down. Orso was not sure he had ever seen her leave her chambers without it elaborately pinned. It hung almost to her waist and seemed, somehow, a surer herald of disaster than if some other person had charged in on fire.

‘What is it?’ he whispered.

‘Come with me, Orso.’

There was a great deal of activity in the palace, considering it was the middle of the night. Everyone busy at nothing, running to nowhere, all with the same oddly panicked expression. A fully armoured Knight of the Body clanked past, sweat beaded across his forehead, the lamp in his hand bringing a glitter to the gilded panelling.

‘What is it, Mother?’ asked Orso, his mouth very dry.

She said nothing, only glided down the chilly hallway, decorated with berries for the new year festival, so quickly he had to take the odd running step to keep up.

Three more Knights of the Body stood at the towering door of his father’s bedchamber. They fumbled their way to attention as the queen swept up. One gave Orso the strangest haunted look before he turned his eyes to the shining tiles.

There was a press of people about the bed, in nightshirts and dressing gowns, grey hair in wispy disarray. Men of the king’s household, lords of the Closed Council, shocked faces strange in the shifting candlelight. They parted wordlessly to let him through and Orso was drawn into the gap without choosing to move his feet. As if he was rolled along on a trolley, numb and dreamlike, his breath coming slow, slow, slow, until it hardly seemed to come at all.

He stopped beside the bed, looking down.

King Jezal the First lay flat on his back, eyes closed, mouth slightly open. The covers had been pulled down to his ankles, feet still making two little peaks in the crimson cloth. His nightshirt had been dragged right up above his chest, waxy pale body exposed, fuzzed here and there with grey hair, shrivelled prick flopped sideways and stuck flat to his hip. Orso’s father had always said that dignity was a luxury kings could not afford.

The royal physician knelt by the bed, ear pressed to the king’s chest. Someone pushed through the crowd to offer him a hand mirror and he held it to the king’s mouth, fumbled for his eye-lenses and perched them on his nose.

‘There was no sign he was ill,’ came a disbelieving mutter.

‘I was talking to His Majesty just last night. He was in high spirits!’

‘What the hell does that matter?’ someone snarled.

The silence stretched.

The physician carefully put down the mirror and slowly stood.

‘Well?’ asked Lord Chamberlain Hoff, wringing his pale hands.

The physician blinked, then shook his head.

Bremer dan Gorst took a breath so sharp it made a strange squeak in his broad nose.

Arch Lector Glokta slumped into his wheeled chair. ‘The king is dead,’ he murmured.

A kind of groan went through the gathering. Or maybe it came from Orso’s own throat.

Suddenly he felt that there had been so much he needed to say to his father. He had always supposed they would discuss the important things later. The profound things. But it would never happen. There had only been a fixed time in his presence, and Orso had pissed it all away talking about the weather, and there would be no more.

He felt a heavy hand on his shoulder, more grasping than comforting, and turned to see the First of the Magi standing beside him. He almost had the ghost of a smile at the corner of his mouth.

‘Long live the king,’ said Bayaz.

Acknowledgments

As always, four people without whom:

Bren Abercrombie, whose eyes are sore from reading it.

Nick Abercrombie, whose ears are sore from hearing about it.

Rob Abercrombie, whose fingers are sore from turning the pages.

Lou Abercrombie, whose arms are sore from holding me up.

Then, my heartfelt thanks:

To all the lovely and talented people in British publishing who have helped bring the First Law books to readers down the years, including but by no means limited to Simon Spanton, Jon Weir, Jen McMenemy, Mark Stay, Jon Wood, Malcolm Edwards, David Shelley, Katie Espiner and Sarah Benton. Then, of course, all those who’ve helped make, publish, publicise, translate and above all sell my books wherever they may be around the world.

To the artists responsible for somehow continuing to make me look classy: Didier Graffet, Dave Senior, Laura Brett, Lauren Panepinto, Raymond Swanland, Tomás Almeida, Sam Weber.

To editors across the Pond: Lou Anders, Devi Pillai, Bradley Englert, Bill Schafer.

To champions in the Circle: Tim and Jen Miller.