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

She darted at Gorst as if to go right, switched to the left with a savage cut at head height. He dropped points and jerked away, fast as a snake in spite of his size, eyes focused on the blade as it whistled past his nose.

‘Excellent,’ he squeaked.

She gave her steels a little flourish. ‘Can Brock beat the Northmen alone?’

‘She’s still gathering her forces in Angland,’ said her father, ‘and she has the Dogman with her, but Scale Ironhand has them well outnumbered. My guess is the Protectorate will be overrun but she’ll hold the Northmen at the Whiteflow. Then, perhaps, circumstances will change here and we can swoop in next spring and reap the glory.’

‘The women do the hard work and the men reap the glory. Sounds familiar.’

‘Petulance is unbecoming in a swordswoman. Cut, girl. Put some blood into it.’

Savine darted around Gorst, shoes squeaking on the wooden floor, slashing away from every angle. For all he scarcely seemed to move, his steels were always in the right place to parry.

‘My daughter has quick feet, eh, Gorst?’

‘Very quick, Your Eminence.’

‘That’ll be your mother’s dancing lessons. Sad to say, I don’t dance much myself these days.’

‘A shame,’ said Savine as she circled, looking for an opening, sweat tickling at her stubbled scalp. ‘I imagine the Closed Council could use some clever footwork. If Brock loses, you’ll look like cowards and fools.’

‘Even bigger cowards and fools than we do already.’

‘If she wins, she’ll gild her own reputation. And her son’s.’

‘Leonault dan Brock.’ Her father sneered, showing his empty gums again. ‘The Young Lion.’

‘Who comes up with these ridiculous names?’

‘ Writers , I daresay. I saw lions when I was on campaign in Gurkhul. Stupid beasts. Especially the males. That’s enough. Break.’

Savine took a hard breath, pulling her padded tunic open to let some air in. She had sweated clean through her shirt. She wondered, as she scrubbed her shaved head with a towel, whether the fine gentlemen of the Solar Society would recognise her now, without powder, jewels, dress, wig. More than likely they would smell money through the sweat and swarm around her just the same.

‘We could adjust your grip a little.’ Her father leaned forwards, bones shifting under the pale skin of his hand as he gripped his cane to rise.

‘No, no.’ She stepped over to put a gentle hand on his shoulder. ‘You’re not hurting yourself just to show me how to grip a sword.’ She took the blanket from the arm of his chair and draped it over his legs, tucked it in carefully around him. By the Fates, he felt thin. It would have been unfair to call him skin and bone. There was scarcely any skin on him.

‘How are you?’ she asked.

His left eye twitched. ‘Have you noticed the nation falling?’

‘Not this morning.’

‘Then I suppose I’m still alive today. You might want to check again tomorrow, though. I’ve enemies everywhere. In the palace. On the Closed Council. On the Open Council. In the fields and the factories. The Anglanders were furious with me before the war, they’re downright incandescent now. I’m hated everywhere.’

‘Not here,’ she said. As close to a declaration of affection as she was ever likely to utter.

‘That’s more than enough for me.’ He gently touched her face, fingertips cold on her sweaty cheek. ‘And far, far more than I deserve.’

‘I suppose a few enemies are the price of one of the big chairs.’

Her father gave a snort of disgust, bitter even for him. ‘The moment your arse hits the wood, you realise what they’re worth. You think the Closed Council really rule? Or the king and queen? We’re all no more than dancing puppets. There to draw the eye. To take the blame.’

Savine frowned. ‘Then who pulls the strings?’

Her father’s eyes met hers, bright and hard. ‘I have been asking questions all my life. I learned that some are better left unanswered.’ He let his hand drop and clapped it on top of hers. The one that held her steels. ‘Time to work on your defence.’

‘Three strikes?’ asked Gorst.

Savine tossed her short steel up with her right hand and snatched it out of the air with her left. ‘Whatever you say.’

He shuffled at her, jabbed and cut with no real venom. It was easy for her to block the jabs, to turn the cut away with a showy flick of the wrist.

‘So, if the lady governor fights the Northmen to a stalemate, what does it mean for holdings in Angland?’

‘Ah!’ Her father grinned. ‘I was wondering when we’d get to money.’

‘We never left it.’ She parried, and again, sidestepped a sluggish lunge. For a man renowned for his ferocity, Gorst was scarcely hitting at all. ‘Prices are tumbling up there. Do I sell out or get deeper in?’

‘The Union will never let go of Angland. If I were a man of business, I’d be snapping up the bargains. After all, danger and opportunity—’

‘Often walk hand in hand,’ she finished for him, and out of the corner of her eye she caught his grin. There were few things that gave her the same satisfaction as making the Arch Lector smile. Aside from her mother, no one else could manage it. ‘I’ll see about borrowing a little to expand my holdings in the mines up there.’ She could hardly keep the smile off her face. ‘There are excellent rates on offer from Valint and Balk—’

‘Don’t!’ barked her father, with a wince that made her feel just a little guilty. ‘Don’t even joke about it, Savine. Valint and Balk are vermin. Parasites. Leeches. Once they get stuck to you, there’s no getting free of them. They won’t be satisfied until they own the sun and can charge the world interest for letting it rise every morning. Promise me you’ll never take a bit from the bastards!’

‘I promise. I’ll stay well away.’ Though it was not always easy. Like a greedy old willow tree, the twisted roots of that particular banking house burrowed into everything. ‘We’re not talking about much. I already took a controlling share in the armoury in Ostenhorm at a price you would scarcely believe.’

‘Swords are always a good investment,’ admitted the Arch Lector as he watched her swat Gorst’s away with her own.

‘I’m told these fire-tubes are the future. These cannons.’

‘We had mixed results with them in Styria.’

‘But they’re getting smaller all the time, more portable and more powerful.’ She stepped nimbly around a limp jab. ‘They’ve developed an exploding cannon-stone now.’

‘Explosions are always a good investment, too.’

‘Especially if I can arrange a contract or two with the King’s Own.’

‘Oh? Do you know anyone with influence?’

‘As it happens, I have arranged a little soirée with Asil dan Roth and a few other military wives. Her husband was recently appointed Master of the King’s Armouries, I believe.’

‘What good fortune,’ murmured her father, drily.

Gorst’s next lunge was positively belittling. ‘I’m not made of glass, either,’ said Savine, flicking irritably at the point of his steel. ‘Come at me like you mean it.’

She had been fencing all her life, after all. As a girl, she had dreamed of winning the Contest disguised as a man, whipping off her cap to reveal her golden tresses to an ecstatic crowd. Then wigs had come into fashion and she had shaved her tresses off, which, honestly, had been a rather unprepossessing brown in any case. Then she had learned men never cheer for a woman who beats them at their own games, so she had left the fencing circle to the cocks and decided to count her victories at the bank.

She parried two efforts which were scarcely stronger than before and, this time, stepped neatly around the lazy cut that followed and gave Gorst a shove with the basketwork of her short steel. ‘Do you hit like a woman as well as talk like one?’