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

Stour opened his arms wide, opened his eyes wide, put on the big act. ‘The only chain I want is a chain of blood !’ Made not the slightest sense. How could you make a chain out of blood anyway? Terrible metaphor. But Magweer and Greenway and the rest of the arse-lickers gave a chorus of warlike growls and shaken fists. ‘I don’t want to be like the Bloody-Nine. I want to be the Bloody-Nine!’ Stour hitched his crazed smile a little wider in a reasonable impression of the Bloody-Nine in his worse moments. ‘ No man more famed. No man more feared .’

‘He wants to be the Bloody-Nine,’ said Wonderful, deadpan, as the Great Wolf stalked off out of earshot, always hurrying to nowhere.

‘To have women spit at the mention of your name. To sow death for years and reap naught but hate at the end. To walk all your days in a circle of blood.’ Clover could only shake his head. ‘I never will unpick the riddle of why men want what they want.’

‘You going to let that fool Magweer talk to you that way?’ asked Wonderful.

Clover looked at her. ‘What’s it to you how he talks?’

‘Confirms these young idiots in their opinion they know best.’

‘We can’t correct the misapprehensions of every idiot any more’n we can correct the tide.’ Clover frowned off into the damp undergrowth where Stour had slapped that bottle, wondering if there was enough left in it to justify the search. He decided most likely not, strolled to the nearest tree instead and slowly lowered himself beside it. ‘Words leave no wounds and I’ve run at feuds enough. I try to run the other way these days.’

‘Very wise. But like you said, you ain’t much of a runner.’

‘True. If someone’s fixed on feuding, I’ve come to realise there’s only two realistic options.’ Clover wriggled back against the trunk until he found a comfortable position. ‘First, you just float over it, like dandelion seeds on a stiff breeze, and pay it no mind at all.’

‘Second?’

‘Murder the bastard.’ Clover grinned up at the blue sky, where the sun was starting to finally show some warmth. ‘But I wouldn’t want to spoil such a wonderful afternoon with murder, would you?’

‘It’d be a shame, I’ll admit.’ Wonderful watched Clover as he stretched out and crossed his legs. ‘What are you doing?’

‘What we should all be doing.’ Clover closed his eyes. ‘Biding my time.’

‘What’s the difference between biding it and wasting it?’

Clover saw no need to open his eyes. ‘Results, woman. Results.’

The Bigger They Are

Glaward peeled his shirt off and tossed it over to Barniva, then growled as he brought his fists together, woody muscle flexing in his outsize chest. An appreciative mutter rose from the onlookers gathered at the fence, a few numbers tossed out. Leo’s steadily lengthening odds, no doubt.

‘I swear he’s got bigger,’ murmured Jurand, eyes wide.

‘So have I,’ growled Leo, trying to sound as big as he could.

‘No doubt. Your legs are nearly as thick as his arms now.’

‘I can beat him.’

‘Easily. With a sword. So why fight him with your hands?’

Leo started unbuttoning his own shirt. ‘When I lived in Uffrith, the Dogman used to tell me stories about the Bloody-Nine. The duels he won in the Circle. I loved those stories. Used to dance around the garden behind his hall with a stick, pretending I was Ninefingers and the laundry post was Rudd Threetrees, or Black Dow, or Fenris the Feared.’ There was still a thrill in saying the names. Like they were magic words.

Jurand watched Glaward loose a few brutal practice punches. ‘The laundry post won’t knock your teeth out.’

Leo tossed his shirt over Jurand’s head. ‘A champion never knows what he’ll have to fight with. That’s why I always let you bastards pick the weapons.’ It was a cold morning, so he started bouncing on his toes to get the blood moving. ‘That’s why I beat Barniva with a heavy sword, and Antaup with a spear. Why I beat Whitewater Jin with a mace and you with long and short steels. That’s why I test my archery against Ritter. Used to, that is.’ The poor dead fool. ‘But I never yet beat Glaward with my bare hands.’

‘Well, no,’ said Jurand, that worried crease between his brows. ‘He’s built like a barn.’

‘The bigger they are—’

‘The harder they hit?’

‘Your defeats teach you more than your victories,’ muttered Leo, trying to slap some warmth into his muscles.

‘They hurt more, too.’ Jurand dropped his voice a little. ‘At least tell me you’ll fight dirty.’

‘With honour or not at all,’ grunted Leo. He thought Casamir the Steadfast might have said it in a storybook once. ‘Whose side are you on, anyway?’

‘Yours.’ Jurand looked a little hurt by the question. ‘Always. We all are. That’s why I won’t enjoy seeing him choke you unconscious.’

Leo narrowed his eyes. ‘What I need from my second is belief .’

Sinew popped from Glaward’s arms as he raised his fists. Leo couldn’t deny it was a majestic sight. Like some piece of exaggerated statuary. Even his teeth looked muscular. ‘I’m going to squeeze you out like a lemon,’ he growled.

‘The Young Lemon!’ barked Barniva, to much merriment from the onlookers.

Jurand leaned close. ‘If you die, can I have your horse?’

‘ Belief ,’ growled Leo, and dashed forward. Attack, always attack. Especially when the odds are against you.

He caught Glaward off guard, ducked under a wild fist, the wind of it catching his hair, and gave the big man the heaviest punches to the body he could. No doubt Glaward was carrying a little fat, but any hope he was soft underneath was long gone. Leo felt as if he’d punched a tree.

‘Shit,’ he hissed through his fixed smile, shaking out his throbbing fingers.

‘I’m going to make you eat this hillside,’ growled Glaward, and the growing audience whooped and laughed.

The dead knew Leo needed to watch Glaward’s fists, but his eye kept being drawn to two of the oddest-looking women among the spectators. The older had a sharp, expressionless face, mouth twisted by a scar, trouser-leg slit open showing bandages underneath. The younger had a wide, almost over-expressive face, a thick gold ring through her broad, freckled nose and a tangle of red-brown hair so wild those behind had to lean around it to see.

‘This is manly,’ she said, propping a muddy boot on the rail of the fence, its tongue flopping from bodged laces. ‘Do they charge for the spectacle?’

‘Far as I can tell,’ mused the old one, ‘they take their clothes off for free.’

The young one spread her arms and gave a huge smile. ‘What a public-spirited thing to do!’

Glaward was in no mood to give anything away. He kept pressing forward, one big fist flicking out in lethal-looking jabs. Leo dodged one, and another, but the third glanced his cheek and sent him staggering. He slipped on the wet grass, luckily, since Glaward’s other fist lashed the air where his head had just been. He slid around the big man, gave him a petulant tap in the ribs as he passed to no effect at all.

Glaward gave a scornful snort. ‘Are we fighting or dancing?’

Over his heavy shoulder, Leo caught sight of the girl again, staring cross-eyed at a strand of hair in her face. She stuck her bottom lip out to blow it away, and it flopped straight back in her eyes along with three others. There was something familiar about her, like a name on the tip of his tongue.

‘We’re fighting!’ he snarled, and ducked in with a flurry of punches, teeth bared and spit flying.

‘That’s it!’ he heard Jurand shout. ‘Give him hell!’