The Thief Who Pulled on Trouble's Braids (14 page)

Chapter Twenty Five

It wasn’t quite as nice as Corbin’s crypt, but the mausoleum for the Thracen retainers was still much more classy than any final resting place I was likely to end up in.

I met Osskil, the same three professional mourners, and two of the surviving armsmen in the necropolis in the late afternoon, about an hour before sunset. Holgren had sent his regrets and funerary tokens, claiming ‘unavoidable occupation.’ I think he just didn’t like funerals, for all that he lived next to dead bodies.

The funeral table was bigger, but the whole ceremony was pretty much the same as for Corbin. Someone had washed the Red Hand’s mark off their faces, thank the gods, and sewed them up with care. They were wearing good cloth under good armor, and their weapons were with them, shiny and sharp.

I arrived in time for the meal, which was all right. Simple fare, no meat. The three professional mourners, I found out, were brothers, though they each had different surnames; Wallum, Stumpole and Brock. I didn’t try to puzzle that one out. I had enough on my mind.

Osskil made the ceremonial speech, we drank the funerary wine, and suddenly there they were, for a few moments, no longer corpses. The youngest one, the one that had kicked in the door to his own doom, looked at me with a sheepish grin on his face. Another, the one in the middle, just looked befuddled. The one on the end, a swordsman, was obviously angry, though somehow I knew it was not at us.

We toasted them, and they raised their glasses at us, the one in the middle having to be nudged by the younger one. And then they were just bodies again, and we put them in the mausoleum in the golden afternoon light.

Once the doors were closed, I turned to Osskil.

“On the day Corbin was killed, Kluge and the constables went through his house.”

He nodded. “I know. I was told.”

“Then you know what they found?” The letter, which according to Kluge, meant that Corbin might have been invited back into the family. That, and a Thracen signet ring. Daruvner’s words had been bothering me the whole trip to the Necropolis. Who had reason to want Corbin killed?

“I know they found evidence he was a thief, and the letter I’d sent him, along with his family ring. Why?”

“The letter
you
sent him?”

“Certainly. Again, why?”

“What did the letter say?”

“I’m not sure that’s your business, Amra. It’s a family matter, and as much as I like you, you aren’t family.”

“But I was his friend, and so I’m asking you to tell me what was in the letter.”

He gave me a long, hard look. “This cannot be shared with anyone else.”

“You’ve got my word.”

“My father is head of the family, but he is no longer in control of his faculties in any meaningful way. I control our interests, now, and make the family decisions. And now that my father is in no condition to object, I want— wanted my brother back. I wanted him to return to the family, to his home, to his daughter if not his wife. I wanted him to be able to be a part of her childhood, while there was still something of her childhood left. It was just too late.”

I felt ashamed for doubting him. It wasn’t as if Corbin, being the younger brother, could have inherited while Osskil was alive anyway.

“Now will you tell me why you wanted to know?” he asked, sounding more weary and heartsick than angry.

I really didn’t want to answer him. For several reasons. But I owed him.

“There’s a chance Bosch and Heirus didn’t kill Corbin,” I said.

“But what does that—” His eyes grew hard. “You suspected
me
?”

“No. Not really. But I wanted to make sure. You would have done the same.”

That hard, cold look of his softened. “I suppose I would have, at that. But why do you think the killer might be someone else?”

“I’ll tell you about it later,” I said, my mouth suddenly dry and my palms sweaty.

About twenty yards away, Heirus had suddenly appeared and was staring straight at me.

Osskil hadn’t noticed him there. I wanted to keep it that way. I turned away, walking slowly towards the crypt, and Osskil kept pace.

“Can I come by tomorrow?” I asked. “I’ll lay it all out for you then.”

“Certainly. I’ll be in all day. But why not now?”

“Because I need to do some thinking first.”

He gave me a long, penetrating stare. I tried to show him nothing. Finally he nodded, and started walking towards the exit. Everybody else had been waiting for him, and followed.

As the mourners streamed off towards the gate, I picked my way around headstones and past mausoleums towards Heirus. Night wasn’t far off. The sun was already behind the high walls, casting everything into half-gloom

He was standing at the base of the very large, not very lovely statue of the Weeping Mother. His oiled, ringleted hair glistened dully in the half-light. His gaunt, dusky face betrayed no emotion.

“I don’t have the Blade,” I said to him. “I don’t know where it is. I’m not holding out on you.”

He seemed not to hear me. He was staring right at me, but he made no acknowledgement. I kept moving toward him, slow and careful, the way you approach any wild, dangerous animal. If you have no choice.

“Have you ever hated?
Really
hated, with every fiber of your being?” he finally asked me as I came within spitting distance of him. “True hate is a powerful thing. It can give you the strength of will to do things you never would have considered. Things you never would have believed yourself capable of. Unthinkable things. Awful and magnificent things.” He took a deep breath, let it out slow. “Hate is a powerful force because it lends an impossible strength. With enough hate, you could rule the world. Or end it.”

“Is that what you want to do?” I asked him. “Destroy the world?”

He laughed. “I don’t give a runny shit about the world, or anyone or anything in it.”

“Then by all the dead gods, what
do
you want?”

He sat down, heavily, on a cracked headstone across from me; leaned down and put his forearms on his knees. He looked tired and ill.

“I think,” I said, “That you’re sick. Maybe dying. I think you want the Blade because it will somehow cure you.”

He laughed.

“What’s so funny?”

“You think I’m dying. You don’t know the half of it.
I die a dozen times a day
.”

“That sounds unpleasant.”

“Well, curses aren’t meant to be enjoyable. It’s what I got for slaying a god.”

“Um, out of curiosity, which god did you kill?’

He gave me an annoyed look. “One who needed it. One whose siblings took offense.” He shuddered, looked as though he might vomit. It passed.

“How long have you been cursed?” I asked.

“How old do you think I am?” he asked.

“Forty? Maybe forty-five?”

“I’m seventeen hundred years old. Older than the Cataclysm. I saw the fall of Thagoth, and of Hluria. I was ancient when Havak Silversword was imprisoned behind the Wall. You people are mayflies to me.”

“You’re tired of life.”

“You haven’t the least idea. It’s much worse than it sounds. Because of the curse laid on me, every moment that passes feels like a hundred. Listening to you talk bores me to tears. Listening to
me
talk bores me to tears. I’ve experienced this conversation as though it’s lasted all damned day.”

“I’ll try and talk faster,” I said, but he waved it away.

“Don’t bother. You can’t speak quickly enough to make the slightest difference.”

“So what do you want, Heirus?”

Suddenly he was in my face. I never saw him move.

“I want the Goddess’s gods-damned Blade, you stupid cow!”

“Call me a cow again and I’ll stick the Blade so far up your—”

I never saw the fist, either.

I sprawled on the ground and in that bright flare of pain realization came to me.

“The toad,” I said. “It’s in the toad.” I wanted to spit out the blood that was spilling into my mouth from the torn lining of my cheek, but I remembered what Osskil had told me. You don’t shed blood in the Necropolis. Ever. The Guardian
will
notice. I swallowed it instead.

“Yes, it’s in the toad. Nice to see you’re finally catching up.”

“Kerf’s crooked staff. You’re worse than that priest of Lagna.”

“I don’t know or care what you’re talking about. Just get me the toad and we can be shut of each other.”

“The thing you had Corbin murdered for? I’d sooner see it dumped in the Dragonsea than in your hands.”

“Your mouth moves but no sense escapes.”

“You had Corbin killed so you wouldn’t have to pay his fee for securing the toad. Then you put a contract out on me so you could have a necromancer get the toad’s location out of my corpse. Am I making sense now?” I wasn’t certain of anything I was saying, of course, but he didn’t have to know that.

“Oh. I see. You’re laboring under a misapprehension. I didn’t have your friend killed, or hire killers to end you either. Perhaps Bosch got greedy and decided to keep the fee for himself. I don’t know. I don’t care.”

“Why should I belie—” I didn’t get to finish my sentence. A knife had appeared at my throat, pressing hard enough to draw a drop of blood. Then it was at my heart. Then almost, almost touching my eye. It didn’t waver in the slightest in his hand.

“If I’d wanted your friend dead, or you dead, I wouldn’t have bothered paying for it. Understand?”

“Yes.”

“Finally.” He stood up from where he was crouched over me. “If for some idiotic reason I’d wanted to kill your compatriot, I’d have done it after I’d secured the Blade. If somehow I’d become doltish enough make a botch of that, I’d have brought the cooling meat of him to a necromancer straight away. And while Bosch may not be the brightest spark in the firmament, he’s cunning enough to work out the same. Now. Bring me the Blade here at dawn tomorrow. Or I
will
find and kill you, and drag your corpse to a necromancer and make you tell me where you’ve hidden it. I will also kill both the mages and that fat lord that invaded my home.”

“Alright. One condition, though.” What did I have to lose?

He gave me a flat, put-upon stare.

“Go to Guache Gavon and tell him to cancel the contract on me.”

“Who?”

“The Low Country trash that arranges contracts for assassination here. Or are you going to tell me that Red Hand doesn’t know what I’m talking about?”

“Oh. I know him. His name escaped me.”

“Tell him the contract lapsed with Bosch. Or tell him you cancel it. Whatever. I just don’t want to be dodging assassins while I get the toad and bring it to you.”

“Fair,” he said. “I
will
see you tomorrow. One day,” he said again.

“Where do we meet?”

“Just come here. I’ll find you. So don’t bother to run. And keep that Arhat away from me or I’ll eviscerate him.”

“Who, the bald kid?” I didn’t have to feign confusion. “It’s not like I have him on a leash,” I said, but I said it to the air. Heirus was gone.

Chapter Twenty-Six

“Do you want to give it to him?” Holgren asked me when I returned to his sanctum and related my conversation.

“Do I have a choice? He’s
Red Hand
, for Kerf’s sweet sake. I don’t give it to him, I’m a dead woman.”

“That isn’t what I asked, though. Do you
want
to give it to him?” The toad was sitting in the middle of some sort of arcane circle he’d sketched out on the floor with charcoal and blood. Bone wanted nothing to do with it, and kept to the corner farthest away.

“I want to have never seen that ugly thing. Sometimes we don’t get what we want.”

“If there is a weapon inside it, a blade forged by a goddess...”

“What?”

“When you next meet the most feared assassin in history, wouldn’t you like to be holding it, rather than an ugly lump of gold?”

I sighed. “Hells, I don’t know, Holgren. He’d probably just take it away from me and shove it in my ear. You didn’t see the way he moves. Neither did I, for that matter. If I’m speaking precisely.”

“Logically speaking, your choice is between meeting him essentially unarmed, or holding a powerful weapon. I know which I’d chose, but it’s up to you. As for his speed, I think I can help you there as well. At least for a short time.”

“Magic?”

“Of course.” He dipped two fingers into the pocket of his waistcoat and brought out a pendant on a silver chain. The pendant was in the shape of a leaf, made of silver as well, about the size of my thumb.

“You just happened to have it in your pocket, eh?”

He smiled. “After what happened at the villa, I decided to un-crate some of my more useful, if dangerous, items.”

“Speaking of the villa, that thing that crawled out of the hearth? It knew your name.”

His face went hard. “Yes, it did.”

“Did you want to talk about that, maybe?”

“Not particularly, no. Suffice it to say that, while I have had dealings with such creatures, I am no daemonist. If that is what you wanted to know.”

I raised a hand. “Not my business.”

“No, I understand that you might be concerned. Be at ease on that score.” He sighed. “Back to the matter at hand,” he went on, holding up the necklace.

“What is it?”

“I’ve made a study of longevity. Call it an interest of mine. In my studies I came across a way to, shall we say, live more expeditiously for a short time. At the cost of shortening your own lifespan commensurately.

“Can you say that without all the expensive words?”

He smiled. “It lets you cram an entire day or so of living into roughly an hour. At the end of the hour, you’re a day older.”

“Oh. That’s not bad. I could even see giving up a week, or even a month.”

“It would kill you. The aftereffects are brutal. Imagine not sleeping, eating or drinking for an entire day and night. Bad enough. A week? You might well die of thirst. A month? You’d be dead before the spell wore off. But if you need to, you can. The spell
will
let you. Best if you don’t need to.”

“Magic comes with a price, eh?”

“Always. Though some don’t count the cost until it is too late.” His expression became remote, but he quickly shrugged off whatever he was thinking about and put the chain around my neck. “No need to decide this instant. If you want to use it, just break the chain.”

I thought about it while scratching Bone behind the ear. With the weapon inside the toad and Holgren’s magic, I might stand a chance against Heirus. Without either I stood none, and would have to trust him not to kill me out of hand. And I still had no idea what he wanted to do with it. I honestly could not imagine it would be anything remotely good.

I was starting to believe—reluctantly—that he had not had Corbin killed. That did not make him a nice person. The Red Hand had killed more people than famine had, if you believed only half the stories about him. Hells.

“Alright,” I said. Let’s open up that ugly thing and get Abanon’s Blade out.”

“That would be a very bad idea,” said the bald boy as he walked through Holgren’s door, and wards, as though they didn’t exist.

~ ~ ~

“Who are you and how did you gain entry to my sanctum?” Holgren’s voice was calm, but I could tell he was ready and willing to unleash violence.

I recognized the boy, of course. The ascetic who had been staring at me as I left Alain’s place. The one from the funeral. Arhat.

“Gaining entry to your sanctum was not difficult, magus. Magic is a rusty hammer with which to beat reality into different shapes. Philosophy, the true Philosophy, is a pen with which to alter, and hopefully correct reality.”

“Arhat,” said Holgren. The boy nodded.

“What do you want?”

“Please give me the statue. It is not meant for you. It is not meant for the world.”

“You know this kid?” I asked Holgren.

“I’ve never laid eyes on him.”

“But you know his name.”

“Arhat? That’s not a name. It’s a title.” He had a pissy expression on his lean face.

“Alright, I’ll bite. What’s an Arhat?”

“Do you remember the Cataclysm?” he asked.

“Not really, no. It
was
a thousand years ago.” But he wasn’t in any mood for banter.

“If you want to know why the Cataclysm happened, ask the Arhat.”

I looked over at the kid. He shook his head sadly. “The Cataclysm was not the fault of the Philosophers, mage.”

“Oh really? Then who was it that decided to poke and prod at the underpinnings of reality? Milk maids?”

“No. But not the Philosophers, either. A group that perverted Philosophy—”

“The point remains, Arhat, if those wise fools hadn’t gone mucking about with knowledge man was literally not meant to know,
millions
wouldn’t have perished—”

“Enough,” I said, rather loudly. “If you two want to debate, go to the Speaker’s Corner. Kerf’s crooked staff, we’re under a deadline here, or had you forgotten, Holgren? Arhat, you can’t have the toad. Sorry about that, now please run along.”

Holgren just stood there, looking mulish. The kid refused to run along.

“Seriously, go. We don’t have time for you.”

“Please give me the statue. What is inside should stay there, in my safekeeping. I’ve been entrusted with it since I was ten years old. When it was stolen, I failed in my duty. I must take that duty up again.”

“Look,” I said, losing patience, “We don’t have time for this. If Heirus doesn’t get the Blade, lots of people are going to die, including and especially us. ‘Please’ is nice, but not nearly enough.”

“The Blade was never meant to leave me. I am its guardian. I must have it back, or the consequences could be unimaginable.”

I looked at him. “Corbin took it from you?”

“It was stolen from the temple.”

“Some tumbledown place in the Gol-Shen swamps?”

“Yes.”

I remembered the cryptic remark he’d made in the City of the Dead. “Then you’re a shitty guardian. I wouldn’t give it back to you in any case. Now get out.”

“You have no idea what you’re doing. Do not render down the statue, for the love of all.”

“Tell me why. Give me one good reason, good enough to balance being slaughtered by the bloody Red Hand if I don’t.”

“It could end the very world.”

“Well that’s pretty good, I admit, but I have only your word on it, and besides, if we don’t melt the damned thing down, Heirus will just kill us, take it, and melt it down himself. Nice try though. Holgren, let’s do it. Or are you going to try and stop us, Arhat?”

“I will not attempt to force you to stop. But know this: What is inside the statue is like a psychic poison. If you release it, what little shielding there is between it and the world will be gone. Everyone and everything around it will be twisted beyond all recognition. Quick or slow, it
will
happen.”

“Again, only your word.”

“For seven years I have watched over Abanon’s Blade. I have paid the price. I will show you.”

And he did.

Suddenly he wasn’t a fresh-faced boy anymore. Suddenly he was a nightmare, scaled and diseased, elongated slavering jaw, piss-colored eyes, taloned fingers—

And that now-familiar hate washed over me and I wanted him dead, dead, in pieces on the floor to stomp on until he was just a stain. I had a knife out and winging toward him in an eye blink, and was already following it with another in hand to gut him, but he was gone.

“You see?” he said from behind me, just a boy again. I spun around and saw that Holgren had a spitting, coruscating knife made of light under the boy’s chin, and a slowly disappearing snarl on his face. Bone, silent as death, had sunk his ivory fangs into the boy’s calf, and blood trickled down.

“The Blade that Whispers Hate,” murmured the boy as Holgren, pale-faced, turned him loose and led Bone outside, shaking and querulous. “Do you think you can ignore its blandishments? I could not. If you release it, you’ll find you have only two choices. To act on them, much to the world’s woe, or to... internalize them.” He bent down and ran a hand over his bleeding leg. The puncture wounds from Bone’s fangs turned to puckered scars in front of my eyes, and the blood dried and flaked away onto Holgren’s threadbare carpet.

“Do you mind if I sit?” he asked.

“Not my house, but feel free.” I was trembling from the aftereffects of that blind hate. I sat, too. Holgren came back in and leaned against the door sill, regarding the Arhat with sharp, brooding eyes.

“You’ve attacked me twice,” I said to the Arhat. “First you tried to break into my house, then you ambushed me when I was breaking into Heirus’s villa. Why?”

“The first time I only meant to take the toad while you slept. But you woke. I did not attack you.”

“You sure as hells did the second time.”

“To keep you from entering the villa. If you had, you would have died. And my intent was not to harm you. But my control over the form Abanon cursed me with is imperfect.”

“Why use it at all then?”

“It is strong. And it is impervious to pain.”

“Why not just appear in my rooms and take the toad?”

He smiled. “I could not, otherwise I would have. The physical places where such parlor tricks are possible are limited, and random. To understand more I would need to teach you at least the fundamentals of Philosophy—”

“Mmm, no thanks. I’m a little pressed for time.” And interest.

Holgren cleared his throat. “I agree that releasing the Blade would be imprudent,” he said. “It still must be handed over to Heirus. There’s no way around it.”

“I implore you not to do so.”

“Sorry. As Amra said, we have no choice.”

“Well then, I will have to take it from him, then.”

“Oh,” I said. “He told me if he sees you he’s going to do unpleasant things to your body.”

“Be that as it may.”

“You want to tell me why he hates you?”

“He hates all Arhat.”

“Again, why?”

“He founded the Order of Philosophers. After the Cataclysm, he walked away from the Order, vowing eternal enmity.”

“Sounds like there’s a story in there.”

“Oh yes. But one you do not have time to hear.”

He stood up, and walked out the door. Holgren and I exchanged glances. He gave me a small shrug.

Somebody else knocked at Holgren’s door.

“I’m becoming entirely too popular,” he said with a frown. He put his hand to the door, shrugged, and opened it.

Standing at the door was Kettle, Daruvner’s runner. Usually he had a mischievous look plastered on his round face, but tonight he was serious.

“Miss Amra, Daruvner wants to see you. Says it’s urgent. You’re s’posed to take the hack back with me.” He pointed a pudgy thumb over his shoulder to the waiting carriage. “Magister Holgren should come too, an’ it please him.”

“What’s it about, Kettle?”

He shook his head. “Not sure. Something to do with Locquewood. His man Bollund showed up at Fengal’s door, bleeding like a fountain, asking after you.”