The Cold Commands

CHAPTER 31

You could hear the yelling from twenty yards off down the alcoved and colonnaded corridor. As they approached, Ringil glanced sideways and saw Archeth pull a face.

“Worse than you thought it’d be?” he asked her.

“Yeah.” But then she shrugged. “No. No, I suppose not.”

“Fucking merchants, eh?”

“You will keep your seat!” came through the door at full pitch. A young, unseasoned voice, trying for command and fraying at the edges. Ringil made it for Noyal Rakan. He’d eavesdropped on the young Throne Eternal captain earlier in the week, and had to agree with Shanta. He wasn’t the man for this job.

Nice arse, though.

They reached the door. Stood wordless, looking at each other. The storm raged on within, Rakan’s attempt to close down debate by now pretty much washed away in the waves of revolt. One heavily accented, bass voice trampled down the Throne Eternal captain’s commands. Behind that, other speakers with more homegrown Tethanne vied for mastery undeterred. Archeth looked at Ringil’s face and saw a cold smile wash across his eyes but barely touch the crooked line of his mouth.

“Well, here we go,” he said.

He reached down with a showy flourish of sleeves, laid hands on the ornate handles of the double doors. He turned each handle sharply and shoved inward. The doors hinged smoothly back, letting out a waft of stale, body-heated air and the surf of raised voices.

“…a fucking choirboy!”

“That’s exactly right, you—”

“…shame! Shame!”

“…no intention of…”

“Gentlemen!”

To Archeth, it didn’t seem as if Ringil had raised his own voice by much, but it stilled the room like a battle clarion. There was an almost comical nature to the way the company froze, heads twitching around to the door and the figure that had just come through it. Half of the assembled worthies were on their feet around the table, caught in furious mid-gesture, the others slumped in their chairs with lordly disdain. Rakan, looking beleaguered, headed the table with another equally young Throne Eternal by his side, but the focus of the room was Shendanak—big, broad-shouldered, and these days swinging a belly like a saddlebag under his robes. Shendanak, who still affected the knotted hair and iron talismans of a youth and a heritage he’d left three decades and a thousand miles behind. Shendanak, who wore the jagged scar on his forehead like some diadem of rank and covered his big, cut-up hands with savagely wrought steel and silver rings.

Shendanak, who spoke first. Full-body swivel, straight in.

“And who the fuck are you?”

Ringil met his eye and dropped into Majak. “Want me to show you?”

It backed the other man up a scant couple of heartbeats. But Shendanak matched the language shift and came right back.

“Oho—and which Skaranak bum-boy’s mouth did you steal that shit out of?”

Ringil let the smile seep out onto his face. Said nothing.

Shendanak bristled, spat out an oath. “Don’t you grin at me, boy!”

The rest of the room had puddled into quiet around this, the new confrontation. At the corner of his vision, Ringil saw a palpable relief course over Rakan’s features. Closely followed by mortification at the way the balance had shifted away from him. He’d blurt something out in a moment, and it probably wouldn’t help.

“Well?” Shendanak’s eyes measured Ringil for an early grave.

Ringil kept his smile. Felt the tug of the scar tissue in his cheek, the soft-tugging weight of the dragon-tooth dagger in his sleeve. The matter of a moment to clear the blade, leap the table and open that prodigious belly like a millet sack—let Shendanak look and find that knowledge floating there in Gil’s gently smiling gaze.

“Share hearth and heart’s truth,” he recited softly. “Break bread and sup under a shared sky. Or would you rather not?”

It was as if a wind off the steppe blew in through the open door behind him. The locking power of the formal phrasing, the cold touch of the double-edged offer. Back in the day, Egar told him once, way it was between the Ish and us, you’d hear that shit about as often just before it really kicked off as you would before everyone sat down to share meat. No one old enough to remember those days will piss on the norms if they can help it.

“No, I mean it, scar-face.” Voice slower and quieted a little this time, because Shendanak, possibly for the first time in years, was suddenly facing something he wasn’t sure how to measure. “Who the fuck are you, really?”

Ringil kept his gaze nailed to the other man’s eyes.

“The warmth of my fire,” he said quietly, “is yours.”

Like arm-wrestling the hulking, confident guy who hasn’t understood how muscle works. Ringil felt the moment bend and then break, like cheap metal. Felt the tension go out of the other man in a gush, felt the arm go down.

“As grateful kin”—the words came grudgingly out of Shendanak’s throat—“I take my place.”

“Good.” Ringil inclined his head, made a courtly gesture at the seat the other man wasn’t using. “Then why don’t you take that place, brother. Be still, keep counsel, and we can deal with these city dwellers in a manner more appropriate to the horsemen they have forgotten how to be.”

“What exactly are you two jabbering about?” snapped a well-fed face farther down the table.

Ringil didn’t switch his gaze, didn’t need to. He kept his tone cold but mannered, dropped back into Tethanne. “That need not concern you, my lord Kaptal.”

“That’s where you’re wrong, my northern friend.” This not from Yilmar Kaptal himself, but another, less heavily jowled individual seated at his side. Menith Tand leaned his spare, gray-maned countenance forward and made an inclusive gesture around the table. “Whatever is said in this room concerns us all. We are here, all of us, in good faith, to underwrite a venture of imperial charter. No one said anything about partisan allegiances or League mercenaries.”

Shendanak snorted. “Fucking partisan, is it? Fucking prick.”

“I’m a little surprised to see you uncomfortable with League mercenary involvement, my lord Tand.” Ringil took a couple more steps into the room. Made the space his own, as if the Ravensfriend still hung on his back. “Do you not hire such men in great numbers to bring your slaves down from the north?”

Tand grinned mirthlessly back. “Yes. And many of them with accents and Tethanne far worse than yours. But they all answer to me for their coin. Who do you answer to, my friend?”

Archeth cleared her throat. “Gentlemen and lady, may I present to you his lordship Ringil of the Glades House Eskiath in Trelayne, once ranked knight commander in the alliance armies and decorated hero of the victory at Gallows Gap.”

Low muttering around the table, like the scurry of rats. Ringil saw Noyal Rakan stiffen and murmur something to his aide. Elsewhere, in querying tones, he caught the words hero, dragon, and faggot in about equal measure.

Well, fame took some unpredictable postures when you fucked him. And he was a fickle boy at best.

“That’s who he is, kir-Archeth,” Tand said laconically. “I asked who he answers to.”

Archeth gave him a blank look, and paced a couple of moments before she spoke. “My lord Ringil has agreed to act as guide and captain for the expedition north. His contract, then, is with me, and with the imperial charter. Does that suffice?”

Across the table from Tand and Kaptal, Nethena Gral wrinkled her famously smooth, pale brow—a couple of court poets, Ringil was told, had made allusion to it—and gestured irritably at Noyal Rakan.

“It was my understanding, my lady Archeth, that the Throne Eternal had command of this expedition, and were, so to speak, the Emperor’s blessing and protecting hand in the venture. Is this then no longer the case?”

Ringil raised a hand to his jaw, made a seemingly innocuous stroking gesture with it. The agreed signal. On his flank, he felt Archeth subside as she saw it.

“Honored lady Gral,” he said. “The Emperor’s blessing here in Yhelteth is no doubt a wondrous bounty, to be sought by any wise citizen. North and west of Tlanmar, however, and paired with a League florin, it will buy you a florin’s worth of salt.”

A taut silence stretched behind the words. Ringil kept half an eye on Captain Noyal Rakan, saw the aide bristle with affront, but Rakan himself stay quiet and watchful.

Down the table, someone cleared a throat.

“Some,” said Yilmar Kaptal carefully. “Would call that an insult to the majesty of the Burnished Throne.”

Ringil shrugged. “Some would call it truth.”

More quiet. What gazes were not fixed on Ringil darted around the room, meeting one another, querying, seeking alliance, shying away again.

Then, abruptly, Menith Tand chuckled.

“He’s completely right, of course.” The slaver looked around at the assembled company. “Isn’t he? Come on, maybe not all of you have been up there, but who here hasn’t read the court records on the northwestern march? He’s completely right, and what’s more we all know it, and we’re all sitting here thinking it. So—”

He clapped his hands on the word, once, sharply. Rubbed them briskly together.

“—shall we just welcome our new captain and war hero, as his rank and exploits dictate, and then get to some serious planning? Because I for one grow bored with this constant measuring of male members in place of intelligent debate.”

IT WOULD TAKE LONGER THAN THAT, OF COURSE. HE’D SOWN THE SEEDS, but the crop would be a while in sprouting.

Imperial summons had brought them all to the first meeting, curiosity and the promise of potential wealth kept them attached, as did an unwillingness to be the first to jump ship in case a hated rival should stay, and garner fame and fortune in their absence. It was a powerful binding force in a group so fractious, but it was unstable and unreliable in the longer term. About as safe as the winds around the Gergis cape was Shanta’s sour opinion. Could die out from under us at any minute, leave us becalmed and going nowhere. Or turn about and fling us on the rocks before we even get a start. Needs a very cool hand on the helm.

Well, he’d made a start. Form an outsider bond with Shendanak, but keep it wrapped and opaque beneath the language gap. Throw a line to Tand with his well-traveled merchant sophistication and connection to the League territories. But keep a vague menace about it all. Neutralize the rivalry between the two men by the simple expedient of giving them Gil to worry about instead. Then dare the others to seek confrontation when they had just seen the two most vociferous of the company prefer to stand down. Lubricate the whole with court charm, and leaven with warrior bluntness. Force unity from the mix with that same unspoken threat and promise you’d summon for any ragtag command you got stuck with—this is the thing you are a part of now, and it belongs to me; fracture it and you call me out. And you wouldn’t want that.

This shit he could do in his sleep.

With the rest of his attention, he worried about Egar.

Still somewhere in the city, Imrana thinks. Archeth didn’t have much detail; even now she was playing catch-up like everyone else. The story of Saril Ashant’s murder in his own bedchamber had rocked the court from top to bottom, but Imrana had enough connections to stanch the flow of further information down to a trickle. And her long years as an independent woman at court had taught her the nimble art of trusting no one any further than you absolutely had to. Archeth got a terse summons and a few minutes’ audience in which Imrana sketched the events of Egar’s last visit. He shows up at the crack of dawn with some little trollop in tow, some hard-luck case he’s rescued from sadistic priests and their evil sorcery—

Sorcery? Priests?

Yeah, tell me about it. But you know what he’s like, Archeth. He doesn’t really see any difference between some bone-through-the-nose shaman up north and the Revelation. It’s all magic to him, it’s all evil. At heart, he’s still the same hulking romantic thug he was when he rode into town fifteen years ago. It’s all tales-around-the-campfire heroism and eternal bonds and—Imrana, gesturing wearily out the window at the city beyond—I mean, seriously, Archeth, who believes in that shit anymore?

Have Saril’s family put a bounty out on him yet?

Probably. A thin grimace. They’re not exactly keeping counsel with me at the moment. I imagine they’re still deciding whether to try to put me in the chair for this.

“The chair?” Ringil, aghast when Archeth reported back that evening. “The fucking chair? I thought that was for traitors.”

“And for women caught in, quote, adulterous machinations against a lawful spouse, unquote. It’s an old law, very early Empire. Used to cover any kind of female adultery back in the day, but modern magistrature usually reads machinations to mean a plot against the husband’s life or property. Anyway”—she picked up her goblet and drained it, but not before he’d seen her shiver—“we have the Chamber of Confidences for traitors now, so the chair’s been gathering rust.”

“Right. Good.” He topped up her glass from the flask on the table. The house was quiet and drowsy around them, flooded with rosy evening light from the west-facing windows. “So, no chance she’ll get strapped into it, then?”

Archeth studied her new drink. “A couple of years ago, I’d have said no way it could happen. But Demlarashan is really shaking things up at court. Lot of military fanfare going around these days. And Saril Ashant is—was—a bona fide war hero.”

Ringil grunted. “Me, too. Outside of scars, what’s that good for?”

“If you’re from the rank and file, not much,” she admitted. “But add it to noble family and wealth, and you’ve got a problem. No one at court wants to be seen not backing our glorious imperial troops.”

“But Imrana has friends at court, right?”

“Imrana has allegiances. It’s not the same thing. And if they don’t catch up with Egar, then everyone’s going to be looking for someone else to take the rap.” Her lip curled in disgust. “Justice in this city is all about visible retribution—and in the end, it doesn’t much matter who’s on the receiving end so long as vengeance is seen to be done.”

“Sounds just like home. And Imrana really thinks Eg hasn’t left town?”

“From the way he was talking, she says not.”

Ringil rubbed at his chin. “Strange.”

“Well, what can I tell you?” Archeth spread her hands. “He has been acting strange the last couple of months. Especially the last couple of weeks, with Ashant back in town. You know, after all that time home on the steppe, maybe it was a mistake for him to come back here. Maybe city life doesn’t agree with him anymore.”

“Doesn’t explain why he didn’t leave town.” Ringil held his drink up to the light, frowned critically at its color. “Anyway, my guess is, what doesn’t agree with Eg most of all is not getting laid. And who could fault him on that? Eh?”

She ignored the glance he shot her, ignored the prod. “They’ve got the City Guard out in force looking for him.”

“Poor City Guard.”

“I don’t know, Gil. Those guys have changed a lot since the war. Lot of demobbed veterans in the ranks now, real hard men from the expeditionary and the sieges. They’re not the joke they used to be. And Eg’s not as young as he used to be, either.”

Ringil got up and went to stand at one of the sunset-gleaming windows. He stared out, as if he might spot the Majak perched there on one of the tiled roofs in the reddish evening light. Grinning and waving at him. Staff lance in hand.

“I back the Dragonbane against anything this city can throw at him,” he said thoughtfully. “With the possible exception of the King’s Reach. And I don’t guess Jhiral plans to waste that kind of manpower on catching just one more steppe nomad who couldn’t keep his dick in his breeches, right?”

Archeth pursed her lips. “Depends. Ashant’s family swing some weight up at the palace. And like I said, the guy was a war hero. If the Guard don’t get somewhere soon, they might push for it. They push hard enough, Jhiral may cave in.”

“Ah, that’ll be the regal majesty of the Burnished Throne in action, will it? The unbendable will of His Imperial Shininess?”

“That’s Radiance.”

“Not from where I’m standing.”

She waved the comment away, a wasp she’d been stung by too many times to care about. “Look, I’ll do what I can to forestall the King’s Reach deploying. But Demlarashan has split this city down the middle. Jhiral’s hard up against the Citadel, and right now he needs all the backing at court he can get.”

“Including, presumably, from the Ashants of this world.”

A tired nod. “Most of the nobility side with the throne because they’re shit scared of what mob religion will do if it hits the streets. That gets Jhiral the bulk of the professional military, too, the officer class and anyone loyal to them. And a fair few of the Citadel’s Mastery are with us as well, because they’re snug in bed with the nobility and don’t want their comfy little boat rocked. But they’re not anything like a majority, and they won’t be able to hold the line if this thing kicks off. You’ve got thousands of pissed-off and pious rank-and-file veterans out there, Gil. Across the Empire as a whole, it’s tens of thousands. Men who went to war on the Citadel’s say-so and came home to no change for the better.”

“Yeah, you can see their point.” He swung away from the window, as if dismissing something. Came back to the table. “So—are they organizing?”

“According to Jhiral’s spies, not yet. Not here, anyway. But they know how to fight.”

Gallows Gap flickered in his eyes like flames. “I know they do.”

“They survived the Scaled Folk, and they think that’s down to God and the Revelation, so they aren’t really afraid of anything anymore. This is what’s fueling Demlarashan. Men like that, men with a grudge, and faith, and nothing much left to lose. And it can just as easily come home to roost right here in the city. It’s another Ashnal schism just waiting to happen. And you’ve got demagogues like Menkarak and his clique, who’ll use that to bring the whole thing to the boil if they can.”

Ringil hooked up his seat by the upright slat, turned it about, and seated himself straddle-legged. Rested his arms on the back and sat there with his cloak puddled in black around him, brooding. “Can’t they take this Menkarak off the board? Sneak into his rooms one night and just slit his throat?”

“Been tried. Jhiral sent half a dozen of the Throne Eternal’s best assassins into the Citadel to get it done. None of them came back.”

A raised brow. “Just can’t get the help these days, huh?”

“It isn’t funny, Gil. The Citadel’s a volcano getting ready to blow. You put enough cracks in Jhiral’s alliances—for example, you fail to deliver when the noble family of a Demlarashan war hero come asking for favors, and—”

“Yeah, I get it.” He sighed. “All right, look. You keep the King’s Reach leashed as long as you can. Soon as I get the chance, I’m going to wander about this town a bit, see if I can get the Dragonbane to show himself. There might be time.”

“And if there isn’t?”

He peeled her an unpleasant smile. “Then to get to Egar, the King’s Reach will have to come through me.”