Blood Pact

FOUR Aarlem Fortress

It was dark by the time the limousine brought him back to Aarlem Fortress. As they raced down the hill road, he looked out at the sodium lights flashing past, the perimeter line, and the blur of chain-link and razorwire. Snowflakes caught the light, and turned the air into white noise.

Beyond the ditch and double fence, like a theatre’s stage brilliantly lime-lit for a performance, he could see the main exercise quad fringed with lights, and the strings of pole-lamps radiating off the quad, lighting the rows of modular sheds. Aarlem Fortress was so named because a fortress called Aarlem had once stood on the spot. It had been razed during the Famous Victory, and the garrison erected on its rendered foundations.

It had been their home for a year.

Gaunt had never expected to go back to Balhaut, and he certainly hadn’t expected to be stationed there for any length of time. He divided, arbitrarily, he supposed, his life into three parts: his cadet-ship, his service with the Hyrkans, and his command of the Ghosts. Balhaut was the end-stop of the Hyrkan period, before the Tanith watershed. It was like revisiting a past life.

Then again, everything had been like revisiting a past life since Jago.

They’d given him skin-grafts, significant skin-grafts, and somehow patched his brutalised organs back together. It was the organ damage that had come closest to ending him in the weeks after his rescue from the hands of the Archenemy torturers, and it had come fething close half a dozen times.

The eyes, oddly, were the most superficial injuries. Augmetics could be easily fitted into emptied sockets. General Van Voytz, perhaps nagged by guilt, had authorised particularly sophisticated implants of ceramic and stainless steel. In terms of performance, they were better than Gaunt’s original eyes. He had greater range and depth perception, and appreciably enhanced cold-light and latent-heat vision. And they sat in his face well enough. They looked like… eyes. A little like the porcelain eyes of an expensive doll, he often thought when he saw them in a mirror, but at least they were alive, not dull like a doll’s. When you caught them right, there was a flash of green fire in them.

It was the eyes, though, that bothered him most, more than the months of itching grafts, and more than the regime of drugs and procedures to heal his sutured innards. The eyes didn’t hurt, they worked perfectly, and they didn’t scare children; they just weren’t his.

And every now and then, he saw…

It wasn’t entirely clear what it was he saw. It was too fast, too subliminal. Doc Dorden said the phenomenon wasn’t anything to do with his new eyes at all. It was a memory of the trauma of losing his old eyes. The memory was haunting his optic nerves.

This seemed likely. Gaunt couldn’t remember much about what the Blood Pact had done to him, and the glimpses conveyed more of a feeling than anything visual, but he could taste pain in them. He was convinced that the intermittent glimpses were flashes of the very last thing his old eyes had seen.

The limousine’s tyres drummed over the ribbed decking of the ditch bridge, and they swung up to the main gate. The headlamps picked up the black-and-yellow chevrons of the barrier as they rose like the jaws of a beast.

The Tanith barracks were on the west side of the quad, facing the drab blockhouses used by the 52nd Bremenen. It was still snowing lightly, though nothing had settled. The fat snowflakes looked yellow as they milled down into the amber glow of the sodium lamps. The air was full of a raw, metal cold that you could taste in the back of your lungs.

Gaunt got out of the limousine beside the steps of the command post. The Munitorum driver held the door for him.

‘What time tomorrow, sir?’ the driver asked.

‘Don’t bother,’ Gaunt replied. He looked at the man, who stiffened suddenly. ‘I’ll be requesting another driver.’

‘Sir?’ the man mumbled. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘You kept me waiting,’ said Gaunt.

‘I… I have apologised about that, sir,’ the man said, standing rigidly to attention and trying not to catch Gaunt’s ceramic eyes. ‘There was a delay at the parking garage, and–’

‘There was a card school at the parking garage. You and the other drivers. A good hand you didn’t want to toss in, so you kept me waiting.’

The man opened his mouth, but then shut it quickly. It was bad enough to get a notice of reprimand from a commissar, far worse to be caught by a commissar in a lie.

‘That’ll be all,’ said Gaunt.

The man saluted, got back into the motor, and drove away.

Gaunt walked up the steps into the post. The card school had been a lucky guess. Where had that come from? Were these idiots getting so predictable in their malingering and incompetence, or was he just getting too old and cynical? He’d seen it all before. He’d made an educated guess.

Except, it felt as if he’d somehow witnessed the man’s crime: the drivers, hunched around an upturned crate beside a brazier in the chilly garage, the cards going down, a steward from the club coming in, calling out the numbers for the staff cars requested, a dismissive wave of the hand and the words, ‘Let the bastard wait a minute.’

Clear as day.

He laughed. Too many years a discipline officer: he knew all the tricks and dodges. He’d seen them all a thousand times.

Captain Obel had the watch. He got up from his desk beside the clerical pool, which was empty for the night, and saluted. The troopers stationed at the doors snapped to attention.

Gaunt waved an ‘at ease’ in their direction as he came in, pulling off his gloves.

‘What’s on the scope tonight, Obel?’ he asked.

Obel shrugged.

‘Square root of feth all, sir,’ he said.

‘Can I see the log?’

Obel reached towards his desk, and passed Gaunt the data-slate holding the regiment’s day-book and activity log. Gaunt sped through it.

‘Major Rawne off-base?’

‘Three-day pass, sir.’

Gaunt nodded. ‘Yes, I remember signing it. You got the whole night?’

‘I’m on till two; Gol Kolea has lates. Did your adjutant find you, by the way?’

Gaunt looked up at Obel. ‘Beltayn? He was looking for me?’

‘Yes, sir. Earlier on.’

‘Know what it was about?’ Gaunt asked.

Obel shook his head. ‘He didn’t say, sir. Sorry.’

Gaunt handed the log back to Obel. ‘Anything I should know about?’

‘There was some rowdy business this afternoon on the quad between some of ours and some of the Bremenen boys. Lot of hot air. Commissar Ludd put a lid on it.’

Gaunt made a mental note to have words with the Bremenen CO. Base-bound boredom was beginning to sour the once-friendly rivalry between the neighbouring regiments.

‘Anything else?’

‘Commissar Hark got called out to the city about an hour ago, sir,’ said Obel.

‘Official?’

‘It sounded like it, sir.’

Gaunt sighed. There were at least three hundred Ghosts off-base on passes at any one time. That meant drinking, betting, whoring, and a list of other, less savoury activities. One of the regiment’s commissars was getting dragged up to the hive every couple of days.

We’re getting fat, Gaunt thought. We’re getting fat and idle, and our patience is wearing thin, but it’s the thin that’s going to cause the worst trouble.

Gaunt wandered along the blockhouse hall towards his quarters, and saw a man sitting on one of the chairs outside his office. He was a civilian: a young, slightly scruffy fellow in a black, buttoned suit and cravat. Several leather carrying boxes and instrument cases sat on the floor beside him. When Gaunt appeared, he rose to his feet.

‘Colonel-Commissar Gaunt?’ he began.

Gaunt held up an index finger.

‘Just a moment,’ he said. He walked past the man and entered his office.

‘Where the hell have you been?’ asked Beltayn.

Gaunt raised his eyebrows, looked at his adjutant, and calmly closed the office door behind him.

Beltayn blinked and composed himself. He put the sheaf of papers he had been sorting on Gaunt’s desk and executed a trim salute.

‘My apologies, sir, that was out of line. Good evening.’

‘Good evening, adjutant,’ Gaunt replied, taking off his coat.

‘So where the… where have you been, sir?’ asked Beltayn.

‘I spent the afternoon with the Kapaj. Is that all right?’

‘It would have b…’ Beltayn began. He changed his mind. ‘It’s unfortunate we weren’t able to speak during the course of the day, sir. You did have several commitments.’

‘Did I?’

‘A three o’clock meeting of the joint review board,’ said Beltayn.

‘Well, it’s probably a mercy I was spared, then, isn’t it?’

‘And you were due here at five for Mr Jaume.’

‘Who’s Mr Jaume?’ Gaunt asked.

His adjutant raised his arm in a swan-neck and pointed towards the office door.

‘The civilian outside?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘What the feth is his business?’

‘He’s a portraitist,’ replied Beltayn. ‘He’s been commissioned to make portraits of officers who served during the Balhaut War.’

‘I’m not sitting for a painting.’

‘He makes photographic exposures, sir. There was a letter of introduction. I showed it to you. You authorised the appointment.’

‘I don’t remember.’

‘The portrait’s for a memorial chapel, or something.’

‘I’m not dead,’ said Gaunt.

‘Clearly,’ replied Beltayn. ‘Mr Jaume presented himself at the appointed time, and you weren’t here. He’s been waiting ever since.’

Gaunt sat down at his desk. ‘Just send him home with my apologies, and reschedule. Tell him I didn’t know anything about an appointment.’

‘You did, though,’ said Beltayn.

‘What?’

‘I pinned a note of your schedule to your copybook first thing this morning and left it on your blotter.’

Gaunt looked down at his desk. He shifted the pile of documents to one side. His brown leather copybook, a sheet of yellow notepaper attached to the cover, lay on the tabletop.

‘You didn’t take it with you,’ said Beltayn.

‘It would appear not,’ replied Gaunt.

Beltayn sighed.

‘I’ll go and rearrange the meeting,’ he said. Gaunt looked at him. He could see Beltayn’s exasperation. He could see him saying, You’ve got to be more focused! There’s work to be done, and you treat everything like a game! There’s no rigour in you anymore! You’d rather duck out and go off gallivanting! That drunken idiot friend of yours, Blenner, he’s the ruin of you!

Of course, Dughan Beltayn would never say anything like that to him, but, just for a moment, Gaunt could see him saying it, standing there beside the desk. Gaunt could see the adjutant blowing his whole career in one infuriated outburst.

Beltayn said nothing. Nevertheless, with a slightly queasy feeling, Gaunt realised that was exactly what the adjutant was thinking.

‘How about tomorrow morning?’ Beltayn asked.

‘Nine o’clock sharp, Bel, that’ll be fine.’

‘Thank you, sir.’

Beltayn headed for the door. Before he got there, it opened, and Dorden walked in.

‘I heard you were back.’

‘Come in,’ said Gaunt, with a careless wave of his hand.

Beltayn went out into the hall to speak to the portraitist, and closed the door. Dorden sat down in the chair facing Gaunt’s desk. With one exception, Chief Medicae Dorden was the oldest person in the regimental company. Gaunt realised just how old the doctor was beginning to look. Out in the field, Dorden had been grizzled and haggard, but two years off the line had put a little meat back on his bones and ruddied his complexion. He’d gone from being a prematurely aged whipcord of a man to a soft, slightly plump country doctor. The tarnish of grey in his wiry hair had turned as white as the Saint’s gown.

‘I’ve been looking for you all day,’ Dorden began.

‘Don’t you start,’ replied Gaunt.

‘I will, actually,’ Dorden said. ‘Medicae and Section are breathing down my neck. Quarterly certification was due two days ago, and it can’t be completed until all regimental medicals are done and submitted.’

‘So do them,’ said Gaunt.

‘Ha ha,’ replied Dorden. ‘It’s all right for you. If the certification is late, you might get a slap on the hand from Section. As the delay is medical-related, I get fined or worse. Can you please get this sorted out?’

‘And the root of the problem is?’

Dorden shrugged as if he barely needed to say it. ‘The regimental medicals can’t be completed because one member of this company is refusing the examination.’

‘Is it who I think it is?’

Dorden nodded.

‘Is he refusing the medical on religious grounds?’

‘I believe he’s refusing it on the basis of being a cantankerous old bastard.’

‘I’ll speak to him.’

‘Tonight?’

‘I’ll go now,’ replied Gaunt.

The temple house adjoined the command post on its east side, just another modular blockhouse like all the other structures in the camp. It could easily have been put to use as a dorm or a storage barn, but they’d taken out the internal floor, so that the square chamber was two storeys deep, filled it with benches, and had a shrine consecrated on the north wall facing the seating. It was a typical Imperial Guard conversion.

Father Zweil, the old ayatani, had attached himself like a barnacle to the Tanith First during the tour on Hagia, and he had never let go. Nor had they ever had the heart to scrape him off their hull. By default, by habit, and by convenience, he had become the company chaplain. He was inconsistent, unpredictable, ill-tempered and belligerent. His age and experience had invested him with a degree of wisdom, but it was generally a challenge to mine that wisdom out of him. On paper, in regimental reports, it was often hard to justify his continued association with the unit.

On the other hand, Zweil had a certain quality that Gaunt found as difficult to deny as it was to identify. Apart from anything else, Zweil had been with them, steadfast, all the way since Hagia. He had been through every fight, every brawl, every set-piece; he’d survived the knife-edge of Herodor, the compartment war of Sparshad Mons, the liberation of Gereon, and the siege of Hinzerhaus. Every step of the way, he had ministered to the needs of the dying and the dead. His blood had become tied to Tanith blood in a way that could not be unworked.

Zweil ran daily services in the temple house, and other notable observances when they cropped up on the calendar. Every morning, without regard to the weather, he walked from Aarlem Fortress to the Templum Ministoria at Aarlem-Sachsen, four kilometres away, and spent an hour there in private worship. This daily, eight kilometre pilgrimage was, he declared, his way of justifying the imhava or ‘roving’ part of his title as imhava ayatani. Years before (how many years Gaunt did not know), Zweil had taken up a life of wandering devotion to travel through the Sabbat Worlds in the footsteps of the Saint, and repeat the epic circuit she had made. When they’d met him on Hagia, he’d claimed that his great journey was nearly finished. He’d walked with them and followed their route ever since, but he had always insisted that, eventually, he would have to finish his devotion. ‘One day, you know,’ he’d said, ‘we’ll part company. Oh yes. You’ll be going your way, and your way won’t suit me any more. So, we’ll say our goodbyes, and I’ll take off on the way I need to go. I’ve spent too much time as it is, following after you. You’ll miss me when I’m gone. I know you will. You’ll all be heartbroken and rudderless. I can’t help that. I’ve got devotions, devotions I must attend to. The Saint expects it of me. In fact, now I come to think of it, I may start tomorrow, or the day after. Is it dumplings tomorrow? It is, isn’t it? Right, I’ll start the day after.’

Every night since they’d taken up post at Aarlem Fortress and converted the temple house, Father Zweil had offered what he described as ‘occasions of enlightenment’. After supper, any member of the regiment without duties, and any member of the regimental train, was welcome to come to the temple house for a couple of hours and listen to him discourse on whatever subject had piqued his interest that day. Sometimes, the occasions were out-and-out sermons, full of piss and vinegar if Zweil’s dander was up. Sometimes, they were more like lectures, methodical and instructive, and delivered with reference to the teetering stack of texts he’d dragged over from the library of the Templum Ministoria. Sometimes, he simply read aloud, covering topics from history to poetics and philosophy or even basic ethics. Sometimes, he handed books out so that everyone present could read privately for an hour. Sometimes, he went amongst them, and used the occasion to help a few of the less-well educated to brush up on their literacy.

In the course of any week, his homilies would veer from the sacred to the profane and back. He would talk about the Saint, or other saints, or the tradition of the ayatani. He would digress at length on the history and customs of the Sabbat Worlds. He would seize enthusiastically on a news story of the day, and use it to ignite animated discussion and debate amongst his congregation. He would teach, directly or indirectly, grammar and numeracy, history and politics, music and poetry. He would air, almost at random, one of the many attics of his mind, and lay out the contents for all to examine.

Gaunt went along whenever he got the chance. Whenever, apropos of nothing, Zweil came out with a fact or detail that he hadn’t previously encountered, Gaunt would make a brief note of it in his copybook. In a year on Balhaut, Gaunt had been obliged to request three copybooks from stores.

That evening, when Gaunt entered the temple house, the chosen subject appeared to be either the history of poetry or the poetry of history. There were about forty Ghosts present, and Zweil, perching at the lectern like a roosting vulture, was getting them to read verses aloud from faded, green-bound schola copies of the Early Sabbatists.

It was Shoggy Domor’s turn. He was on his feet, carefully reading short cantos that Gaunt reckoned were either Ahmud or some middle period Feyaytan. Gaunt waited a while. When Domor had done enough, Zweil gestured for him to sit down, and then picked on Chiria, Domor’s adjutant. She got up, wiped her palm across her scarred cheek uncertainly, and started up where Domor had left off.

Gaunt found a seat near the back, and listened. When Chiria, halting and clumsy, had done, Costin got up and embarked on an over-hasty run at one of the Odes of Sarpedon. After Costin, Sergeant Raglon read a Niciezian sonnet, and after Raglon, Wheln, who offered up a surprisingly fluid and spirited recital of Kongress’s Intimations. After Wheln, it was Eszrah’s turn.

The Nihtgane rose to his feet, a tall and considerable presence, and read one of Locaster’s Parables. It was peculiar to hear his Untill vowel-sounds rounding out Low Gothic. In the two years since Jago, and especially in that last year on Balhaut, Zweil and Gaunt between them had taught Eszrah ap Niht his letters. The Nihtgane virtually never missed one of the ayatani’s ‘occasions of enlightenment’. He read well. He even removed his battered old sunshades when required to read from a book indoors. When he wrote out his name, he spelled it Ezra Night.

If a year on Balhaut has civilised Eszrah, Gaunt thought, what has it done to the rest of us? How soft have we become? How much of our bite have we lost? Is there an edge left on us at all?

When the meeting broke up, Gaunt went down the front to speak to Zweil. The old ayatani looked up from a discussion he was having with Bool, and saw Gaunt approaching.

‘This can’t be good,’ he said.

‘It’s nothing,’ said Gaunt.

‘If it’s about that amasec in Baskevyl’s quarters, somebody had already drunk most of it.’

‘It isn’t about that,’ said Gaunt.

‘Well, if this is about the Oudinot mascot, I didn’t roast it, nor did I suggest to anybody that it should be roasted, and I certainly didn’t supply any recipe for ploin and forcemeat stuffing.’

‘This isn’t about the Oudinot mascot,’ said Gaunt. He paused. ‘What Oudinot mascot?’

‘Oh, they don’t have one,’ said Zweil hurriedly.

‘They don’t?’

‘Not since someone roasted it,’ Zweil added.

Gaunt shook his head. ‘It’s not about any of that. I just need a little help, father.’

‘Help?’

‘That’s right. The benefit of your great experience.’

‘And my wisdom?’

‘And that. There’s a problem with one of the men, and I’d like your advice.’

Zweil furrowed his brow, concentrating. ‘Oh, certainly. No problem. Hit me.’

‘There’s a member of the regimental company–’

‘Do I know him?’ asked Zweil.

‘Yes, father.’

‘All right, go on.’

‘This member of the regimental company, he’s causing a big bureaucratic problem.’

‘Oh, the little fether!’ Zweil hissed, nodding conspiratorially. ‘Are you going to have him flogged?’

‘Flogged?’

‘Flogging’s too good for him. I know, have him tied to a rocket and fired into the heart of the local star,’ said Zweil.

‘Well, that’s certainly on my list of possibilities.’

‘Is it? Good.’

‘The problem,’ said Gaunt, ‘is that the man is refusing to take his medical.’

‘Refusing?’

‘Everyone needs to be certified fit, and he’s refusing to submit himself for the exam.’

‘There’s always one, isn’t there?’ said Zweil. He frowned more deeply and tapped his finger against his chin. ‘I’d make an example of him, if I were you.’

‘You would?’

‘You can’t have insubordination like that, Gaunt. You’re meant to have some authority. Don’t stand for it. Have the man drummed up and down the quad, and then maybe tied to something heavy while the rest of us throw blunt objects at him.’

‘So, in your opinion, this man’s definitely out of line?’ asked Gaunt.

‘Absolutely, categorically, inexcusably out of line. He needs to be certified fit, and he knows it. It’s just pure bloody-mindedness, is what it is. He has to be made to follow the rules down to the letter of the– Waitaminute. It’s me, isn’t it?’

‘It is,’ said Gaunt.

‘Hmm,’ said Zweil. ‘That was very sly of you.’

‘I know. Will you go and see Dorden?’

‘I suppose.’

‘What’s the problem?’

Zweil rocked his head from side to side and shrugged. ‘I’ve never liked doctors. Yurk. Poking their noses in places where noses weren’t supposed to fit. I won’t have it.’

‘You’ll have this.’

Zweil stuck his tongue out at Gaunt.

‘What are you afraid they’ll find?’ Gaunt asked.

‘I’m old. I’m very, very old. What aren’t they going to find?’

Gaunt smiled. ‘Tomorrow morning, please. Don’t make me have this conversation with you again.’

Zweil scowled.

‘Now bless me.’

Zweil waved some half-hearted business with his hands. ‘Bless you, in the name of the God-thingumy, blah blah.’

‘Thank you.’

Zweil returned to the conversation he had been having with Bool. Haller was waiting to ask a question of his own. Gaunt wandered over to the seat where Eszrah was working. The Nihtgane was patiently writing in a copybook. He was concentrating, threading the pen across the paper in a slow, exact hand.

‘Histye, soule,’ Gaunt said.

Eszrah looked up. ‘Histye.’

Gaunt sat down beside him. ‘Busy?’

Eszrah nodded. He carefully blotted out the paragraph he had already written, using a square of tan blotting paper.

‘The father, he asked of me to written down stories that have belonged to my regiment,’ he said.

‘Zweil asked you?’

Eszrah nodded. By regiment, Eszrah meant his people, the Nihtgane of the Gereon Untill. His vocabulary was expanding every day, often with nuanced meanings, but he understood the word regiment in a very particular way. He could not be encouraged to use ‘tribe’ or ‘people’ or even ‘community’ in relation to the Nihtgane, nor could he be persuaded of the specific military definition of regiment. The Tanith First was a regiment and, to Eszrah, it exhibited precisely the same dynamics of loyalty and collective reliance as a tribe or a family.

‘He’s asked you to record Nihtgane stories? Do you mean histories?’

Eszrah shook his head. ‘Not of things that were done, but of older than things.’

‘You mean like folklore?’ Gaunt asked.

Eszrah shrugged. ‘Soule not know word.’

‘I mean legends. Myths,’ Gaunt said.

Eszrah smiled. ‘Aye. That is word how the father says it.’

‘Do the Nihtgane have many myths?’ Gaunt asked.

Eszrah puffed out his lips and turned his eyes up to indicate the level of Gaunt’s understatement.

‘They have belong many, many,’ he said. ‘There is the story of the sleeping walker, which I have writ here, and the story of the moth and the jar, and the story of the snake and the branch, which I have writ here and writ here both. Also there is the story of the walking sleeper, and the story of the old sun, and the story of the hunter and the beast–’

‘How many have you written?’

‘Four and ten,’ said Eszrah. He looked at the open copybook. ‘This I am written, it is the story of the hunter and the pool. It will make five and ten. The hunter, he walks in many of my regiment their stories.’

‘Can I read them?’

Eszrah nodded willingly, and then hesitated. ‘But I must need the book to written down more of them.’

‘Here’s what,’ said Gaunt. ‘Why don’t I get you a second copybook. You write a story down in one book while I’m reading another, then we’ll swap. How’s that?’

Eszrah seemed quite satisfied by this compromise. Abruptly, he touched Gaunt on the sleeve and nodded towards the door of the temple house.

Beltayn had just entered, followed by Nahum Ludd, the regiment’s junior commissar. Ludd was in full uniform, and thawing snowflakes speckled his stormcoat.

‘There he is,’ said Beltayn.

Gaunt got up. ‘Something awry, Bel?’

Beltayn gestured to Ludd. The junior commissar drew an envelope from his coat. Gaunt could see that it was trimmed with a blue stripe, indicating an order despatch from the Commissariat.

‘A courier just brought this in, sir,’ said Ludd. ‘It’s come direct from Section, for your eyes only.’

Gaunt slit the envelope open quickly, took out the tissue-thin sheet inside and opened it to read it.

‘You’re going to have to reschedule Mr Jaume, Bel,’ he said.

‘How come, sir?’

‘Because I’ve got to report to Section at daybreak tomorrow.’

‘Does it say why?’ asked Ludd.

‘No,’ said Gaunt, ‘it doesn’t say anything else at all.’