data-slate.
I could see myself, reflected in the polished panels of his backplate. My clothes were ragged and filthy. My skin pale. 1 had dropped a good seven kilos, and now sported a thick beard as unruly as my hair. The only item in my possession was the inquisitorial rosette in my coat pocket. It comforted me.
Osma turned to face me. 'In three months, your story has not changed/
'That should tell you something/
'It tells me you have great reserves of strength and a careful mind/
'Or that I'm not lying/
He put the slate down on one of the lamp tables.
'Let me explain to you what is going to happen. Lord Rorken has persuaded Grandmaster Orsini to have you extradited to Thracian Primaris. There you will stand trial for the charges in the carta extremis before a Magistery Tribunal of the Ordo Malleus and the Officio of Internal Prosecution. Rorken isn't happy, but it is all Orsini would allow. Rorken, I have heard, feels that your innocence – or guilt – can be ascertained once and for all in a formal trial/
The result of that trial may embarrass you and your master, Lord Bezier/
He laughed. 'In truth, I would welcome such embarrassment if it meant the exoneration of a valuable inquisitor like you, Eisenhorn. But I don't think it will. You will burn on Thracian for this, Eisenhorn, as surely as you would have done here/
'I'll take my chances, Osma/
He nodded. 'So will I. The Black Ships will arrive in three days time to conduct you to Thracian Primaris. That gives me three days to break you before the matter is taken out of my hands/
'Be careful, Osma/
'I'm always careful. Tomorrow, my staff will begin Ninth Action examination of you. There will be no respite until the Black Ships arrive or you tell me what I want to hear/
'Two days of Ninth Action methods will probably guarantee I won't be alive when the Black Ships come/
'Probably A shame, and questions will be asked. But this is a lonely prison and I am in charge. That is why, today, I'm just talking to you. Just you and me. A last chance. Tell me the whole truth now, Eisenhorn, man to man. Make this easy on us both. Confess your crimes before the pain begins tomorrow, spare us the trial on Thracian, and I'll do everything in my power to ensure your execution is quick and painless/
Til gladly tell you the truth/ His eyes brightened.
'It's all there, on that slate you were reading. Exactly as I have been saying these last three months/
When the guards took me back to my frigid cell, down stone hallways where the ocean gales moaned, Fischig was waiting for me. Our daily fifteen minutes.
He had brought a lamp, and a tray with my night meal: thin, tepid fish-broth and stale hunks of rusk bread with a glass of watered rum.
I sat down on the crude bunk.
'I'm to be extradited for trial/ I told him.
He nodded. 'But I understand tomorrow the painwork begins. I've filed a protest, but I'm sure it'll be accidentally lost in the trash/
'I'm sure it will/
'You should eat/ he said.
'I'm not hungry/
'Just eat. You'll need your strength and from the look of you, you've precious little of that/
I shook my head.
'Gregor/ he said, dropping his voice. 'I have a question to ask you. You won't like it much, but it's important/
'Important?'
'To me. And to your friends/
'Ask it/
'Do you remember – God-Emperor, but it seems so long ago! – last year, when we met up again, at that grave field outside Kasr Tyrok?'
'Of course/
'In the shrine tower, you said to me that you couldn't conceive of doing anything that would please or benefit a daemon. You said, 'I can't ever imagine myself that insane.''
'I remember it clearly. You said that if you ever thought I was, you'd shoot me yourself/
He nodded, with a sour chuckle. There was a moment of silence, broken only by the crackling of the lamp and the boom of the sea outside the prison ramparts.
You want to be sure, don't you, Godwyn?' I asked.
He looked at me, reproachfully.
'I can understand that. I expect total loyalty from you and all my staff. You have the right to be assured of the same from me/
Then you know my question/
I fixed him with my eyes. 'You want to ask if I'm lying. If there's any truth to the charges. If you have been working for a man who consorts with daemons/
'It's a stupid question, I know. If you are those things, you won't hesitate to lie again now/
'I'm too tired for anything but the truth, Godwyn. I swear, by the Golden Throne, I am not what Osma says I am. I am a true servant of the Emperor and the Inquisition. Find me an eagle and I'll swear on that too. I don't know what else I can do to convince you.'
He got to his feet. That's enough for me. I just wanted to be sure. Your word has always been enough, and after all the years we've been together, I was sure that you'd tell me if… even if it was…'
'Know this, old friend. 1 would. Even if I was the scum Osma believes me to be, and even if I could hide it from him… I couldn't lie to a direct question from you. Not you, Chastener Fischig.'
The guard rapped on the cell door.
'One minute more!' Fischig shouted. 'Eat your supper,' he said to me.
'Did Osma put you up to this?' I asked.
'Hell, no!' he snarled, offended.
'It's all right. I didn't think so.'
The guard hammered again.
'All right, damn your eyes!' Fischig growled.
'I'll see you tomorrow/ I said.
Yeah/ he replied. 'Do one thing for me.'
'Name it.'
'Eat your supper/
The cramps began just after what I guessed was midnight. They woke me from a bad sleep. Pain surged through my body and my mind was numb. I hadn't felt this bad since Pye's handiwork on Lethe Eleven, during the Darknight almost two whole years before.
I tried to rise, and fell off the bunk. Spasms wracked me, and I cried out. I vomited up the dregs of the dire supper. Bouts of fever-heat and death-chill twitched through me.
I don't know how long it took for me to crawl to the cell door, or how long I lay there beating my fists against it until it opened. Hours, possibly.
Consciousness ebbed and flowed with the cramping and the rising agony.
'Holy Emperor!' the guard exclaimed as he opened the door and saw me by the
