It is not much changed, he said.
CHAPTER 34
There was a wolf out there in the dark, he knew, and it was watching him. It was waiting for him to move.
Oddly, the thought didn t bother him at all.
He stood alone, head tipped exhilaratingly back, on the tilting, turning surface of the Earth, felt the massy weight of its whirl behind his eyes. The steppe sky spun by overhead, darkened purplish masses of cloud fracturing apart on the wind and letting in a golden orange light. He heard the hurrying of the breeze, felt the deep chill on his face that seemed to distance him from his own flesh
Campfire smoke, drifting across his eyes, fragrant with
No, wait
Somewhere distant, someone coughed. He blinked at the sound, and it was as if the world turned slowly, majestically upside down and let him fall. The steppe washed away, the smoke remained. It hung in the air, thick and sweet, the unmistakable catch of flandrijn at the back of his throat. The cough came again, from somewhere behind him, and this time he joined in. He propped himself up on one elbow and rubbed at his eyes.
Drapes of muslin, the hue of dirty honey in the low flickering lamplight. A dimly seen jumble of reclining figures beyond, and the odd upright form, bending to minister to them. He felt a body at his back, felt someone mutter grumpily at his sudden movement. Memory swam up into view, like a big ugly fish on a line.
I m in the pipe house.
He was indeed. The long, smooth barrel of the flandrijn pipe was cupped loosely in his left hand, but the ember was long out. He set it aside and sat up fully. No pain in his leg, though he could feel the tug of the stitches the doctor had put in. And his clothes smelled faintly of liniment. He had no idea what time of day or night it was. He had no idea how long he d been here. On closer examination, along with the whiff of liniment, he detected less pleasant odors. Then again, his clothes hadn t been exactly clean when he stumbled in here, however long ago that was. Blood, sweat, drenching with river water, and, he now remembered, somewhere in the long run of pipes they d brought him, he d lain there and pissed himself with the gentle disregard of a baby.
He gathered up his bundled cloak and lurched stiffly to his feet. Stumbled through the carpet of drowsing bodies, trailing a wake of curses and complaints. An attendant came running, fresh pipe in hand, but he waved her away.
Enough, he said gruffly. Had enough.
His immediate instinct was to seek some coffee and a good long soak in a hot bath. But on reflection, he supposed the way he smelled now would go a good way to completing his beggar s disguise. Best keep it that way.
He grimaced at the thought.
Life in the big city, Eg.
Yeah, and life in the big city is making you soft as the next fucking courtier, Dragonbane. How often did you bathe in hot water out on the steppe? Come to that, how often did you bathe at all on deployment during the war?
True enough he spent most of the war smelling far worse than he did now. At Gallows Gap, Ringil had joked with him, handkerchief held affectedly to mouth, that just the way they stank ought to turn the reptile advance.
Urann s balls, he missed that faggot.
He got himself outside, squinting at the blast of the sun overhead. He estimated time of day, reckoned early afternoon. He d been piped up for at least a full day, then, maybe two.
Yeah, maybe three, said something authoritative, through the fumes in his head.
Vaguely, he recalled the doctor muttering, as he finished up his ministrations, something about cheap pain relief from our coastal brethren downstairs. The disdain in his voice would have been hilarious if Egar hadn t felt quite so much like boiled shit. Well, you re the one renting a coffin-sized room above them, he d felt like growling. You re the one doesn t look like he s been on a fucking horse in his life.
He d dripped coins into the doctor s hand in silence instead, watched with thin satisfaction at the little fish- mouth gape the man made with each clink. Then he lurched shakily away downstairs to talk to the coastal brethren.
They d sorted him out. Quite politely, too, the good doctor s disdain notwithstanding.
Doesn t matter where you go, Ringil told him once, as they sat horses on the cliffs at Demlarashan, overlooking the beach, that shit never changes. Men need someone to hate. It makes them feel strong, it makes them feel good about themselves. Binds them together. Yhelteth against the League, coastlanders against the horse tribes, marsh dwellers against the city
Skaranak against Ishlinak, Egar offered companionably.
Just so. Same shit everywhere, Eg. Only way you stop them squabbling is show them someone else they can all hate together.
Egar grinned in his beard, and gestured down to the beach below. Better hope we don t beat these fuckers too easily then.
The fury of the previous week s storms had shoved the dragondrift up almost to the base of the cliffs, and it was beginning to bubble up in a way they d seen before, farther north. Just a matter of time, they both knew, before the hatching began. There was a queasy kind of excitement building around the camp with the waiting. Previous experience had shown you could never be sure what exactly would come tearing its way out of the sticky, purplish-black mess when the time came. Might be eight-foot-tall high-caste reptiles, might be swarms of the weaker, smaller peons. Might be something else entirely.
Of course, on this occasion, something else entirely turned out to be exactly right.
A something else entirely that would send men many of them seasoned levy troops screaming for their lives in retreat. A something else entirely it would cost over a hundred lives to defeat, and earn Egar the title that would catapult him into the upper ranks of the alliance overnight.
Yeah, shame we re down to brawling with jealous husbands and priests these days, Dragonbane. Not going to give you any medals for that, now, are they?
He limped up the sun-saturated street with a wry grimace. Leaning into the limp a little more than strictly necessary it couldn t hurt to get in the habit, after all. Start playing his new role to the hilt. He let the cavalry cloak flap open a little in his grubby grasp, enough so it showed what it was. He slowed his pace to a beggar s shuffle. Something appropriate to a broken man of war.
Close enough, after all, innit? Egar Cuckoldbane.
Yeah, yeah, very fucking funny.
His age fell on him abruptly, out of the pitiless, sun-glaring sky. He felt himself sag for real, no theater in it now.
Is this how it ends, then? Faded glories and memories of a youth growing dim. The cold creep of time as it eats you. Weaker and weary, less and less triumph in your stride, less and less to warm you outside of those recollections of another, brighter, harder, younger man
The sour meander of his thoughts brought him, inevitably, to Harath. He owed the boy coin coin he probably ought to hang on to himself for the foreseeable future. But more than that, he owed him a warning. By now the City Guard would be out in force, wrapping their pointy little heads as best they could about the task of apprehending a Dragonbane Majak. If Harath was out flapping his mouth oh surely not about their exploits at Afa marag, he was likely going to get hauled in for questioning. And while he knew nothing of consequence that could endanger Egar, and was, to boot, an irritating little shit, the Dragonbane could still not find it in himself to dislike the young Ishlinak enough to let him be taken by the Guard s inquisitors.
A warning, that s all, he promised himself, keeping carefully to the shuffling gait, playing the limp for all it was worth. In place of the coin he s trusting you to bring. He deserves that much. He d do as much for you, any Majak would.
