the law that binds its direction. The canal is but a detour.’
‘Yes, one that slows the passage of its water. And in turn that water changes, gathering the refuse of the city it passes through, and so, upon returning to the river, it is a different colour. Muddier, more befouled.’
‘The slower your path, the muddier your boots?’
‘Even so,’ Icarium said, nodding.
‘Time is nothing like that.’
‘Are you so certain? When we must wait, our minds fill with sludge, random thoughts like so much refuse. When we are driven to action, our current is swift, the water seemingly clear, cold and sharp.’
‘I’d rather, Icarium, we wait a long time. Here, in the face of what is to come.’
‘The path to Rhulad? As you like. But I tell you, Taralack Veed, that is not the path I am walking.’
Another half-dozen strides.
Then the Gral spoke. ‘They wrap the cord around them, Icarium, to keep them from breaking.’
Senior Assessor’s eyes glittered as he stood amidst a crowd twenty paces from where Icarium and Taralack Veed had paused in front of a potter’s stall. His hands were folded together, the fingers twitching. His breathing was rapid and shallow;
Beside him, Samar Dev rolled her eyes, then asked, ‘Are you about to fall dead on me? If I’d known this walk involved skulking in that Jhag’s shadow, I think I would have stayed in the compound.’
‘The choices you make,’ he replied, ‘must needs be entirely of your own accord, Samar Dev. Reasonably distinct from mine or anyone else’s. It is said that the history of human conflict resides exclusively in the clash of expectations.’
‘Is it now?’
‘Furthermore-’
‘Never mind your “furthermore”, Senior Assessor. Compromise is the negotiation of expectation. With your wayward notions we do not negotiate, and so all the compromising is mine.’
‘As you choose.’
She thought about hitting him, decided she didn’t want to make a scene. What was it with men and their obsessions? ‘He is in all likelihood going to die, and soon.’
‘I think not. No, most certainly I think not.’
Icarium and the Gral resumed their meander through the crowds, and after a moment Senior Assessor followed, maintaining his distance. Sighing, Samar Dev set off after him. She didn’t like this mob. It felt wrong. Tense, overwrought. Strain was visible on faces, and the cries of the hawkers sounded strident and half desperate. Few passers-by, she noted, were buying.
‘Something’s wrong,’ she said.
‘There is nothing here that cannot be explained by impending financial panic, Samar Dev. Although you may believe I am unaware of anything but him, I assure you that I have assessed the condition of Letheras and, by extension, this entire empire. A crisis looms. Wealth, alas, is not an infinite commodity. Systems such as this are dependent upon the assumption of unlimited resources, however. These resources range from cheap labour and materials to an insatiable demand. Such demand, in turn, depends on rather more ethereal virtues, such as confidence, will, perceived need and the bliss of short-term thinking, any one of which is vulnerable to mysterious and often inexplicable influences. We are witness, here, to the effects of a complex collusion of factors which are serving to undermine said virtues. Furthermore, it is my belief that the situation has been orchestrated.’
Her mind had begun to drift with Senior Assessor’s diatribe, but this last observation drew her round. ‘Letheras is under economic assault?’
‘Well put, Samar Dev. Someone is manipulating the situation to achieve a cascading collapse, yes. Such is my humble assessment.’
‘Humble?’
‘Of course not. I view my own brilliance with irony’
‘To what end?’
‘Why, to make me humble.’
‘Are we going to follow Icarium and his pet Gral all afternoon?’
‘I am the only living native of Cabal, Samar Dev, to have seen with my own eyes our god. Is it any wonder I follow him?’
God? He’s not a god. He’s a damned Jhag from the Odhan west of Seven Cities. Suffering a tragic curse, but then, aren’t they all? A figure well ahead of Icarium and Taralack Veed caught her attention. A figure tall, hulking, with a shattered face and a huge stone sword strapped to its back. ‘Oh no,’ she murmured.
‘What is it?’ Senior Assessor asked.
‘He’s seen him.’
‘Samar Dev?’
But he was behind her now, and she was hurrying forward, roughly pushing past people. Expectations? Most certainly. Compromise? Not a chance.
One of the sconces had a faulty valve and had begun producing thick black tendrils of smoke that coiled like serpents in the air, and Uruth’s coughing echoed like barks in the antechamber. His back to the door leading to the throne room, Sirryn Kanar stood with crossed arms, watching the two Tiste Edur. Tomad Sengar was pacing, walking a path that deftly avoided the other waiting guards even as he made a point of pretending they weren’t there. His wife had drawn her dark grey robe about herself, so tight she reminded Sirryn of a vulture with its wings folded close. Age had made her shoulders slightly hunched, adding to the avian impression, sufficient to draw a half-smile to the guard’s mouth.
‘No doubt this waiting amuses you,’ Tomad said in a growl.
‘So you were watching me after all.’
‘I was watching the door, which you happen to be standing against.’
Contemplating kicking through it, no doubt. Sirryn’s smile broadened. Alas, you’d have to go through me, and that you won’t do, will you? ‘The Emperor is very busy.’
‘With what?’ Tomad demanded. ‘Triban Gnol decides everything, after all. Rhulad just sits with a glazed look and nods every now and then.’
‘You think little of your son.’
That struck a nerve, he saw, as husband and wife both fixed hard eyes on him.
‘We think less of Triban Gnol,’ Uruth said.
There was no need to comment on that observation, for Sirryn well knew their opinions of the Chancellor; indeed, their views on all Letherii. Blind bigotry, of course, all the more hypocritical for the zeal with which the Edur had embraced the Letherii way of living, even as they sneered and proclaimed their disgust and contempt. If you are so dis-gusted, why do you still suckle at the tit, Edur? You had your chance at destroying all this. Vs. And our own whole terrible civilization. No, there was little that was worth saying to these two savages.
He felt more than heard the scratch at the door behind him, and slowly straightened. ‘The Emperor will see you now.’
Tomad wheeled round to face the door, and Sirryn saw in the bastard’s face a sudden strain beneath the haughty facade. Beyond him, Uruth swept her cloak back, freeing her arms. Was that fear in her eyes? He watched her move up to stand beside her husband, yet it seemed all they drew from that proximity was yet another tension.
Stepping to one side, Sirryn Kanar swung open the door. ‘Halt in the tiled circle,’ he said. ‘Step past it and a dozen arrows will find your body. No warning will be voiced. By the Emperor’s own command. Now, proceed. Slowly.’
At this moment, a Tiste Edur and four Letherii soldiers approached the city’s west gate on lathered horses. A shout from the Edur sent pedestrians scattering from the raised • road. The five riders were covered in mud and two bore wounds. The swords of the two whose scabbards were not empty were blood-crusted. The Edur was one of those with-out weapons, and from his back jutted the stub of an arrow, its iron head buried in his right scapula. Blood soaked his cloak where the quarrel had pinned it to his back.
This warrior was dying. He had been dying for four days. Another hoarse shout from the Tiste Edur, as he led his ragged troop beneath the gate’s arch, and into the city of Letheras.
The Errant studied Rhulad Sengar, who had sat motionless since the Chancellor had returned to announce the
