know each other well on this journey. I could not imagine anyone better to guard my back than you.’ He shook his head. ‘I do not intend to cross the continent. There are… other paths. Perhaps indeed more perilous, but I assure you I am not easy to kill. The failure was mine and to make it right, well, the responsibility is mine and mine alone. I will not-1 cannot-accept that others risk their lives on my behalf. Not you, friend. Not blessed Chaur. Please, leave me to this.’
Barathol sighed. ‘You force upon me an even more terrible choice, then.’
‘Oh?’
A wry grin. ‘Aye. What to do with my life.’
Mappo grunted a laugh. ‘I would not call that terrible, at least from my own point of view.’
‘I understand what it is to be driven,’ Barathol said. ‘I think that is all that I understand. Back in Seven Cities, well, I’d almost convinced myself that what I’d found was all I needed, but I was lying to myself. Some people, I now believe, cannot just… retire. It feels too much like surrender.’
‘You were a blacksmith-’
‘By default. I was a soldier, Mappo. A Red Blade.’
‘Even so, to work iron is a worthy profession. Perhaps you were a soldier, once, but to set down your weapons and find another profession is not surrender. Yet if it feels so to you, well, this city is no doubt crowded with estates, many of which would welcome a guard of your experience. And there will be merchants, operating caravans. Indeed, the city must have its own garrison-no warrior ever fears unemployment, for their skills are ever in demand.’
‘A sad admission, Mappo.’
The Trell shrugged again. ‘I would think, now, Barathol, that if anyone needs his back guarded, it is Cutter.’
Barathol sighed in frustration. ‘He says little of what he plans to do. In any case, this is his city. He will find those who know enough to protect him. Besides, I must admit, having seen Cutter practise with those knives of his, well, perhaps it is Darujhistan that must fear his return.’
‘He is too precipitous.’
‘I trust Scillara to rein him in.’
‘Barathol, let us now make our farewells. I intend to depart soon.’
‘And had I not followed you down here?’
‘I do poorly saying goodbye.’ His gaze shied away.
‘Then I will convey such to the others, on your behalf. Cutter will be… upset. For he has known you the longest among us all.’
‘I know, and I am sorry-in so many ways I am a coward.’
But Barathol well understood. This was not cowardice. It was some sort of shame, twisted past any possible reason, any conceivable justification. The loss of Icarium was a wound so raw, so irreconcilable, that its spreading stain swept all from its path. Friends, loyalties, lives and histories. And Mappo could not fight against that onrushing tide and the fate he sought at its very end. There would be grief at that conclusion, Barathol suspected, of incalculable measure.
If Icarium Lifestealer was not yet unleashed, he would be soon. Mappo would be too late to prevent that. It was difficult, then, to leave the Trell to all that awaited him, to simply turn away, yet what else could he do, when Mappo’s own desires were so clear? ‘I will leave you to your… paths, then, Mappo. And I wish you the best; a peaceful journey, its satisfactory conclusion.’
‘Thank you, my friend. I hope you will find Darujhistan a worthy home.’ He rose to clasp the blacksmith’s hand, then moved past to embrace Chaur, who laughed in delight and tried to begin a dance with the Trell. Grimacing, Mappo stepped back. ‘Goodbye, Chaur. Take care of Barathol here.’
When Chaur finally understood that he would not see Mappo again, there would be tears. There was a simple beauty to such open, child-like responses. Perhaps, Barathol considered, Chaur alone walked the truest path in life.
Settling a hand on Chaur’s muscled shoulder, he smiled at Mappo. ‘He is a gift I do not deserve.’
The Trell nodded. ‘A gift this world does not deserve. Now, I would be alone, in these final moments.’
Barathol bowed, then guided Chaur back to the ladder leading up to the hatch.
Iskaral Pust clambered on to his bunk, the middle of three stacked against the curving hull. He scraped his head against the underside of the top one and cursed under his breath, then cursed some more as he had to fish out a handful of disgusting offerings left beneath his pillow by the bhokarala. Rotting fish-heads, clumps of scaly faeces, baubles stolen from Spite and a cracked kaolin pipe filched from Scillara. Flung off, they clumped and clattered on the two-plank-wide walkway at the very hoofs of his mule, which had taken to standing beside his berth at random intervals-each one proving succinctly inconvenient, as befitted a thoroughly brainless but quaintly loyal animal…
from the bunk above came a ratting snort. ‘The hatch is too small, you know,’ said Mogora, ‘You make it too obvious, husband,’
‘Maybe obvious is my middle name, did you think that? No, of course not. She never thinks at all. She had ten thousand eyes and not one of them can see past her nose hairs. Listen well, woman. Everyone knows mules are superior to horses in every way. Including the navigation of hatches. Why, my blessed servant here prefers using outhouses over just plopping any which where along the roadside. She possesses decorum, which can hardly be said for you now, can it?’
‘Shouldn’t you be picking your nose or something? Your worshippers are praying for a sign, you know.’
‘At least I have worshippers. You just scare ’em. You scare everybody.’
‘Even you?’
‘Of course not. Gods below, she terrifies me! Better not let her know, though.
That would be bad. I need to do something soon. Twist off her legs, maybe! Yes, that would do it. Leave her lying on her back scratching at the air and making pathetic mewling sounds. Oh, the imagination is a wonderful thing, is it not?’
‘When it’s all you have.’
‘When what’s all I have? What idiocy are you blabbering about now? That was uncanny. Almost as if she can read my mind. Good thing she can’t, though.’
‘Hold on,’ hissed Mogora. ‘That mule was male! I’d swear it!’
‘Checking him out, were you?’
‘One more step on that track, husband, and I will kill you with my own hands.’
‘Hee hee. What a terrible, disgusting mind you have, wife.’
‘No, you won’t distract me this time. Your mule has just changed sex and knowing you I might be looking at a rival, but you know what? She can have you. With my blessing she can, oh yes!’
‘Popularity is a curse,’ Iskaral said, stretching out with his hands behind his head and staring up at the taut ropes of the mattress above him. ‘Not that she’d know anything about that. I’d better visit the local temple, assert my tyrannical dominance over all the local acolytes and fakir priests and priestesses. Priestesses! Might be a pretty one or two. As High Priest, I could have my pick as is my right. Make offerings in the shadow between her legs, yes-’
‘I’d know, Iskaral Pust,’ Mogora snapped, moving about on the bed above. ‘I’d just know, and then I’d take my knife, one night when you’re sleeping, and I’d snick snick and you’d be singing like a child and squatting t’piss and what woman or mule would want you then?’
‘Get out of my head, woman!’
‘It’s not hard to know what you’re thinking.’
‘That’s what you think! She’s getting more dangerous, we need a divorce. But isn’t it why most mates break up? When the woman gets too dangerous? Must be. I’m sure of it. Well, I’d be free then, wouldn’t I? Free!’
The mule brayed.
Mogora laughed so hard she wet herself, if the rank dribbles from above were any indication.
Scillara and Cutter had taken the berths closest to the stern in an effort to achieve some sort of privacy, and had rigged a section of spare canvas across the walkway, Despite this, Mogora’s half-mad laughter reached through, triggering yet another scowl from Cutter.
‘If those two just realized how perfect they are for each other, we’d finally get some peace.’
