‘Why do you believe he could be regrouping?’ she asked.
Gaunt paused, then allowed himself a small smile.
‘That’s the question I keep asking,’ he said. ‘Sek could be wounded and running, or even dead. But the nature of his breakaway in Eltath has… I just have a feeling about it. It didn’t feel to me like a burn-out. Like an assault that had lost momentum. It felt like a deliberate cessation. As if some objective, unknown to us, had been achieved. The halt was deliberate, as though a phase was over. We don’t know what the next phase is.’
‘But you have suspicions?’
‘Yes, I do.’
‘Concerning?’
‘That, I’m afraid, is entirely classified. I’m sorry.’
‘Of course,’ she said, dismissively. ‘Though I wager it connects to the materials recovered during the Salvation’s Reach operation.’
‘I couldn’t comment,’ said Gaunt. ‘But I am impressed by your appreciation of the circumstances.’
‘I was there, at the Reach.’
‘You were.’
‘Do others share your appraisal? Other lords, I mean? Macaroth himself?’
‘There is some dispute,’ said Gaunt. ‘At staff level, there is seldom consensus. I’m going to have to work hard to keep everyone who matters convinced of the critical danger we may be facing.’
‘You don’t have to convince anyone,’ she said. ‘You are Lord Executor. If you believe there’s a present danger, you order them to fall in line. They are obliged. Isn’t that the point of a Lord Executor?’
‘You would think so,’ he agreed. ‘In practice…’
He shrugged.
‘This is the Imperial Guard,’ he said. ‘Orders are supposed to be orders, not points of debate. I fear the problem is that there are too many chiefs here. Too much authority, concentrated in one place.’
‘And you’re an unknown factor. Untested. They’re not used to your supreme authority.’
‘There’s that,’ he agreed.
‘Then you should exercise it. Demonstrate it. Make an example of someone.’
‘I don’t think–’
‘Before everything else, you were a commissar. You need a little of that, perhaps.’
He nodded. ‘Perhaps so.’
‘What about Van Voytz?’ she asked.
‘What about him?’
‘He is disgraced,’ she said.
‘Who told you that?’
She winced. ‘Your adjutant mentioned–’
‘Beltayn’s wrong,’ Gaunt said gently. ‘Van Voytz took action he deemed was right for the crusade. It was misguided. He has been reprimanded.’
‘But not disgraced. Have you sent him away to some fourth tier duty?’
‘No. I thought it better to keep him at hand. Punishment sometimes sends the wrong message. I’ve taken the Fifth Army off him for my own division, and charged him with preparation for the Saint’s arrival.’
‘Is that…’ she paused. ‘With respect, is that wise? His insubordination was a slim legal definition away from treason. The two of you were close, in times past. Could this not be read as you going easy on an old ally?’
‘Where making an example of him would demonstrate my authority shows no one favours?’ he asked.
Merity nodded.
‘I was a commissar, as you said,’ said Gaunt, ‘then a line officer too. My whole career, I have tried to temper the ruthlessness of the former role with the consideration of the other. A balance. To be unswervingly strict when necessary, but also not to make enemies needlessly. There are more than enough of those in this galaxy as it is.’
‘Yet you are, in fact, neither of those things now,’ she said. ‘You are First Lord Executor. You don’t need to make enemies or friends.’
He looked at her quizzically.
‘Have I amused you, sir?’ she asked.
‘No,’ he said.
‘I was just talking,’ she said. ‘Chattering, I suppose. I have felt very isolated. I am…’
‘What?’
‘I am sorry they died. Ezra, and even those men.’
Gaunt was about to respond when someone knocked hard at the outer door. It opened.
‘My lord?’ Sancto called.
Gaunt rose, and motioned Merity to stay. He walked through the bedchamber. The Scion Sancto stood in the doorway, Beltayn hovering behind him.
‘I told him you were busy,’ Beltayn said.
‘Be quiet,’ Sancto said to Beltayn, sidelong. He looked at Gaunt. ‘Inquisitor Laksheema requests immediate audience, my lord,’ he said.
‘Inquisitor Laksheema was instructed to go through channels,’ said Gaunt.
Sancto didn’t reply, as if his part in the entire exchange was complete. Behind him, Beltayn grimaced.
‘I think this is her idea of going through channels, sir,’ he said.
Gaunt pushed past them. The inquisitor awaited him in the outer room, flanked by Colonel Grae of the Intelligence Service and members of Laksheema’s retinue. Ban Daur was standing in the corner of the room, glaring at Laksheema.
Behind Laksheema, in the doorway, stood Viktor Hark and Gol Kolea.
‘Lord Executor,’ said Laksheema, nodding her head in a quick bow of deference.
‘What’s this about?’ Gaunt growled.
Three: The Effects of the Dead
The alarms went off, screeching through the halls of the palace undercroft. Then they cut out again, just as sharply.
‘Feth’s sake,’ Baskevyl muttered. That was the sixth time it had happened in the last two hours. The Tanith personnel and retinue billeted in the cold cellars of the Urdeshic Palace were getting seriously spooked. They were well below ground in arched basement chambers beneath the palace’s Hexagonal Court, spaces once used to store wine and grain. There were no windows to look out of, no windows through which they could see if an actual attack was underway. Baskevyl was sick of asking the Munitorum work crews what the problem was, and sick of their vague answer of ‘probably faulty wiring’.
He set aside his half-finished cup of cold caffeine and got up to take another stroll through the billet and calm some nerves.
Blenner was standing in the archway of his billet area.
‘False alarm?’ Blenner asked.
‘Seems so,’ replied Baskevyl.
‘Again?’
Baskevyl pulled on his coat, and didn’t reply.
‘Are you, ah…’ Blenner began.
‘Am I what, commissar?’ Baskevyl asked.
‘You seem to be giving me the cold shoulder a little, Bask,’ said Blenner, trying a friendly smile.
Baskevyl turned and looked at the commissar as he buttoned up his jacket. His look did not return the friendship.
‘Not everything is about you, Vaynom,’ he said.
‘No. Obviously.’
‘We’re the personal company of the First Lord Executor,’ said Baskevyl. ‘Privileged and elevated. And this is what our privilege gets us. Stuck here in a wine cellar. There are matters to deal with that aren’t being dealt with. I have feth-all idea what’s going on, and I’m itching to re-join my company, which is out in Millgate somewhere, facing Throne knows what. So that might account for my demeanour.’
‘Of course.’
‘Unless there was something else you think might be weighing on me?’
‘Just…’ Blenner shrugged awkwardly. ‘Just the matter of Jakub Wilder.’
‘Because you executed him?’
‘Yes, Bask. That.’
‘He had just committed murder, had he not?’
‘He had. Poor Ezra–’
‘So I should think your field execution was entirely justified under the discipline code. You are a commissar.’
‘Is that… is that what Fazekiel is writing up?’ asked Blenner eagerly.
‘Her investigation is ongoing,’ said Baskevyl. ‘I can’t imagine how she could find in any other way. Unless there’s something you and Meryn aren’t telling us.’