‘Kill me.’
Daur looked at her.
‘What?’
‘Kill me,’ said Elodie. ‘It would be a kindness.’
‘How do you work that out?’
‘Urbano has friends. Colleagues. Partners. They run all the serious clubs and bars in this part of town. If they come here and discover what’s happened, and find me alive, they’ll just assume I had some part in it all. So, please, kill me. Make it quick.’
‘I’m not going to kill you,’ he protested. He turned another card over.
‘Please, Daur. Your name is Daur, isn’t it?’
‘Yes. My name is Daur.’
‘So what is this? That Hark guy, he’s no commissar. And Banda–’
‘Banda is Banda. Hark, his name is actually Rawne, and no, he’s no commissar. This was a scam. We’re all Guard, and, Throne help us, we were bored. We decided to see just how much we could take the famous Zolunder’s for. I think it was Varl’s idea, originally. No, maybe Meryn’s. I was the icing on the cake. What Varl calls the “beauty part”.’
‘Because you’re straight and honest, and you don’t do this sort of thing?’
‘Precisely. You know what? Here and now, in this fix, I can’t even begin to remember why I said yes.’
‘The thrill of it,’ said Elodie.
‘What?’
‘You’re a soldier, a warrior.’
‘So?’
‘When did you last see action?’ Elodie asked.
‘Two years ago,’ said Daur.
‘You miss the risk,’ she said.
Daur started to reply, and then nodded. He turned over a few more cards. He had a dynasty in front of him, capped by Blue Sejanus and the Queen of Mab.
‘I like the cards too,’ he confessed.
‘Yeah?’
‘I’ve never played,’ he said, ‘not much at all. I just like the cards themselves. Their permutations.’
‘You’re an undiagnosed gambler,’ said Elodie.
Daur shook his head.
‘No, no. I just like them,’ he said.
‘Can you see the future in them?’ she asked.
‘It’s not like that.’
‘Can you tell me what’s going on?’ she asked.
Daur sighed, and said, ‘We ripped you off. The night before last, we ripped you off. Then we got caught and bad things happened to us. We were looking at serious charges, detention–’
‘And?’
‘Then the stakes changed again. Suddenly. The Archenemy is here, mamzel. Here on Balhaut. He’s got his hands in the guts of this world, and he’s going to keep twisting until it hurts.’
‘Are you serious?’ Elodie asked.
‘Absolutely.’
‘So if Urbano’s partners don’t get me, the Archenemy will?’ Elodie asked.
‘Not if I can help it,’ Daur replied.
‘Pretty standard vox,’ said Meryn, sitting back with a shrug in the club’s monitor room.
‘Plus, we can watch all the approaches on these viewers,’ Varl said. ‘We’re pretty secure.’
Rawne nodded, and asked, ‘The vox is high gain?’
‘It’s a Guard-issue unit,’ said Meryn. ‘These idiots got it off the black market.’
‘You know how to twin a signal, Meryn?’ Rawne asked.
‘Yeah, of course.’
‘So twin one for me.’
Meryn adjusted the caster’s dials.
‘Who am I sending to?’ he asked.
Rawne told him.
‘Are you out of your mind?’ Meryn cried.
‘Uh, Meryn?’
‘For feth’s sake… are you out of your mind, sir?’
‘Send exactly what I say, Meryn,’ said Rawne. ‘Right now, I need to trust someone, and he’s the only bastard I can think of.’
NINETEEN
Traces and Results
The Inquisition’s birds had set down in Viceroy Square and the courtyards of Section. Their fans were cycling on neutral and the snow fell softly around them. The snowflakes perished fast when they landed on the hot hoods of the turbo fan assemblies. Black smoke was still pluming from the HQ’s damaged wings.
Kolea waited at the gate with a group of Tanith personnel that included Baskevyl and Larkin. Edur prowled around nearby with some storm-troopers from S Company, keeping his eye on Rime and the forces of the ordos, who were searching the stands of trees in the square’s gardens.
‘Will we be expected to take shots?’ Larkin asked Kolea.
‘Of course not,’ Kolea replied.
‘But we’ll be up and scoping?’
‘Will you relax, Larks?’ Kolea said.
‘It feels wrong, Gol,’ Larkin said. ‘I shouldn’t be going looking for Gaunt through my scope.’
‘So noted, Larkin,’ said Baskevyl. He touched Kolea’s arm. ‘Here comes Mkoll.’
Mkoll, Bonin and the other Tanith scouts came into view, walking out through the gatehouse towards them. Behind them, Section smouldered against the colourless sky.
‘Talk to me,’ said Kolea.
‘Gaunt’s alive,’ said Mkoll, coming to a halt in front of the acting commander and pulling a small but respectful salute. ‘The high-value prisoner too. We’ve seen monitor footage and track-back from the gate cameras, and pict-feed from guard-tower mounts.’
‘Gaunt and Maggs busted out of here at the height of the attack,’ said Caober. ‘Hell of a thing. They were definitely the Blood Pact’s main targets.’
‘So they’re alive,’ said Kolea. ‘Close by?’
‘Give us ten minutes and we’ll tell you,’ said Bonin.
‘Who’s going aloft?’ asked Baskevyl.
Bonin looked at Mkoll.
Mkoll said, ‘You go up. Take Larks with you. Hwlan, get upstairs with Nessa.’
‘On it!’ Hwlan called back.
They ran to their waiting Valkyries. Turbo-fans began to wind up to speed. Mkoll gestured to Jajjo, Preed and the other scouts and they began to move forward. Eszrah ap Niht had been standing near Baskevyl. When the scouts moved off, so did he.
The trees in the square trembled and swished as the two Valkyries took off, and snow gusted out like dust.
‘I didn’t authorise any transport lifts!’ Inquisitor Rime declared, striding over to them. ‘Where are those Valkyries going?’
‘We’ve got the scent,’ Kolea told him.
‘Really? And this scent? Who has it?’
‘He does, sir,’ said Kolea. He pointed across the snowy gardens.
‘And he’s your chief of scouts? Does he know what he’s doing?’
‘The Tanith know what they’re doing, inquisitor,’ said Edur.
Out in front, Mkoll was slowly following the tracks left in the snow. As if realising they were talking about him, he rose and looked back.
He beckoned them after him.
‘Game on,’ muttered Gol Kolea.
‘It would have been nice to get out there with them,’ remarked Nahum Ludd. He was gazing out of the command post’s grubby windows at the snow falling onto Aarlem’s parade ground.
‘Too many chiefs,’ replied Hark.
‘How so, sir?’
Hark looked up at his junior from the stack of reports he was working through.
‘The Inquisition’s all over this. Did you not get the impression that the Edur fellow was doing everything he could to retain some control of the operation?’
‘I suppose.’
‘Thanks to him, we’ve got Tanith officers and scouts on the ground. I think if he’d tried to bring Commissariat personnel into the mix too, that creep Rime would have burst something aortic.’
‘Do you know Edur?’ Ludd asked.
‘No,’ replied Hark. ‘I’ve met him a couple of times at Section. He seems a decent sort. I’m glad we’ve got him on our side.’