‘If that’s the case, he deserves an award from the Theatrum Imperialis.’
‘What about the female?’ asked the other Sirkle.
‘I believe Gaunt didn’t tell her the meaning so she couldn’t betray it. But she’s smart. She may have figured it out.’
‘Should we submit her for deep purpose interrogation?’
‘We’ve only got until four o’clock,’ Rime replied. ‘The female is extremely resilient. You can tell that just by looking at her. She would most likely hold out until the time frame had passed. We have to cut through the marrow of this, and we can’t afford to be fussy.’
Rime took out a data-slate and quickly copied down the key phrase. He handed the slate to one of the Sirkles.
‘Run this against Gaunt’s file. See what comes up.’
The Sirkle nodded.
‘We were using the Tanith to find their commander,’ said Rime. ‘I suggest we continue with that policy. Contact our agents at the Tanith HQ and see if the phrase means anything to them. Have them quiz the Tanith especially. The Tanith core of the regiment has been with him longest, and knows him best.’
‘Oh, and get rid of this,’ Rime added, and passed Criid’s straight silver to his agent. The Sirkle hurried away.
The other agents waited for their master’s next decision. Rime looked over his shoulder, and spotted the Tanith officers standing with Edur, watching him from a distance.
‘What is your will?’ one of the Sirkles asked.
Rime began to walk towards them.
‘Let’s ask them the question too,’ he said.
‘Here he comes again,’ muttered Kolea to Baskevyl.
‘You saw what he had?’ Baskevyl whispered back.
‘Oh, yes.’
‘What?’ asked Edur quietly. ‘What did he have?’
‘He brought a Tanith warknife out of the truck,’ said Kolea, ‘and there was blood on it. I want to know who’s in there and what he’s done to them.’
Mabbon, the prisoner, the pheguth, was awake.
Gaunt found him standing in front of one of the studio’s windows. He’d opened the shutter a little to peer at the luminous white nothingness of the foggy daylight outside.
‘Your woman, she’s gone?’ Mabbon asked.
‘She’s not my woman,’ Gaunt replied, sipping a cup of caffeine he’d made for himself.
‘I wasn’t suggesting you were sexually involved,’ said Mabbon. ‘She’s your woman. She serves you. She’s one of your Ghosts, isn’t she?’
‘Yes.’
‘She was on Gereon, wasn’t she?’
Gaunt nodded.
‘It’s funny,’ Mabbon murmured.
‘What is?’
‘On Gereon, if I’d won, if I’d been successful in my mission, you’d be dead, and so would she. Yet here you are, risking your lives to protect me.’
Gaunt scowled.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Ironic, isn’t it?’
‘Is there any more of that?’ Mabbon asked, pointing at Gaunt’s cup.
Gaunt nodded, and Mabbon followed him into Jaume’s rancid cubicle of a kitchen. Gaunt poured another cup.
‘Can I trust Maggs?’ Gaunt asked. ‘I could really do with an extra pair of hands.’
‘You’re asking me?’
‘Yes.’
Mabbon shrugged, and sipped from his cup. ‘I’d trust him.’
‘I’m not you,’ Gaunt said.
‘Well, if I was you, I’d never trust him again,’ said Mabbon. ‘I’d probably kill him, to be sure.’
‘Throne,’ Gaunt breathed.
Mabbon suddenly put down his cup, and scratched at the back of his head.
‘They’re closing in,’ he said.
‘The Blood Pact?’
Mabbon nodded.
‘You can feel them?’
Mabbon looked at Gaunt.
‘You ever serve on a tropic world so wet-hot the dust flies tap at your eyeballs faster than you can blink?’
‘Yes, I’ve been there.’
Mabbon took up his cup and breathed deeply before sipping again.
‘That’s what it feels like. Micro-contact in my arms, at the base of my spine, deep down. Something touching my eyes.’
‘And this tells you they’re close?’
‘Close and closing,’ said Mabbon Etogaur.
Gaunt blinked. Once again, he could see it, as clear as day: the Blood Pact, dripping in wet gore, stepping over the threshold into Jaume’s premises.
His new eyes had been showing him an awful lot in the last couple of days.
Every step of the way, he’d dismissed the images as system errors, as glitches, as imaging artifacts, as optical reconciliations, as patterns of accustomisation.
But he’d seen such things through his new eyes. He’d seen his driver’s bad attitude. He’d seen the attack on Section before it had come. If truth be told, he’d seen Maggs trying to kill the etogaur. It hadn’t been the wild shots of the gun that had been left behind that had alerted him.
He’d already been running before the gun had started firing.
‘How close are they?’ he asked.
‘Very close,’ Mabbon replied.
Gaunt looked at his pocket chron. It had stopped.
‘We have to move anyway,’ he said. ‘We’ve got an appointment.’
‘The phrase doesn’t mean anything in particular to me,’ Hark told Sirkle. ‘But I’ll give it some careful consideration. It may be more obvious than it sounds.’
Sirkle nodded.
‘Of course,’ Hark went on, ‘if the message was intended for Commissar Blenner as you suggest, it might be very specific to his relationship with Gaunt. They’ve known each other for a long time. It might reference something that none of us have any knowledge of.’
With a sour look that suggested he thought Hark was being less than entirely helpful, Sirkle walked away to continue his questioning. Ordo agents were already moving through the main barrack-rooms, quizzing the rank and file.
‘You know what it is, don’t you, sir?’ Ludd asked Hark quietly.
‘Remind me never to play cards with you, Ludd,’ Hark murmured. With Dalin and Merrt in tow, they turned and began to walk briskly in the direction of the temple house.
‘You do know what it is,’ said Ludd.
‘Of course I do, Ludd. It’s hardly vermillion-level cryptography. A place that Gaunt has made sure isn’t there? Anyone?’
‘The Tower of the Plutocrat,’ said Dalin.
Hark stopped in his tracks and looked at the young adjutant.
‘Give the boy a medal! Well done, Criid.’
Dalin coloured up. ‘My mother– I mean, Sergeant Criid, she has studied the colonel-commissar’s career in some detail. I grew up on the stories.’
Hark clapped Dalin on the shoulder, and then resumed his stride towards the temple.
They entered the temple. Rerval, his arms folded, was standing beside the vox-caster while Beltayn worked at it.
‘Anything?’ Hark asked.
Rerval shook his head.
‘It’s still dead. It’s like Major Rawne has just dropped out of existence.’
‘Shame,’ Hark replied, ‘because we’ve now got something to tell him. Keep trying. Where did Doctor Curth go?’
‘She took a break, sir,’ said Beltayn. ‘I don’t think she could stand the tension. She said she’d be back. She said she had something important to do.’
‘You look funny,’ said Zweil.
‘Charming,’ Curth replied. She sat down opposite him. The closed folder lay on the desk in front of her.
‘I mean, there’s a funny look on your face,’ Zweil said. ‘Get on with it, will you? I don’t like doctors’ offices. They don’t agree with me. Besides, I’ve got things to do. Urgent things. I’ve got hymnals to re-cover. In hessian, which is the best I could come up with. And there’s half a bottle of altar wine that won’t just drink itself.’