Well enough. She tossed her bow rattling onto a polished table, dragged her sword out of her belt, shrugged off her quiver. She had only a few shafts left. Most of them she had left stuck through Gurkish soldiers, out there in the blackened ruins at the edge of the city.
But Ferro could not bring herself to smile.
Killing Gurkish was like eating honey. A little only left you craving more. Too much could become sickening. Corpses had always been a poor reward for all the effort it took to make them. But there was no stopping now.
You are hurt?
Ferro squeezed at the filthy bandage round her arm, and watched the blood seep out into the grey cloth. There was no pain. No, she said.
It is not too late, Ferro. You do not need to die here. I brought you. I can still take you away. I go where I please, and I take who I please with me. If you stop killing now, who knows? Perhaps God will still find a place in heaven for you.
Ferro was becoming very tired of Yulweis preaching. She and Bayaz might not have trusted each other a fingers breadth, but they understood each other. Yulwei understood nothing.
Heaven? she sneered as she turned away from him. Perhaps hell suits me better, did you think of that?
She hunched up her shoulders as footsteps echoed down the hallway outside. She felt Bayaz anger even before the door was flung open and the old bald pink stormed into the room.
That little bastard! After all that I have given him, how does he repay me? Quai and Sulfur slunk through the doorway behind him like a pair of dogs creeping after their master. He defies me before the Closed Council! He tells me to mind my business! Me! How would that cringing dunce know what is my business and what is not?
Trouble with King Luthar the Magnificent? grunted Ferro.
The Magus narrowed his eyes at her. A year ago there was no emptier head in the whole Circle of the World. Stick a crown on him and have a crowd of old liars tongue his arse for a few weeks and the little shit thinks hes Stolicus!
Ferro shrugged. Luthar had never lacked a high opinion of himself, king or not. You should be more careful who you stick crowns on.
Thats the trouble with crowns, they have to go on someone. All you can do is drop them in a crowd and hope for the best. Bayaz scowled over at Yulwei. What of you brother? Have you been walking outside the walls?
I have.
And what have you seen?
Death. Much of that. The Emperors soldiers flood into the western districts of Adua, his ships choke the bay. Every day more troops come up the road from the south, and tighten the Gurkish grip on the city.
That much I can learn from those halfwits on the Closed Council. What of Mamun and his Hundred Words?
Mamun, the thrice blessed and thrice cursed? Wondrous first apprentice of great Khalul, Gods right hand? He is waiting. He and his brothers, and his sisters, they have a great tent outside the bounds of the city. They pray for victory, they listen to sweet music, they bathe in scented water, they laze naked and enjoy the pleasures of the flesh. They wait for the Gurkish soldiers to carry the walls of the city, and they eat. He looked up at Bayaz. They eat night and day, in open defiance of the Second Law. In brazen mockery of the solemn word of Euz. Making ready for the moment when they will come to seek you out. The moment for which Khalul made them. They think it will not be long, now. They polish their armour.
Do they indeed? hissed Bayaz. Damn them then.
They have damned themselves already. But that is no help to us.
Then we must visit the House of the Maker. Ferros head jerked up. There was something about that great, stark tower that had fascinated her ever since she first arrived in Adua. She found her eyes always drawn towards its mountainous bulk, rising untouchable, high above the smoke and the fury.
Why? asked Yulwei. Do you plan to seal yourself inside? Just as Kanedias did, all those years ago, when we came seeking our vengeance? Will you cower in the darkness, Bayaz? And this time, will you be the one thrown down, to break upon the bridge below?
The First of the Magi snorted. You know me better than that. When they come for me I will face them in the open. But there are still weapons in the darkness. A surprise or two from the Makers forge for our cursed friends beyond the walls.
Yulwei looked even more worried than before. The Divider?
One edge here, whispered Quai from the corner. One on the Other Side.
Bayaz, as usual, ignored him. It can cut through anything, even an Eater.
Will it cut through a hundred? asked Yulwei.
I will settle for Mamun alone.
Yulwei slowly unfolded himself from the chair, stood with a sigh.
Very well, lead on. I will enter the Makers House with you, one last time.
Ferro licked her teeth. The idea of going inside was irresistible. I will come with you.
Bayaz glared back. No, you will not. You can stay here and sulk. That has always been your special gift, has it not? I would hate to deny you the opportunity to make use of it. You will come with us, he snapped at Quai. You have your business, eh, Yoru?
I do, Master Bayaz.
Good. The First of the Magi strode from the room with Yulwei at his shoulder, his apprentice trudging at the rear. Sulfur did not move. Ferro frowned at him, and he grinned back, his head tipped against the panelled wall, his chin pointed towards the moulded ceiling.
Are these Hundred Words not your enemies too? Ferro demanded.
My deepest and most bitter enemies.
Why do you not fight, then?
Oh, there are other ways to fight than struggling in the dirt out there. There was something in those eyes, one dark, one bright, that Ferro did not like the look of. There was something hard and hungry behind his smiles. Though I would love to stay and chat, I must go and give the wheels another push. He turned a finger round and round in the air. The wheels must keep turning, eh, Maljinn?
Go then, she snapped. I will not stop you.
You could not if you wanted to. I would bid you a good day. But Id wager youve never had one. And he sauntered out, the door clicking to behind him.
Ferro was already across the room, shooting back the bolt on the window. She had done as Bayaz told her once before, and it had brought her nothing but a wasted year. She would make her own choices now. She jerked the hangings aside and slipped out onto the balcony. Curled-up leaves blew on the wind, whipping around the lawns below along with the spitting rain. A quick glance up and down the damp paths showed only one guard, and he was looking the wrong way, huddled in his cloak.
Sometimes it is best to seize the moment.
Ferro swung her legs over the rail, gathered herself, then sprang out into the air. She caught a slippery tree branch, swung to the trunk, slid down it to the damp earth and crept behind a neatly clipped hedge, low to the ground.
She heard footsteps, then voices. Bayaz voice, and Yulweis, speaking soft into the hissing wind. Damn, but these old fools of Magi loved to flap their lips.
Sulfur? came Yulweis voice. He is still with you?
Why would he not be?
His studies ran in dangerous directions. I told you this, brother.
And? Khalul is not so picky with his servants
They passed out of earshot and Ferro had to rush along behind the hedge to keep pace, staying bent double.
I do not like this habit, Yulwei was saying, of taking forms, of changing skin. A cursed discipline. You know what Juvens feelings were on it
I have no time to worry on the feelings of a man centuries in his grave. There is no Third Law, Yulwei.