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up the boulder-strewn slope. It was a road that had seen little traffic ever,
yet it remained clearly defined. Only a few stubborn, hardy weeds had taken
root there. Except for one small slide way up the hill no rocks seemed willing
to remain on the road's surface.
I tried to take Smoke in that direction.
I enjoyed no more success than I ever had, which meant I managed to cross half
the distance from Overlook to the slide before Smoke refused to go any
farther.
Someday the Black Company would go up that road. No one else ever went but we
would go. That was the road to Khatovar. That was the road that would lead us
to our origins.
From Kiaulune I rode Smoke north in a sweeping search for Soulcatcher, Lady's
mad, wicked sister. I found no obvious sign immediately but she was skilled at
not being seen. I closed in on the Old Man himself, began using Smoke's
ability to move through time as well as space to backtrack the crows that
follow the army and hang around him.
I fooled the coward for just a moment. For long enough to carry myself into
view of Lady's nemesis.
She was out in the wastes, all alone except for her pets. She was eating,
something I had never seen or heard of Soulcatcher doing. She was gorgeous.
Gorgeous like only evil can be. For an instant I felt that same twinge I had
experienced the first time I saw Sahra.
Thought of Sahra startled me. Out here was my time free of that pain...
The instant I lost my focus Smoke's cowardly soul seemed to sense how near
Soulcatcher it was. It pushed away as though repelled. I did not resist. I
needed to be away from there, too.
Soulcatcher was a madwoman, bold beyond reason, likely to do almost anything
if it amused her. She must be having great fun lately.
If Smoke's visions could be trusted she was less than a mile away right now,
here in the middle of the army, undetected, so close she could strike anyone
anywhere instantly whenever the urge came upon her. And such urges did.
The Old Man needed to know...
Or did he?
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He might, reasoning that crows had a limited endurance.
I went away from there and took Smoke back to the Palace in Taglios. He seemed
comfortable with that. We went to the room where he had been hidden so long.
Dust was gathering there. The lost Annals were still out of sight where I had
concealed them.
In another part of the Palace the Radisha was going about the daily business
of ruling an empire, she and all the powerful priests and lords and
functionaries going along with the pretense that she was just standing in
momentarily for her brother, the Prahbrindrah Drah. As long as everybody
agreed not to notice the Prince's extended absence, the engines of state
continued to function reasonably well.
In truth, though never stated publicly, the state operated much more
efficiently without the Prince present to filter and soften his sister's will.
I found the Woman and buzzed around her like an invisible mosquito, forward
and backward in time, sticking my long nose into her every conversation
excepting those she had with Cordy Mather when no one else was around. Much.
I heard enough to know Mather was getting used. But it was use most men
willingly endure, at least for a while.
Her conversations with several senior priests were interesting, though never
as explicit as I would like. The Radisha had matured in the seldom friendly
environment of the Palace, where a thousand plots great and small were afoot
every day, at the best of times, and there were always ears eager to pick up
anything you said.
She did not plan to keep her word to the Captain and Company. Surprise,
surprise. But she was not yet pursuing any vigorous course of betrayal. Like
everyone else she was certain Croaker's winter campaign was either a tactic
not directed at the Shadowmaster at all or if pursued genuinely would result
in a debacle for Taglian arms. This despite our having seized victory in the
face of certain defeat on several occasions earlier.
We just might be able to make her sorry she was not a more ambitious
backstabber.
What other avenues needed exploration? Goblin? He could manage without me
watching over his shoulder.
Out of curiosity and because I was not yet ready to return to the world, I
traced each of my in-laws back for the last few weeks. I learned nothing that
would support the Old Man's paranoia. But they were a cautious folk, just
three of them out here amongst folk no Nyueng Bao had reason to trust or love.
Thai Dei and Uncle Doj said very little about anything, just like they did
when I was around. Mother Gota was little different, too. She just complained
about different things.
Her opinion of me was not completely flattering. Hardly an hour passed when
she failed to take the opportunity to damn her mother for having wished me
onto the family Ky.
There were times when I was not too fond of Hong Tray for having wished all
her family on me.
What should I see now? I was not ready to go back yet. Narayan Singh and the
Daughter of Night? They were at Charandaprash with Mogaba, collecting the
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scabby remnants of the Deceiver cult under the Shadowmaster's standard. Not
much mischief they could get up to there.
Lady, then. Then I would report to the Captain. I had not been tracking her
but wherever she was I was likely to find somebody the Company needed to
watch, like the Prahbrindrah Drah or Willow Swan.
The Prince was not in Lady's camp. He was capable of letting duty overrule
wishful thinking. He was with his own division, paying attention to business.
Charandaprash was no longer that far away. Around the lake, over a few hills
and valleys, then there we would be, staring across the stony plain at the
mouth of the only practical pass through the Dandha Presh.
Swan was close to Lady, of course. He looked worried whether I rolled back
through the days or stayed hovering right now. Lady was having problems she
would not share with him or anyone else. She looked as though she had been
getting no sleep. I knew she slept very little at the best of times. For her
to abandon sleep like this now, as we neared our most important confrontation
in years, one that could become a defining event in the Company's history,
suggested that she had no faith in the future at all.
Running through time did give me a clue or two, though. She was indeed doing
without sleep. And whenever she did take a nap she did not rest well. She
seemed to be having dreams as ugly as some of mine.
For some reason crows never came close to her. But they were always around,
somewhere in the distance, watching.
Lady was not interesting. She did nothing but work. She did not bother to look
overwhelmingly beautiful anymore, unlike her sister. Was she, like some women
do, going all dowdy because she had herself a man?
She was just fine as far as Willow Swan was concerned. Even after four years
of no luck at all he was happy to tag along, using his assignment as commander
of royal guards as an excuse to stay near the front.
So what was worth reporting here? That Lady had to get some rest?
Maybe. Exhaustion could impair her judgment at a critical moment.
I started to back away, drifting up and over Lake Tanji, which was pretty
damned impressive even from Smoke's point of view.
I shivered in the cold wind... [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]