The Blade Itself

Outside, the square was even busier than before, the dense throng growing ever more excited as the news of the dissolution of the Guild of Mercers spread to those who had not been within. People stood, disbelieving, or hurried here and there: scared, surprised, confused. Jezal saw one man staring at him, staring at anyone, face pale, hands trembling. A Mercer perhaps, or a man in too deep with the Mercers, deep enough to be ruined along with them. There would be many such men.

Jezal felt a sudden tingling. Ardee West was leaning casually against the stones a little further on. They had not met in some time, not since that drunken outburst of hers, and he was surprised how pleased he was to see her. Probably she had been punished long enough, he told himself. Everyone deserved the chance to apologise. He hastened towards her with a broad smile on his lips. Then he noticed who she was with.

“That little bastard!” he muttered under his breath.

Lieutenant Brint was chatting freely in his cheap uniform, leaning closer to Ardee than Jezal thought was appropriate, underlining his tedious points with flamboyant gestures of his arms. She was nodding, smiling, then she tipped her head back and laughed, slapping the Lieutenant playfully on the chest. Brint laughed as well, the ugly little shit. They laughed together. For some reason Jezal felt a sharp pang of fury.

“Jezal, how are you!” shouted Brint, still giggling.

He stepped up close. “That’s Captain Luthar!” he spat, “and how I am is none of your concern! Don’t you have a job to do?”

Brint’s mouth hung stupidly open for a moment, then his brows drew into a surly frown. “Yes, sir,” he muttered, turning and stalking off. Jezal watched him go with a contempt even more intense than usual.

“Well that was charming,” said Ardee. “Are those the manners you should use before a lady?”

“I really couldn’t say. Why? Was there one watching?”

He turned to look at her and caught, just for a moment, a self-satisfied smirk. Quite a nasty expression, as though she had enjoyed his outburst. He wondered for a silly instant whether she might have arranged the meeting, have placed herself and that idiot where Jezal would see them, hoping to arouse his jealousy… then she smiled at him, and laughed, and Jezal felt his anger fading. She looked very fine, he thought, tanned and vibrant in the sunlight, laughing out loud, not caring who heard. Very fine. Better than ever, in fact. A chance meeting was all, what else could it be? She fixed him with those dark eyes and his suspicions vanished. “Did you have to be so hard on him?” she asked.

Jezal fixed his jaw. “Jumped-up, arrogant nobody, he’s probably nothing more than some rich man’s bastard. No blood, no money, no manners—”

“More than me, of all three.”

Jezal cursed his big mouth. Rather than dragging an apology from her he was now in need of giving one himself. He sought desperately for some way out of this self-made trap. “Oh, but he’s an absolute moron!” he whined.

“Well,” and Jezal was relieved to see one corner of Ardee’s mouth curl up in a sly smile, “he is at that. Shall we walk?” She slipped her hand through his arm before he had the chance to answer, and started to lead him off towards the Kingsway. Jezal allowed himself to be guided between the frightened, the angry, the excited people.

“So is it true?” she asked.

“Is what true?”

“That the Mercers are finished?”

“So it seems. Your old friend Sand dan Glokta was in the thick of it. He gave quite the performance, for a cripple.”

Ardee looked down at the floor. “You wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of him, crippled or no.”

“No.” Jezal’s mind went back to Salem Rews’ terrified eyes, staring desperately at him as he vanished into the darkness of the archway. “No, you wouldn’t.”

A silence descended on them as they strolled down the avenue, but it was a comfortable one. He liked walking with her. It no longer seemed important whether anyone apologised. Perhaps she had been right about the fencing anyway, just a little. Ardee seemed to read his thoughts. “How’s the swordplay going?” she asked.

“Not bad. How’s the drinking going?”

She raised a dark eyebrow. “Excellent well. If only there was a Contest for that every year, I’d soon come to the attention of the public.” Jezal laughed, looking down at her as she walked beside him, and she smiled back. So clever, so sharp, so fearless. So damn fine looking. Jezal wondered if there had ever been a woman quite like her. If only she had the right blood, he thought to himself, and some money. A lot of money.

Means of Escape