The Blade Itself

Jezal stared after him, mouth slightly open. “Damn it!” he shouted, throwing his steels down on the grass. Everyone seemed to want to take a hand in his business today, even crazy strangers in the park.

As soon as he thought it was late enough, Jezal went to call on Major West. You could always be sure of a sympathetic ear with him, and Jezal was hoping that he might be able to manipulate his friend into breaking the bad news to Lord Marshal Varuz. That was a scene that he wanted no part of, if he could possibly avoid it. He knocked on the door and waited, he knocked again. The door opened.

“Captain Luthar! What an almost unbearable honour!”

“Ardee,” muttered Jezal, somewhat surprised to find her here, “it’s good to see you again.” For once he actually meant it. She was interesting, is what she was. It was a new and refreshing thing for him to actually be interested in what a woman had to say. And she was damn good-looking too, there was no denying it, and seemed prettier every time he saw her. Nothing could ever happen between them, of course, what with West being his friend and all, but there was no harm in looking, was there? “Er… is your brother around?”

She threw herself carelessly down onto the settle against the wall, one leg stretched out, looking very sour. “He’s out. Gone out. Always busy. Much too busy for me.” There was a definite flush to her cheek. Jezal’s eye lighted on the decanter. The stopper was out and the wine was halfway down.

“Are you drunk?”

“Somewhat,” she squinted at a half-full wine glass at her elbow, “but mostly I’m just bored.”

“It’s not even ten.”

“Can’t I be bored before ten?”

“You know what I mean.”

“Leave the moralising to my brother. It suits him better. And have a drink.” She waved her hand at the bottle. “You look like you need one.”

Well, that was true enough. He poured himself a glass and sat down in a chair facing Ardee, while she regarded him with heavy-lidded eyes. She took her own glass from the table. There was a thick book lying next to it, face down.

“How’s the book?” asked Jezal.

“The Fall of the Master Maker, in three volumes. They say it’s one of the great classics of history. Lot of boring rubbish,” she snorted derisively. “Full of wise Magi, stern knights with mighty swords and ladies with mightier bosoms. Magic, violence and romance, in equal measure. Utter shit.” She slapped the book off the table and it tumbled onto the carpet, pages flapping.

“There must be something you can find to keep busy?”

“Really? What would you suggest?”

“My cousins do a lot of embroidery.”

“Fuck yourself.”

“Hmm,” said Jezal, smiling. The swearing no longer seemed half so offensive as it had done when they first met. “What did you do at home, in Angland?”

“Oh, home,” her head dropped against the back of the settle. “I thought I was bored there. I could hardly wait to come here to the bright centre of things. Now I can hardly wait to go back. Marry some farmer. Have a dozen brats. At least I’d get some conversation that way.” She closed her eyes and sighed. “But Collem won’t let me. He feels responsible, now that our father’s dead. Thinks it’s too dangerous. He’d rather I didn’t get slaughtered by the Northmen, but that’s about where his sense of responsibility ends. It certainly doesn’t extend to spending ten minutes together with me. So it looks like I’m stuck here, with all you arrogant snobs.”

Jezal shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “He seems to manage.”

“Oh yes,” snorted Ardee, “Collem West, he’s a damn fine fellow! Won a Contest don’t you know? First through the breach at Ulrioch, wasn’t he? No breeding at all, never be one of us, but a damn fine fellow, for a commoner! Shame about that upstart sister of his though, too clever by half. And they say she drinks,” she whispered. “Doesn’t know her place. Total disgrace. Best just to ignore her.” She sighed again. “Yes, the sooner I go home, the happier everyone will be.”

“I won’t be happier.” Damn, did he say that out loud?

Ardee laughed, none too pleasantly. “Well, it’s enormously noble of you to say so. Why aren’t you fencing anyway?”

“Marshal Varuz was busy today.” He paused for a moment. “In fact, I had your friend Sand dan Glokta as fencing master this morning.”

“Really? What did he have to say for himself?”

“Various things. He called me a fool.”

“Imagine that.”

Jezal frowned. “Yes, well. I’m as bored with fencing as you are with that book. That was what I wanted to talk to your brother about. I’m thinking of giving it up.”

She burst out laughing. Snorting, gurgling peals of it. Her whole body was shaking. Wine sloshed out of her glass and splattered across the floor. “What’s so funny?” he demanded.

“It’s just,” she wiped a tear from her eye, “I had a bet with Collem. He was sure you’d stick at it. And now I’m ten marks richer.”

“I’m not sure that I like being the subject of your bet,” said Jezal sharply.

“I’m not sure I give a damn.”

“This is serious.”