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Authors: Caleb Carr
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on a man near the Cat’s Paw?”
Linnet Niksar’s features fill with comprehension. “If he is part of Baster-kin’s Guard, he would know the others are unlikely to hear him.”
“True. Unless …” This has always been Arnem’s way: to draw ideas from his men, rather than to bellow indictments of their blindness.
Ban-chindo snaps upright once again: he has used the moment well. “Unless—he was a new recruit. He may have been unaware of local conditions, and patrolled too far from the rest of the watch.”
Arnem smiles and nods. “Yes, Ban-chindo,” he says, offering the young man a look that any soldier of Broken would endure great hardship to receive. “Yours is the best explanation.” As quickly as it brightened, however, Arnem’s face grows dark. “But it is not particularly reassuring …”
Ban-chindo is too confused to speak, leaving Niksar to ask: “Why not, Sentek? It’s no joy to lose a man, but better to wolves than—”
“My dear Niksar,” Arnem interrupts a bit impatiently. “You don’t find it strange that wolves should know to pick an ignorant new recruit, at an ideal distance from the river, when there are so many easier targets? The cattle, for example—what pack of wolves risks a struggle against men, when grazing livestock are to be had? No …” Arnem gazes out at the faraway edge of Lord Baster-kin’s Plain a final time, as if he will tease more clues from it with his eyes alone. “There is more to this business than we yet know. Something, and even more likely someone, was certainly lying in wait for just such a target as our unfortunate new recruit …” †
A few quiet moments pass, as Niksar and Pallin Ban-chindo watch their chief cast his gaze over the distant line of the Wood. Eventually, Niksar must step forward. “Sentek? The council in the Sacristy—”
“Hak!”
‡ Arnem noises, rousing himself. “Curse me for a buggered Bane …” It is another of the popular oaths, the use of which mark the sentek as an outsider among the ruling classes of Broken, but which have helped forge his close bond to his men. “Yes, Niksar, we must be away. Ban-chindo—eyes and ears open, eh? If anything of further interest happens, you’ll bring the news to me yourself—understood?”
“I—am to report to the High Temple?” the young man replies, once more the very image of Broken pride. “Yes, Sentek!”
“Good. Come, Niksar, before Korsar’s impatience turns to rage.”
And the two officers of the Talons finally vanish into the chisel-scored walls of the guard tower, and down its worn stone steps.
The carving of Broken’s outer walls took more than twenty years to complete, even under Oxmontrot’s ferocious direction. It meant death for thousands of laborers, and misery for many more. But the impenetrable barrier that finally surrounded the Mad King’s fortress-city was, on its completion, a source of awe even for those who had suffered cruelly during its construction. And there were many ways to suffer: for in the early years of Oxmontrot’s reign, the first of the banishments took place, as a pragmatic means of ensuring that those citizens of the infant kingdom who were too feeble—in body
or
mind—to contribute to the great undertaking would not occupy its members’ energies with pointless care-giving, consume any of the initially thin streams of foodstuffs that came up the mountain, or waste space in the crude shelters that were built for the healthy. † Cruel reasoning; yet effective.
Arnem and Niksar make their way swiftly to the foot of the guard tower steps, and, once outside, proceed along a pathway that runs at the base of the city’s outer walls, and is kept clear at all times for the passage of troops. Taking a left turn, Arnem decides to cut the distance to Yantek Korsar’s quarters by taking Broken’s main avenue, the Celestial Way, ‡ which separates the market stalls of the Second District from the more formal shops and sturdy
Linnet Niksar’s features fill with comprehension. “If he is part of Baster-kin’s Guard, he would know the others are unlikely to hear him.”
“True. Unless …” This has always been Arnem’s way: to draw ideas from his men, rather than to bellow indictments of their blindness.
Ban-chindo snaps upright once again: he has used the moment well. “Unless—he was a new recruit. He may have been unaware of local conditions, and patrolled too far from the rest of the watch.”
Arnem smiles and nods. “Yes, Ban-chindo,” he says, offering the young man a look that any soldier of Broken would endure great hardship to receive. “Yours is the best explanation.” As quickly as it brightened, however, Arnem’s face grows dark. “But it is not particularly reassuring …”
Ban-chindo is too confused to speak, leaving Niksar to ask: “Why not, Sentek? It’s no joy to lose a man, but better to wolves than—”
“My dear Niksar,” Arnem interrupts a bit impatiently. “You don’t find it strange that wolves should know to pick an ignorant new recruit, at an ideal distance from the river, when there are so many easier targets? The cattle, for example—what pack of wolves risks a struggle against men, when grazing livestock are to be had? No …” Arnem gazes out at the faraway edge of Lord Baster-kin’s Plain a final time, as if he will tease more clues from it with his eyes alone. “There is more to this business than we yet know. Something, and even more likely someone, was certainly lying in wait for just such a target as our unfortunate new recruit …” †
A few quiet moments pass, as Niksar and Pallin Ban-chindo watch their chief cast his gaze over the distant line of the Wood. Eventually, Niksar must step forward. “Sentek? The council in the Sacristy—”
“Hak!”
‡ Arnem noises, rousing himself. “Curse me for a buggered Bane …” It is another of the popular oaths, the use of which mark the sentek as an outsider among the ruling classes of Broken, but which have helped forge his close bond to his men. “Yes, Niksar, we must be away. Ban-chindo—eyes and ears open, eh? If anything of further interest happens, you’ll bring the news to me yourself—understood?”
“I—am to report to the High Temple?” the young man replies, once more the very image of Broken pride. “Yes, Sentek!”
“Good. Come, Niksar, before Korsar’s impatience turns to rage.”
And the two officers of the Talons finally vanish into the chisel-scored walls of the guard tower, and down its worn stone steps.
The carving of Broken’s outer walls took more than twenty years to complete, even under Oxmontrot’s ferocious direction. It meant death for thousands of laborers, and misery for many more. But the impenetrable barrier that finally surrounded the Mad King’s fortress-city was, on its completion, a source of awe even for those who had suffered cruelly during its construction. And there were many ways to suffer: for in the early years of Oxmontrot’s reign, the first of the banishments took place, as a pragmatic means of ensuring that those citizens of the infant kingdom who were too feeble—in body
or
mind—to contribute to the great undertaking would not occupy its members’ energies with pointless care-giving, consume any of the initially thin streams of foodstuffs that came up the mountain, or waste space in the crude shelters that were built for the healthy. † Cruel reasoning; yet effective.
Arnem and Niksar make their way swiftly to the foot of the guard tower steps, and, once outside, proceed along a pathway that runs at the base of the city’s outer walls, and is kept clear at all times for the passage of troops. Taking a left turn, Arnem decides to cut the distance to Yantek Korsar’s quarters by taking Broken’s main avenue, the Celestial Way, ‡ which separates the market stalls of the Second District from the more formal shops and sturdy
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