The Bonehunters

'No.'

He fell silent, but he could feel sweat prickling beneath his clothes.

'Her first move,' the Empress whispered, and there was something like excitement – or dark satisfaction – in her tone.

A squeal sounded from the weather vane atop the tower behind them, and Pearl shivered. Aye, on a night with no wind… He looked down upon the city, and saw torchlight in the streets. Sparks to tinder, the word of the arrival in the hay races from mouth to mouth, eager as lust. The Wickans have returned, and now the mob gathers… the rage awakens.

Thus, Empress – you need those ships to close, you need the lines drawn fast.

You need the victims to disembark, to bring the flames to a roar.

She turned about then. 'Follow me.'

Back along the watch-mount, across the causeway span to the keep itself. Her strides sure, almost eager. Beneath the arched entranceway, between the two cloaked, hooded forms of Claws – he felt their warrens held open, power roiling invisibly from their unseen hands.

A long, poorly lit corridor, the pavestones humped where subsurface settling had occurred, marking where an enormous crack was riven through the entire fortress. One day, this whole damned place will tumble into the bay, and good riddance. Of course, the engineers and mages had assured everyone that such a risk was half a century away, or longer. Too bad.

An intersection, the Empress leading him to the left – oh yes, she was familiar with this place. Where she had, years ago, assassinated the Emperor and Dancer. Assassination. If you could call it that. More like inadvertently aided and abetted. Along another canted corridor, and finally to the doors of a meeting chamber. Where stood two more Claws, the one on the left turning upon sighting them and tugging open the left door, in time for the Empress to pass within without change of pace.

Pearl followed, his steps suddenly slowing as soon as he stepped into the room.

Before him, a long T-shaped table. A tribunal arrangement. He found himself at its intersection. A raised chair marked the head, up the length of the axis, and that modest throne was flanked by figures already seated, although they both rose with Laseen's arrival.

Mallick Rel.

And Korbolo Dom.

Pearl struggled to keep the disgust from his face. Immediately before him were the backs of three chairs along the horizontal span. He hesitated. 'Where, Empress,' he asked, 'shall I sit?'

Settling into the throne, she regarded him for a moment, then one thin brow rose. 'Pearl, I do not expect you to be present. After all, you indicated you had no particular interest in seeing the Adjunct again, and so I shall relieve you of that burden.'

'I see. Then what would you have me do?'

The Jhistal priest on her right cleared his throat, then said, 'A burdensome but essential mission, Pearl, falls upon you. Organization is required, yes? The dispatch of a Hand, which you will find assembled at the Gate. A solitary killing. A drunkard who frequents Coop's Hanged Man Inn. His name: Banaschar. Thereafter, you may return to your quarters to await further instruction.'

Pearl's eyes remained fixed on the Empress, locked with her own, but she gave nothing away, as if daring him to ask what he so longed to:

Does a Claw take his orders from a Jhistal priest of Mael now? A man delivered here in chains not so long ago? But, he knew, her silence gave him his answer. He broke his gaze from her and studied Korbolo Dom. The Napan bastard was wearing the regalia of a High Fist. Seeing the man's smug, contemptuous expression, Pearl's palms itched. Two knives, my favourite ones, slowly slicing that face away – all of it – gods, never mind that – I could bury a blade in his damned throat right now – maybe I'd be fast enough, maybe not. That's the problem.

The hidden Claw in this room will take me down, of course, but maybe they're not anticipating… no, don't be a fool, Pearl. He glanced once more at the Empress and something in her look told him she had comprehended, in full, the desires with which he struggled… and was amused.

Still, he hesitated. Now was the time, he realized, to speak out against this. To seek to convince her that she'd invited two vultures, perched now on each shoulder, and what they hungered for was not the ones who would in a short time be seated before them – no, they wanted the throne they flanked. And they will kill you, Laseen. They will kill you.

'You may now go,' Mallick Rel said in a sibilant voice.

'Empress,' Pearl forced himself to say, 'please, consider well Tavore' s words this night. She is your Adjunct, and nothing has changed that.

No-one can change that-'