Trinkets were the most common purchases for the rabble crowd, parting gifts and keepsakes and forget-me-nots. Engravers at small stalls worked to mark names onto cheap jewellery and lockets. Ecclesiarchs and trancemissionaries sold safeguard charms and rosaries; prophylactics against harm, the eternal protection of the God-Emperor. They also handed out pamphlets and treatises for uplifting consolation during the voyage. Blessings were obtainable, and so were sermons, delivered from portable pulpits. Garlands and posies were sold in abundance, and the victuallers and black-marketeers did a busy trade in foodstuffs, drink and smokes, indulgences for the last night on shore or the long nights in transit.
The crowd parted and a jester came by, clown-masked, striding on stilts. Behind him came a gang of laughing children, most of them regimental offspring. Elodie recognised many of them. Some she knew by name. That little girl was Yoncy. She was one of the ones Juniper minded, so Elodie had come to hear the story. For a while, Yoncy and her brother had been minded by a woman called Aleksa, but Aleksa had passed away and Juniper had taken on the care of them. The children were orphans from Verghast, and they’d been adopted by Tona Criid, a woman officer who’d found them on the battlefield. It turned out later their father wasn’t dead at all. He was Major Gol Kolea of C Company. He hadn’t wanted to overturn their little lives any further by taking them away from their adoptive mother, so he’d stayed out of it, and just kept an eye on them through Aleksa. Now the boy, Dalin, was a trooper, the adjutant of E Company, and the girl was getting quite big. The regiment had become their family, and had provided for them.
Still, they had suffered and lost a lot. Tragedy had marked their lives. You could see it in them, especially the little girl. From the time she had first seen her, Elodie had detected the most haunting sadness in Yoncy’s eyes.
The girl was a pretty little thing though. She raced past after the stilt-clown, giving Elodie a wave. Behind her, letting her run along, came the brother, Dalin. He was in uniform, a fine young man, watching his sister’s enjoyment with a smile. A last hour of shore leave for him before duties began. He’d bought a little medal of the Saint on a ribbon, no doubt for his sister.
He saw Elodie.
‘Mam,’ he said.
‘Dalin,’ she returned.
‘A good day,’ he said.
‘I would think almost any day is a good day to leave Anzimar,’ she replied.
He laughed.
Elodie walked on, past a bottle stall. She saw two Tanith men purchasing flasks of amasec. One of them saw her and suddenly looked guilty. He put the bottle he had been studying back hastily.
‘How are you today, mam?’ he asked.
‘Well, soldier,’ she said. His name was Costin. She knew it, because Ban had pointed him out as a man who had known great trouble with drink over the years. He was embarrassed because an officer’s woman had seen him buying liquor.
‘I was considering a gift,’ he said. ‘For my good captain, Domor, to mark this making shift. I would otherwise not touch the stuff.’
‘You don’t have to explain yourself, soldier,’ she said.
But perhaps he did. As a hostess in the clubs of Balhaut, Elodie had observed much about the relationship between men and their poisons. Costin was clearly a sot. The raw redness of his face told her that. He drank quantity, not quality, or his Guard pay would not stretch to cover his habit. He was the sort of man who would brew his own sacra to ensure a cheap supply.
So why would he be purchasing a fine bottle of amasec that ought to be locked in a colonel’s tantalus? Was it truly a gift as he said? Where would a man like Costin get that sort of money?
She reached the tailor’s stall on the fifth row and joined a short queue that was being entertained by a fire-eater. Sixteen Valkyrie assault carriers wailed overhead in formation. Elodie watched the entertainer, oiled and lithe, caper as he blew cones of flame from his burning wands.
‘Quite a trick,’ said a voice from beside her. ‘I tried to learn it once, in the hope that it might impress the mamzels.’
She turned and found Commissar Blenner standing in the queue behind her. He smiled and doffed his cap.
‘Good day, Lady Daur,’ he said.
‘Not quite lady yet, sir.’
‘You should see about that,’ he replied.
‘Really?’
‘Yes, before–’
Blenner paused, as if he had strayed into territory he regretted.
‘I always believe,’ he said, changing tack, ‘that sensible provision is the greatest defence against the vagaries of war.’
‘I’ll bear that in mind, sir.’
‘Please,’ he said, ‘a blind man could see you are no soldier, so there is no need to address me like one. Vaynom, I insist.’
Commissar Blenner had, like her, joined the regiment at Balhaut. He was, Ban had told her, an old friend of the commander’s, and he’d been brought in to supplement the Tanith First’s commissar strength, now that Commissar Hark’s work had become so specialised.
Elodie had encountered Blenner at several formal dinners. He didn’t look like a soldier. He seemed a little pudgy and unfit, a touch bloated from an easy life of inaction. He looked like an Administratum clerk dressed up as a soldier. He had, perhaps, been handsome once, but he was no longer as handsome as he thought he was, and his roguish manner was a little obnoxious. Elodie had met his type many times in the clubs of Balhaut. Privileged, silver-tongued, charming enough to like. But you’d always wonder where he was going to put his hands.
‘You are here for the tailor?’ she asked.
‘Indeed,’ he said. ‘My coat is being stitched. I have an influx to greet. Duty calls us all.’
It was her turn. She took Daur’s jacket from the tailor, inspected the work, and paid.
‘Good day, sir,’ she said to Blenner. ‘May we all make shift safely.’
‘The Emperor protects, dear lady,’ he replied. He watched her walk away. The view was worth the effort.
‘Now, where’s my damn coat?’ he said to the tailor.
Blenner put on his stormcoat as he walked through the crowd. No one, not even the enforcers’ serjeants-at-arms policing the revels, got in a commissar’s way. He crossed a small yard where men were playing camp ball, and entered the infirmary.
Inside, a big Tanith thug was stripped to the waist and sitting backwards on a wooden chair while one of the orderlies, a skinny fellow still wearing his medical smock, applied a tattoo to his shoulder blade with an outsized needle. Blenner stood for a moment, watching in fascination. The man was big and hairy, and smelled of liquid promethium. This wasn’t his first piece of ink. The new tattoo, half done, was a playing card, the King of Knives. Colour would be added later.
‘Is that really an appropriate use of medical facilities?’ Blenner
asked.
The orderly jumped up, realising Blenner was there. His smock was clean, but his fingers were permanently stained with blue ink. He had a cup full of needles. The man receiving the tattoo turned his big, bearded face and looked over his shoulder at Blenner. He made no attempt to get up or show respect.
‘I’m sorry sir, I had a moment,’ said the orderly.
‘You do this work?’ Blenner asked, peering at the tattoo.
‘I’ve always done it, sir.’
‘He’s good with needles,’ said the big man.
‘What’s your name?’ asked Blenner.
‘Lesp, sir,’ said the orderly.
Lesp. Lesp. So many new names and faces to remember.
‘What is that?’ Blenner asked, gesturing to the tattoo.
‘King of Knives, sir,’ said Lesp.