Akkad met Silo on the balcony. He sat in a heavy, crudely carved chair softened with hide throws, his back to the jungle. The sides of the balcony were open, and provided a hundred-and-eighty degree view of the shadowed greenery all around. To Akkad’s right stood his wife Menlil, and to his left were three children, a boy and two girls, ranging frls, and-eigom eleven to seven years old. A half-dozen others stood at the edge of the room: three bodyguards, a witch-sister, a hard-faced Vard that Silo didn’t recognise and a Murthian that he did. Babbad, who had once been a rival of his. No doubt he and the Vard were Akkad’s right-hand men.
Silo would have stood in their place, once. Now he stood alone in the gathering, without even the Cap’n for an ally. Frey was being guarded outside. Even Silo had only been allowed in after a thorough check for weapons.
Akkad had become careful. And he was very wary of Silo, it seemed.
We all thought you were dead, said Akkad.
Silo spread his hands. ~ Evidently not.
You should have stayed away.
So I’m told, he replied. ~ But this is my homeland. How could I?
Akkad’s penetrating stare never wavered. A gambler’s stare. Calculating him.
He seemed more careworn than Silo remembered, but he was still a powerful man. His jungle-stained hogskin jacket was sleeveless and left open for ventilation, showing a lean, muscled torso and big arms dense with tattoos. His tightly curled black hair shone with oil, thick despite his forty-something years. He had a sharp, beaklike nose and a short beard that tapered to a point. A handsome man, often fierce, but capable of great charisma when the occasion called for it.
Why have you come? Akkad asked. ~ To see to unfinished business?
I have no quarrel with you, Akkad. All that was long ago.
Akkad studied him closely. Working him out. He didn’t know what to make of Silo. Didn’t believe him. Couldn’t understand why he’d come walking in to the camp unprotected, after all that had gone before. He suspected a trick or a trap. Perhaps there was an army waiting in the jungle? Perhaps Silo had sold them out to the Samarlans?
That was Akkad. Always suspicious. Silo thought it best to keep him guessing for now. It wouldn’t be long before Akkad realised that he had no cards in his hand. His best hope had been that Akkad had left, or died, or been usurped in his absence. But Akkad was still here.
Silo had no fear for himself. Death didn’t worry him. But he wished the Cap’n hadn’t come along. He should have fought harder to keep Frey away from this place, forbidden him, even. But he’d decided long ago that his days of ordering people around were done. Nowadays, he only took orders, like a good little slave. He’d given up the right to tell people what to do.
He’d warned Frey. Frey hadn’t listened. So it was on the Cap’n what happened to him.
I saw many sick people outside, Silo said.
The days are cruel, said Akkad.
An old Murthian saying. He was giving nothing away.
Yet your numbers have become greater.
They have.
And have you given your home a name, yet?
Akkad’s eyes tightened a fraction. ~ We have.
Silo nodded to himself. It was as he suspected. This was no longer a hideout, a place for dangerous men, plotting war on their oppressors; this was a village.
Akkad took his silence as a judgement. ~ Things have changed since you left us, he said, a hint of anger in his voice. ~ We plan for the future now.
The Vard looked down at his feet, then away. A tiny movement, but Silo spotted it. Seems at least one of you ain’t too keen on your plan for the future. Reckon there were a lot that weren’t keen on it back when I was here, neither.
If Akkad wasn’t going to give away any information, he’d have to divine it himself. He decided to push a little.
I recognise many faces I knew in the past, he said. ~ It’s a credit to your leadership that so many have lived so long in these violent times.
The Vard’s gaze flickered up to meet his, just for a moment. The man didn’t know Silo, except perhaps by reputation, but he suspected what Silo was implying.
Akkad did, too, and now the anger in his voice was more than a hint. ~ They are alive because I kept them safe, he said. ~ Alive to enjoy their freedom, instead of living out their next lives back in the slave pens and work camps. You would have driven them to their deaths.
Silo said nothing. He didn’t need to. Akkad had been too quick to defend himself, and he noticed the minute flickers of uncertainty on the faces of the people in the room. All except Babbad, whose face remained rigid.
~ Where have you been, Silopethkai? Akkad asked at length.
Akkad used his full name. Formal. Distancing himself from the friendship they’d once had.
Vardia, Silo replied.
I had understood that our people were not welcome in Vardia.
I did not say I was welcome there.
It felt strange to talk like this. Fencing was a part of Murthian conversation, and he was out of practice. The language was precise and elegant compared to Vardic, which was constantly rearranging itself, buried in slang that changed like the seasons. Murthian was an old and static tongue, rigid and dignified.
And now you have returned, said Akkad. ~ Walking from the jungle as if nothing has happened. All those deaths on your head, Silopethkai. Do you imagine they have been forgotten?
I did not kill them, Silo said.
Yes, said Akkad. ~ You did.
You had the choice.
I had no choice! he said, his voice rising as his fist came down on the arm of his chair. The men and women in the room looked uneasy.
Akkad’s gaze locked with Silo. Silo saw no remorse in the eyes of the man who had once been his friend. No regret at all. And so Silo looked away first. Because if Akkad felt no responsibility for what had happened, then Silo carried enough for two.
There were things that weighed on a man’s soul. He’d hit a woman he loved, once, while in the grip of one of the wild rages he used to get. He’d never stop being ashamed of that. But that didn’t even come close to the events that led to him fleeing this place nine years ago. Fifteen lives, friends and companions, all lost that day. And while he didn’t actually kill any one of them, he might as well have done, the way it turned out.
Do you remember Gagriisk? he asked eventually.
Of course I do, said Akkad. ~ It is a name burned on the heart of every Murthian. Those who did not escape and leave their people’s conflict behind them.
That was a provocation too far. ~ I see little evidence of conflict here, said Silo, looking around. ~ There are many ways to escape, Akkad.
But Akkad didn’t rise to it this time. ~ You lost that argument, Silopethkai, he said. ~ Good men and women died for it. Now speak your piece, and then I will decide what to do with you.
Gagriisk is one of the most notorious murder-camps in Samarla, said Silo, for the benefit of the Vard in the room. ~ Hidden in the poisonous mists of the Choke Bowl. Many years ago, we talked of an assault on that place.
You talked of an assault. A bloody and suicidal one. As was your habit.
Silo let it pass. Akkad’s churlishness only hurt himself in the eyes of his followers. He didn’t remember him being so prickly and easy to rattle. His eyes went to the children standing alongside him. Perhaps eleven years of fatherhood did that to a man. Or per a and leavhaps it was the sight of his old friend and old enemy, back from the grave.
We obtained a map, said Silo. ~ A map that showed the location of the target in amid the vast, shrouded wastes of the Choke Bowl.
I recall.
I have come to ask you for that map.
Akkad looked at him for a long time. Silo could see the gears in his mind working, trying to figure out the trick.
And what if I refuse? said Akkad, when he’d finally tired of trying to outguess his opponent.