‘All right.’ The boy flopped down where he stood, dropping the halberd in the mud. ‘I’m hungry,’ he said.
‘Tough. If you want, you can go and see if you can kill something. If there’s anything to kill in this horrible swamp except soldiers, which I doubt.’
The boy shook his head. ‘Haven’t seen any sign of anything,’ he replied.
‘Then we’ll just have to make do without, and try not to think about it.’
‘All right.’
A few minutes later the boy was fast asleep. Gannadius closed his eyes, but it didn’t do him any good, not for a long time. When at last he did fall asleep, he had the dream again, and that was worse.
Gannadius?
He was in the dream: burning thatch, falling timbers whipping up clouds of sparks as they crashed to the ground, smoke and confused shouts. ‘Alexius?’ he asked. ‘What are you doing here?’
There he was, standing in front of him. I don’t know. I haven’t been here for a long time. Where are you?
‘I was hoping you could tell me,’ Gannadius replied. ‘What can you see?’
Well, this, Alexius replied. The Fall of Perimadeia. What did you want me to see?
Gannadius frowned. ‘My nephew and I are lost in a swamp somewhere between Ap’ Escatoy and Ap’ Amodi. I was hoping you could tell me what to do.’
Sorry. Alexius shrugged. Did you say Ap’ Escatoy? That’s curious. That’s where I keep going lately.
‘Fascinating. I look forward to reading your monograph on the subject. Can’t you make an effort and see if you can find out where we are? It’d be a tremendous help, you know.’
I really wish I could help, but you know how it is. Just out of interest, what are you doing in a swamp in the disputed territories, anyway? Last I heard, you had a nice, comfortable job in Shastel.
Around him, Perimadeia continued to burn. Gannadius tried not to watch. ‘I hope I still do,’ he said, ‘though if I don’t get back there soon they’ll assume I’m dead and give it to somebody else. No, I went to the Island to see my nephew.’
Your nephew – oh, yes, I remember. The boy Bardas Loredan rescued from the City and took with him to Scona. Now that’s a curious thing, as well.
‘Quite,’ Gannadius said, with a hint of impatience. ‘The idea was, Athli Zeuxis – you remember her?’
Of course. Bardas’ clerk. She’s a merchant on the Island now, isn’t she?
‘That’s right. Anyway, she brought the boy with her to the Island when Bardas went through that bad patch a few years ago, around the time she got the Island franchise for the Shastel Bank. Well, she’s done very well for herself since then, to the extent that she needs to open a corresponding office back at head-quarters, on Shastel; and she thought it’d be a good idea all round if young Theudas-’
Your nephew.
‘That’s right. Named after me in fact-’
Your original name was Theudas?
‘Yes. Theudas Morosin.’
Good gods We’ve known each other all these years and I never knew that. Sorry, please go on.
‘Athli thought it’d be a good idea,’ Gannadius continued patiently, ‘if young Theudas spent some time in Shastel with her agent there, setting up the office, learning the trade, and spending some time with me, of course, since I’m practically his only living relative – apart from his father, of course, but he’s disappeared again, and he never was any sort of father to the boy.’
It sounds like a splendid idea. What went wrong?
Gannadius sighed. ‘It was just my luck,’ he said. ‘A day or so after we left the Island, Shastel picked a fight with the provincial office over some wretched little island or other – really, it’s all to do with this Ap’ Escatoy business; obviously Shastel is scared stiff about what’s going to happen next – and now the provincial fleet’s blockading the Straits of Escati. If we’d had any sense we’d have turned back and gone the long way round – they haven’t closed that off, as far as I know – or at the very least we could have sat tight in Ap’ Amodi until the sabres stopped rattling. But no, we had to be clever and run the blockade. And instead, we ran on to the rocks, and then we ran into a patrol, and here we are. In a swamp.’
I see. What rotten luck. I really do wish I could help.
‘So do I,’ Gannadius said. ‘But you can’t, so that’s that. Anyway, how are you keeping? All well with you?’
The figure of Alexius (not really him, of course; not in any comprehensible sense, though of course he was there) shrugged its thin shoulders. Not so bad. A dying spearman staggered toward him; he stepped sideways to let him through. I haven’t been sleeping at all well, though. Bad dreams, you know.
‘You as well? This one?’
Not lately; in fact, not since the last time I saw you here. No, I fancy I’ve been dreaming the siege of Ap’ Escatoy. The Loredan connection, I suppose, though I can’t remember having seen him. Just a lot of very unpleasant dark tunnels, with the roof caving in and people fighting in the darkness. Now the siege is over, perhaps they’ll stop.
‘Let’s hope so,’ Gannadius said, trying to sound properly sympathetic. ‘I’m glad to say I haven’t-’
‘Uncle?’
Gannadius opened his eyes. ‘What? Oh, it’s you.’
The boy looked at him. ‘You were talking to somebody, ’ he said.
‘Was I?’ Gannadius looked vague. ‘I must have been dreaming. Um, what was I saying?’
The boy smiled. ‘I haven’t the faintest idea,’ he said. ‘You were mumbling, and I think it was some other language. Do you do that a lot? Talk in your sleep, I mean.’
Gannadius frowned. ‘I have no idea,’ he said. ‘You see, even if I do, I’m asleep and don’t know I’m doing it.’
CHAPTER THREE
‘So you’re him, are you?’ the clerk said, looking sideways along his nose. ‘The hero.’
There was a scorpion on the window-ledge; a female, with her newly born young clinging to her back. Bardas counted nine of them. She skittered a few steps, stopped and froze, her pincers raised. The clerk either hadn’t noticed or wasn’t bothered.
‘That’s me,’ Bardas said. ‘At least, I’m Bardas Loredan, and I’ve been called a lot worse.’
The clerk raised an eyebrow. ‘Well, now,’ he said. ‘A sense of humour, too. You’ll get on all right with the prefect, he’s got a sense of humour. At least,’ he added, ‘he makes jokes. More a producer than a consumer, if you take my meaning.’
Bardas nodded. ‘Thank you,’ he said.
The clerk dismissed the thanks with a small gesture of his long, elegant fingers. ‘We’ve heard all about you,’ he said. ‘Of course, you’re an interesting man.’ He swatted at a fly without looking at it; got it, too. ‘The prefect collects interesting men. He’s a student of human nature.’
‘It’s an interesting thing to study,’ Bardas said.
‘So I’m told.’ The scorpion set off again; but the clerk spotted her out of the corner of his eye, picked up a half-round ebony ruler from the folding desk in front of him, leaned across and dealt her a devastating smack with the flat side, crushing her and her nine children into a sticky, compacted mess. ‘It’s all right,’ the clerk went on, flicking the remains off the ledge, ‘they’re not nearly as dangerous as people make out. Sure, if they sting you, chances are you’ll swell up for a day or so, and it hurts dreadfully. But it’s quite rare for anybody to die.’
‘That’s good to know,’ Bardas said.
The clerk wiped the ruler against the wall-hanging and put it back on his desk. ‘So you used to be a law-fencer, ’ he said. ‘I’ve heard about that. You used to kill people to settle lawsuits.’
‘That’s right,’ Bardas said.
‘Remarkable. Well, I suppose there’s something to be said for it, as a way of dealing with these things. Quicker than our way, probably fairer, undoubtedly less painful and gruelling for the participants. Not how I’d choose to earn a living, though.’