Blend, she decided, was in a lot of trouble.
Zechan and Giddyn, in perfect unison, launched themselves out from the alcoves, daggers raised then thrusting down.
A yelp from the taller one as Giddyn’s blades plunged deep. The Malazan’s knees buckled and vomit sprayed from his mouth as he sank down, the jug crash shy;ing to a rush of wine.
Zechan’s own weapons punched through leather, edges grating along ribs. One for each lung. Tearing the daggers loose, the assassin stepped back to watch the red-haired one fall.
A short sword plunged into the side of Zechan’s neck.
He was dead before he hit the cobbles.
Giddyn, looming over the kneeling Malazan, looked up.
Two hands closed round his head. One clamped tight over his mouth, and all at once his lungs were full of water. He was drowning. The hand tightened, fingers pinching his nostrils shut. Darkness rose within him, and the world slowly went away.
Antsy snorted as he tugged his weapon free, then added a kick to the assassin’s face to punctuate its frozen expression of surprise.
Bluepearl grinned across at him. ‘See the way I made the puke spray out? If that ain’t genius I don’t know what-’
‘Shut up,’ Antsy snapped. ‘These weren’t muggers looking for a free drink, in case you hadn’t noticed.’
Frowning, Bluepearl looked down at the body before him with the water leaking from its mouth and nose. The Napan ran a hand over his shaved pate. ‘Aye. But they was amateurs anyway. Hood, we saw those breath plumes from halfway down the street. Which stopped when those drunks crossed, telling us they wasn’t the target. Meaning-’
‘We were. Aye, and that’s my point.’
‘Let’s get back,’ Bluepearl said, suddenly nervous.
Antsy tugged at his moustache, then nodded. ‘Work up that illusion again, Bluepearl. Us ten paces ahead.’
‘Easy, Sergeant-’
‘I ain’t no sergeant no more.’
‘Yeah? Then why you still barking orders?’
By the time Picker arrived within sight of the front entrance to K’rul’s Bar, her rage was incandescent. She paused, scanned the area. Spotted someone leaning in shadows across from the bar’s door. Hood drawn up, hands hidden.
Picker set off towards the figure.
She was noticed with ten paces between them, and she saw the man straighten, saw the growing unease betrayed by a shift of those covered arms, the cloak rip shy;pling. A half-dozen celebrants careened between them, and as they passed, Picker took the last stride needed to reach the man.
Whatever he had been expecting — perhaps her accosting him with some loud accusation — it was clear that he was unprepared for the savage kick she delivered between his legs. As he was going down she stepped closer and slapped her right hand against the back of his head, adding momentum to the man’s collapse. When his forehead cracked against the cobbles there was a sickly crunch. The body began to spasm where it lay.
A passer-by paused, peered down at the twitching body.
‘You!’ Picker snarled. ‘What’s your damned problem?’
Surprise, then a shrug. ‘Nothing, sweetie. Served ’im right, standin’ there like that. Say, would you marry me?’
‘Go away.’
As the stranger ambled on, bemoaning his failure at love, Picker looked around, waiting to see if there was someone else. . bolting from some hidden place nearby. If it had already happened, then she had missed it. More likely, the unseen eyes watching all of this were peering down from a rooftop somewhere.
The man on the ground had stopped twitching.
Spinning round, she headed for the entrance to K’rul’s Bar.
‘Pick!’
Two strides from the battered door, she turned, and saw Antsy and Bluepearl — lugging jugs of Saltoan wine — hurrying up to join her. Antsy’s expression was fierce. Bluepearl lagged half a step behind, eyes on the motionless body on the other side of the street, where a Gadrobi urchin was now busy stealing whatever she could find.
‘Get over here,’ Picker snapped, ‘both of you! Keep your eyes open.’
‘Shopping’s gettin’ murderous,’ Antsy said, ‘Bluepearl had us illusioned most of the way back, after we sniffed out an ambush-’
With one last glare back out on to the street, Picker took them both by their arms and pulled them unceremoniously towards the door. ‘Inside, idiots.’
Unbelievable, a night like this, making me so foul of temper I went and turned down the first decent marriage proposal I’ve had in twenty years.
Blend was sitting in the place she sat in whenever she smelled trouble. A small table in shadows right beside the door, doing her blending thing, except this time her legs were stretched out, just enough to force a stumble from anyone coming inside.
Stepping through the doorway, Picker gave those black boots a solid kick.
‘Ow, my ankle!’
Picker dropped the stack of flatbread on to Blend’s lap.
‘Oof!’
Antsy and Bluepearl pushed past. The ex-sergeant snorted. ‘Now there’s our scary minder at the door. “Ow, oof!” she says.’
But Blend had already recovered and was unwrapping the flatbread.
‘You know, Blend,’ Picker said as she settled at the bar, ‘the old Rhivi hags who make those spit on the pan before they slap down the dough. Some ancient spirit blessing-’
‘It’s not that,’ Blend cut in, folding back the flaps of the wrapper. ‘The sizzle tells them the pan’s hot enough.’
‘Ain’t it just,’ Bluepearl muttered.
Picker scowled, then nodded. ‘Aye. Let’s all head to our office, all of us — Blend, go find Mallet, too.’
‘Bad timing,’ Blend observed.
‘What?’
‘Spindle taking that pilgrimage.’
‘Lucky for him.’
Blend slowly rose and said round a mouthful of flatbread, ‘Duiker?’
Picker hesitated, then said, ‘Ask him. If he wants, aye.’
Blend slowly blinked. ‘You kill somebody tonight, Pick?’
No answer was a good enough answer. Picker peered suspiciously at the small crowd in the bar, those too drunk to have reeled out into the street at the twelfth bell, as was the custom. Regulars one and all. That’ll do. Waving for the others to follow, Picker set out for the stairs.
At the far end of the main room, that damned bard was bleating on with one of the more obscure verses of Anomandaris, but nobody was listening.
The three of them saw themselves as the new breed on Darujhistan’s Council. Shardan Lim was the thinnest and tallest, with a parched face and washed-out blue eyes. Hook-nosed, a lipless slash of a mouth perpetually turned down as if he could not restrain his contempt for the world. The muscles of his left wrist were twice the size of those of the right, criss-crossed with proudly displayed scars. He met Challice’s eyes like a man about to ask her husband if his own turn with her was imminent, and she felt that regard like the cold hand of possession round her throat. A moment later his bleached eyes slid away and there was the flicker of a half-smile as he reached for his goblet where it rested on the mantel.
Standing opposite Shardan Lim, on the other side of the nearly dead fire, with long fingers caressing the ancient ground hammerstones mortared into the fire shy;place, was Hanut Orr. Plaything to half the noble women in the city, so long as they were married or otherwise divested of maidenhood, he did indeed present that most enticing combination of dangerous charm and dominating arrogance — traits that seduced otherwise intelligent women — and it was well known how he delighted in seeing his lovers crawl on their knees towards him, begging a morsel of his attention.
Challice’s husband was sprawled in his favourite chair to Hanut Orr’s left, legs stretched out, looking thoughtfully into his goblet, the wine with its hue of blue blood slowly swirling as he tilted his hand in lazy circles.