Bainisk reached up with the knife, just above his fist where it held tight. And he sliced through.

Dig heels in, it will not help. We must wing back to the present. For everything to be understood, every facet must flash alight at least once. Earlier, the round man begged forgiveness. Now, he pleads for trust. His is a sure hand, even if it trembles. Trust.

A bard sits opposite an historian. At a nearby table in K'rul's Bar, Blend watches Scillara unfolding coils of smoke from her mouth. There is something avid in that gaze, but every now and then a war erupts in her eyes, when she thinks of the woman lying in a coma upstairs. When she thinks of her, yes. Blend has taken to sleeping in the bed with Picker, has taken to trying all she could think of to awaken sensation once more in her lover. But nothing has worked. Picker's soul is lost, wandering far from the cool, flaccid flesh.

Blend hates herself now, as she senses her soul ready to move on, to seek the blessing of a new life, a new body to explore and caress, new lips to press upon her own.

But this is silly. Scillara's amiability was ever casual. She was a woman who preferred a man's charms, such as they were. And truth be told, Blend had played in that crib more than once herself. So why now has this l.u.s.t awakened? What made it so wild, so needy?

Loss, my dear. Loss is like a goad, a stinging shove that sets one lunging forward seeking handholds, seeking ecstasy, delicious surrender, even the lure of self-destruction. The bud cut at the stem throws its last energy into one final flowering, one glorious exclamation. The flower defies The flower defies, to quote in entirety an ancient Tiste Andii poem. Life runs from death. It must, it cannot help it. Life runs Life runs, to quote a round man's epitome of poetic brevity.

Slip into Blend's mind, ease in behind her eyes, and watch as she watches, feel as she feels, if you dare.

Or try Antsy, there at the counter on which are arrayed seven crossbows, twelve flatpacks of quarrels amounting to one hundred and twenty darts, six shortswords, three throwing axes of Falari design, a Genabarii broadsword and buckler, two local rapiers with fancy quillons so fancy the weapons were snagged together and Antsy had spent an entire morning trying to separate them, with no luck and a small sack containing three sharpers. He is trying to decide what to wear.

But the mission they were about to set out on was meant to be peaceful, so he should just wear his shortsword as usual, peace-strapped as usual, everything as usual, in fact. But then there were a.s.sa.s.sins out there who wanted Antsy's head on a dagger point, so maybe keeping things usual was in fact suicidal. So he should strap on at least two shortswords, throw a couple of crossbows over his shoulders and hold the broadsword in his right hand and the twin rapiers in his left, with a flatpack tied to each hip, the sharper sack at his belt, and a throwing axe between his teeth no, that's ridiculous, he'd break his jaw trying that. Maybe an extra shortsword, but then he might cut his own tongue out the first time he tried saying anything and he was sure to try saying something eventually, wasn't he?

But he could run the scabbards for all six shortswords through his belt, and end up wearing a skirt of shortswords, but that'd be all right, wouldn't it? But then, where would he carry the sharpers? One knock against a pommel or hilt and he'd be an expanding cloud of whiskers and weapon bits. And what about the crossbows? He'd need to load them all up but keep everything away from the releases, unless he wanted to end up skewering all his friends with the first stumble.

What if- What's that? Back to Blend, please? Flesh against flesh, the weight of full b.r.e.a.s.t.s in hands, one knee pushing up between parted thighs, sweat a blending of sweet oils, soft lips trying to merge, tongues dancing eager and slick as- 'I can't wear alla this!'

Scillara glanced over. 'Really, Antsy? Didn't Blend say that about a bell ago?'

'What? Who? Her? What does she know?'

To that entirely unselfconscious display of irony, Blend could only raise her brows when she caught Scillara's eye.

Scillara smiled in response, then drew again on her pipe.

Blend glanced over at the bard, and then said to Antsy, 'We're safe out there now, anyway.'

Eyes bulging, Antsy stared at her in disbelief. 'You'd take the word of some d.a.m.ned minstrel? What does he know?'

'You keep asking what does anyone know, when it's obvious that whatever they know you're not listening to anyway.'

'What?'

'Sorry, that so confused me I doubt I could repeat it. The contract's cancelled Fisher said so.'

Antsy wagged his head from side to side. 'Fisher said so!' He jabbed a finger at the bard. 'He's not Fisher not the famous one, anyway. He's just stolen the name! If he was famous he wouldn't be just sittin' there, would he? Famous people don't do that.'

'Really?' the bard who called himself Fisher asked. 'What are we supposed to do, Antsy?'

'Famous people do famous things, alla time. Everybody knows that!'

'The contract has been bought out,' the bard said. 'But if you want to dress as if preparing for a single-handed a.s.sault on Moon's Sp.a.w.n, you go right ahead.'

'Rope! Do I need rope? Let me think!' And to aid in this process Antsy began pacing, moustache twitching.

Blend wanted to pull a boot off and push her foot between Scillara's thighs. No, she wanted to crawl right in there. Staking a claim. With a hiss of frustration she stood, hesitated, and then went to sit down at the bard's table. She fixed him with an intense stare, to which he responded with a raised brow.

'There're more songs supposedly composed by Fisher than anyone else I've ever heard of.'

The man shrugged.

'Some of them are a hundred years old.'

'I was a prodigy.'

'Were you now?'

Duiker spoke. 'The poet is immortal.'

She turned to face him. 'Is that some kind of general, ideological statement, Historian? Or are you talking about the man sharing this table with you?'

Antsy cursed suddenly and then said, 'I don't need any rope! Who put that into my head? Let's get going I'm taking this shortsword and a sharper and anybody gets too close to me or looks suspicious they can eat the sharper for breakfast!'

'We'll stay here,' Duiker said when Blend hesitated. 'The bard and me. I'll look in on Picker.'

'All right. Thanks.'

Antsy, Blend and Scillara set out.

The journey took them from the Estates District and into Daru District, along the Second Tier Wall. The city had fully awakened now, and in places the crowds were thick with the endless machinery of living. Voices and smells and needs and wants, hungers and thirsts, laughter and irritation, misery and joy, and the sunlight fell on everything it could reach and shadows retreated wherever they could.

Temporary barriers blocked the three foreigners here and there a cart jammed sideways in a narrow street, a carthorse dropped dead with its legs sticking up, half a family pinned under the upended cart. A swarm of people round a small collapsed building, stealing every dislodged brick and shard of lumber, and if anyone had been trapped in it, alas, no one was looking for them.

Scillara walked like a woman bred to be admired. And oh, yes, people noticed. In other circ.u.mstances, Blend being another woman might have resented that, but then she'd made a career out of not being noticed; and besides, she counted herself among the admirers.

'Friendly people, these Darujhistanii,' said Scillara as they finally swung south from the wall, heading for the southwest corner of the district.

'They're smiling,' said Blend, 'because they want a roll with you. And clearly you haven't noticed the wives and such, all looking as if they swallowed something sour.'

'Maybe they did.'

'Oh they did, all right. The truth that men are men, that's what they've swallowed.'

Antsy snorted. 'What else would men be but men? Your problem, Blend, is you see too much, even when it's not there.'

'Oh, and what have you been noticing, Antsy?'

'Suspicious people, that's what.'

'What suspicious people?'

'The ones who keep staring at us, of course.'

'That's because of Scillara what do you think we've just been talking about?'

'Maybe they are, maybe they ain't. Maybe they're a.s.sa.s.sins, lookin' to jump us.'

'That old man back there who got his ear boxed by his wife was an a.s.sa.s.sin? What kind of Guild are they running here?'

'You don't know she was his wife,' Antsy retorted. 'And you don't know but that was a signal to somebody on a roof. We could be walking right into an ambush!' 'Of course,' agreed Blend, 'that woman was his mother, because Guild rules state that Ma's got to come along to make sure he's got the hand signals down, and that he eats all his lunch and his knives are sharp and he's tied up his moccasins right so he doesn't trip in the middle of his murderous lunge at Sergeant Antsy.'

'I ain't so lucky he trips,' Antsy said in a growl. 'In case you ain't noticed, Blend, it's been a run of the Lord's push for us. Oponn's got it in for me, especially.'

'Why?' Scillara asked.

'Because I don't believe in the Twins, that's why. Luck it's all bad. Oponn only pulls now to push later. If you've been pulled, it don't end there. Never does. No, you can expect the push to come any time and all you know for sure is it's gonna come, that push. Every time. In fact, we're all as good as dead.'

'Well,' said Scillara, 'I can't argue with that. Sooner or later, Hood takes us all, and that's the only certainty there is.'

'Aren't you two cheerful this morning,' Blend observed. 'Look, here we are.'

They had arrived at the Warden Barracks, suitably sombre and foreboding.

Blend saw an annexe fronting the blockish building with barred windows and set out towards it, the other two following.

A guard lounging outside the door watched them approach, and then said, 'Check your weapons at the front desk. You here to visit someone?'

'No,' snorted Antsy, 'we've come to break 'im out!' And then he laughed. 'Haha.'

No one found the joke at all amusing, especially after the sharper was found and correctly identified. Antsy then made the mistake of getting belligerent, in the midst of five or six stern-visaged constabulary, which led to a scuffle and then an arrest.

When all was said and done, Antsy found himself in a lock-up with three drunks, only one of whom was conscious singing some old Fisher cla.s.sic in a broken-hearted voice and a fourth man who seemed to be entirely mad, convinced as he was that everyone he saw was wearing a mask, which was hiding something demonic, horrible, bloodthirsty. He'd been arrested for trying to tear off a merchant's face and he eyed Antsy speculatively before evidently deciding that the red-whiskered foreigner looked too tough to take on, at least while he was still awake.

The sentence was three days long, provided Antsy proved a model prisoner. Any trouble and it could stretch out some more.

As a result of all this, it was some time before Scillara and Blend managed to gain permission to see Barathol Mekhar. They met him in a holding cell while two guards stood flanking the single door, shortswords drawn.

Noting this, Scillara said, 'Making friends in here, are you?'

The blacksmith looked somewhat shamefaced as he shrugged. 'I had no intention of resisting the arrest, Scillara. My apprentice, alas, decided otherwise.' Anxiety tightened his features as he asked, 'Any news of him? Has he been captured? Is he hurt?'

Scillara shrugged. 'We've not seen or heard anything like that, Barathol.'

'I keep telling them here, he's only a child in his head. It was my responsibility, all of it. But he went and broke some bones and noses, and they're pretty annoyed about that.'

Blend cleared her throat. Something was going back and forth between Barathol and Scillara and it made her uneasy. 'Barathol, we can pay the fine to the Guild, but that sc.r.a.p you had, that one's more serious.'

He nodded morosely. 'Hard labour, yes. Six months or so.' There was the twitch of a grin. 'And guess who I will be working for?'

'Who?'

'Eldra Foundry. And in six months I'll earn my ticket as a smith, since that's allowed. Some kind of rehabilitation programme.'

Scillara's throaty laugh straightened up both guards. 'Well, that's one way to get there, I suppose.'

He nodded. 'I went about it all wrong, it seems.'

'I'm not sure,' said Scillara. 'Is the Guild happy with that? I mean, it's sort of a way round them, isn't it?'

'They've no choice. Every Guild in the city has to comply, barring, I suppose, the a.s.sa.s.sins' Guild. Obviously, for most prisoners six months working in a trade might earn them an apprentice grade of some sort but there's no limit to how fast you can advance. Just pa.s.s the exams and that's that.'

Scillara looked ready to burst out laughing. Even Barathol was struggling.

Blend sighed and then said, 'I'll go settle the fine. Consider it a loan.'

'Much appreciated, Blend, and thank you.'

'Remembering Kalam,' she replied, heading out. Neither guard paid her any attention. But she was used to that.

A bhokaral answered the door. High Alchemist Baruk stared down at it for a long moment before concluding that this was nothing more than a bhokaral. Not a demon, not Soletaken. Just a bhokaral, its little wizened face scrunched up in belligerent regard, spiky ears twitching. When it made to close the postern door again Baruk stepped forward and held it open.

Sudden outrage and indignation. Hissing, spitting, making faces, the bhokaral shook a fist at Baruk and then fled down the corridor.

The High Alchemist closed the door behind him and made his way along the corridor. He could now hear other bhokarala, a cacophony of b.e.s.t.i.a.l voices joining in with the first one, raising an alarm that echoed through the temple. At a branching of the pa.s.sageway he came upon an old Dal Honese woman tearing apart a straw broom. She glared up at Baruk and snapped something in some tribal tongue, then made squiggly gestures with the fingers of her left hand.

The High Alchemist scowled. 'Retract that curse, witch.

Now.'

'You'll not be so bold when the spiders come for you.'

'Now,' he repeated, 'before I lose my temper.'

'Bah! You're not worth the effort anyway!' And all at once she collapsed into a heap of spiders that scurried in all directions.

Baruk blinked, and then quickly stepped back. But none of the creatures skittered his way. Moments later they had inexplicably vanished, although not a single crack or seam was visible.

'High Alchemist.'

He looked up. 'Ah, High Priestess. I did knock-'

'And a bhokaral let you in, yes. They're in the habit of doing that, having chased away most of my acolytes.'

'I wasn't aware bhokarala were in the habit of infestation.'

'Yes, well. Have you come to speak to me or the chosen . . . mouthpiece of Shadowthrone?'

'I do not believe you have been entirely usurped, High Priestess.'

'Your generosity is noted.'

'Why is there a witch of Ardatha in your temple?'