The Blade Itself

casting a dappled shade on the
players beneath. A pleasing breeze fluttered through the courtyard,
so the cards were clutched tightly or weighted down with glasses or
coins. Birds twittered from the trees, and the shears of a gardener
clacked across from the far side of the lawn, making faint, agreeable
echoes against the tall white buildings of the quadrangle. Whether or
not the players found the large sum of money in the centre of the
table pleasant depended, of course, on the cards they held.
    Captain Jezal
dan Luthar certainly liked it. He had discovered an uncanny talent
for the game since he gained his commission in the King’s Own,
a talent which he had used to win large sums of money from his
comrades. He didn’t really need the money, of course, coming
from such a wealthy family, but it had allowed him to maintain an
illusion of thrift while spending like a sailor. Whenever Jezal went
home, his father bored everyone on the subject of his good fiscal
planning, and had rewarded him by buying his Captaincy just six
months ago. His brothers had not been happy. Yes, the money was
certainly useful, and there’s nothing half so amusing as
humiliating one’s closest friends.
    Jezal half sat,
half lay back on his bench with one leg stretched out, and allowed
his eyes to wander over the other players. Major West had rocked his
chair so far onto its back legs that he looked in imminent danger of
tipping over entirely. He was holding his glass up to the sun,
admiring the way that the light filtered through the amber spirit
inside. He had a faint, mysterious smile which seemed to say, “I
am not a nobleman, and may be your social inferior, but I won a
Contest and the King’s favour on the battlefield and that makes
me the better man, so you children will damn well do as I say.â€

Teeth and Fingers
    Time is
short. We must work quickly. Glokta nodded to Severard, and he
smiled and pulled the bag off Sepp dan Teufel’s head.
    The Master of
the Mints was a strong, noble-looking man. His face was already
starting to bruise. “What is the meaning of this?â€

The Wide and Barren North
    The Magi are an
ancient and mysterious order, learned in the secrets of the world,
practised in the ways of magic, wise and powerful beyond the dreams
of men. That was the rumour. Such a one should have ways of finding a
man, even a man alone in the wide and barren North. If that was so,
then he was taking his time about it.
    Logen scratched
at his tangled beard and wondered what was keeping the great one.
Perhaps he was lost. He asked himself again if he should have stayed
in the forests, where food at least was plentiful. But to the south
the spirits had said, and if you went south from the hills you came
to these withered moors. So here he had waited in the briars and the
mud, in bad weather, and mostly gone hungry.
    His boots were
worn out anyway, so he had set his miserable camp not far from the
road, the better to see this wizard coming. Since the wars, the North
was full of dangerous scum—deserting warriors turned bandit,
peasants fled from their burned-out land, leaderless and desperate
men with nothing left to lose, and so on. Logen wasn’t worried,
though. No one had a reason to come to this arsehole of the world. No
one but him and the Magus.
    So he sat and
waited, looked for food, didn’t find any, sat and waited some
more. At this time of year the moors were often soaked by sudden
downpours, but he would have smoky, thorny little fires by night if
he could, to keep his flagging spirits up and attract any passing
wizards. It had been raining this evening, but it had stopped a while
before and it was dry enough for a fire. Now he had his pot over it,
cooking a stew with the last of the meat he had brought with him from
the forest. He would have to move on in the morning, and look for
food. The Magus could catch up with him later, if he still cared.
    He was stirring
his meagre meal, and wondering whether to go back north or move on
south tomorrow, when he heard the sound of hooves on the road. One
horse, moving slowly. He sat back on his coat and waited. There was a
neigh, the jingle of a harness. A rider came over the rise. With the
watery sun low on the horizon behind, Logen couldn’t see him
clearly, but he sat stiff and awkward in his saddle, like a man not
used to the road. He urged his horse gently in the direction of the
fire and reined in a few yards