The Hammer Part 31

"Getting ready," she replied.

She'd pulled out another, smaller table. It was neatly piled with rolled-up strips of cloth, tin basins, various incongruous tools-pliers, a hacksaw, a spread-out roll of needles. "What's all this junk for?" he asked.

"Like I said," she told him, "I'm getting ready."

And three books: two closed, the third open and face down, to mark the place if she needed it in a hurry. "What's going on?" he asked.

"You don't know."

"If I knew..."

She frowned. Such inefficiency. "Uncle Marzo and Gignomai and a load of other people have gone to fight the met'Oc," she said. "I'm not entirely sure why, they wouldn't let me listen. I think it's because the met'Oc have given guns to the savages so they can attack us."

He stared at her. "Gignomai-"

"He made a speech," Teucer said. "He said something about his sister, but I couldn't hear enough to make any sense of it. Anyway, they've all gone off, so I thought I'd better make a few preparations, in case anybody gets hurt." There was a sort of wild hope under her flat, calm voice that turned his stomach. After all, what better chance could she possibly ask for?

"When did they leave?" Furio asked.

She shrugged. "Five hours ago, more or less. They've gone to the Tabletop. They took a couple of carts full of tools and Uncle's long ladder. I'm guessing Gignomai's going to show them the place where he got out, when he ran away."

Furio stood perfectly still. I have no idea what I'm supposed to do now, he thought. Five hours. How long would it take him to run to the Tabletop? Not that he was capable of running that far; he'd be lucky to make it at a slow hobble. But there were horses in the livery. Of course, Ra.s.so would most likely have joined the posse, so the livery would be closed for business, so he'd have to break in and steal a horse, which was against the law. "Are you going after them?" he heard Teucer say. It was one of her flat questions; she might just as well have been asking him what he fancied for dinner.

"I don't know," Furio replied. "I mean, what use would I be?"

"Gignomai's your friend. I'd have thought you'd have wanted to help him."

No point in even starting to explain. "Do you happen to know if Ra.s.so was with them? You know, at the livery."

"I heard his voice," Teucer said, "at the meeting. So presumably yes. Why?"

She'd finished with the oilstone and was stropping the blade on one of Uncle Marzo's belts. You'd need the finest possible edge for surgery. He s.h.i.+vered. "Thanks," he said, and made for the door.

"You've hurt your ankle," she called after him. "Want me to take a look at it?"

He fled without answering and hobbled and skipped as quickly as he could down the street to the corner, where the livery stood. The main gate was closed and the bar was down, but there was no padlock in the hasp. No point stealing a horse in the colony, where everybody knew every horse, pony, donkey and mule by sight, along with who owned it. He chose a short-legged chestnut cob, purely because it was closer to the ground than any of the other horses, so less far to fall. He knew how to tack up a carthorse, but he'd never put on a saddle before. He was a lousy rider at the best of times.

He led it outside, lined it up with the mounting-block, climbed the two short steps and put his foot in the stirrup. "Nice horse," he said.

The first ten yards were fine, then the saddle slipped. He dismounted, and tightened the girth, which had been plenty tight when he'd put the saddle on. b.l.o.o.d.y thing must've been holding its breath, he rationalised. He led it back to the block and tried again. Gripping the pommel of the saddle with the fingers of both hands, he nudged firmly with his heels. The horse carried on ambling, like a prosperous citizen taking a turn round the square after dinner. He kicked harder, and harder still. The horse broke into a grudging trot, which threatened to hammer his spine into his head like a nail.

The earliest version of the met'Oc wedding ceremony to survive dates from the reign of the Sixth Emperor. Inscribed on four bronze s.h.i.+elds installed on the central pillar of the north transept of the New Temple, they are largely illegible on account of corrosion and the extremely archaic script in which they are written, but a transcript made in the fifteenth year of the Twenty-First Emperor survives in the archives of the Studium. The version generally used, up to the family's exile in the ninth year of the Fortieth Emperor, was the Seventh Revision, compiled on the orders of Lambanomai met'Oc on the occasion of his eldest son's wedding to Anser, youngest daughter of the Nineteenth Emperor in the last year of his reign. The Seventh Revision requires that the bride be brought in procession from her father's house, preceded by twelve Knights of Equity on white horses and accompanied by ninety halbardiers, who will in due course comprise her honour guard during her first three years of married life. The groom meets her on the steps of the White Temple, escorted by the Senate and the heads of the six Departments in military dress and representatives of the Studium, the Hospital and the three Orders Martial. The bride is permitted to wear the customary costume of her family, but the groom must be dressed in his formal regalia as Count of the Stables and Chaplain Domestic. The ceremony is conducted by the City Patriarch, a.s.sisted by the Provost of the White Temple, the bride's family chaplain and the met'Oc Chaplain-General. After the ceremony it is optional, but customary, for the groom's honour guard to distribute gold angels, struck with the groom's head on the obverse and the bride's on the reverse, to the crowds in Temple Square. These coins are recognised as legal tender by a special Act of Senate.

The met'Oc in exile used the Ninth, or Emergency, Revision for the wedding of Lusomai met'Oc. Dating from the sixth year of the Twenty-Second Emperor, it was compiled by government draughtsmen on the orders of the Senate to facilitate the wedding of Thanomai met'Oc to his cousin Pa.s.ser as he lay dying in his tent after the Battle of the Field of Roses, thereby ensuring the smooth transition of the family honours and properties to Pa.s.ser's brother, Lanthanomai, who served as Steward Regent until Thanomai's son by his previous marriage came of age. Since the Ninth Revision, of necessity, provided for a morganatic marriage, the terms were amended for Phainomai's wedding. Copies of the amendment were sent to the Senate for ratification, but no reply was ever received.

In the third book of his Commentaries on the House Law of the met'Oc, Commentaries on the House Law of the met'Oc, a copy of which, in his own hand, was lodged by met'Oc sympathisers in the Studium archives at some point before his death, Phainomai met'Oc came to the conclusion that the validity of the Ninth Revision depended on the groom being ent.i.tled to the status of a copy of which, in his own hand, was lodged by met'Oc sympathisers in the Studium archives at some point before his death, Phainomai met'Oc came to the conclusion that the validity of the Ninth Revision depended on the groom being ent.i.tled to the status of sun hoplois sun hoplois-that is to say, on active service as a commander of forces in the field, and therefore exempt from the formal requirements of certain aspects of matrimonial, property and testamentary law. Phainomai argued that the second son of the met'Oc in exile was, by virtue of his position as House Constable, inherently and permanently sun hoplois sun hoplois until such time as his elder brother succeeded to the family honours, maintaining that the perilous nature of the met'Oc's existence, surrounded on all sides by potentially hostile neighbours, meant that the Constable's service was, in theory and often in practice, continuously active. Nevertheless, quite possibly under pressure from Boulomai met'Ousa to ensure the irreproachable legitimacy of the marriage, Phainomai formally invested Lusomai met'Oc with an active commission against the colonists and the savages before allowing the bride to be admitted to the Great Hall for the public part of the ceremony. until such time as his elder brother succeeded to the family honours, maintaining that the perilous nature of the met'Oc's existence, surrounded on all sides by potentially hostile neighbours, meant that the Constable's service was, in theory and often in practice, continuously active. Nevertheless, quite possibly under pressure from Boulomai met'Ousa to ensure the irreproachable legitimacy of the marriage, Phainomai formally invested Lusomai met'Oc with an active commission against the colonists and the savages before allowing the bride to be admitted to the Great Hall for the public part of the ceremony.

To reflect this, the full-strength house garrison paraded in the courtyard throughout the ceremony. Lusomai protested about this, expressing grave concern about leaving the Gates and Doorstep unguarded. His father overruled him, citing the case of Coptomai met'Oc in the reign of the Fourteenth Emperor, whose commission in the Fifth Vesani War was retrospectively invalidated because two regiments of his army were not present in the encampment when Coptomai a.s.sumed his command. Phainomai's interpretation was supported by Boulomai met'Ousa, referring to the practice of his own family, and Gignomai met'Oc, who also drew attention to the fourth section of the Dispensations Dispensations, concerning commencement and transfer of commands. Lusomai gave way with his customary good grace, and ordered the muster of the garrison.

He had to stand on the raised platform at the far end of the Hall, next to Stheno and Boulo. He could see the back of Luso's head, and beyond that the faces of the two dozen or so farmhands and servants standing on either side of the strip of faded blue carpet along which the bride would walk. Off to the left, Father was waiting in the cheese store to make his grand entrance. He saw his mother in the front row. They'd let her have a chair to sit in. He couldn't see from where he was standing, but he doubted the chair legs were fastened to the floor.

Someone had made an effort. The sconces in the walls (no longer used; they made do with tallow candles these days) were draped with swathes of ivy and fir branches. Someone had knotted a rope of wild roses, twenty feet long, and looped it through the crossbeams of the roof, too high to be properly seen unless you stood with your head right back. It looked ridiculous and faintly sad, like children dressing up as people from history, using their imaginations but having to make do with what they could find in the hedgerows or the dressing-up basket.

His mother was staring at her feet. He hadn't seen her for months. If she'd looked up at him, it must've been when he was looking the other way. Stheno's boots were black and s.h.i.+ny with the stuff they used for blacking the fire-irons. He only had the one pair, but they'd come up really well. As for Boulomai, he looked like the rich kid at the party who doesn't fit in. His parents have had a proper costume made for him, while all the other kids are wearing painted paper armour and old sheets. There were oil-stains on his sash where a snapping-hen pistol usually rested, but he hadn't felt the need to come armed to his sister's wedding. He was picking at the b.u.t.tons on his tunic sleeve.

"h.e.l.lo, Cousin Boulo," Gignomai said quietly.

"Gignomai." Boulo frowned, looking straight ahead. "Thanks for coming back. I know how much it means to your brother."

"Well." Gignomai glanced sideways at him. Less to Cousin Boulo than meets the eye. "This is the sort of occasion when the whole family needs to be together. It's just a shame my sister couldn't be here."

"I didn't know you had a sister."

"She's away at school," Gignomai said, "back Home, under a false name. That's why we don't talk about her in front of strangers. But you're family. I guess the rule doesn't apply." He was about to add, "Ask Luso about her; he's got lots of stories," but bit the words back. No point, and no need. Forgive me, he mouthed silently, as the nail forgives the hammer. But Boulo was still looking dead ahead, and didn't notice.

The Ninth Revision was silent on the subject of appropriate music, so Father had given orders for the house musician to play a solemn air on the rebec until the arrival of the bride, at which point he was to strike up the met'Oc march. This was his debut performance (he usually worked for Stheno, doing odd jobs) and he was out of practice, or just not very good. The rebec was two hundred years old and had belonged to an emperor's daughter; its soundbox was cracked and two of the strings had gone soft.

I must watch all this, Gignomai told himself, and make sure I remember. This time tomorrow, I'll be the only one left, and I have a duty to posterity to bear witness.

The double doors at the far end of the hall opened, and the bride came through. At least, there was a figure dressed in a great swathe of material, and he a.s.sumed she was in there somewhere. Gignomai frowned slightly. He knew the contents of every trunk and box in the store rooms, the sculleries and the barns. He'd have noticed enough fine white silk to cover a hay-rick. She'd brought it with her, then, her wedding dress, and presumably not just on the off-chance. She looked lonely and barely human pacing slowly up the Hall. He guessed she was taking her time so as not to tread on the trailing excess of hem and end up flat on her face. It could just as easily have been a bear under all that veil, but n.o.body here had that sort of sense of humour.

Eventually she halted, like a s.h.i.+p drifting into harbour on a flat wind. Beside him Stheno coughed loudly, whereupon the cheese-store door opened and Father came out. He was an extraordinary sight, in the full formal court dress of an Elector of the Empire, complete with brocaded gown, wig and sword. He walked painfully, taking short steps. The costume was his father's, and Phainomai was several sizes bigger. He looked like a man wearing his wife's clothes for a bet.

Even in the Emergency Revision, the words of the ceremony were in the old language. There was a speech to begin with, a general address that lasted for as long as it takes to pluck a chicken. Then Luso was allowed to take two steps forward. He and Pasi knew their lines reasonably well, though since n.o.body in the room except Father could understand what they were saying, it didn't matter terribly much. Cousin Boulo kept his eyes tight shut until the last response had been given, then breathed a long sigh, which Gignomai a.s.sumed was relief. He knew how he felt.

Next came the reading of the settlement, and Gignomai stood up a little straighter, paying close attention. As her dowry, Pasi brought with her substantial estates in the northern and eastern provinces, together with the rents of three market towns and the benefit of four advowsons, and a number of turnpike roads, a merchant s.h.i.+p and a share in a mercantile consortium, a street of shops and two inns in the City. In return, the met'Oc settled on her a whole county in the southern province, a bell foundry, the benefit of government contracts in perpetuity to supply lumber, rope and chain to the Navy, the met'Oc town house and, very much an afterthought, all honours and possessions currently enjoyed by the met'Oc overseas. The deed was signed by Father, Luso and Pasi (a tiny pink hand struggled out of the cloth to take the pen), and sealed by Father with the Great Seal, after three goes at getting the wax to melt.

That's it, Gignomai thought, that's the fall of the hammer: going once, going twice, sold and delivered. He felt an unsettling flow of strength seep into his arms and legs, as though a lever had been thrown to connect him to the drive-shaft. He'd lost track of the time, but it didn't really matter. If they had to wait, so what?

His original plan had simply been to pretend to pa.s.s out, but he'd decided against it. Father was quite capable of leaving him lying there until the ceremony was over. So much simpler just to walk out, quickly, stepping in front of Boulo rather than Stheno, since his brother might make a grab and stop him. Even so, it proved extraordinarily difficult to make himself do it. You'll be in so much trouble later, yelled every instinct he had. But there wouldn't be a later. He took the first step, and the rest followed. He saw Father look round at him with murderous fury on his face; Boulo even took a step back to let him pa.s.s. Luso, the only one who might conceivably have guessed, was mercifully preoccupied.

Out through the side door into the boot-and-hat room, through that and into fresh air. The first thing he did was glance up at the sun, but it was masked in cloud. He had no idea what the time was. He looked back to make sure n.o.body was following him, then walked quickly across the stable yard, pushed open the rickety gate and broke into a run.

Even then he couldn't help grinning, thinking of himself as a boy, slipping out to go and meet his common friend from town. Different friends would be waiting for him this time, but it hardly signified. He was glad there wasn't enough time for him to linger and take a last look, which he knew he would have done, had it been possible.

He'd drawn them a map, but he wasn't expecting them actually to be there. He was, therefore, pleasantly surprised to see them-they were doing their best to keep out of sight, but they stood out like blood on snow-though the incongruity of their presence offended him before he'd had a chance to adjust his att.i.tude. They had no right to be here; trespa.s.sers on private land. That's all right, he told himself firmly, they're with me. They're my guests.

"What the h.e.l.l took you so-?"

"Quiet," he snapped, and whoever it was, someone he didn't recognise, fell silent as abruptly as though he'd had his throat cut. "The wedding's in full swing, they're all inside except the garrison, and they're standing to in the courtyard."

"That's not what you said," Ra.s.so interrupted; he was terrified. "You said they'd all be in the house. We can't-"

Gignomai rolled his eyes. "Can't you read a simple map? The courtyard's inside the main wall. The hall's right next to the wall. We can secure all three doors of the hall without anyone in the courtyard noticing, and we'll block the yard gate so the garrison won't be able to get through. They'll just have to stand there and watch; they won't be able to do a thing." He turned his head and looked for Marzo, and found him. "You brought the stuff I told you?"

Marzo nodded. "Hammers, nails, a couple of saws. That's what you said," he added. "Isn't it?"

"That's fine." Gignomai stopped to take a deep breath, like a diver who expects to be under for a dangerously long time. "Right," he said, "follow me."

He led them back the way he'd just come, and it felt all wrong. They were all scared half to death, as though he was leading them out of the fire and the slaughter, not in to start it. Luso'd wet himself laughing if he could see them, he thought. Some army. But there was n.o.body about, not in the home meadow, not in the stableyard. They filled the yard; there was barely enough room for them all. He thought what Luso would be able to achieve with his hanger, among so many frightened men, so tightly packed together. He didn't really care, but the thought disturbed him.

"All right," he said. "This is the side door, ten of you here, there's planks and battens in the woodshed just over there. Ten of you round that side, you'll find the kitchen door. You four, shoot the bolts on the yard gates, then get back here. The rest of you with me, round the front."

They emptied the woodshed of suitable lumber and divided up into their three contingents. Gignomai didn't look back. He'd put Heddo in charge of the kitchen door and Ra.s.so (yes, but what harm could he do?) would deal with the side. He led his party, forty strong, with Marzo right behind him trying to keep up, round the corner to the main gate.

"Double doors," he said, "so we'll need at least a ten-foot plank." He chose one from the selection they offered him, and took a hammer and a fistful of long nails, his own make, from the factory. "Soon as we start hammering they're going to realise something's going on, so we need to wedge the door first. It opens outwards, so there's no problem. Then we just get the nails in as quick as we can, and that's the job done."

He looked at them, and although they were white with fear, he could see they believed him. None of them had taken the trouble to look up and see the great first-floor bow window, the only weak point in his plan. He herded his party closer together. If anyone dropped anything out of the window it'd hit someone, but they wouldn't be able to jump out and expect to survive. That was the best he could do.

He chose a good solid fence post and wedged it under the head-sized iron knocker on the left door. On the right side he had to make do with jamming a section of rafter under the bottom edge of the hinge. Shouldn't matter. It'd take Luso a second or two to figure out what the hammering meant, and six, seven more seconds to run to the door. Plenty of time to knock in a couple of nails.

He put one nail in his mouth, the other stayed between the fingers of his left hand. With his right, he lifted the hammer. He nodded, and two men lifted the inch-thick oak plank and presented it level across the door, just above the knocker. He touched the point of the nail lightly to the wood and swung the hammer.

The sound of the blow was like Luso's gun going off in the early morning, lifting the crows out of the trees, hitting the edge of the wood and bouncing back. He hit hard, counting the seconds under his breath. One nail home. He spat the other one into his hand, fumbled it, positioned it and hammered. He paused for a moment, just long enough to hear hammer blows from the other side of the house. Then he drove in four more nails, two each side, as easily as if he'd been doing this sort of thing all his life.

"Finish up," he snapped, pus.h.i.+ng the hammer at the man standing next to him. "Three more planks." As he turned away, he heard the thump of a fist on the other side of the door. They'd be shoulder-charging it in a moment or so, but the plank was in and should hold. He strolled across the yard, pausing to pick up a bit of stick from the woodshed, to the small hay barn. Plenty of loose straw on the floor. He picked up a fat handful and wrapped it carefully, tightly round the stick.

Father had always been mortified that the met'Oc should live in a thatched house. His father had tried to make tiles, or have tiles made, but the river clay wasn't the right sort. It cracked when you fired it. Father had had his eye on the slate beds down by the coast for many years, but obtaining enough slate would have meant trading with the colonists. The house stayed thatched.

Gignomai had stolen a tinderbox from the kitchens rather than use his own, which had come from Marzo's store and didn't work very well. He watched the spark drop into the moss and blew on it gently, like a boy blowing in a girl's ear. Such a little thing, a spark, like an idea. He watched it bud and flower, then touched the straw to it and wandered back to the gate.

"What are you doing?" someone asked. He didn't answer. He felt and savoured the moment as it sank in, as they figured it out for themselves, were properly horrified, and did nothing.

He fancied he could hear Luso's voice, but it was hard to tell over the noise of the hammers and the thump of bodies slamming against the other side of the door. It was shaking with every impact, but the met'Oc had built their doors of ply, to resist axes, sledgehammers and battering-rams. It was the posts wedged against the doors rather than the planks nailed across them that were taking, and resisting, the strain. Gignomai was surprised at that, but it all came to the same thing. He walked backwards a few steps until he could see the top ridge of the roof. Then he swung the torch back and threw it as hard as he could.

It was better this way, he thought. He had no particular interest in watching them die, no furious need to taunt or harangue them, to let them know how he felt. He was quite content to communicate with them purely through fire with the minimum possible contact. When it was all over, there'd be nothing left to speak of, just anonymous bones that could just as easily be some farm worker as his brothers or parents. It'd be like coming home from a long journey to find your family had all died while you were away-upsetting, but all over. Gignomai had no time for people who enjoyed revelling in their emotions.

The torch pitched just short of the top ridge, rolled a little way and came to rest. It flickered, for a moment Gignomai thought it was going to go out, but the thatch all around it began to smoke, and then to burn. He'd chosen his spot with care, directly over the north wall of the library. As soon as it burned through, fire would fall on Father's desk, where there were always loose papers, and on the old, dry books of genealogy, history, house law. The heat would shatter the windows, letting in the brisk southerly breeze. The polished oak floor, fanned by the crossdraught, would burn through and drop floorboards and rafters into the hall below, while the fire would carry down through the cricks and beams of the house and collapse the walls. By then, of course, the smoke would have- "Just a moment," someone was saying. "The women and the farm hands. How're they going to get out?"

He looked past the face that had just spoken. They were all looking at him. "They can't," he said.

"But that's-" The speaker, someone he knew by sight from over East Reach, had a stunned look on his face. "You can't do that. It's murder."

Gignomai did Luso's shrug, all lazy shoulders and straight back. "Fine," he said. "If that bothers you, you can pry off those planks and pull out the props. Go on, there's still time." He waited. n.o.body moved. "Of course," he went on, "you'll have to apologise to my brother for spoiling his wedding, and he might not be in a mood to listen. But if it bothers you that much, go ahead."

n.o.body moved. Gignomai remembered n.o.body moving the first time, when Father had his daughter tied to a chair. They'd known something bad was about to happen, the moment had come and pa.s.sed and moved on, but n.o.body could quite bring themselves to be the first to speak, and the moment moved on a little more as Father beckoned to the nurse and she stepped forward with the needle and thread, and n.o.body moved then either, or spoke. Now, this time, he looked round for somebody to move, or say something. They all looked at him, but n.o.body said anything or did anything, and the only sound was the crackle of burning straw and the thumping of a fist on the inside. He tried to remember if Father had said anything. He rather thought not, and so decided to say nothing himself. The moments came and went and moved on, and Gignomai couldn't help thinking, Like Father, like son. Same act, different reason, same outcome. At least I said something this time, he comforted himself. It's them standing still and quiet while the thatch burns. Very clearly he could see inside their minds: any moment now, someone else would do something or say something, any moment now they'll rip down the planks and let those people out of there, and the met'Oc would come tumbling out, coughing and blind, weak as baby rats in a nest, and we'll take away their weapons and tell them not to do it again, and they'll have learned their lesson and everything will be fine. There's still time (there had still been time, right up to the time she died, and then there was no time at all) for someone to do something, but not me. Not me standing up to the man in charge, the last of the met'Oc, and getting my throat cut for it.

He heard the crack of timber. Soon the first burning beam would fall on the paper.

To take his mind off the pa.s.sage of time, he considered the doors. Six planks had been nailed across, a fistful of nails each side. But Luso was in there, a clever, strong, resourceful man. "Get another half-dozen planks and nail them longwise," he said. "Better safe than sorry."

Four men jumped to it. They looked happy to be doing something, rather than just standing around. The man who'd spoken earlier came close. He was short, and Gignomai had to lean forward to hear him, because for some reason he was whispering, "I thought we'd light the thatch and just guard the doors," the short man said, "and as they came running out-well, we'd let the women and the farm hands go."

Gignomai nodded gravely. "And cut down the met'Oc with our billhooks."

The short man didn't answer. His face was twisted with fear and something else-shame, Gignomai guessed. "I didn't think we were going to kill all all of them." of them."

"All right," Gignomai said. "We can do it that way if you want, there's still time. You want to prise off the planks, be my guest. You may need to talk it over with the others, but I won't stop you."

The short man stared at him as though he'd spoken to someone he thought he knew, who had turned out to be the Angel of Death in a big, floppy hood. "Sure?" Gignomai said. "I mean it. You go right ahead and take down the planks and let Luso out, and I promise I won't interfere."

The short man took a long step backwards, and Gignomai lost sight of his face in the crowd. One man, he thought, and too scared when it came to it, but better than us. Not better enough, though. The four men came back with more planks, and a bucket of rusty nails they'd found on the windowledge. Those who had hammers kept themselves busy for quite some time.

Smoke, Gignomai thought. In a house fire it's the smoke that kills everyone. It's a well-known fact. Must be filling up by now. Maybe they were all dead already. He smiled, thinking of the first time Stheno had tried to make charcoal. He had been too impatient, and kept pulling the rick apart to see what was happening inside, with the result that the air got in and burned most of the wood to ash. He wasn't about to make the same mistake. In fact, there wasn't any reason why they should hang around waiting. It made much more sense if they all went home and came back in the morning.

He heard a woman scream. He had to think for a moment before he could place the voice: Dorper, she worked in the kitchen; a big mound of a woman who talked in grunts; she'd run away from the colony twelve years ago because her husband beat her up. He speculated whether, if he could talk to Luso, maybe they could arrange something, a truce, safe pa.s.sage for the women, at least. Just the sort of thing Luso might agree to, given how marinaded in honour and proper conduct he'd been all his life. But it was his parents and brother in there, in that furnace with him, and his wife. Honour might just slip his mind at the sight of a door opening. Besides, Dorper worked in the kitchen. She could've smuggled out a few crusts of bread in her sleeves or her ap.r.o.n pocket, or used a small paring-knife to cut through his sister's st.i.tches. He apologised to her under his breath, but that was as far as he was prepared to go.

He heard the gla.s.s in the bow window above his head shatter. As he lifted his head to look, he saw a blur, something falling, a man. He should have broken his neck, but he landed with his heels on young Fasenna's shoulders. Fasenna crumpled, going down like a nail driven into wood by a hammer. The jumper stood up, and some fool lifted a billhook at him. With a movement so smooth you'd have sworn they'd rehea.r.s.ed it together for hours, the jumper twisted the billhook out of the man's hands, took a neat step back and swung at the fool's knee. There was a sound like someone driving in a fence post, then a crack as the jumper twisted on the hook handle to free the blade, which had sunk two inches into the fool's kneecap. The fool dropped, his mouth moving, both hands round his knee. He twisted on the ground like a landed fish. n.o.body else moved, of course.

"Luso?" Gignomai said.

The jumper took a pace sideways and backwards, fencer's footwork. His head was bald and bright red, and his face was more or less melted away, but he wore burnt rags that had once been Luso's wedding costume. His boots were still smoking. Gignomai knew him by his size, the remains of the clothes and his footwork. He shortened his grip on the billhook shaft and, like a shape-s.h.i.+fter in a fairy tale, became the low guard for polearms, straight out of the coaching manual.

Gignomai glanced past him, afraid that someone might be stupid enough to try and stab Luso in the back. Such an attempt, he knew, would not end well for the attacker. But the half circle of colonists standing well out of Luso's reach were quite still, all desperately hoping that the eyes in the back of Lusomai met'Oc's head wouldn't notice them so long as they didn't move. Luso s.h.i.+fted his guard from low to middle. His left eye was opaque and half closed.

"What're you going to do, Luso?" Gignomai asked. "Are you going to kill us all?"

(Which he could, of course. He had the strength and the skill, and the colonists were far too scared to fight, too frozen to run. There were technical exercises in Luso's books that covered the single-handed slaughter of a section, a platoon, a company. The skill, according to the books, lay in achieving the slaughter using the minimum number of handstrokes.) Then Luso spoke. He said, "Gig? Are you all right?"

Coming from a man half burned away, it was a ludicrous thing to say. "I'm fine, Luso," he replied.

"You got out in time."

"Sure." Gignomai couldn't feel scared any more. He realised, with a deep, sick feeling, that Luso had been worried about him; hadn't yet figured it out. "I got out before the fire started. I started the fire."

Luso s.h.i.+vered, but it wasn't the pain. "Don't say that, Gig. Not funny."

"I started the fire." He said it like a child almost, like a child taunting his elder brother from some place of safety, halfway up a tree or down a hole too small for a nearly grown-up to crawl into. "I planned it all. I brought them here. I came to your wedding so I could burn you all to death." He tried to look at Luso's face, but he couldn't help watching the billhook blade. Too many hours of weapon practice: always watch the blade, not the man. "It was all me, Luso. So, what're you going to do about it?"

And the forty or so men Luso had his back to just stood there and did nothing, while he faced a sharp edge, unarmed and unarmoured. I don't care what happens next, Gignomai realised, whatever happens is just tidying up loose ends.

"You f.u.c.king b.a.s.t.a.r.d, Gig," Luso said. "What did you want to do a thing like that for?"

It was as if he'd borrowed Luso's bow and lost his favourite arrow, or galloped his favourite horse over the stones and lamed it, as though it was some act of thoughtless stupidity, but no malice. Gignomai sighed. He'd have to spell it out, then. "He tied her to a chair and sewed her mouth up, Luso," he said, patiently, as to an idiot, "and you just stood back and didn't do anything. All of you. So..." He shrugged. That just about covered it. What more needed to be said? "What're you going to do?" he repeated. "Up to you. I really don't mind."

And that, he knew as he made himself look away from the sharp edge and into his brother's one good eye, was no more or less than the truth. There was no anger left. Still, he thought, I'm also here as a witness. We might as well have the facts, while there's still time. "Father?" he asked. "And Stheno?"

"Dead," Luso said. "Stheno was trying to cut a hole in the roof, and a rafter fell on him. I was in the library, trying to beat out the fire. When I went down to tell them it was out of control, Father and Mother were dead in the smoke. So I thought..."

"You came to find me," Gignomai said. "To see if I'd made it." He waited, to see if he could gouge a reply out of the melted face. No chance. "And your wife? Your brother-in-law?"

"Smoke," Luso said. "They're all dead, except me."

"It would be you, wouldn't it?" Gignomai shook his head. "Well, you're the head of the family now, Luso. You'd better make your mind up."

Luso looked at him, and Gignomai realised that he didn't understand. He still didn't understand. But being left alive is worse, for him. Serves him right for being too awkward to die. "Well?" Gignomai said, and Luso opened his hands, letting the billhook fall. It missed his feet by an inch or so and clattered on the flagstones. Then, slow, sad and weary, Luso turned his back on him and walked away. The colonists parted to let him through like an honour guard.

Gignomai counted ten steps. Then, from his inside pocket, he took the miniature snapping-hen pistol, the last one Aurelio had made, no bigger than an outstretched hand, three-eighths bore, one-inch barrel. He drew back the hammer until the sear snicked into place, then levelled it, looking down the stupid little barrel at the middle of Luso's back. He was fifteen yards away by now, an unreliable shot with a full-sized pistol, let alone a toy, and so far, Gignomai had never managed to hit what he'd been aiming at, not even at five yards. He concentrated, and pulled the trigger. The puff of white smoke from the pan blinded him for a moment. When it cleared, he saw that Luso had stopped. He was trying to turn round when he fell, like a sack of grain dropped from the hayloft door. He made an untidy pile of limbs on the ground.