The Great Leveller by Joe Abercrombie
‘Of course.’
‘So it wasn’t you at all who sent those boys to kill me at your weapon-take?’
The pipe froze half way to Reachey’s mouth. ‘Why would I do a thing like that?’
‘Because Seff was standing hostage, and I was talking big about dealing with Dow, and you decided to stir the pot a bit harder.’
Reachey pressed the end of his tongue between his teeth, lifted the pipe the rest of the way, sucked at it again, but it was dead. He tapped the ashes out on the stones by the fire. ‘If you’re going to stir the pot, I’ve always believed in doing it … firmly.’
Calder slowly shook his head. ‘Why not just get your old pricks to kill me when we were sat around the fire? Make sure of it?’
‘I got a reputation to think on. When it comes to knives in the dark I hire out, keep my name free of it.’ Reachey didn’t look guilty. He looked annoyed. Offended, even. ‘Don’t sit there like you’re disappointed. Don’t pretend you haven’t done worse. What about Forley the Weakest, eh? Killed him for nothing, didn’t you?’
‘I’m me!’ said Calder. ‘Everyone knows me for a liar! I guess I just …’ Sounded stupid now he said it. ‘Expected better from you. I thought you were a straight edge. Thought you did things the old way.’
Reachey gave a scornful grunt. ‘The old way? Hah! People are apt to get all misty-eyed over how things used to be. Age o’ Heroes, and all. Well, I remember the old way. I was there, and it was no different from the new.’ He leaned forward, stabbing at Calder with the stem of his pipe. ‘Grab what you can, however you can! Folk might like to harp on how your father changed everything. They like someone to blame. But he was just better at it than the rest. It’s the winners sing the songs. And they can pick what tune they please.’
‘I’m just picking out what tune they’ll play on you!’ hissed Calder, the anger flaring up for a moment. But, ‘Anger’s a luxury the man in the big chair can’t afford.’ That’s what his father used to say. Mercy, mercy, always think about mercy. Calder took in a long, sore breath, and heaved out resignation. ‘But maybe I’d have done no different, wearing your coat, and I’ve too few friends by far. The fact is I need your support.’
Reachey grinned. ‘You’ll have it. To the death, don’t worry about that. You’re family, lad. Family don’t always get on but, in the end, they’re the only ones you can trust.’
‘So my father used to tell me.’ Calder slowly stood and gave another aching sigh, right from his gut. ‘Family.’ And he made his way off through the fires, towards the tent that had been Black Dow’s.
‘And?’ croaked Shivers, falling into step beside him.
‘You were right. The old fuck tried to kill me.’
‘Shall I return the favour?’
‘By the dead, no!’ He forced his voice softer as they headed away. ‘Not until my child’s born. I don’t want my wife upset. Let things settle then do it quietly. Some way that’ll point the finger at someone else. Glama Golden, maybe. Can you do that?’
‘When it comes to killing, I can do it any way you want it.’
‘I always said Dow should’ve made better use of you. Now my wife’s waiting. Go and have some fun.’
‘I just might.’
‘What do you do for fun, anyway?’
There was a glint in Shivers’ eye as he turned away, but then there always was. ‘I sharpen my knives.’
Calder wasn’t quite sure if he was joking.
New Hands
Dear Mistress Worth,
With the greatest regret, I must inform you of the death of your son in action on the battlefield near Osrung. It is usual for the commanding officer to write such letters, but I requested the honour as I knew your son personally, and have but rarely in a long career served with so willing, pleasant, able, and courageous a comrade. He embodied all those virtues that one looks for in a soldier. I do not know if it can provide you with any satisfaction in the face of a loss so great, but it is not stretching the truth to say that your son died a hero. I feel honoured to have known him.
With the deepest condolences, Your obedient servant,
Corporal Tunny, Standard-Bearer of His Majesty’s First Regiment.
Tunny gave a sigh, folded the letter ever so carefully and pressed two neat creases into it with his thumbnail. Might be the worst letter the poor woman ever got, he owed it to her to put a decent crease in the damn thing. He tucked it inside his jacket next to Mistress Klige’s, unscrewed the cap from Yolk’s flask and took a nip, then dipped the pen in the ink bottle and started on the next.
Dear Mistress Lederlingen,
With the greatest regret, I must inform you of the death of your son in—
‘Corporal Tunny!’ Yolk was approaching with a cocky strut somewhere between a pimp and a labourer. His boots were caked with dirt, his stained jacket was hanging open showing a strip of sweaty chest, his sunburned face sported several days’ worth of patchy stubble and instead of a spear over his shoulder he had a worn shovel. He looked, in short, like a proud veteran of his August Majesty’s army. He came to a stop not far from Tunny’s hammock, looking down at the papers. ‘Working out all the debts you’re owed?’
‘The ones I owe, as it goes.’ Tunny seriously doubted Yolk could read, but he pushed a sheet of paper over the unfinished letter even so. If this got out it could ruin his reputation. ‘Everything all right?’
‘Everything’s well enough,’ said Yolk as he set down his shovel, though under his good humour he looked, in fact, a little pensive. ‘The colonel’s had us doing some burying.’
‘Uh.’ Tunny worked the stopper back into the ink bottle. He’d done a fair amount of burying himself and it was never a desirable duty. ‘Always some cleaning up to do after a battle. A lot to put right, here and at home. Might take years to clean up what takes a day or three to dirty.’ He cleaned off his pen on a bit of rag. ‘Might never happen.’
‘Why do it, then?’ asked Yolk, frowning off across the sunlit barley towards the hazy hills. ‘I mean to say, all the effort, and all the men dead, and what’ve we got done here?’
Tunny scratched his head. Never had Yolk down as a philosopher, but he guessed every man has his thoughtful moments. ‘Wars don’t often change much, in my considerable experience. Bit here, bit there, but overall there have to be better ways for men to settle their differences.’ He thought about it for a moment. ‘Kings, and nobles, and Closed Councils, and so forth, I never have quite understood why they keep at it, given how the lessons of history do seem to stack up powerfully against. War is damned uncomfortable work, for minimal rewards, and it’s the soldiers who always bear the worst.’
‘Why be a soldier, then?’
Tunny found himself temporarily at a loss for words. Then he shrugged. ‘Best job in the world, isn’t it.’
A group of horses were being led without urgency up the track nearby, hooves clopping at the mud, a few soldiers trudging along with them. One detached himself and strolled over, chewing at an apple. Sergeant Forest, and grinning broadly.
‘Oh, bloody hell,’ muttered Tunny under his breath, quickly clearing the last evidence of letter writing and tossing the shield he’d been leaning on under his hammock.
‘What is it?’ whispered Yolk.
‘When First Sergeant Forest smiles there’s rarely good news on the way.’
‘When is there good news on the way?’
Tunny had to admit Yolk had a point.
‘Corporal Tunny!’ Forest stripped his apple and flicked away the core. ‘You’re awake.’
‘Sadly, Sergeant, yes. Any news from our esteemed commanders?’
‘Some.’ Forest jerked a thumb towards the horses. ‘You’ll be delighted to learn we’re getting our mounts back.’
‘Marvellous,’ grunted Tunny. ‘Just in time to ride them back the way we came.’
‘Let it never be said that his August Majesty does not provide his loyal soldiers with everything needful. We’re pulling out in
Tunny found a smile of his own. He’d had about enough of the North. ‘Homewards, eh? My favourite direction.’
Forest saw Tunny’s grin and raised him a tooth on each side. ‘Sorry to disappoint you. We’re shipping for Styria.’
‘Styria?’ muttered Yolk, hands on hips.
‘For beautiful Westport!’ Forest flung an arm around Yolk’s shoulders and pushed his other hand out in front of them, as if showing off a magnificent civic vista where there was, in fact, a stand of rotting trees. ‘Crossroads of the world! We’re to stand alongside our bold allies in Sipani, and take righteous arms against that notorious she-devil Monzcarro Murcatto, the Snake of Talins. She is, by all reports, a fiend in human form, an enemy to freedom and the greatest threat ever to face the Union!’
‘Since Black Dow.’ Tunny rubbed at the bridge of his nose, his smile a memory. ‘Who we made peace with yesterday.’
Forest slapped Yolk on the shoulder. ‘The beauty of the soldier’s profession, trooper. The world never runs out of villains. And Marshal Mitterick’s just the man to make ’em quake!’
‘Marshal… Mitterick?’ Yolk looked baffled. ‘What happened to Kroy?’
‘He’s done,’ grunted Tunny.
‘How many have you outlasted now?’ asked Forest.
‘I’m thinking … eight, at a quick guess.’ Tunny counted them off on his fingers. ‘Frengen, then Altmoyer, then that short one …’
‘Krepsky.’
‘Krepsky. Then the other Frengen.’
‘The other Frengen,’ snorted Forest.
‘A notable fool even for a commander-in-chief. Then there was Varuz, then Burr, then West—’
‘He was a good man, West.’
‘Gone too early, like most good men. Then we had Kroy …’
‘Lord marshals are temporary in nature,’ explained Forest, gesturing at Tunny, ‘but corporals? Corporals are eternal.’
‘Sipani, you say?’ Tunny slid slowly back in his hammock, putting one boot up and rocking himself gently back and forth with the other. ‘Never been there myself.’ Now that he was thinking about it, he was starting to see the advantages. A good soldier always keeps an eye on the advantages. ‘Fine weather, I expect?’
‘Excellent weather,’ said Forest.
‘And I hear they have the best bloody whores in the world.’
‘The ladies of the city have been mentioned once or twice since the orders came down.’
‘Two things to look forward to.’
‘Which is two more than you get in the North.’ Forest was smiling bigger than ever. Bigger than seemed necessary. ‘And in the meantime, since your detail stands so sadly reduced, here’s another.’
‘Oh, no,’ groaned Tunny, all hopes of whores and sunshine quickly wilting.
‘Oh, yes! Up you come, lads!’
And up they came indeed. Four of them. New recruits, fresh off the boat from Midderland by their looks. Seen off at the docks with kisses from Mummy or sweetheart or both. New uniforms pressed, buckles gleaming, and ready for the noble soldiering life, indeed. They stared open-mouthed at Yolk, who could hardly have presented a greater contrast, his face pinched and rat-like, his jacket frayed and mud-smeared from grave-digging, one strap on his pack broken and repaired with string. Forest gestured towards Tunny like a showman towards his freak, and trotted out that same little speech he always gave.
‘Boys, this here is the famous Corporal Tunny, one of the longest serving non-commissioned officers in General Felnigg’s division.’ Tunny gave a long, hard sigh, right from his stomach. ‘A veteran of the Starikland Rebellion, the Gurkish War, the last Northern War, the Siege of Adua, the recent climactic Battle of Osrung and a quantity of peacetime soldiering that would have bored a keener mind to death.’ Tunny unscrewed the cap of Yolk’s flask, took a pull, then handed it over to its original owner, who shrugged and had a swig of his own. ‘He has survived the runs, the rot, the grip, the autumn shudders, the caresses of Northern winds, the buffets of Southern women, thousands of miles of marching, many years of his Majesty’s rations and even a tiny bit of actual fighting to stand – or sit – before you now …’
Tunny crossed one ruined boot over the other, sank slowly back into his hammock and closed his eyes, the sun glowing pink through his lids.
Old Hands
It was near sunset when he made it back. Midges swirling in clouds over the marshy little brook, yellowing leaves casting dappled shadows onto the path, boughs stirring in the breeze, low enough he had to duck.
The house looked smaller’n he remembered. It looked small, but it looked beautiful. Looked so beautiful it made him want to cry. The door creaked as he pushed it wide, almost as scared for some reason as he had been in Osrung. There was no one inside. Just the same old smoke-smelling dimness. His cot was packed away to make more space, slashes of pale sunlight across the boards where it had been.
No one here, and his mouth went sour. What if they were packed up and left? Or what if men had come when he was away, deserters turned bandit—
He heard the soft clock of an axe splitting logs. He ducked back out into the evening, hurrying past the pen and the staring goats and the five big tree stumps all hacked and scarred from years of his blade practice. Practice that hadn’t helped much, as it went. He knew now stabbing a stump ain’t much preparation for stabbing a man.
His mother was just over the rise, leaning on the axe by the old chopping block, arching her back while Festen gathered up the split halves and tossed ’em onto the pile. Beck stood there for a moment, watching ’em. Watching his mother’s hair stirring in the breeze. Watching the boy struggling with the chunks of wood.
‘Ma,’ he croaked.
She looked around, blinked at him for a moment. ‘You’re back.’
‘I’m back.’
He walked over to her, and she stuck one corner of the axe in the block for safe keeping and met him half way. Even though she was so much smaller than him she still held his head against her shoulder. Held it with one hand and pressed it to her, wrapped her other arm tight around him, strong enough to make it hard to breathe.
‘My son,’ she whispered.
He broke away from her, sniffing back his tears, looking down. Saw his cloak, or her cloak, and how muddied, and bloodied, and torn it was. ‘I’m sorry. Reckon I got your cloak ruined.’
She touched his face. ‘It’s a bit of cloth.’
‘Guess it is at that.’ He squatted down, and ruffled Festen’s hair. ‘You all right?’ He could hardly keep his voice from cracking.
‘I’m fine!’ Slapping Beck’s hand away from his head. ‘Did you get yourself a name?’
Beck paused. ‘I did.’
‘What is it?’
Beck shook his head. ‘Don’t matter. How’s Wenden?’
‘Same,’ said Beck’s mother. ‘You weren’t gone more’n a few days.’
He hadn’t expected that. Felt like years since he was last here. ‘I guess I was gone long enough.’
‘What happened?’
‘Can we … not talk about it?’
‘Your father talked about nothing else.’
He looked up at her. ‘If there’s one thing I learned it’s that I’m not my father.’
‘Good. That’s good.’ She patted him gently on the side of the face, wet glimmering in her eyes. ‘I’m glad you’re here. Don’t have the words to tell you how glad I am. You hungry?’
He stood, straightening his legs feeling like quite the effort, and wiped away more tears on the back of his wrist. Realised he hadn’t eaten since he left the Heroes, yesterday morning. ‘I could eat.’
‘I’ll get the fire lit!’ And Festen trotted off towards the house.
‘You coming in?’ asked Beck’s mother.
Beck blinked out towards the valley. ‘Reckon I might stay out here a minute. Split a log or two.’
‘All r
‘Oh.’ And he slid his father’s sword from his belt, held it for a moment, then offered it out to her. ‘Can you put this away?’
‘Where?’
‘Anywhere I don’t have to look at it.’
She took it from him, and it felt like a weight he didn’t have to carry no more. ‘Seems like good things can come back from the wars,’ she said.
‘Coming back’s the only good thing I could see.’ He leaned down and set a log on the block, spat on one palm and took up the wood axe. The haft felt good in his hands. Familiar. It fitted ’em better than the sword ever had, that was sure. He swung it down and two neat halves went tumbling. He was no hero, and never would be.
He was made to chop logs, not to fight.
And that made him lucky. Luckier’n Reft, or Stodder, or Brait. Luckier’n Drofd or Whirrun of Bligh. Luckier’n Black Dow, even. He worked the axe clear of the block and stood back. They don’t sing many songs about log-splitters, maybe, but the lambs were bleating, up on the fells out of sight, and that sounded like music. Sounded a sweeter song to him then than all the hero’s lays he knew.
He closed his eyes and breathed in the smell of grass and woodsmoke. Then he opened ’em, and looked across the valley. Skin all tingling with the peace of that moment. Couldn’t believe he used to hate this place.
Didn’t seem so bad, now. Didn’t seem so bad at all.
Everyone Serves
‘So you’re standing with me?’ asked Calder, breezy as a spring morning.
‘If there’s still room.’
‘Loyal as Rudd Threetrees, eh?’
Ironhead shrugged. ‘I won’t take you for a fool and say yes. But I know where my best interest lies and it’s at your heels. I’d also point out loyalty’s a dangerous foundation. Tends to wash away in a storm. Self-interest stands in any weather.’
Calder had to nod at that. ‘A sound principle.’ He glanced up at Foss Deep, lately returned to his service following the end of hostilities and an apt display of the power of self-interest in the flesh. Despite his stated distaste for battles he’d somehow acquired, gleaming beneath his shabby coat, a splendid Union breastplate engraved with a golden sun. ‘A man should have some, eh, Deep?’