Book 2 - Lord of the Silent Kingdom Read Online Free PDF Page A

of harsh pain. "Bring that corpse.
Somebody in the Collegium may be able to get something out of it."
    Ghort did not argue although, strictly speaking, the Captain-General
of Patriarchal forces had no standing with the Brothen City Regiment.
"What the hell just happened, Pipe? I mean, I'm fucking glad it did,
but there ain't no way you shouldn't be all over looking like Polo's
arm now." Ghort had Polo down, now, trying to examine his arm. Polo
would not lie still. "That black bolt shoulda plugged you in the
brisket. But it turned off. And got this poor bastard."
    "I don't know. I'm glad it did. Though I'm sorry about Polo's arm."
    "No shit. Hold still, goddamnit! Garnier! Arnoul! Get those damned
horses under control! Aaron's Hairy Balls! They're worse than kids. You
have to tell them everything."
    Piper Hecht burst into laughter.
    "What?"
    "Grade Drocker said the same about you not that long ago."
    "When? I was always a self-starter."
    "When we were in the Connec. At Bishop Serifs's manor, besieging
Antieux."
    "That was different. You didn't want to stick your neck out around
those Brotherhood of War assholes. They didn't care what you did, it
was fucked up. You were always wrong just because you didn't belong to
their crazy man club."
    Pinkus Ghort always had an answer. It might not ring true or make
sense, but he had one.
    "The corpse," Hecht reminded gently.
    "Izzy. Buchie. Search the dead guy. And don't pocket anything. It
could kill you later." Softly, he said, "They wouldn't take nothing, no
how. They're all guys from out in the sticks. So superstitious and
scared of the Night it'll be a miracle if they keep it together now
long enough to find the kind of priest who'll pretend to pull the
imaginary supernatural leeches off them."
    Ghort was exaggerating. That was a matter of course. But Hecht had
run into people who were that afraid of the hidden world. People who
could not draw a breath without praying and calculating how much
attention that might draw from the Instrumentalities of the Night.
    Brothe being the Holy Mother City of the Episcopal strain of
Chaldareanism, its streets ever boasted floods of religious pilgrims.
Many were the sort who held intimate discourse with their deity every
waking moment. They wandered in a perpetual daze, babbling constantly.
    God must find them annoying. They suffered more misfortunes than
the less devout.
    Ghort helped Polo onto his mount. Sensitive to the Night, the animal
grew skittish. Men, forced to walk because their mounts were carrying a
dead sorcerer, a wounded ambusher, or had run away, kept Polo's horse
under control.
    Polo was incoherent.
    He needed a healing brother. Soon.
    Pinkus Ghort did not dispute possession of the prisoners. "Just let me
have one healthy one, Pipe. A trophy. So I don't have to listen to
Principatè Doneto bark."
    "Take your pick. Take two if you want." Hecht was confident that
nothing useful could be gained from any of the prisoners. "That'll ease
my budget." Working for Sublime, even indirectly, included an endless,
thankless, continuous scramble for money. The Patriarch had no
comprehension of economics. He could not be made to understand that he
had to have income if he wanted to spend. He resented any effort to
explain by those whose wages had to be paid and whose costs had to be
underwritten.
    Sublime was convinced that the Lord would provide. And that hired
hands should be happy with what the Lord provided.
    They were crossing the vast limestone sprawl of the Closed Ground,
so-called since antiquity because the wings of the Chiaro Palace
enfolded it completely. The Palace was three and four stories high, its
limestone architecture classically simple. The eastern face, in the
direction of the Holy Lands, boasted balconies where the Patriarch and
senior Principatès presented themselves on Holy Days. There were always
scaffoldings somewhere around the marges of the Closed Ground. The
Chiaro Palace was under continuous rehabilitation.
    The