Free Ascendant's Rite (The Moontide Quartet) by David Hair Page A
Authors: David Hair
that Gyle had been pussy-footing around in one of his usual highly suspect games of cat and mouse. Betillon didn’t have the patience for any of that; he just had the man brought in and racked. Mustaq al’Madhi was a fat, balding man who looked like a shopkeeper but apparently ran half the crime in the city. He’d had him and his male kin publically hanged and displayed them on the city wall. Examples had to be made.
By way of spreading his favours, he’d given the criminal’s women to the rankers to screw, apart from one, a skinny little maid who looked girlish enough to stir his own blood. She was roped up in one of the bed chambers awaiting his pleasure – his pleasure, not hers.
The Grandmaster of the Kirkegarde legion who had come with him to Javon, a scar-faced mage-knight named Lann Wilfort, leaned against the nearest pillar, picking his teeth. He’d just been expounding on the need to go north and knock some Gorgio heads together. ‘I’ll bring back the Tolidi bint for you to break,’ Wilfort was saying. ‘The Hytel mines are vital.’
‘I don’t care about this Tolidi woman,’ Betillon replied with a wave of the hand. He preferred unbled virgins, the younger the better, and the famed beauty of Portia Tolidi held little attraction, especially not when she’d so recently given birth – what an ugly mental image that was. She’ll be fat and stretched and ugly now, not to mention amply used by Francis Dorobon, they say. Why would I want that? ‘Forget Hytel. We can’t afford to send anyone, not until Gyle comes to heel.’
‘But the mines . . .’ Wilfort rubbed his scar, which ran from his right eye to the remaining stump of his ear. ‘They provide this wasteland with all its iron.’
‘Irrelevant for now: it’s food the Crusade needs. We’ve got to take the Krak in the south or Kaltus’ legions are going to starve.’
Wilfort whistled softly. ‘The Krak di Condotiori . . . defended by a mercenary legion . . . I’d call that nigh on impregnable.’
‘Not from the north. The Krak’s main defences face south.’ Betillon scratched his crotch and thought about the skinny Jhafi girl tied up in his suite. Was she scared enough yet? She’d be ripening nicely, but he could let her stew a little longer.
Or maybe not . . . The stench of the bodies was becoming unpleasant and he began to rise when a familiar gnostic contact nudged against his awareness. He fed the link, and shuffled into the shade of a wall, away from prying ears.
Gurvon Gyle sounded tense, as well he might.
Tomas rocked back on his heels, momentarily discomforted. Gyle had supposedly been Anborn’s captive, but perhaps they were colluding – they had been lovers, after all . . . perhaps they still were.
Gyle snapped, unusually brittle.
This sounded ever more far-fetched.
Gyle faked Cera Nesti’s death? Betillon almost laughed. Sweet Kore, the man spins in strange circles! But even if this was true and not some ruse to divert his attention, he was unmoved.
By way of spreading his favours, he’d given the criminal’s women to the rankers to screw, apart from one, a skinny little maid who looked girlish enough to stir his own blood. She was roped up in one of the bed chambers awaiting his pleasure – his pleasure, not hers.
The Grandmaster of the Kirkegarde legion who had come with him to Javon, a scar-faced mage-knight named Lann Wilfort, leaned against the nearest pillar, picking his teeth. He’d just been expounding on the need to go north and knock some Gorgio heads together. ‘I’ll bring back the Tolidi bint for you to break,’ Wilfort was saying. ‘The Hytel mines are vital.’
‘I don’t care about this Tolidi woman,’ Betillon replied with a wave of the hand. He preferred unbled virgins, the younger the better, and the famed beauty of Portia Tolidi held little attraction, especially not when she’d so recently given birth – what an ugly mental image that was. She’ll be fat and stretched and ugly now, not to mention amply used by Francis Dorobon, they say. Why would I want that? ‘Forget Hytel. We can’t afford to send anyone, not until Gyle comes to heel.’
‘But the mines . . .’ Wilfort rubbed his scar, which ran from his right eye to the remaining stump of his ear. ‘They provide this wasteland with all its iron.’
‘Irrelevant for now: it’s food the Crusade needs. We’ve got to take the Krak in the south or Kaltus’ legions are going to starve.’
Wilfort whistled softly. ‘The Krak di Condotiori . . . defended by a mercenary legion . . . I’d call that nigh on impregnable.’
‘Not from the north. The Krak’s main defences face south.’ Betillon scratched his crotch and thought about the skinny Jhafi girl tied up in his suite. Was she scared enough yet? She’d be ripening nicely, but he could let her stew a little longer.
Or maybe not . . . The stench of the bodies was becoming unpleasant and he began to rise when a familiar gnostic contact nudged against his awareness. He fed the link, and shuffled into the shade of a wall, away from prying ears.
Tomas rocked back on his heels, momentarily discomforted. Gyle had supposedly been Anborn’s captive, but perhaps they were colluding – they had been lovers, after all . . . perhaps they still were.
This sounded ever more far-fetched.
Gyle faked Cera Nesti’s death? Betillon almost laughed. Sweet Kore, the man spins in strange circles! But even if this was true and not some ruse to divert his attention, he was unmoved.
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