Aftermath- - Thieves World 10 Read Free

come back What did it matter^ They were all punks anyway Still, some of them might remember him.
    He laughed thinking about it, but there was no humor m that sound Wouldn't they be surprised to see him agam^ The local boy come back in triumph He had made good by Sanctuary standards He was nch beyond most men's imagination, and powerful, very powerful
    He had turned his talent into a very profitable art The art of death. For a fee he killed He was more than an assassin and less than d murderer. For he did kill with passion, but never pleasure He killed in the name of mankind to free his victims from lies
    For Sanctuary had taught Cade the most valuable of all lessons, it had taught him the truth In all its pain and agony, poverty and despair, was written the LAW, in ironclad runes of blood
    And the LAW was one simple word Hell . .
    For the world was not a hell, he knew that, it was the hell, the only true hell A man lived a life of pain, no matter who or what he was, the punishment was daily When he died, he either went somewhere better, 16 AFTERMATH
    or his spirit was annihilated for all time. It was simple really: the good,
    they went to their just desserts; the evil could sink no further, so they
    were destroyed.
    All this ran through his thoughts as he stared down at the place he hated most. He was little concerned. He believed he had only killed the genuinely good or the genuinely evil, never those in-between. Now he was going to kill his brother's murderer and he was worried. What if the killer was neither good nor evil? What if he had not made the final choice
    —could Cade kill him then? After all, he was no soldier like his unknown father, butchering because someone told him to. He was very careful in accepting contracts, very careful in his death-dealing that whomever he brought the final moment to was either good or evil, either free or doomed. What if ...
    "Enough!" he cried out loud. Somewhere in the Maze TerreFs family waited in fear, in fear for their lives and in agony over the dead man they
    had loved so much. Cade would protect them. Terrel would have wanted that, but Cade would do more; he would use them as he had always used anyone he needed. Use them to find the murderer and for the first time in
    his long career he would not kill cleanly or quickly. No matter who had to die, or why, this time Cade would have vengeance!
    He knelt down and cleared a space on the ground at his feet. He withdrew a dagger and began to make marks in the dirt. Here a slash for Tempus; there a curve for Ischade, others for Molin Torchholder, Jubal, Chenaya, the Stepsons, the PFLS, the Rankan 3rd Commando, Enas Yorl ... He had run out of room. Sanctuary had managed to become the most dangerous place in the empire. It was truly hell's own capital. And all its demon princes were fighting for its bitter rule. His information was incomplete. He could barely believe Tempus would stay here with the whole empire falling apart around him. And if Tempus went ... he scratched out the marks for the Rankan 3rd Commando, and the Stepsons. He shook his head; it helped, but not by much. Then he scratched in a fish eye. Beysibs. Now what the hell were they?
    Were they like other men? What happened when they died? Too, too many questions.
    If it had been just magic, or men ... but there were gods here now. All sorts of godly manifestations had taken place here, though his people
    had claimed that things had quieted down of late. Hardly a comforting thoughtHe gripped the handle of the dagger tightly. It was all too unclear, too many random factors. Even Cade could not keep himself hidden from the gods, frauds though they were. Still, part of him hoped the trail would lead to one of these gods-He had only ever killed one obscure demigod.

CADE 17
    To cast down one of the great ones, those masters of the great lie, ah, now
    that would nearly make Terrel's horrid death worthwhile. There was no point in going in quietly; this town was a catastrophe