Broken Blade Read Free Page B

possible.
    I turned a stern eye on my now much-clearer shadow, and demanded, “What are you trying to pull?”
    Though my arms remained tight to my sides, the shadow’s arms lifted and broadened into wings at the same time its legs fused themselves together into something much longer and narrower. Combine that with the way the head and neck respectively flattened and lengthened, and you no longer had a shape that looked even remotely human. In fact, were you to go by the form and movement of my shadow alone, you could be forgiven for making the assumption that I had become a rather small and agitated dragon.
    My shadow, or rather the Shade that inhabited it, tilted his head to one side and shot out a long slender shadow of a forked tongue to touch my cheek. And that was Triss.
    “I want you to take the job,” he said.
    I say “his” and “he,” because Triss lives in my shadow, and I’m a man, though “its” and “it” would probably be more accurate, for what is sex to a shadow? His smoke-and-syrup voice reinforces the ambiguity, lying as it does midway between tenor and contralto.
    “Why?” I asked him.
    “Because you’re broke and you’re bored, and when you’re working, you drink less.”
    I shook my head. “I’m not buying it, Triss. That’s been true of the last dozen job offers, none of which made you break cover like you did with this one. That’s dangerous. What if someone had seen you?”
    Triss reared up. “Since when did you care if something was dangerous? I can’t even count the number of times your frankly reckless attitude about the kinds of work we take has nearly gotten us killed in the last five years!”
    “That’s different. Killed in action on a job is a risk I’ve always been willing to take. Getting tumbled in a tavern and nailed to the traitor’s gate or sent off to provide amusement for the Son of Heaven is a fucking amateur’s death! Do you want that to be our legacy?”
    “As opposed to what?” demanded Triss, his wings vibrating with agitation. “Killed while delivering a stolen painting to its buyer? You’re not seriously comparing the risks of the last five years to dying on a mission from the goddess. At least if someone sells us to the King of Zhan or the so-called Son of Heaven, we’ll be dying for what we used to be. Back before the fall of the temple, what we did mattered. We worked for a cause bigger than just getting paid.”
    “In case you hadn’t noticed, Triss, the goddess is dead, murdered by her heavenly peers, and most of her servants followed her into the grave. The Son of Heaven pronounced the ban on our entire order. Nothing we do matters anymore and it never will again. The fucking gods themselves have decreed it through their official human mouthpiece.”
    “May he rot from within,” snapped Triss.
    I threw up my hands. “There is no cause anymore, just you and me and the work and getting paid. So we might as well hold on to our professionalism because we sure as hell don’t have anything else left. Which is why I’d really rather not get taken down for the kind of mistake a rank amateur would make.”
    Triss’s wings sagged. “Dead is dead, Aral. How doesn’t really matter.” Before I could answer, Triss contracted briefly—his version of an embarrassed shrug. “But I am sorry about moving around like that. I hadn’t intended to be so obvious. It’s just that this Maylien is more than she seems, possibly much more. It made me curious.”
    I sighed and accepted the peace offering. “I’m sorry, too, Triss. I know it’s harder for you, always hiding in my shadow, having to pretend you don’t even exist.” I hated fighting with Triss. Far more than the work, he was what I had left. His friendship and love were what made me keep getting up and going on even when I no longer saw much point. “If you want me to take this job, I’ll do it.”
    “Thank you.”
    “I’ll go tell Maylien now.” I reached for the dagger I’d