The Two of Swords: Part 8 Read Free Page A

in, if I’d been that way inclined. Now I’m here doing this, glorified footman, with a good chance of getting myself killed any day of the week. That’s promotion in the lodge, my boy, and don’t you forget it. Nothing but trouble and sorrow. Like I said, I guess that’s why it works so well.”
    Musen was looking at him with a mildly startled expression. “I don’t want to be anything special,” he said. “I just want to serve the lodge, that’s all. It’s the only thing I ever wanted.”
    “Sure. That, and a load of stuff that doesn’t belong to you. Just as well the lodge can use you, then, isn’t it? Mind, that’s the other reason the lodge is so successful. We can use
everybody
.” And then the grin. “Even you.”
    Maybe the grin wasn’t working today. He could tell Musen didn’t like what he’d said – not the stuff about promotion and all, the other thing. “Fact is,” he said, “we’re all the same. We wouldn’t do it otherwise. We serve the lodge because we believe in it. And if you’re a believer – well, the rest all sort of goes without saying. I don’t think it’s something you choose. It’s inside you, right from the start.” Like stealing, he didn’t say. “Some people are like that, they were born to be just the one thing. That’s us. That’s why we don’t need money and flash clothes and big houses.” He paused for a moment, then added: “You’re one of us, sunshine, I can tell. Don’t expect praise. After all, it’s none of your doing.”
    He’d said the right thing, at last. “That’s it,” Musen said. “That’s exactly how I’ve always thought about it. It’s why – well, when I was growing up, in Merebarton. That’s my village. I was the only craftsman there.”
    Pleda frowned. “Now that’s hard,” he said. “When you’re the only one. Different for me; there were always at least half a dozen of us, we always had someone to talk to. We felt special, you know, strong. Just you on your own, that must’ve been tough.”
    Musen’s eyes were wide and bright. “It was,” he said eagerly. “You know, I think that’s why I started taking things. I always felt, you know, different, shut out. Actually, it was more than that. I felt like they were all blind and I was the only one that could see. But somehow that wasn’t an advantage, if you get what I mean.”
    Sooner or later, Pleda thought, sooner or later. There’s always a certain combination of words that gets through, and then you’ve got them; like those amazing locks they have in Sond Amorcy, the ones with no keys, and you turn three little dials to line up the tumblers. Work people a click at a time, you’ll get there eventually. He let the boy talk. There was a whole lifetime waiting to come out, like a blocked drain.
    Beloisa was just depressing. There was a structure calling itself an inn, on the quay, where the customs house used to be. It was mostly made of doors, charred on the outside, but military-spec crossply is too dense to burn right through; someone had been all round the site and gathered up about a hundred charred and scorched doors, nailed them to scaffold poles and lengths of rafter; oiled sailcloth for a roof, which sagged where rainwater had pooled – any day now, the cloth would give way and some poor devil would wake up drenched. Meanwhile, the weight of the rainwater had bowed the walls inwards. They’d tried to draw them straight again with guy ropes, but the pegs had already started to pull out. Sorry, the innkeeper said, we’re full up; try again next week, or the week after that.
    The plan had been to buy a cart. No problem there; country people desperate to get across the sea had plenty of carts for sale, but horses to pull them were a different matter. The military paid cash – about three stuivers in the mark, but cash – for anything with four legs and a faint spark of life. So the country people had mostly turned their carts on their sides and added a