His voice was really quite soothing, given that they were talking about her impending death. She would have laughed if she had enough air.
She could not keep track of time. She breathed through her teeth and Brenner’s shirt for eternity and he said things to her that he had never said when they were lovers.
“It’s okay. I’ve got you. It’s okay.”
Possibly if he’d said those things when they were lovers, thingswould have turned out differently…Yes. Because strangling on your own spit while monsters walk the roads is the perfect time to re-litigate old relationships.
“I won’t let go.”
Don’t,she willed him.Don’t. I’ll kill us all. Don’t let go.
He didn’t let go.
The end of the column passed.
A long time later, the scent of rosemary faded.
A little time after that, Brenner released her throat.
Slate took a deep breath, coughed it out, took another, and that one went down normally. She could smell other things, which in this case was mostly Brenner. He smelled like leather and cigarettes, and that was wonderful, because it wasn’t rosemary.
The assassin helped her politely to her feet.
“She knew,” said Learned Edmund, staring at her. He was holding the horses’ reins bunched together. Slate wondered if the horses had been too stupid to run or if the scholar had somehow soothed them. “How did she know?”
“Word of advice,” said Brenner, slapping leaf-litter off Slate’s back. “If our Slate starts choking and sneezing and tells you to do something,do it.Don’t ask questions.”
Caliban was staring at them. His expression was indescribable.
“What?” asked Slate, wiping at her nose.
“You two,” said the paladin slowly, “have averyodd relationship.”
“Oh, come on, if your friends aren’t willing to strangle you, what kind of friends are they?” asked Brenner.
Caliban turned away, shaking his head.
“So those are the Clockwork Boys…” said Learned Edmund, almost to himself.
“Big ugly bastards, aren’t they?” said Brenner.
“I should have been better prepared,” said the dedicate. “The last correspondence that we received from Brother Amadai included a drawing of one. But I could not picture the scale. I thought perhaps they were the size of a man, no more…”
Slate shuddered. She’d only caught a glimpse through Brenner’s arms of the creatures, and it had been enough to give her nightmares. She snuffled into her sleeve.
When she got back to her horse, there was a handkerchief draped across the saddle.
CHAPTER 10
THEY STRUCK OUT NORTH, through the woods, looking for the smuggler’s road. It was a stupid idea—they didn’t know how far it was, or what it would look like—but the other two alternatives were to go back, behind a marching column of Clockwork Boys, or forward, through territory that the Clockwork Boys were raiding, and there was just no way.
Slate had been entertaining a faint illusion that between the three of them—Caliban, Brenner and herself—they might be a match for a Clockwork Boy. She’d never seen one, after all, and she had a lot more faith in Brenner’s knives than a soldier’s sword. The sight of the column had squashed that flat. It would be like trying to kill an elephant made out of stone.
She had a persistent vision, though, of Caliban standing before one of the gear-riddled monoliths, his sword held upright before him, like a hero out of an old story. It bothered her, not least because Caliban hadbeenjust such a hero. She could see him meeting his death that way again, on his feet, with his sword before him.
Getting maudlin. Getting sentimental in my old age. I shouldn’t care how any of us die anyway—we’re all just looking for ways to falldown. If we even make it to Anuket City, I’ll be impressed, and if we do, I’ll be dogmeat as soon as I walk through the gate.
All this time, Slate had been expecting to die in Anuket City. She had personal history there that wasn’t going to lie quiet.
