Emperor of Thorns (The Broken Empire, Book 3)

‘Don’t expect me to do well, I’m a slow study.’ I took the shaker and dice from him.

The Moor seemed relaxed. He could afford to be if he had me figured out, if he knew before I did what course I would take. How many slates had they covered with their equations, how many men passing their calculations back and forth to balance and simplify my terms? Did they know already at what point I might draw steel for an attack? Did a man stand ready for it at a dark window, crossbow wound and aimed at the spot I would choose? Did they know the hour when I might elect to slip away, or the direction I would take? If they all had Qalasadi’s skill I would not be surprised to find they had already written down the next words to come from my mouth.

‘Well that’s not good!’ A one and a two. I advanced my counters.

Yusuf shook the dice. All around us men played the game, smoked, sipped their dark and bitter brews. From time to time a face would turn my way, lined and sun-stained, usually the grey hairs outnumbering the black. No smiles for the traveller here, nothing to read from those incurious eyes. I wondered how many of them worked for Qalasadi? All of them. Only Yusuf and his servant?

I could stand and make for the Keshaf, still tied at the quay. But they already knew if I would or not. Maddening.

Yusuf threw and took his move. White counters sweeping around the board. My tea arrived, and his java. Would it be poisoned? I lifted it to my lips.

‘Oranges?’

‘It is scented with the blossom of the orange tree,’ Yusuf agreed.

If they had wanted me poisoned the deck-boy on the Keshaf could have put powders in the water he brought me. I touched the cup to my lips, a thin work of porcelain set round with a delicate pattern of diamonds. They would want me as a hostage for Ibn Fayed’s war against my grandfather.

The tea tasted good. I threw the dice and made my moves, taking longer than I needed to puzzle them. Yusuf’s next moves seemed wrong to me, not foolish, but overcautious. I reminded myself that even mathmagicians are fallible. They had meant to poison grandfather, and yet he lived. They had meant to further Ibn Fayed’s cause, and yet a dozen and more highborn deaths along the Horse Coast were now piled at his door, dishonourable killings. The stench of them tainted his house.

I rolled the dice. Six and four.

Beneath the table my fingers curled around the hilt of my dagger. ‘Do you know what I’m going to do next, Lord Yusuf?’ I asked.

I could have the blade in his throat quicker than quick.

A slow smile. ‘No, but I can guess.’

I took my move.

Yusuf hesitated a moment before scooping the dice into the cup. A frown creased his forehead. Perhaps he was recalculating.

While the Moor took his go I made a mental list. A list of six options, choices other men might make.

1) Rike: Reach out, catch Yusuf behind the head and slam his face very hard into the table. Go with the flow thereafter.

2) Makin: Make a new friend. Turn on the charm.

3) Gorgoth: Part company without fuss. Take a path to protect those most depending on me.

4) Father: Purchase whichever loyalties can be bought. Dispense whatever justice can be paid out without loss. Return home to consolidate my strengths.

5) Gomst: Pray for guidance. Follow Yusuf, obey the rules, run when a chance presents itself.

6) Sim: Show no defiance. Go with Yusuf and his man. Murder them both in a lonely spot. Continue on disguised as the Moor.



The dice came my way again. I picked one out. If I let the die choose, if I let chance decide among unlikely options, that might break the network of prediction that had me snared.

‘Maybe one at a time will improve my luck,’ I said.

Yusuf smiled but said nothing, watching with intent.

I rolled the die. Predict this!

A two. Make a friend? Damn that!

I set the second cube spinning across the table. Alea iacta est, as Caesar put it. The die is cast. I would tie my fate to this one.

It spun for an age on one corner, caught an edge, clattered off the table. Yusuf bent to follow it and brought it up in his hand. ‘Another two!’

Damnation.

I moved my counters, hoping for some kind of inspiration. Yusuf was already pretending to be my friend. How to turn that into something real I hadn’t a clue. In fact I wasn’t entirely sure I understood the difference.

A disturbance in the white heat outside caught my eye. A hunch-backed giant in black mobbed by a sudden crowd? No, mobbed by children, a man surrounded by ragged children as he dragged something across the square.

‘Your pardon, Yusuf.’ I stood, rewarded by momentary confusion in the Moor’s eyes.