‘Clementh. Good to see you.’ He gestured to her gear. ‘Coming up in the world, I see.’
She inclined her head. ‘Lieutenant in the Royal Guard.’
Cartheron nodded, impressed. ‘So he sent the Royals, hey?’
‘For his sister? Of course.’
He shook his head. ‘She’s dead. Took her own life.’
Clementh waved a hand, dismissive. ‘Don’t even try. We’ve had spies on the island for weeks. She’s been identified.’
‘Listen, Clementh. Why follow that fool? Look at the damage he’s done to the fleets. Come over to us. You know Sureth is in the right.’
She lifted her shoulders in a shrug. ‘Look what damage he’s done to the Malazan fleets. At least he acts.’
‘The right is hers.’
She lifted a hand to forestall anything more. ‘Don’t try to involve me in a political argument right now, Crust. What’s done is done. Stand aside, or, unfortunately, I’ll just have to kill you and feel bad about it afterwards.’
‘You can try.’
She pulled down her helm. ‘What? Fifty of the Royal Guard against your ragtag pirates? Don’t be a fool, Crust.’
He was backing away. ‘We’ll see. Until then.’ He saluted and jogged back to the barricade.
Climbing down, he noticed that the piled wood of the crates and carts was wet and slick with oil. Choss met him on the other side. ‘Is that Clementh?’ he asked.
‘Yeah.’
‘Damn. She’s good.’
‘I know.’
Choss handed him a spear and he took it, his brows rising. ‘Good idea.’
‘Jack’s.’
Everyone, he saw, was armed with spears and other pole weapons, even Dancer. With luck, they’d be able to hold the Napans off. He nodded to everyone. ‘Okay. Line up. Double ranks.’ He looked at the spear in Dancer’s hands. ‘You okay with that?’
The assassin was peering off at the sky as if distracted, but he nodded. ‘For now.’
‘Good.’ Marching boots shook the timbers of the bridge. ‘Because here they come.’
*
Dancer did his best to push aside his worries regarding Kellanved – had he truly been blown to atoms? Really? Just like that? Could anything regarding him be that plain and simple?
But once the fighting started it was easy to set all that aside and slip into the focus of battle and instantly forget all else. He thrust as quickly as he could through gaps in the barricade, catching thighs, stomachs, and occasionally necks, then yanking the spear back before the blade could be shorn off. The young officer, Jack, was the best armoured of all of them, in a long mail hauberk; he held the top of the barricade, hammering down with his shield. Choss and Cartheron fought as if on board a ship, with twinned long-knives each, catching swords and counter-thrusting, while the Malazans brawled without any rules at all – stabbing feet, spitting in faces, thrusting into groins. It appeared to Dancer that these Royal Guards were rather at a disadvantage in the chaos of this street-fight.
Yet weight of numbers was slowly telling. Their barricade was beginning to teeter backwards on to them. Gaps were being hacked open by the Guards’ heavy bastard-swords.
It was frankly looking bad for the defenders when Jack jumped down from a cart to snatch up a torch from its fitting on the bridge. He yelled to everyone: ‘Burn it!’ and threw the torch on to the oil-soaked wood. It went up with a bursting whoosh of air. Screams reached them through the roar of flames; Dancer retreated, shielding his face from the heat of the inferno. He held a length of wood now no taller than him, the rest having been hacked away some time ago, but its cut end was sharp, and wet with blood.
So hot was the fire that even the timbers of the bridge caught, and it soon became obvious that the white-hot conflagration would eventually consume the entire bridge. The defenders retreated to the street.
In the light of the burning bridge Dancer could see that the Napans had retreated as well. He saw them marching away for the next bridge – Urko’s command. After damning the noisome stinking swamp of a river all year, Dancer now blessed it; not one of those heavily armoured soldiers would dare wade into that quagmire.
He motioned to Cartheron. ‘I’m going to help Dassem. You join Urko.’
Cartheron raised a hand. ‘I’ll check on Surly first.’ He ordered everyone else to head for Urko.
Dancer started up the cobbled way that traced the channel. Cartheron struck off along an alleyway. Choss, who was wounded, was helped by Jack as the rest of the crew made their way to Urko’s bridge.
Jogging along through the blustering, lashing winds, Dancer decided that he had to believe that Kellanved couldn’t just have been blown up like that. After all the tricks he’d pulled? It must have been another of his diversions … mustn’t it?
He slowed to a walk. Someone had stepped out on to the empty street in front of him. A slim fellow all in dark clothes. Pale, with short black hair, his hands loose at his sides and a mocking arrogant grin on his lips, the meaning of which Dancer knew all too well.
He felt his shoulders fall as he looked up at the night sky. Oh, for the love of Burn … I do not have time for this. He waved the fellow off. ‘Not now. I’m damned busy.’
The lad laughed, high and sneering. ‘Not now,’ he teased. ‘Pathetic. You sound like a mark begging for his life. I expected better.’
Dancer pointed past him. ‘Look. There’s a man up there about to attempt the greatest feat of arms I’ve ever heard of, and he could use my help.’
The lad reached behind his back, and when he brought his hands out each held a very long and very slim blade. ‘Do I look like I give a shit?’
Dancer drew his own blades from his chest baldrics. ‘I don’t give a shit about this.’
‘That doesn’t sound like the Dancer I’m after.’
‘I guess I went and grew up.’
That pulled down the youth’s thin lips. He struck a ready stance, blades straight forward. ‘Just so you know – it’s Cowl who is about to kill you.’
Dancer eased back into a bent knee stance. ‘Spare me. I’ve heard it all before.’
The youth, Cowl, charged.
*
‘What’s he doin’ just standin’ there?’ one of her boys complained.
Lee rolled her eyes. ‘How in the Abyss should I know?’
‘Let’s rush ’im,’ another suggested.
She and ten of her remaining toughs were crouched in the mouth of an alleyway eyeing Stonemason Bridge, where a solitary swordsman stood watch. ‘Sure,’ Lee hissed, ‘your knife against his sword!’
‘Well, how’re we gonna get past?’
‘I don’t know!’ she growled once more.
‘Just shoot ’im,’ another urged.
Lee hefted her crossbow. ‘In this wind? Forget it. Have to get much closer.’
‘Fine. Let’s do it.’
‘Wait!’ another whispered. ‘Someone’s comin’.’