The Burning White (Lightbringer #5) - Brent Weeks Page 0,49

Right. And I do.”

“Half ta. Cuz you only got the one eye,” Gunner said. “Instead a two? Never mind. Not very bright sometimes, are ya, Guile? Go on.”

There was something about being called stupid by an illiterate that rankled more than it ought to have, but Gavin held back. He said, “You want to know if I’m going to do . . . his bidding.” Curse you forever, Grinwoody.

Gavin couldn’t say the name without risking that black jewel shooting through his brain. He didn’t even know if he could talk about his mission to kill Orholam—which Grinwoody thought was simply an impersonal nexus of magic. Grinwoody, at least, thought sticking the Blinding Knife into that nexus would kill all magic in the world.

“I do,” Gunner said. “Seems ya change every time I lay my orisons on ya. Yer name, your face, number of eyeballs and fingers, sometimes your heart. But you were never a quitter, not even when I had you pull that oar. Never gave up. Till now.”

Gunner’s point was something else entirely, but Gavin couldn’t get past how he’d put ‘when I had you pull that oar.’ Oh, yes, let’s do pretend my enslavement was nothing personal, you piece of human—

Then again, maybe it hadn’t been.

As Prism, Gavin’s own murders had fallen like rain on the heads of the just and the unjust alike.

Shit. There goes my righteous fury. That was the trouble of a consistency in moral affairs: holding yourself up to the measure you judge others by is three clicks past irritating.

So Gavin answered Gunner’s question, answered it without even thinking of what the pirate might want to hear: “I don’t know yet what I’m gonna do, but I reckon before the sucking sand closes over my face, you’ll find me fighting,” Gavin said.

Still standing heedlessly on the cannon, Gunner crossed his arms and stroked his raggedy black beard, eyeing him.

“Funny thing, then,” Gunner said. “Fightin’ only makes you sink faster.”

Chapter 14

Ambassador Bram Red Leaf looked like a barrel of fat with little arms poking out. Like so many of the nobles of the Seven Satrapies, he didn’t much resemble the people he was supposed to represent. Here in fair Blood Forest, he was dark-skinned, with light eyes and curly hair, and a sheen of sweat on his forehead despite the coolness of the morning.

Kip couldn’t help but hate him a little. The man was a vision of what Kip would’ve become if he’d never joined the Blackguard.

He waved the man over to stand beside him while he examined his maps again. From all the refugees who’d come here before the siege, Tisis had gathered a wealth of new intelligence for Kip’s maps. In no small part, she was trying to see how she’d missed Koios’s getting around them to take the river with her scouts never hearing of it. Messengers were coming and going constantly, adding new points to the map even now, chatting in quiet voices. Currently, Tisis was working with four drafters and Sibéal Siofra to add points to the map. The pygmy woman wore a fresh demeanor and new clothes to go with it. There was a new self-respect that joined beautifully with her previous professionalism.

“Hello, Ambassador,” Kip said. “Welcome to my humble council.” He didn’t say ‘court.’ Not yet.

“A pleasure to be received so graciously. An excellent day to you, Luíseach.”

The words stopped even Tisis, who met Kip’s gaze quickly.

Maybe if they lived long enough to become an old married couple someday, they’d be able to have whole conversations with a glance. Right now, all they said was simply, ‘What?!’

In a voice that sounded overly casual even to his own ears, Kip said, “I’ve not claimed that title. Why would you claim it for me?”

The man patted his forehead with a handkerchief, but when he spoke, there was no reticence in his voice. “You’re busy saving this satrapy, so I’ll be as direct as people say you are: you let others claim you to be the Luíseach when it serves your purposes, and back off when it seems dangerous. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I don’t blame you. Problem with claiming a prophecy is that you have to fulfill all the conditions of it, though, huh?”

“You’ve come to play games,” Kip said. He wondered if this conversation would have been different if they’d held it in the palace’s great hall. As it was, this parlor now held only a few hundred scrolls and tomes, gleaming wood in the natural-unnatural patterns the