The Trouble with Peace (The Age of Madness #2) - Joe Abercrombie Page 0,99

when someone was about to get hurt, which wasn’t rarely. “I heard tell you could disappear.”

“Well… er…” The eyes of the magus darted nervously about. “Only under certain conditions, my king. Auspicious moments in the moon’s cycle, you understand, when the stars align, and—”

“Hit him,” said Stour.

Greenway’s fist smacked into the old man’s cheek and knocked him flat on his back, robes flapping and his staff clattering down, the crystal on the end jolting loose and skittering away into a corner.

“I just do tricks!” he squealed as Greenway dragged him up again, his magnificence somewhat spoiled by a bloody mouth. “In a travelling show! It’s not magic. Not really.” His “r” sounds weren’t too clever any more. None of his sounds were. “I’m not a magus! I can disappear, but… it’s a box with a fake bottom—”

Stour’s lip curled. “Get this old halfhead out o’ my sight.”

Greenway caught the would-be magus around the neck and hauled him towards the door, heels helplessly kicking. Turned out he could disappear after all. Clover felt the twitch of a smile, almost turned around to toss the joke at Wonderful. Then he remembered he’d killed her.

Black Calder gave a great scornful snort as Radierus was dragged out, making Stour frown over. “Something tickling you, Father?”

“Aye, rounding up magicians.” Calder snorted again. “Quite the bloody joke.”

“You could skip to the punchline right now. Head to the Great Northern Library and bring your friend the First of the Magi to see me.”

The scorn slipped from Calder’s face and left him grim. “Bayaz is no friend of mine. No friend of anyone’s. His help’ll cost far more than it’s worth. Cost you everything. Better off shaking hands with the plague.”

“The Dogman’s daughter has the Long Eye,” said Stour, and a few of his warriors muttered and grumbled unhappily. “I have to fight fire with fire.”

“That’ll win you naught but ashes,” said Calder. “There’s not much magic left in the world, and what there is ain’t worth the price. You’d best hope all you find is tricks and liars.” And he sank further into his seat and took another swig of ale. Seemed with his brother back to the mud, he was set on keeping the breweries in business himself.

Greenway was marching the next magician in, and she looked a lot less promising than the last. A sturdy woman with a ragged dress and dirty bare feet who couldn’t tear her big round eyes away from the cage in the corner. Gregun Hollowhead wasn’t in it any more. His head was rotting on a spike over the gates of Carleon. But one of his Named Men had come to complain about it so the cage had a new guest, starved and battered, one scabbed leg dangling from the bottom and nearly scraping the sticky stones underneath.

“Who’s this one?” asked Stour, rubbing at his chin. He’d grown himself a little bit of beard, just under his mouth, while he shaved the rest. Clover couldn’t understand it. Grow it or don’t, but why leave bits? It was like leaving your wife half-fucked. But then, Clover had given up on trying to work out why anyone did anything, especially Stour.

“She’s from a village up near Yaws,” said Greenway.

“That so?” asked the Great Wolf, considering her with his bright, wet eyes.

“Her name’s Seff.”

Calder sat up, looking sharply over. “Huh,” grunted Stour. “That was my mother’s name.”

“Good sign, I guess,” said Greenway.

“It’s just a fucking name, fool. I’ve heard tell you can see things, Seff from up near Yaws.”

She glanced around the hard faces in the room. No one could’ve looked more terrified, and Clover didn’t blame her. “Well… sometimes I do… I reckon…”

Calder sank back with another great snort of contempt, made his son bare his teeth in frustration. “What do you see?”

“One time, I saw the village burning,” said Seff from up near Yaws, “and the next day men came, and… well, they burned the village.”

“Saved everyone, then?”

She swallowed. “Well, no, ’cause no one believed me.”

“Guess that’s their fault, eh?”

“I reckon…”

Stour sat forward. “You heard there’s a witch down in Uffrith?”

“The Dogman’s daughter?” Seff from up near Yaws nervously licked her lips. “I heard she’s got the Long Eye. Got it real and true, like back in the Old Time. Heard she can see what a man’s thinking. Heard she can stay dry in the rain ’cause she knows where all the drops’ll fall. Heard she’s got everything that’ll happen written in a golden book and all she has to do