Kalam looked away. “I doubt they're idiots. They must know it's the Malazan way. Offer the Guild a contract it can't refuse, then sit back and watch the rulers drop like headless flies. Whiskeyjack suggested the plan. Dujek OK'd it. Those two were talking the old Emperor's language there, Quick. The old man must be laughing in hell right now.”
The wizard shivered. “An unpleasant image.”
Shrugging, Kalam continued, “It's all academic, anyway, if we can't find a local assassin. Wherever they are, it's not in Lakefront District, I'd swear to that. The only name I picked up that's got mystery around it is someone named the Eel. Not an assassin, though. Something else.”
“Where next, then?” Quick Ben asked. “Gadrobi District?”
“No. just a bunch of farmers and herders there. Hell, the smell alone coming from that place is enough to cross it off the list. We'll try Daru, starting tomorrow.” Kalam hesitated. “What about your side of things?”
Quick Ben bowed his head. When he answered it was a faint whisper.
“Almost ready.”
“Whiskeyjack nearly choked when he heard your proposal. So did I. You'll be walking into the viper's den, Quick. You sure it's necessary?”
“No.” Quick Ben looked up. “Personally, I'd rather we just dropped everything and ran away from it all, from the Empire, from Darujhistan, from war. But try convincing the sergeant to do that. He's loyal to an idea, and that's the hardest kind to turn.”
Kalam nodded. “Honour, integrity, all that expensive crap.”
“Right. So we do it this way because it's the only way left to us. Hairlock's insanity has become a liability, but we can use him still, one last time. Power draws power, and with luck Hairlock's demise will do just that. The more Ascendants we can lure into the fray the better.”
“I always thought that was something to avoid, Quick.”
The wizard's smile was strained. “Tell me about it. But right now the more confusion and chaos the better.”
“And if Tayschrenn catches wind?”
Quick Ben's smile broadened. “Then we're dead all that much sooner. So it goes.”
Kalam barked a short, humourless laugh. “So it goes.”
The wizard cocked his head. “The sun's past the horizon. Time to start.”
“You want me out of here?” Kalam asked.
Quick Ben shook his head. “No, I want you right where you are for this one. If I don't come back, take my body and burn it down to ash. Scatter the ash to the four winds, and curse my name with all your heart.”
Kalam was silent. Then he asked, in a growl, “How long do I wait?”
“Dawn,” Quick Ben replied. “You understand I would only ask this of my closest friend.”
“I understand. Now, get on with it, dammit.”
Quick Ben gestured. A ring of fire sprang from the earth, surrounding the wizard. He closed his eyes.
To Kalam, his friend seemed to deflate slightly, as if something essential to life had disappeared. Quick Ben's neck creaked as his chin sank down to his chest, his shoulders slumped, and a long breath escaped with a slow hiss. The ring of fire flared, then dimmed to a lapping glimmer on the earth.
Kalam shifted position, stretching out his legs and crossing his arms.
In the gathering silence, he waited.
A pale Murillio returned to the table and sat down. “Someone's disposing of the body,” he said, then shook his head. “Whoever killed Chert was a professional with a real nasty streak. Right through the eye-”
“Enough!” Kruppe cried out, raising his hands. “Kruppe happens to be eating, dear Murillio, and Kruppe also happens to have a delicate stomach.”
“Chert was a fool,” Murillio continued, ignoring Kruppe, “but hardly the type to attract such viciousness.”
Crokus said nothing. He'd seen the blood on that dark-haired woman's dagger.
“Who can say?” Kruppe waggled his eyebrows. “Perhaps he was witness to some horrific horror. Perhaps he was stamped out as a man crushes a cute mouse underfoot.”
Crokus glanced around. His eyes returned to the woman standing with Meese at the bar. Dressed in leather armour with a plain duelling sword strapped to her hip, she reminded him of the time he'd watched, as a young boy, a troop of mercenaries ride through the city. They had been the Crimson Guard, he recalled: five hundred men and women without a shiny buckle among them.
His gaze remained on the woman. Like a mercenary, a killer for whom killing had long since lost its horror. What had Chert done to earn a knife in the eye?