He said it with such an adult tone and assurance that Gavin looked at his brother’s bastard son with new eyes. Four months had changed the boy. He was still chunky—maybe always would be—but as only young men can do, he’d dropped at least a seven already. It was like watching a man emerge from himself. The fat that had rounded and softened his features was receding. The strong line of his jaw and brow was all Guile. He was broad-shouldered, and his arms, though still shapeless, were huge. His confidence was soaring today, of course, his having just gotten into the Blackguard. It would crumple again—a dozen times. Boys, especially athletes, can look like a man in a day—but it takes them longer to reconcile themselves to themselves. But this Kip, this was a glimpse of the Kip who could be.
And Gavin liked that Kip.
It takes some of us a great deal longer to reconcile ourselves to ourselves, does it?
Looking at his brother’s son, Gavin was pierced with sorrow. He would never have his own son. Not even if he achieved his impossible goal, and that was looking less and less likely with every passing day.
Aware that he had paused too long, Gavin said, “It’s a good plan. Tell the rest of the runts that we’re going to lose this city, so they shouldn’t get any heroic ideas in their heads. Heroism is a fine thing, but heroism wasted means you can’t be there to help on the day you can make a difference.”
“Yes, sir. Trainer Fisk has been saying the same thing to us. Except the part about losing.” Kip frowned. “But thank you. For telling me the truth.”
Thank you for telling me the truth. Now, if there wasn’t some bitter irony in that statement, Gavin was a marsh mug.
“I want to go with you tomorrow,” Kip said.
“And what makes you think I’m going anywhere tomorrow—other than the fact that all of us are already traveling, so you’ll be going with me by default?”
“You’re the promachos, sir. Whether they call you that or not. I want to fight with you.”
So ready to fight. But was I any different? How many men did I kill before I really understood what it meant to kill? Gavin rubbed the bridge of his nose.
“I’m going to kill men tomorrow, Kip. Men who don’t precisely deserve killing. It’s one thing to kill a wight, or a murderer, or pirates, or a man invading your city or your home, ready to rape and murder and steal. It’s another to kill a merchant whose goods will bring death, but who is himself simply trying to make a living. A man like that has children back home, a wife you’re making a widow, and a destitute one at that.”
“We all pick sides,” Kip said.
“Simple as that?” Gavin asked.
Kip shifted from foot to foot, but nodded.
“We’ve heard from four different spies that Liv Danavis is with the Color Prince now. Part of his army. So tell me, Kip, if we see Liv Danavis on the deck of one of those ships, about to toss a grenado at us, you’ll kill her? Without hesitation, before she can kill us?”
Kip swallowed. “Orholam’s… beard, sir. I… I hope he would defend me from having to make such a choice.”
“If Orholam defended us from such choices, we wouldn’t be here, Kip.”
“How could she go with them, sir? They’re monsters. Literal, real, flesh and luxin monsters.”
“Idealists mature badly. If they can’t outgrow their idealism, they become hypocrites or blind. Liv has chosen blindness, fixating so much on the Chromeria’s flaws that she believes those who oppose us must be paragons. That we’re not perfect says nothing about our enemies, Kip. Nothing. As it turns out, they’re mostly bad. Bad enough that their rule would be a cataclysm, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have some good points about us. It doesn’t mean that every fool who works for them is evil. It simply means they have to be stopped. By killing them, if necessary. That’s the life you’re stepping into here, Kip. I leave tomorrow at dawn. I’ll get permission from your commander for you to join me, but if you can’t kill Liv if you need to, don’t show up. I won’t hold it against you as a man, but as a soldier, I won’t want you covering my back either.”
Kip didn’t answer immediately, and Gavin respected him the more for it.
“Thank you, sir,” Kip said eventually. “I don’t like it, but I appreciate your honesty.”
Honesty? When I tell the truth about this and lie about all else? Appreciate something else, boy. I’m a liar to the core.
Chapter 98
Dawn found Kip on the deck, waiting for his father. It was cold and the seas were choppy, but his Blackguard’s runt clothes were warm enough. At least when combined with his fat. He pulled the gray cloak around himself, stamping his feet. He hadn’t gotten much sleep. The idea of killing Liv—or of being killed by her—had kept him from that.
But Liv had made her choices. She’d believed the lies she wanted to believe. She’d gone over to the side of madmen. How could she be so stupid?
Maybe Kip hadn’t known her at all.
The thought made him sick to his stomach. He thought of her smile. Her laugh when she’d made him think the walkway between the towers was snapping, the fine curves of her body as she’d walked in front of him.
The knot in his stomach eased when he saw his father come out of his room onto the deck, already speaking with Commander Ironfist.
The commander was in the lead, speaking over his shoulder. “Do you know what your wife will do to me if I let anything happen to you?” he asked.
“Wife?” Kip asked.
Commander Ironfist scowled quickly. “My apologies, my lord, I didn’t—”
“It’s not a secret, Commander,” Gavin said smoothly. “I married Karris before we left, Kip.”
“You wha—Oh, oh,” Kip said. Clearly that relationship had been a little different than Kip had thought in the little slivers of it he’d seen. Which had included curses and slapping and jumping off a boat rather than be near Gavin. Kip closed his mouth, then realized not saying anything might look like he was passing judgment. He couldn’t help but feel left out. That he hadn’t deserved to hear about it right away, that his father was still holding out on him. “Uh, congratulations, sir?”
“Why thank you, Kip. And I’m very glad to see you this morning. I’ve asked you to fight not as a boy, but as a man, and you’ve responded. And I can tell you haven’t slept, so you’ve responded appropriately. Well done, son.”
Well done, son. The words were what Kip had ached to hear for his whole life, and doubly so since learning Gavin Guile was his father. But they were delivered perfunctorily, as if Gavin were checking items off a list, without emotion, without attention.
“Now, as we go this morning,” Gavin said, “I want you to tell me about the assassination attempt.”
Kip hadn’t really thought of what happened in the alley that way, but Gavin said it so blithely that Kip knew he had to be right. Lucia had died because of Kip. Had stepped into the line of fire. It was, oddly, exactly what Blackguards were supposed to do, but she’d done it on accident. Kip wasn’t sure if that made it better, or worse.
They walked to the stern and Kip saw that they weren’t going alone. At the bottom of a pair of rope ladders, a dozen Blackguards stood on a skimmer the likes of which Kip had never seen. It was, of course, bigger so that it could hold seventeen of them, but it was also shaped differently, like a large flying wing, with eight scoops. Every Blackguard was armed with a bow and a large quiver and bandoliers of grenadoes. Some had spare spectacles. From there, each was armed according to his fancy and expertise. A couple had bucklers. One carried a notched sword-breaker. Most had a pistol. One had a bich’hwa like Karris often carried. And others had the forward-bent ataghans or the sweeping scimitars. The skimmer itself had grapnels and ropes aplenty.