Best Served Cold

“Fight all the way back across Styria?” The chains round Victus’ neck rattled as he tossed his head. “The same ground we’ve fought over the past eight years?”

Andiche looked up from the coin to her, and puffed out his acne-scarred cheeks. “Sounds like an awful lot of fighting.”

“You’ve won against longer odds, with me in charge.”

“Oh, that’s a fact.” Sesaria gestured at the tattered flags. “We’ve won all kinds of glory with you in the chair, all kinds of pride.”

“But try paying a whore with that.” Victus was grinning, and that weasel never grinned. Something was wrong about their smiles, something mocking in them.

“Look.” Andiche rested one lazy hand on the arm of the captain general’s chair and dusted the seat off with the other. “We don’t doubt for a moment that when it comes to a fight, you’re the best damn general a man could ask for.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

Victus’ face twisted into a snarl. “We don’t want to fight! We want to make… fucking… money!”

“Who ever brought you more money than me?”

“Ahem,” came a voice right in her ear. Monza jerked round, and froze, hand halfway to the hilt of her sword. Standing just behind her, with a faintly embarrassed smile, was Nicomo Cosca.

He’d shaved off his moustache, and all his hair besides, left only a black and grey stubble over his knobbly skull, his sharp jaw. The rash had faded to a faint pink splash up the side of his neck. His eyes were less sunken, his face no longer trembling or beaded with sweat. But the smile was the same. The faint little smile and the playful gleam in his dark eyes. The same he used to have, when she first met him.

“A delight to see you both well.”

“Uh,” grunted Shivers. Monza found she’d made a kind of strangled cough, but no words came with it.

“I am in resplendent health, your concern for my welfare is most touching.” Cosca strolled past, slapping a puzzled-looking Shivers on the back, more captains of the Thousand Swords pushing their way through the flap after him and spreading out around the edges of the tent. Men whose names, faces, qualities, or lack of them, she knew well. A thick-set man with a stoop, a worn coat and almost no neck came at the rear. He raised his heavy brows at her as he passed.

“Friendly?” she hissed. “I thought you were going back to Talins!”

He shrugged, as if it was nothing. “Didn’t make it all the way.”

“So I fucking see!”

Cosca stepped up onto the packing cases and turned to the assembly with a self-satisfied flourish. He’d acquired a grand black breastplate with golden scrollwork from somewhere, a sword with a gilded hilt, fine black boots with shining buckles. He settled himself into the captain general’s chair with as much pomp as an Emperor into his throne, Friendly standing watchful beside the cases, arms crossed. As Cosca’s arse touched the wood the tent broke into polite applause, every captain tapping their fingers against their palms as daintily as fine ladies attending the theatre. Just as they had for Monza, when she stole the chair. If she hadn’t felt suddenly so sick she might almost have laughed.

Cosca waved away the applause while obviously encouraging it. “No, no, really, entirely undeserved. But it’s good to be back.”

“How the hell-”

“Did I survive? The wound, it appears, was not quite so fatal as we all supposed. The Talinese took me, on account of my uniform, for one of their own, and bore me directly to an excellent surgeon, who was able to staunch the bleeding. I was two weeks abed, then slipped out of a window. I made contact in Puranti with my old friend Andiche, who I had gathered might be desirous of a change in command. He was, and so were all his noble fellows.” He gestured to the captains scattered about the tent, then to himself. “And here I am.”

Monza snapped her mouth shut. There was no planning for this. Nicomo Cosca, the very definition of an unpredictable development. Still, a plan too brittle to bend with circumstances is worse than no plan at all. “My congratulations, then, General Cosca,” she managed to grate. “But my offer still stands. Gurkish gold in return for your services to Duke Rogont-”

“Ah.” Cosca winced, sucking air through his teeth. “Tiny little problem there, unfortunately. I already signed a new engagement with Grand Duke Orso. Or with his heir, to be precise, Prince Foscar. A promising young man. We’ll be moving against Ospria just as Faithful Carpi planned, prior to his untimely demise.” He poked at the air with his forefinger. “Putting paid to the League of Eight! Taking the fight to the Duke of Delay! There’s plenty to sack in Ospria. It was a good plan.” Agreeing mutters from the captains. “Why work out another?”

“But you hate Orso!”

“Oh, I despise him utterly, that’s well known, but I’ve nothing against his money. It’s the exact same colour as everybody else’s. You should know. He paid you enough of it.”

“You old cunt,” she said.

“You really shouldn’t talk to me that way.” Cosca stuck his lips out at her. “I am a mature forty-eight. Besides, I gave my life for you!”