Gardens of the Moon

'More or less. Five squads left, or thereabouts. About forty in all.' His left eye squinted and he reached up to adjust his battered helmet. 'Didn't know where you'd be heading before. Do now. You're Whiskeyjack's new captain, huh?'

'Sergeant Whiskeyjack is known to you?' Paran scowled. This Claw wasn't like the others. Whatever thinking they did about him they kept to themselves, and he preferred it that way.

The man climbed back into his saddle. 'Let's ride. We can talk on the way.'

Paran went to the other horse and tied his bag to the saddle, which was of the Seven Cities style, high-backed and with a hinged horn that folded forward-he'd seen several like this on this continent. It was a detail he'd already filed away. Natives from the Seven Cities had a predisposition for making trouble, and this whole Genabackan Campaign had been a foul-up from the very start. No coincidence, that. Most of the 2nd, 5th and 6th Armies had been recruited from the Seven Cities subcontinent.

He mounted and they settled into a steady canter across the plateau.

The Claw talked. 'Sergeant Whiskeyjack's got a lot of followers around here. Acts like he don't know it. You got to remember something that's been damn near forgotten back in Malaz-Whiskeyjack once commanded his own company:'

Paran's head snapped around. That fact had been thoroughly stripped from the annals. As far as Empire history was concerned, it had never happened.

': back in the days when Dassern Ultor ran the military,' the Claw continued blithely. 'It was Whiskeyjack's Seventh Company that ran down the Seven Cities' mage cabal out in the Pan'potsun Wastes. He ended the war then and there. Of course, everything went to hell after that, what with Hood taking Ultor's daughter. And not long after that, when Ultor died, all his men were pulled down fast. That's when the bureaucrats swallowed up the Army. Damn jackals. And they've been sniping at each other ever since and to hell with the campaigns.' The Claw sat forward, pushing the saddlehorn down, and spat past his horse's left ear.

Paran shivered, seeing that gesture. In the old days it had announced the beginning of tribal war among the Seven Cities. Now, it had become the symbol of the Malaz 2nd Army. 'Are you suggesting,' he cut in, 'that the story you've just told me is commonplace?'

'Not in detail,' the Claw admitted. 'But some old veterans in the Second fought with Ultor, not just in Seven Cities but as far back as Falar.'

Paran thought for a time. The man riding beside him, though a Claw, was also 2nd Army. And he'd been through a lot with them. It made for an interesting perspective. He glanced at the man and saw him grinning.

'What's so funny?'

The man shrugged. 'The Bridgeburners are a little hot, these days. They're getting chaff for recruits and that makes it look like they're about to be disbanded. You talk with whoever it is you talk with back in Malaz, you tell them they'd end up with a mutiny on their hands, they start messing with the Bridgeburners. That's in every report I send but no one seems to listen to me.' His grin broadened. 'Maybe they think I've been turned or something, eh?'

Paran shrugged. 'You were called in to meet me, weren't you?'

The Claw laughed. 'You've really been out of touch, haven't you?

They called me in because I'm the last Active in the Second. And as for the Fifth and Sixth-forget it. Brood's Tiste And? could pick out a Claw from a thousand paces. None of them left, either. My own Claw Master was garotted two days back-that's something else, ain't it? You, I inherited, Captain. Once we hit the city, I send you on your way, and that's probably the last we'll ever see of each other. You deliver your mission details as Captain of the Ninth Squad, they either laugh in your face or they stick a knife in your eye-it's even betting what they'll do. Too bad, but there it is.'

Up ahead loomed the gates of Pale.

'One more thing,' the Claw said, his eyes on the merlons above the gate, 'just a bone I'll throw you in case Oponn's smiling on you. The High Mage Tayschrenn's running things here. Dujek's not happy, especially considering what happened with Moon's Spawn. It's a bad situation between them, but the High Mage is relying on his being in close and constant communication with the Empress, and that's what's keeping him on top. A warning, then. Dujek's soldiers will follow him : anywhere. And that goes for the Fifth and Sixth Armies, too. What's been gathered here is a storm waiting to break.'

Paran stared at the man. Topper had explained the situation, but Paran had dismissed the man's assessment-it had seemed too much like a scenario devised to justify the Empress filling the gallows. Not a tangle I want to get involved in. Leave me to complete my single task-I desire no more than that.

ks *w-i VwSseA XT&wtvt UwN %'?6Ve- tverby, Tayschrenn just watched us arrive. Any chance he knows you, Captain?'

'No.' I hope not, he added silently.