The woman had once held rank – perhaps she still did, although her accoutrements and colours announced no present status; nor was the man behind her wearing anything like a uniform.
Kalam saw weals on both their faces and smiled to himself. They'd run into chigger fleas, and neither looked too pleased about it. The man jerked suddenly as one bit him somewhere beneath his hauberk, cursing, he began loosening the armour's straps.
'No,' the woman snapped.
The man stopped.
She was Pardu, a southern plains tribe; her companion had the look of a northerner – possibly Ehrlii. His dusky skin was a shade paler than the woman's and bare of any tribal tattooing.
'Hood's breath!' the sergeant snarled at the woman. 'Not another step closer! You're both crawling with chiggers. Take the far end of the table. One of the servants will prepare a cedar-chip bath – though that will cost you.'
For a moment the woman seemed ready to resist, but then she gestured to the unoccupied end of the table with one gloved hand and her companion responded by pulling two chairs back before seating himself stiffly in one of them. The Pardu took the other. 'A flagon of beer,' she said.
'The Master charges for that,' Kalam said, giving her a wry smile.
'The Seven's fate! The cheap bastard – you, servant! Bring me a tankard and I'll judge if it's worth any coin. Quickly now!'
'The woman thinks this a tavern,' one of the guards said.
The sergeant spoke. 'You're here by the grace of this Keep's commander. You'll pay for the beer, you'll pay for the bath, and you'll pay for sleeping on this floor.'
'And this is grace?'
The sergeant's expression darkened – he was Malazan, and he shared the room with a Clawmaster. 'The four walls, the ceiling, the hearth and the use of the stables are free, woman. Yet you complain like a virgin princess – accept the hospitality or be gone.'
The woman's eyes narrowed, then she removed a handful of jakatas from a belt pouch and slammed them on the tabletop. 'I gather,' she said smoothly, 'that your gracious master charges even you for beer, Sergeant. So be it, I've no choice but to buy everyone here a tankard.'
'Generous,' the sergeant said with a stiff nod.
'The future shall now be prised loose,' the merchant's wife said, trimming the Deck.
Kalam saw the Pardu flinch upon seeing the cards.
'Spare us,' the assassin said. 'There's nothing to be gained from seeing what's to come, assuming you've any talent at all, which I doubt. Save us all from the embarrassment of your performance.'
Ignoring him, the old woman angled herself to face the guardsmen. 'All your fates rest upon ... this!' She laid out the first card.
Kalam barked a laugh.
'Which one is that?' one of the guards demanded.
'Obelisk,' Kalam said. 'The woman's a fake. As any seer of talent would know, that card's inactive in Seven Cities.'
'An expert in divination, are you?' the old woman snapped.
'I visit a worthy seer before any overland journey,' Kalam replied. 'It would be foolish to do otherwise. I know the Deck, and I've seen when the reading was true, when power showed the hand. No doubt you intended to charge these guardsmen once the reading was done, once you'd told them how rich they were going to become, how they'd live to ripe old ages, fathering heroes by the score—'
Her expression unveiling the charade's end, the old woman screamed with rage and flung the Deck at Kalam. It struck him on the chest, cards clattering on the tabletop in a wild scatter – which settled into a pattern.
The breath hissed from the Pardu woman, the only sound to be heard within the common room.
Suddenly sweating, Kalam looked down at the cards. Six surrounded a single, and that single card – he knew with certainty – was his. The Rope, Assassin of Shadow. The six cards encircling it were all of one House. King, Herald, Mason, Spinner, Knight, Queen . . . High House Death, Hood's House all arrayed . . . around the one who carries the Holy Book of Dryjhna. 'Ah, well,' Kalam sighed, glancing up at the Pardu woman, 'I guess I sleep alone tonight.'
The Red Blade Captain Lostara Yil and her companion soldier were the last to leave Ladro Keep, over an hour after their target had departed on his stallion, riding south through the dusty wake of the sandstorm.
The forced proximity with Kalam had been unavoidable, but just as he was skilled at deception, so too was Lostara. Bluster could be its own disguise, arrogance a mask hiding an altogether deadlier assurance.
