Keneb cleared his throat. 'Adjunct, the Bonehunters may well have been birthed that day in Aren, but it only drew its first breath yesterday.'
'What do you mean?'
'We were wondering,' Kalam said to her, 'where that decoration came from. The one you presented, with your own hand, to Captain Faradan Sort and the witch Sinn.'
'Ah, yes. Well, I can make no claim regarding that. The design of that sigil was by T'amber's hand. There were jewelsmiths in her family, I understand, and she passed a few years of her youth as an apprentice.
Nonetheless, I do not see how that ceremony achieved little more than a confirmation of what already existed.'
'Adjunct,' Fist Keneb said, 'it was your confirmation that was needed.
To make it real. I do not wish to offend you, but before then, you were the Adjunct. You were Laseen's. Her property.'
Her expression was suddenly flat, dangerous. 'And now, Fist?'
But it was Kalam who answered. 'Now, you belong to the Fourteenth.'
'You belong to us,' Keneb said.
The moment should have ended there, and all would have been well.
Better than well. It would have been perfect. Instead, they saw, upon Tavore's expression, a growing… dismay. And fear. And at first, neither emotion made any sense.
Unless…
Unless she was unable to return such loyalty.
And so the doubt twisted free, like newborn vipers slithering from their clutch of eggs, and tiny, deadly fangs sank into every figure standing there, witness to what her face revealed.
Revealed. And this from a woman whose self-control was damned near inhuman.
Startled into life, the rhizan lizard dropped free of its perch, wheeled once then flitted off, down along the strand, where it alighted on the white flank of a huge tree-trunk some past storm had flung ashore, the creature's legs spread wide, belly to the wood, its tiny sides palpitating. Distracted and frightened, Bottle reached out to brush one fingertip between the rhizan's eyes, a gesture intended to offer comfort, even as he released his hold upon its life-spark.
The creature fled in a flurry of wings and whipping tail.
And now, five days later, Bottle found himself on the foredeck of the Silanda, staring back down the ship to that tarp-covered heap of severed heads that Stormy called his brain's trust. Amusing, yes, but Bottle knew those undying eyes were piercing the frayed fabric of the canvas, watching him. In expectation. Of what? Damn you, I can't help you poor fools. You have to see that!
Besides, he had plenty of other things to worry over right now. So many, in fact, that he did not know where to start.
He had seen the sigil, the decoration the Adjunct had presented to Faradan Sort at what should have been her courtmartial, and to the mute child Sinn – not that she was in truth mute, Bottle knew. The urchin just had very little to say to anyone, barring her brother Shard. The sigil… in silver, a city wall over which rose ruby flames, and the sloped tel beneath that wall, a mass of gold human skulls. The echo of the Bridgeburners' old sigil was not accident – no, it was sheer genius. T'amber's genius.
By the end of that same day, iron needles and silk threads were out as blunted fingers worked with varying degrees of talent, and military issue cloaks found a new decoration among the soldiers of the Fourteenth Army. To go along with dangling finger bones, the occasional bird skull and drilled teeth.
All well and good, as far as it went. For much of the first day, as Bottle and the others recovered, soldiers would come by just to look at them. It had been unnerving, all that attention, and he still struggled to understand what he saw in those staring eyes. Yes, we're alive. Unlikely, granted, but true nonetheless. Now, what is it that you see?
The memories of that time beneath the city were a haunting refrain behind every spoken word shared between Bottle and his fellow survivors. It fuelled their terrible dreams at night – he had grown used to awakening to some muffled cry from a squad member; from Smiles, or Cuttle, or Corabb Bhilan Thenu'alas. Cries dimly echoed from where other squads slept on the stony ground.
Their kits had been rifled through in their absence, items and gear redistributed as was the custom, and on that first day soldiers arrived to return what they had taken. By dusk, each survivor had more than they had ever begun with – and could only look on in bemusement at the heaped trinkets, buckles, clasps and charms; the mended tunics, the scrubbed clean quilted under-padding, the buffed leather straps and weapon-rigging. And daggers. Lots of daggers, the most personal and precious of all weapons – the fighter's last resort. The weapon that, if necessary, would be used to take one's own life in the face of something far worse. Now, what significance are we to take from that?
