The roads were now quite busy with traffic, mostly transports and tracks, so they kept to the hedge paths, crossing in the open only when they had to. During a rest stop under a copse of talix trees, when the sun was high and hot, Gaunt sat down next to Curth.
“How are you doing?”
Today? Better. Not feeling quite so overwrought.”
“Me too, I think,” Gaunt said. He took a drink from his water bottle. “You left.”
“I left what?” she asked.
“You left. This morning.”
“What the feth are you talking about?” she asked. “Have you been out in the sun without your cap on again?”
“Never mind,” Gaunt said. He decided there was no point pushing it when Curth was quite so vulnerable and prone to mood swings. He got to his feet.
“Let’s go,” he called. “Let’s get this done.”
TWENTY-FIVE
Three excubitors wandered down the yard, the long barrels of their slantwise las-locks swinging. They exchanged a few words, then turned right through the gate arch and disappeared up the flagged street towards the commercia.
Bonin waited until they were well clear, then slipped out of the shadows, ran the length of the yard and ducked down behind a tall stack of paper bundles. Some of the loose papers were sticking out, and Bonin pulled one free and read it. It was a crudely printed leaflet encouraging “citizens of the Intercession’ to become proselytes and convert. Bonin stuffed it back where he’d found it.
It was early evening in Leafering, and the street lighting was beginning to flicker on, though the streets themselves were still quite busy. Another hour and the curfew would sound, ordering all those consented only for day to their habs. From his vantage point behind the stacked propaganda leaflets, Bonin had a good view along the rear of the yard. The large ouslite building to his left was being used as a station house by the Occupation forces. Around the front, there was a lot of troop activity, and a line of half-tracks was parked in the thoroughfare.
But this small yard area, enclosed by a high stone wall, ran around to the rear of the building. There were several smaller annexes out here, one of which had a roof festooned with vox masts and aerials.
No one in sight. And no sign of any nasty glyf-like surprises either. They’d had to shrink past wirewolf gibbets in the outskirts to get into the town, and at least once had seen the shimmer of a glyf behind a nearby row of buildings. The sight had made Feygor shake.
But this little yard was clean enough.
Bonin made the signal.
Mkoll and Mkvenner came in over the wall, dropped down and crossed to the far side of the yard until they had overlapped Bonin. All three had their suppressed pistols drawn.
As Bonin backed up the yard, his weapon hunting left and right, Mkoll and Mkvenner reached the annexe with the masted roof. Mkvenner covered Mkoll as he ducked inside.
Thirty-five seconds later, he came out and gave the all clear.
Bonin nodded, and keyed his micro-bead.
“Silver,” he said.
A door in the back of the main building suddenly opened onto the yard. Mkoll and Mkvenner had slipped inside the annexe doorway, and Bonin threw himself back into the shadows along the outer wall. A uniformed sirdar, accompanied by a junior officer and four excubitors, emerged and began to walk down the yard.
“Bragg! Bragg!” Bonin hissed.
* * * * *
In the shadows of an alleyway on the far side of the yard wall, Gaunt listened hard to his earpiece.
“Bonin? Bragg or silver? Which is it?”
A long pause.
“Bonin?”
“Bragg,” the whisper came back.
Rawne and Beltayn were all set to go over the wall.
“Hold it,” Gaunt said. “It’s not clear.”
“I heard Bo call ‘silver’,” Rawne said.
“Well, he’s changed his mind,” Gaunt said.
“I’m going anyway,” Rawne said, gesturing for Varl to cup his hands and boost him over the wall. “We’ll be here all night otherwise.”
“Can’t you control your people?” Cirk hissed.
“There’s been no evidence of it so far,” Gaunt replied.
“Silver. Silver!” Bonin called.
“Right, go,” Gaunt said.
The sirdar and his escort had gone out through the gate. Bonin signalled again, and Rawne and Beltayn appeared over the wall and slithered down into the yard. They ran towards Bonin, who ushered them up to the annexe, where Mkvenner was waiting at the door.
The annexe was the vox office for the station house. Inside, in a dingy room lit by yellowed glow-globes, sat a large, non-portable voxcaster unit. Coils of trunking and sheaves of cable sprouted up through the roof to connect it to the mast array. It was part of the Occupation’s principal communications network, tuned to the archenemy’s main command channels and data relays. Most important of all, it was equipped with a cipher module that decrypted the network’s confidence codes. Two operators had been staffing the annexe. Mkoll had left their bodies in the corner of the room.
Beltayn hurried in, and swung his vox-set off his shoulder. He pulled the cover off, and unlatched the door of the cable port in its side.
“Fast as you can,” Rawne urged.
“Don’t fuss me when I’m working,” Beltayn answered without looking up. He’d unbuttoned a pouch of tools, and was playing out a connector cable. Then he turned his attention to the enemy machine.
“Sonegraph 160. Really, really old, and clearly modified. I haven’t messed with one of these in a long time.”
“Fascinate me further, why don’t you,” Rawne growled. He glanced at the outer door where Bonin and Mkvenner were watching for interruptions.
Beltayn test flicked a few of the switches on the big caster, and studied the wavelength display. Then he used a watchmaker’s screwdriver to remove the pins holding an inspection plate in place. The plate came away, exposing loops of wire and small plug-in valve shunts. Using small pliers and a voltmeter from his kit, Beltayn tested and then exchanged several of the wire connectors and took out one of the valves. Then he attached one end of the connector cable to his set and the other to an output socket on the caster.
“Hurry up,” Rawne said. He was getting jumpy. The cluster of wires Beltayn had exposed precisely formed the shape of the stigma. He looked at something else.
Beltayn switched on his set’s power pack, made an adjustment to its dials, then crossed back to the big machine. He tentatively pressed several keys on the main console and, as gauges glowed amber and needles quivered, he started to scroll down through a column of data presented in trembling graphic form on a small sub-screen.
“Got it,” Beltayn said. “Yep, I’ve got it. The transmission log. How much do you want?”
“How much is there?” asked Rawne.
Beltayn scrolled down some more, peering. “Mmm… about eight months at least. It’ll take a while to get all that.”
“How long are we talking?”
Beltayn shrugged. “Probably five, ten minutes per week.”
“Feth!” said Rawne.
“Take the last week,” Mkoll said. “We don’t have time for more. Let’s just pray there’s something usable in it.”
Beltayn looked at Rawne.
“Do as he says,” Rawne agreed. Beltayn set the device, pressed activation keys on both the main caster and his own portable, and information began to stream down the connector into the set’s recording buffer.
“Quiet!” Mkvenner called from the doorway.
Outside, two Occupation troopers had wandered out into the yard and were loitering, smoking lho-sticks. They were making idle conversation.
“Come on,” whispered Bonin. “Smoke up and get lost.”
Beltayn got up and crept over to his set, studying the small display.
“Something’s awry,” he whispered.
Rawne felt his heart go cold. “What do you mean?”
&nbs
p; Beltayn reset his vox and hurried back to the main caster to do the same.
“It’s transferring, but the data’s encrypted. I’ll have to start over. What I’ve got so far is useless.”
“Feth it!” Rawne hissed.
The troopers in the yard were still smoking and chatting.
“Think, think…” Beltayn said to himself. He located the cipher module and examined it. “Why aren’t you working? Why the feth aren’t you working?”
He turned to Rawne and Mkoll. “It’s got a security lockout. The cipher needs a key to start it running.”
“A code?”
“No, an actual key. Goes in here.”
Mkoll went over to the bodies of the operators. He searched their pockets and finally found a small steel key on a thin chain around the neck of one of the dead men.
“This it?”
Beltayn tried it. As the key turned, the cipher module began to hum. Two monitor lights came on.
“We’re back in business,” he said, and set the transfer going again.
Bonin was pretty sure the two troopers were close to leaving. Then the yard door opened again, and a uniformed junior ran out with a sheet of paper in his hand. He was heading for the annexe. A runner, bringing an urgent message for the operators to send.
“Someone’s coming,” Mkvenner said.
“Here?” asked Rawne.
“Right here,” Bonin replied.
Mkoll came towards the door. “Let him in,” he said. “Let him right in and then take him. No noise.”
The runner came up to the annexe door. Then he did the one thing they weren’t expecting. He knocked.
The Ghosts looked at each other blankly.
The runner knocked again. Waiting at the door, bouncing eagerly on his toes, the runner turned and grinned at the two troopers. One of them called out something. The runner replied and laughed. Then he knocked again.
“Voi sahn, magir?” he called out.
Everyone was looking at Rawne. “I don’t know!” he mouthed indignantly. How the feth did you say “Come in’? All Rawne could think of was that Cirk would have known.
In desperation, he called out some made-up sounds, deliberately strangling them into an unintelligible bark.
It did the trick. The runner opened the door and stepped inside. His smile melted. He saw three enemy troopers in filthy black fatigues grouped around the main caster. He didn’t see the other two either side of the door behind him. Bonin closed the door. Mkvenner’s left hand clamped around the runner’s mouth before he could utter a word and his warknife punched. He held the wide-eyed runner tightly as he twitched and shook. When the twitching had stopped, he lowered the body soundlessly to the floor with Mkoll’s help.
Bonin gently reopened the door a crack and peered out. The troopers were leaving.
Mkoll looked down at the runner. “He was in a hurry. He may have been expecting to take back a quick reply. I’d lay money he’s going to be missed within the next fifteen minutes.”
Rawne looked at Beltayn. “How long?” he asked.
Beltayn was watching the set display. “It’s slow. Ten, maybe twelve minutes more.”
Those minutes tracked by painfully slowly. Bonin and Mkvenner crouched by the door. Mkoll sat, perfectly still, in one of the operator chairs. Rawne paced, drumming the fingers of his right hand against the knuckles of his left. He became aware that Mkoll was staring at him, his eyes narrowed. Rawne’s fidgeting was really getting to the calm, quiet chief scout.
Rawne glared at Mkoll. “I’m a major,” he snapped. “I can do what I fething like.”
“And therein, so often, lies our problem,” Mkoll replied coldly. Everyone looked round. With the possible exception of Mkvenner, Mkoll was the most collected, reserved man in the Ghosts. No one had ever heard him rise to the bait and throw out a jibe like that.
“You say something?” Rawne said, taking a step forward. Mkoll’s chair scraped back and he got to his feet. Rawne was a good deal taller than Mkoll, but their eyes locked murderously.
“Do you honestly want some, you asshole?” Mkoll breathed.
Mkvenner and Bonin had both risen, flanking Rawne from behind. Surrounded by three of the most dangerous men in the Tanith First, Rawne seemed utterly unfazed. His eyes never leaving Mkoll’s, he said, “You know, feth-face, I believe I do.”
“Oh for feth’s sake!” Beltayn cried, so loudly it made them all start. “What’s the matter with you, major? Is it your plan to pick a fight with everyone on the mission team before we’re done?”
All four men looked at him sharply. Beltayn shrank back, raising his hands. “Or I could just carry on minding my own business.”
His expression made Bonin snigger.
Rawne’s shoulders relaxed slightly. “Boy’s right. Feth’s sake,” he murmured. “What am I doing?”
Mkoll backed off too, staring at the floor, his fingers to his temples. “Holy Throne,” he said. “That was me, wasn’t it? That was me.” He looked up at Rawne. “I’m sorry, sir,” he said. “I don’t know where that came from.”
Rawne bit his lip and shook his head sadly. “It’s all of us,” he said. “It’s all of us.”
“Transfer’s complete,” Beltayn called. He started to uncouple his equipment and stow his kit.
“Let’s go,” Rawne said.
“To quote my friend the vox-man,” Bonin said. “Something’s awry.”
A truck, painted in the livery of the Occupation forces, had pulled up in the yard while they had been idiotically facing off. Four men had jumped down and, under the supervision of a fifth, an obese, older man in a sirdar’s uniform, they were loading the bundles of propaganda pamphlets onto the flatbed from the pile.
“This we didn’t need,” Bonin remarked.
Rawne took a look. “Emperor kiss my arse,” he sighed. “It’s going to take them ages to get that crap loaded. We’re stuck here until they’ve finished.”
“Or until someone comes looking for the messenger,” Mkoll said.
“Or until we go out there and kill them,” suggested Beltayn. “Not me, obviously. You guys are the mean, tough types who do that sort of thing.”
“Last thing we want now is a fight that could escalate,” Mkoll said.
Twilight was sliding into night now. The curfew had sounded, and the streets were clearing. Mkoll’s team was taking far too long.
Gaunt had withdrawn the rest of them from the alley, where they were too exposed, and they’d holed up in the back parlour of a derelict tailor’s store a few doors down. Larkin was covering the front, Varl the back, and Criid was lookout on the side door of the premises. Gaunt waited with Cirk, Landerson, Feygor, Curth and Brostin in a room full of headless fitting dummies, dusty cloth samples and crinkled paper patterns. Eszrah ap Niht lurked in one corner, slowly leafing through a heavy catalogue book, his grey fingers tracing in wonder across the pictures of fine gentlemen and ladies modelling the styles of the latest season.
“What did you mean, I left?” Curth said suddenly.
“Not now, Ana,” Gaunt said.
“No. What did you mean?”
Gaunt got up quickly and walked away. He went into the back hall. “Anything?” he called down to Criid.
She shook her head.
“Dammit,” he said and turned back. Cirk had followed him out. She was blocking the doorway.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Your woman didn’t leave,” she said quietly.
“What?”
“I left, Ibram.”
Gaunt stared at her. He was about to reply, when his micro-bead blipped. Rawne had been told only to use the link in an emergency.
“One?”
“This is two. We’ve got the stuff. But we’re pinned in the annexe. Some idiots are loading a truck in the yard.”
“Can you deal, two?”
“I’d say “Bragg” to that, sir. We could take them, but it could get complicated fast. However, we don’t want to be sitt
ing here much longer either.”
“Understood, Stand by. When you hear ‘silver’, get out into the alley. One out.”
“Problem?” Cirk asked. She reached out a hand and placed it against Gaunt’s chest. He brushed it aside.
“Not now, Sabbatine. We’ll talk about this later.”
“What’s to talk about?” she asked.
“Stop it.” Gaunt walked back into the parlour. “Everyone up,” he said. “It seems to be time for one of those events Major Cirk dreads.”
“A planetary invasion?” she quipped smartly.
“A diversion,” he replied.
“Throne’s sake!” she growled, her jaw stuck out pugnaciously. “Fine, just so long as it doesn’t involve your pyromaniac.”
“Bad news part two,” said Gaunt. “Brostin, you’re up. That fething burner work yet?”
“We’ll see, sir,” Brostin replied, pulling the harness of the hefty weapon over his wide shoulders.
“Varl?” Gaunt called.
Varl responded quickly, running back into the parlour with his lasrifle ready.
“I’m going out front with Brostin. Gather the team, get out into the alley, and wait for Rawne’s bunch. Cirk?”
“Yes, Ibram?”
He ignored the familiarity. “The next stage is up to you and Mr Landerson. The Leafering cell. How do we find them?”
“Things may have changed, but there used to be a contact point at the Temple of the Beati, just west of here,” Cirk replied.
The Temple of the Beati, Gaunt smiled. How entirely appropriate. “All right,” he said. “Talk to Varl, explain how to get to it. I want the two of you ready to lead the team through as soon as we rejoin you. If you hear the code word… uh… ‘Sabbat’, let’s use ‘Sabbat’… if you hear that, go on without us. No questions. Varl, at that point, the senior ranking officer has command of the mission.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Stop smiling, Varl,” Gaunt said. “If things go arse-up now, it could be you.”
“The Emperor protects,” Varl said sweetly. “And also dumps on us from a very great height.”