[Gaunt's Ghosts 10] - The Armour of Contempt

  Dalin blinked again and looked around at the smiling faces surrounding him. They looked… proud. Connected to him, like they owned him, in the very best way.

  Mach Bonin stood on an upper landing, leading the cheer. “Dalin Criid! Show him we approve!” he was shouting.

  “This…” Dalin grinned. “This is…”

  “The way Ghosts welcome one of their own,” said Domor, coming forward. “Dalin, this is a rare moment, so you’ll excuse us if we make the most of it.”

  He shook Dalin’s hand.

  “Your dad’s here,” he said, over the clapping.

  Dalin looked around, and saw Caffran smiling at him.

  “Oh, you mean Caff,” he said.

  “All right, then?” Caffran asked, coming forward.

  Dalin nodded. “What did you do to your uniform?” he asked.

  “Don’t you start. Look, I did a thing. I hope you like it. I set you up with a billet cage, right upstairs, two down from mine. Guard issue, all proper.”

  “I’m not Guard yet, Caff.”

  “I know, but you will be.”

  Dalin smiled and clamped his hands around Caffran’s.

  Dermon Caffran wasn’t old enough to be Dalin’s biological father, but, as Tona Criid’s partner, he had raised the boy and his sister as his own, as far as Guard life allowed that to be possible. Then complications had set in.

  “I got you this,” Caffran said, producing the sacra. “To toast you.”

  “Thanks.”

  Dalin turned in a slow circle, acknowledging the applause. He saw all the faces: Obel, Ban Daur, Wheln, Rafflan, Brostin, Lyse, Caober, Nessa Bourah. Larkin was there. Larkin winked. The old dog.

  Zweil came forward, holding a psalter and bless-bottle. “Heavens, Dalin Criid. You’re very tall suddenly,” he exclaimed. “I thought I might bless you, but I fear I won’t reach!”

  Dalin grinned and bowed.

  The crowd hushed as Zweil made the sign of the eagle on Dalin’s forehead. “In the name of the God-Emperor who watches over us, and the Saint whose work we do, I vouchsafe your soul against the horrors of the dark,” Zweil announced. He sprinkled some holy water over Dalin’s shoulders.

  “The Emperor protects,” he finished. There was more applause.

  Tona Criid had appeared at Caffran’s side. “Enjoy this,” she told Dalin. “The Ghosts don’t make a fuss much.”

  “They didn’t need to make a fuss at all, ma,” Dalin said. She smiled, and touched her fingertips to his cheek briefly. Truth of it was, when the Ghosts gathered like this, it was usually to say goodbye, not hello. To bid farewell to another friend or comrade lost in the grinder. This was an expression of welcome, a salute to the living. Criid’s heart was heavier than her smile suggested. They were welcoming her son into the Imperial Guard, into a way of life that had only one conclusion. This, too, was as good as saying goodbye, and she knew it. From this moment on, sooner or later…

  “There’s someone here who wants to say a few special words,” Varl said, appearing from the crowd.

  Varl beckoned. In the shadows behind the cage wall, Kolea stiffened and cleared his throat. Then he pulled back as a tall figure strode past him.

  It was Gaunt.

  VI

  “I wouldn’t miss this,” said Ibram Gaunt. Silence had fallen.

  “How did you go?” Gaunt asked.

  “Good, sir. Good,” Dalin replied. “Just starting out.”

  “You’ll be a good trooper,” Gaunt said. “Is that sacra, Caffran?”

  Caffran froze, half-hiding the bottle. “It might be, sir.”

  Gaunt nodded. “You know there’s a charge related to illicit alcohol?”

  “I’d heard something of that, sir,” Caffran admitted.

  “We’d better drink it before someone sees then, hadn’t we?” Gaunt said.

  Caffran smiled. “Yes, sir.”

  “Get some glasses, Caff,” Gaunt said. “By the way, what the feth is going on with your uniform? A starch accident?”

  “That might explain it,” Caffran said.

  Shot glasses were produced. The bottle emptied as it filled as many cups as it could.

  Gaunt raised his. “To Dalin. First and next.”

  They slugged it down. Dalin felt his torso go warm.

  “We’re walking Glory Road,” Gaunt told him, handing his empty glass to Domor. “You know where that leads?”

  “Well, glory?” said Dalin.

  Gaunt nodded. “I have complete confidence you’ll be a trooper by then, Dalin. I’ll show you glory, and I’ll be proud to have you stand at my side.”

  Gaunt looked around. “I know I’m not wanted here. But I needed to come. That’s it done. Carry on.”

  He walked away.

  The troopers closed around Dalin, shaking his hand and scrubbing his hair.

  “Come on!” Varl hissed.

  “Not now,” replied Kolea. “He’s happy. I don’t want to go walking in there…”

  “Gol…”

  Kolea turned and walked away.

  “Very clever, sir, if I might say so,” Beltayn said, following Gaunt through the billet.

  “How’s that, Bel?”

  “Sharing the grog out like that.”

  Gaunt nodded. “Dalin will need a clear head in the morning. Anything awry?”

  Beltayn smiled and shook his head. “Nothing right now, sir.”

  “Dismissed then, Bel. Thank you.”

  Gaunt had reached the medical tents. Dorden, the regiment’s venerable chief medicae, stood in the doorway of the main surgery.

  “You don’t look happy,” said Gaunt.

  “Do we still not know where we’re going?” Dorden asked. Gaunt shook his head.

  “Then come and look at this.”

  Dorden led him into a freight space that was piled high with wrapped boxes from the Munitorum.

  “These just arrived,” he said. “Standing order is to distribute them throughout the regiment, double dose.”

  Gaunt picked up a packet and read the label. “Anti-ague drench?”

  Dorden nodded. “Remind you of anything?”

  “I’ll assemble an informal,” he said.

  VII

  Seraphine. The letters were inscribed into the heavy ironwork of the vent duct, and again on the duct beside it, and again on the duct beside that. Eszrah ap Niht traced his fingers across the bas-relief letters. Seraphine. It was, he understood, the name of the great boat they flew in. It wore its name on metal-work all about the place, as if acknowledging that it was so vast, a person might forget where he was, and need reminding.

  Eszrah had been on a great boat before, but not as great a boat as this. It was so mighty, it was a world within a world. Gaunt had told Eszrah that it was a “mass conveyance”, a carrier ship. Several dozen regiments were being carried in its belly, more people than he’d seen in his whole life before leaving the Untill.

  There was no sense they were moving. No soaring sensation of flight. Just a dull vibration in the deck, a harmonic in the heavy iron of the ducts and walls and plating.

  He touched the word again, following the letters left to right as Gaunt had taught him. His lips moved.

  “S… sera… serap… hine…”

  He heard a noise and stopped, withdrawing his hand sharply. He was struggling to master the out-tongue, but it was hard, and he didn’t like people seeing how hard he found it.

  He was Nihtgane, Sleepwalker, bow-hunter of the Untill. It did not do for people to see his weaknesses.

  It was bad enough they had to see him without his wode.

  Ludd was approaching down the companionway. Ludd was all right, because Gaunt trusted Ludd, and Ludd and Eszrah had bloodied together in the hollow city.

  Nahum Ludd saw Eszrah Night waiting for him as he came up. Gaunt’s private quarters lay at the end of Barrack Hall 22, accessible via the narrow companionway flanked by ductwork. Eszrah had taken to guarding this narrow approach, like a warrior-spirit
guarding a secret ravine in some ancient myth. In the months since they’d met, Ludd had begun to relax around the towering Nihtgane partisan, although his initial impression that Eszrah was about to kill him in some particularly silent and effective manner was never far away When he’d first met him, Eszrah had been a fearsome giant of dreadlocks and painted skin. Gaunt had tidied him up, disguising the savage a little. The wode had gone, as had the shaggy mane and beard, and the eye mosaics, but still Eszrah stood out. Unnaturally tall, rake thin, he wore black, Guard-issue fatigues, heavy laced boots and a camo-cloak. His skull was shaved, and had a regal sculpture to it. His skin was gun-metal grey. His eyes were hidden behind a battered old pair of sunshades Varl had once given him.

  Everything about Eszrah Niht, in fact, was hidden. Hiding was what the Nihtgane did. They hid themselves and their thoughts, their emotions, their hopes and their fears. Ludd knew Eszrah, but he didn’t know him at all. He doubted anyone did. Not even Gaunt.

  “Histye, soule Eszrah,” Ludd said. With a little tuition from Gaunt, Ludd had been practising the Nihtgane’s tongue, just a few phrases. It seemed to Ludd unfair that only Gaunt could converse with him.

  Eszrah nodded, faintly amused. Ludd’s accent was terrible. The vowels were all too short. Ludd had almost said histyhi, the word for swine mash, rather than histye, the greeting.

  “Histye, soule Ludd,” Eszrah replied.

  Ludd grinned. This was almost a proper conversation by Eszrah ap Niht’s standards. The over-long vowels of Eszrah’s accent amused Ludd, especially the way he made his name sound like “Lewd”.

  “We’re gathering for an informal,” Ludd said. “More people will be coming this way.”

  And I’d rather you didn’t kill them, was the unspoken end of that sentence. Eszrah considered himself to be Gaunt’s property, and for this reason alone had followed the colonel-commissar all the way from the deep Untill of Gereon. As Ludd understood it, Eszrah didn’t regard himself as a slave. Gaunt owned him as one might own a good sword or a balanced rifle. As part of this relationship, Eszrah protected Gaunt’s person and his quarters with what Gaunt’s adjutant Beltayn had described as “maternal fury”. A few days earlier, a Belladon NCO had been hurrying down the companionway to bring an order slip to Gaunt, and Eszrah had pounced on him from the shadows, presuming him to be, perhaps, an assassin. It had taken quite a while before Eszrah could be convinced of the man’s innocence enough to let go of his throat, and a good deal longer for the NCO’s breathing to return to normal.

  Eszrah nodded again. He understood. Ludd was warning him, decently, that others were coming, giving him time to melt away. He disliked company.

  Voices could be heard at the mouth of the companionway Ludd glanced round. “That’ll be the rest,” he began, “so we—”

  He turned back. Eszrah ap Niht had vanished, as surely as if he had never been there.

  Ludd sighed, shook his head, and walked on.

  The others came. From the shadows of the ducting, the Sleepwalker watched them, his reynbow loaded and aimed. Major Rawne first, walking with Dorden, the old surgeon. Eszrah didn’t know Dorden well, but he had warmed to him. The Nihtgane respected the seniors of their tribe, and Eszrah showed the same courtesy to the elders of the Ghost clan. Rawne was different. Of the out-worlders who had come to the Untill, Rawne was one of the most ferocious warriors, and for that alone, he had earned Eszrah’s respect. Gaunt valued Rawne too, and that counted for a great deal.

  But there was a quality to Rawne. A malice. Eszrah’s people had a word—srahke—which they used for people like Rawne. Literally, it meant the keen-ness of a newly-whetted dagger’s edge.

  Next came Major Kolea and Major Baskevyl, and Beltayn, the adjutant. They were chatting convivially. Kolea, a Verghastite, was a big man, physically imposing, with an air of reliability and determination about him as heavy and hard as a block of ouslite. But his weight of personality was leavened with a good humour. Baskevyl was a Belladon, a well-made, compact man who, like Kolea, married a stern reliability with a refreshing brand of confidence. Beltayn, a Tanith man, was small and bright and so lightly built it seemed soldiering was entirely the wrong profession for him. But Eszrah had seen Beltayn fight, and seen him survive the Untill. Along with Gaunt and Ludd, Beltayn was one of the few Ghosts Eszrah considered to be friends. Though, in the Nihtgane tongue, the words for “friend” simply meant “someone I consider to be a trustworthy hunting partner”.

  Belladon, Verghastite, Tanith… this was where things became complicated for Eszrah. Gaunt had explained it many times, but still it seemed peculiar. The fighting clan was the Tanith, the Tanith First-and-Only. At some point in their history, after, so Eszrah had been told, a mighty battle, the Tanith had agreed to accept men from another clan into their order. These were the Verghastites, and some of them were females. The two clans had bonded into one. This, in Eszrah’s experience, never happened amongst the tribes of the Untill. Unless disease or famine had ravaged one tribe, and breeding partners were needed.

  Then had come the matter of the hollow city. Eszrah had been there and seen it, following Gaunt to war. During Gaunt’s expedition to Gereon, his fighting clan had been given to another leader, and had bonded to yet a third clan, who were called the Belladon. Following Gaunt’s return, and the death in war of the other leader, all three clans had unified under Gaunt, taking the name Tanith First-and-Only.

  This, as far as Gaunt and the others seemed to think, had been a good thing.

  Eszrah wasn’t sure. In the Untill, clans seldom combined successfully. For a start, there was the scent. No clan smelled alike. How could they bond when their bodies gave off such different scents? With his eyes closed, Eszrah could tell them apart quite easily. The resin sap of the Tanith, the mineral dust of the Verghastites, the hard steel of the Belladons. Eyes open, it was even more apparent. Tanith were lean and hard, pale skinned, dark haired. Verghastites were more solid, flat-faced and fairer. Belladons were between the two in their average build, darker-skinned, lighter in voice.

  Eszrah didn’t understand how such a compact of fighting clans could work. It wasn’t even a fact that these could. At the hollow city, they had fought to victory together due to the extremities of circumstance. Genuine bonding had yet to be proven, and that test would happen wherever they were going, wherever the great boat was taking them.

  To complicate matters further in Eszrah’s mind, Gaunt wasn’t Tanith, Verghastite or Belladon. He was other, with a scent of good, oiled hide. So too was Ludd (fire ash and flint), and Hark (bone dust and chemicals). And the old man Zweil too, though as Eszrah understood it, the clan kept Zweil around so they could be amused by a capering madman. Untill chieftains often allowed a simpleton to live for exactly the same purposes. The name for that was jestyr or foole.

  Gaunt, Ludd, Hark. They were Tanith, but not Tanith. It was perplexing. A fighting clan, already intermingled in blood and scent, allowed itself to be led by men from other clan territories.

  Eszrah decided he would never understand it, not even if he lived to be forty years old.

  Kolea, Beltayn and Baskevyl had passed down the companionway into Gaunt’s quarters. After a moment, Gaunt himself went by, alone, striding purposefully.

  Eszrah lowered his reynbow. Then he raised it again, quickly, as a final figure passed by.

  Mkoll. The master of scouts. The master of hunters. Tanith, so Tanith that his Tanith scent was stronger than any, though Eszrah doubted any could ever track the man’s spoor.

  Mkoll stopped suddenly, halfway down the companionway, turned and looked directly into the shadows at the place where Eszrah was concealed. He smiled.

  “All right, Eszrah?” he asked.

  Eszrah froze, then nodded.

  “That’s good,” Mkoll grinned. “Carry on.” He walked away into the commander’s quarters.

  The Nihtgane had a word for people like Mkoll too. It was sidthe. It meant ghost.

  The room was quite small, just a st
eel box, with a table in the centre of the floor. Beltayn had, over the days since they’d boarded the carrier, begged, borrowed or robbed a number of seats to furnish the place into some semblance of a briefing room. Pew benches with sagging upholstery, a few stools, a couple of high-backed chairs, both of which were so loose on their spells that they creaked and swayed.

  “Hello to all,” Gaunt said, taking off his storm coat. “Take a seat.”

  The officers of the regiment had been standing out of courtesy. Now they took their places. Kolea and Rawne reclined on one pew, Dorden and Hark on another. Baskevyl scooted forward on one of the creaking high-backs, and Mkoll settled himself on its twin. Beltayn perched his backside on a stool. Ludd withdrew to a corner of the room and remained standing.

  The room was dark, lit only by the outer light shafting through the door and high window slits. Gaunt nodded to Ludd, and the junior commissar activated the overhead lamps.

  Holding his coat up by the collar loop, Gaunt brushed it down as he carried it over towards a row of wall hooks.

  “Let’s start with basics. Any reports?”

  “The men are bedding down well, sir,” Kolea said. “Good transit discipline.”

  “Gol’s right,” said Baskevyl. “No nonsense. Smooth ride.” He leaned forward as he spoke, and his feeble chair let out a screech of wood.

  “Eli?” Gaunt asked over his shoulder, hanging his coat up.

  Elim Rawne was the regiment’s second officer, the senior man in the Tanith-Verghastite-Belladon command pyramid formed by himself, Kolea and Baskevyl.

  He stayed reclined, arms folded, and shrugged. “I’ve no reason to refute those statements. The Tanith have always conducted themselves perfectly during carrier transits. In my experience, the Verghastites have too. I can’t speak for the Belladon.”

  That was pointed. Gaunt looked around sharply.

  “Eli…”

  Baskevyl snorted and sat back. Another terrible groan issued from his chair. He said, “Major Rawne and I are reaching an understanding. He goads me and mine, sir, and I let his scorn drip off me like rain. Come the zone, the Belladon have agreed to allow Rawne to buff our medals.”