The Black Company 9: Soldiers Live by Glen Cook

Author:Glen Cook [Cook, Glen]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Lady cornered Tobo. “We have a dangerous situation, here. And like a pet cobra it’s going to bite us someday. We have to do something.”

The boy sounded puzzled. “What’re you talking about? Something about what?”

“Those Voroshk. They aren’t as strong or as bright as we first thought but there are four of them and only one of you.”

“But they’re not going to . . . ”

“Pardon me for being an old cynic,” I said. “Magadan keeps telling me, in so many words, that he wants to be anywhere that isn’t here with us. And there’s at least the implication that he’ll do whatever it takes if we don’t help him go home. And Gromovol is going to be trouble eventually because his personality requires it. If you go out to visit Sleepy or just on a flying date the rest of us are stuck here with no better hope than the Howler.”

“And speaking of flying,” Lady said, “don’t you ever go out with both of those girls again. Hush! You’re only familiar with the women you’ve grown up around. I’m telling you right now that Arkana is exactly like Magadan. But she has one more weapon than he does and she means to use it to cloud your mind.”

“But . . . ”

“Shukrat I’m not sure about. There’s a chance Shukrat is exactly what she seems.”

I agreed. The kid was likable. And according to Tobo the hidden folk agreed. They offered no reason not to trust her.

Tobo was not used to arguing with anybody but his mother, even when he thought he was right. He did not want to think ill of Arkana but would not fight us.

Lady demanded, “So how do we make sure of them? You have to think of something before we move against Dejagore. We’ll be scattered, distracted and extremely vulnerable then. And because you spend time with the girls, out amongst the rest of us, all four will know what’s going on. They can plan accordingly.”

Again Tobo did not get a word in before I said, “I would be.”

Lady reminded him, “You’ve never been a prisoner.”

“Now there’s a joke. I was born a prisoner. A prisoner of a prophecy by an old woman who died years before I was born. A prisoner of the expectations of all you people. Gods, I wish Hong Tray was wrong and I could’ve been a normal kid.”

“There aren’t any normal kids, Tobo,” I told him. “Just kids who fake it better than the rest of us do.”

“And that name. Tobo. That was my baby name. Why does everybody still call me that? Why didn’t we ever have a ceremony to give me a grown-up name?”

Nyueng Bao do that. And Tobo was years past the appropriate birthday.

Lady told him, “You’ll have to take that up with Uncle Doj. Meantime, the other thing needs addressing right now. Blade is moving already. In three more days Sleepy will curl back to the northeast and it’ll be too late to stop anything. I want to be sure that we won’t get stabbed in the back just when things get exciting.

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