All Darkness Met by Glen Cook Read Free Book Online

marked the little one with the eye-patch. He would undergo the most exquisite tortures after the tables turned.
    Mocker didn’t doubt that they would. His past justified that optimism.
    After dark, following back-ways and forest trails, his captors took him southeastward, into the province of Uhlmansiek. So confident were they that they didn’t bother concealing anything from him.
    “A friend of mine,” said the knight, “Habibullah the ambassador, sent us.”
    “Is a puzzlement. Self, profess bambizoolment. Met same two nights passing, speaking once to same, maybeso. Self, am wondering why same wants inconsequential-though ponder-ous, admit-self snapped up like slave by second-class thugs pretending to entitlement?”
    Sir Keren laughed. “But you’ve met before. A long time ago.
    You gutted him and left him for dead the night you kidnapped El Murid’s daughter.”
    That put a nasty complexion on the matter. Mocker felt a new, deeper fear. Now he knew his destination.
    They would have a very special, very painful welcome for him at Al Rhemish.
    But Fate was to deprive him of his visit to the Most Holy Mrazkim Shrines. They were somehwere in the Uhlmansiek Kapenrungs when it happened.
    They rounded a bend. Two horsemen blocked their path. One was Guild Colonel Balfour, the second an equally hard and scarred Mercenary battalion chieftain. Mocker remembered both from the Victory Day celebration.
    “Hai!” he cried, for, if Sir Keren had made any mistake at all, it had been leaving him ungagged. “Rescue on hand. Poor old fat fool not forgotten....” The little fellow with an eye missing belted him in the mouth.
    Sir Keren’s rogues were old hands. Despite his circum-stances, Mocker found himself admiring their professionalism. They spread out, three against two. There was no question of a parley.
    The currents of intrigue ran deep.
    The one-eyed man moved suddenly, a split second after Sir Keren and his comrade launched their attack. His blade found a narrow gap below the rim of Sir Keren’s helmet.
    Balfour’s companion died at the same moment, struck down
    (by Sir Keren’s companion. Balfour himself barely managed to survive till the one-eye skewered the remaining man from behind.
    Mocker’s glee soon became tempered by a suspicion that his rescue wasn’t what it seemed. It might, in fact, be no rescue at all. He seized the best chance he saw.
    Having long ago slipped his bonds, he wheeled his mount and took off.
    They must be ignorant of his past, he reflected as forest flew past. Otherwise they would’ve taken precautions. Escape tricks were one way he had of making his meager living.
    He managed two hundred yards before the survivors noticed. The chase was on.
    It was brief.
    Mocker rounded a turn. His mount stopped violently, reared, screamed.
    A tall, slim man in black blocked the trail. He wore a golden cat-gargoyle mask finely chased in black, with jeweled eyes and fangs. And while words could describe that mask, they couldn’t convey the dread and revulsion it inspired.
    Mocker kicked his mount’s flanks, intending to ride the man down.
    The horse screamed and reared again. Mocker tumbled off. Stunned, he rolled in the deep pine needles, muttered, “Woe! Is story of life. Always one more evil, waiting round next bend.” He lay there twitching, pretending injury, fingers probing the pine needles for something useful as a weapon.
    Balfour and the one-eyed man arrived. The latter swung down and booted Mocker, then tied him again.
    “You nearly failed,” the stranger accused.
    Balfour revealed neither fear nor contrition. “They were good. And you’ve got him. That’s what matters. Pay Rico. He’s served us well: He deserves well of us. I’ve got to get back to Vorgreberg.”
    “No.”
    Balfour slapped his hilt. “My weapon is faster than yours.” He drew the blade a foot from its scabbard. “If we can’t deal honorably amongst ourselves, then our failure is inevitable.”
    The man in