An Inch of Ashes by David Wingrove Read Free Book Online Page A

side of Kung. ‘I’ll do it.’
    If it was like the others it would have a metal plate set into its chest. The real Kung would have been killed months ago.
    Tolonen handed Karr the knife, then sat back on his knees, rubbing at his ribs again, a momentary flicker of pain in his face. ‘Okay. Let’s see what it is.’
    Karr slit the Advocate’s tunic open, exposing the flesh, then, leaning right over the body, he dug deeply into the flesh, drawing the blade across the corpse’s chest.
    Blood welled, flowed freely down the corpse’s sides. They had not expected that. But there was something. Not a plate, as they’d both expected, but something much smaller, softer. Karr prised the knife beneath it and lifted it out. It was a wallet. A tiny black wallet no bigger than a child’s hand. He frowned, then handed it across.
    Tolonen wiped it against his sleeve, then turned it over, studying it. It seemed like an ordinary pouch; the kind one kept tobacco in. For a moment he hesitated. What if it was a bomb? He ought to hand it over to the experts. But he was impatient to know, for the man – and he
was
a man, there was no doubting that now – had almost killed him. He had been that close.
    Gently he pressed the two ends of the wallet’s rim towards each other. The mouth of the pouch gaped open. He reached in with two fingers, hooking out the thing within.
    He stared at it a moment, then handed it across to Karr. He had known. The moment before he had opened it, he had known what would be inside. A stone. A single white
wei chi
stone. Like a calling card. To let the T’ang know who had killed him.
    Tolonen met Karr’s eyes and smiled bitterly.
    ‘DeVore. This was DeVore’s work.’
    Karr looked down. ‘Yes, and when he hears about it he’ll be disappointed. Very disappointed.’
    Tolonen was quiet a moment, brooding, then he looked back at Karr. ‘Something’s wrong, Gregor. My instincts tell me he’s up to something. While we’re here, distracted by this business. I must get back. At once. Jelka...’
    Karr touched his arm. ‘We’ll go at once.’
    DeVore turned in his chair and looked across at his lieutenant.
    ‘What is it, Wiegand?’
    ‘I thought you should know, sir. The Han has failed. Marshal Tolonen is still alive.’
    ‘Ah...’ He turned, staring out of the long window again, effectively dismissing the man. For a while he sat there, perfectly still, studying the slow movement of cloud above the distant peaks, the thin wisps of cirrus like delicate feathers of snow against the rich blue of the sky. Then he turned back.
    He smiled. Like Wiegand, they would all be thinking he had tried to kill Tolonen, but that wasn’t what he’d wanted. Killing him would only make him a martyr. Would strengthen the Seven. No, what he wanted was to destroy Tolonen. Day by day. Little by little.
    Yes. Tolonen would have found the stone. And he would know it was his doing.
    There was a secret lift in his room, behind one of the full-length wall charts. He used it now, descending to the heart of the warren. At the bottom a one-way mirror gave him a view of the corridor outside. He checked it was clear, then stepped out. The room was to the left, fifty
ch’i
along the corridor, at the end of a cul-de-sac hewn out of the surrounding rock.
    At the door he paused and took a small lamp from his pocket, then examined both the locks. They seemed untouched. Satisfied, he tapped in the combinations and placed his eye against the indented pad. The door hissed back.
    The girl was asleep. She lay there, face down on her cot, her long, ash-blonde hair spilling out across her naked shoulders.
    He had found her in one of the outlying villages. The physical resemblance had struck him at once. Not that she would have fooled anyone as she was, but eighteen months of good food and expert surgery had transformed her, making the thousand
yuan
he’d paid for her seem the merest trifle. As she was now she was worth a million, maybe ten.
    He