Before They Are Hanged by Joe Abercrombie Read Free Book Online Page B

joined the city to the mainland, the blue sea on one side and the blue harbour on the other.
The strongest defences in the world, so they say. I wonder if we shall be putting that proud boast to the test before too long
?
    'Superior Glokta?' Harker cleared his throat. 'The Lord Governor and his council will be waiting.'
    'They can wait a little longer, then. I am curious to know what progress you have made in investigating the disappearance of Superior Davoust.'
It would be most unfortunate if the new Superior were to suffer the same fate, after all
.
    Harker frowned. 'Well… some progress. I have no doubt the natives are responsible. They never stop plotting. Despite the measures Davoust took after the rebellion, many of them still refuse to learn their place.'
    'I stand amazed.'
    'It is all too true, believe me. Three Dagoskan servants were present in the Superior's chambers on the night he disappeared. I have been questioning them.'
    'And what have you discovered?'
    'Nothing yet, unfortunately. They have proved exceedingly stubborn.'
    'Then let us question them together.'
    'Together?' Harker licked his lips. 'I wasn't aware that you would want to question them yourself, Superior.'
    'Now you are.'
     
    One would have thought it would be cooler, deep within the rock
. But it was every bit as hot as outside in the baking streets, without the mercy of the slightest breeze. The corridor was silent, dead, and stuffy as a tomb. Vitari's torch cast flickering shadows into the corners, and the darkness closed in fast behind them.
    Harker paused beside an iron-bound door, mopped fat beads of sweat from his face. 'I must warn you, Superior, it was necessary to be quite… firm with them. A firm hand is the best thing, you know.'
    'Oh, I can be quite firm myself, when the situation demands it. I am not easily shocked.'
    'Good, good.' The key turned in the lock, the door swung open, and a foul smell washed out into the corridor.
A blocked latrine and a rotten rubbish heap rolled into one
. The cell beyond was tiny, windowless, the ceiling almost too low to stand. The heat was crushing, the stench was appalling. It reminded Glokta of another cell. Further south, in Shaffa. Deep beneath the Emperor's palace.
A cell in which I gasped away two years, squealing in the blackness, scratching at the walls, crawling in my own filth
. His eye had begun to twitch, and he wiped it carefully with his finger.
    One prisoner lay stretched out, his face to the wall, skin black with bruises, both legs broken. Another hung from the ceiling by his wrists, knees brushing the floor, head hanging limp, back whipped raw. Vitari stooped and prodded at one of them with her finger. 'Dead,' she said simply. She crossed to the other. 'And this one. Dead a good while.'
    The flickering light fell across a third prisoner. This one was alive.
Just
. She was chained by hands and feet, face hollow with hunger, lips cracked with thirst, clutching filthy, bloodstained rags to her. Her heels scraped at the floor as she tried to push herself further back into the corner, gibbering faintly in Kantic, one hand across her face to ward off the light.
I remember. The only thing worse than the darkness is when the light comes. The questions always come with it
.
    Glokta frowned, his twitching eyes moving from the two broken corpses to the cowering girl, his head spinning from the effort, and the heat, and the stink. 'Well this is very cosy. What have they told you?'
    Harker had his hand over his nose and mouth as he stepped reluctantly into the cell, Frost looming just over his shoulder. 'Nothing yet, but I—'
    'You'll get nothing from these two, now, that's sure. I hope they signed confessions.'
    'Well… not exactly. Superior Davoust was never that interested in confessions from the browns, we just, you know…'
    'You couldn't even keep them alive long enough to confess?'
    Harker looked sullen.
Like a child unfairly punished by his schoolmaster
. 'There's still the girl,' he