Book 1 - The Black Company by Glen Cook Read Free Book Online

the monster.
    I faced him. And the memory came. A devil's hammer drove spikes
of ice into the belly of my soul. I knew why One-Eye did not want
to cross the sea. The ancient evil of the
north . . .
    "I thought you people died three
hundred years ago."
    The legate laughed. "You don't know your history
well enough. We weren't destroyed. Just chained and buried alive."
His laughter had an hysterical edge. "Chained, buried, and
eventually liberated by a fool named Bomanz, Croaker."
    I dropped to my haunches beside One-Eye, who buried his face in
his hands.
    The legate, the terror called Soulcatcher in old tales, a devil
worse than any dozen forvalaka, laughed madly. His crewmen cringed.
A great joke, enlisting the Black Company in the service of evil. A
great city taken and little villains suborned. A truly cosmic
jest.
    The Captain settled beside me. "Tell me, Croaker."
    So I told him about the Domination, and the Dominator and his
Lady. Their rule had spanned an empire of evil unrivalled in Hell,
I told him about the Ten Who Were Taken (of whom Soulcatcher was
one), ten great wizards, near-demigods in their power, who had been
overcome by the Dominator and compelled into his service. I told
him about the White Rose, the lady general who had brought the
Domination down, but whose power had been insufficient to destroy
the Dominator, his Lady, and the Ten. She had interred the lot in a
charm-bound barrow somewhere north of the sea.
    "And now they're restored to life, it seems," I said. "They rule
the northern empire. Tom-Tom and One-Eye must have
suspected . . . We've enlisted in their
service."
    "Taken," he murmured. "Rather like the forvalaka."
    The beast screamed and hurled itself against the bars of its
cage, Soulcatcher's laughter drifted across the foggy deck. "Taken
by the Taken," I agreed. "The parallel is uncomfortable." I had
begun to shake as more and more old tales surfaced in my mind.
    The Captain sighed and stared into the fog, toward the new
land.
    One-Eye stared at the thing in the cage, hating. I tried to ease him away. He shook me off. "Not yet, Croaker. I have to
figure this."
    "What?"
    "This isn't the one that killed Tom-Tom. It doesn't have the
scars we put on it."
    I turned slowly, studied the legate. He laughed again, looking
our way.
    One-Eye never figured it out. And I never told him. We have
troubles enough.
     
----

----

Chapter Two: RAVEN
    "The crossing from Beryl proves my point," One-Eye growled over
a pewter tankard. "The Black Company doesn't belong on water.
Wench! More ale!" He waved his tankard. The girl could not
understand him otherwise. He refused to learn the languages of the
north.
    "You're drunk," I observed.
    "How perceptive. Will you take note, gentlemen? The Croaker, our
esteemed master of the arts cleric and medical, has had the
perspicacity to discover that I am drunk." He punctuated his speech
with belches and mispronunciations. He surveyed his audience with
that look of sublime solemnity only a drunk can muster.
    The girl brought another pitcher, and a bottle for Silent. He,
too, was ready for more of his particular poison. He was drinking a
sour Beryl wine perfectly suited to his personality. Money changed
hands.
    There were seven of us altogether. We were keeping our heads
down. The place was full of sailors. We were outsiders, outlanders,
the sort picked for pounding when the brawling started. With the
exception of One-Eye, we prefer saving our fight for when we are
getting paid.
    Pawnbroker stuck his ugly face in through the street doorway.
His beady little eyes tightened into a squint. He spotted us.
    Pawnbroker. He got that name because he loansharks the Company.
He doesn't like it, but says anything is better than the moniker
hung on him by his peasant parents: Sugar Beet.
    "Hey! It's the Sweet Beet!" One-Eye roared. "Come on over, Sugar
Baby. Drinks on One-Eye. He's too drunk to know any better." He
was. Sober, One-Eye is tighter than a collar of