Assail (Malazan Empire, #6)(26)

For his part, Kyle suffered no such quandary. His answer to their scowls and slit-eyed hard stares was a quiet smile of amusement, as if they’d become a joke – something they no doubt suspected and thus dreaded to be the truth.

His companion for much of this time was Reuth, Tulan’s nephew. In terms of seamanship, the lad was far behind even him. The Mare sailors were dismissive of the lad, seeing no worth in anyone so woefully ignorant. Kyle, however, remembered his own abrupt introduction to the sea: he’d grown up on the steppes, far inland, and had never even seen a ship until his fourteenth summer.

The lad tagged along with him during watches and while he crewed. He kept up a peppering of questions regarding the outside world. A week into the crossing, perhaps halfway, Kyle drew the task of inspecting the lines, their splices and ends, searching for breaks and any dangerous fraying. He sat near the bow in the half-shade of the high prow while he sorted through the coils and bundles. Reuth sat with him. This day the lad was uncharacteristically quiet and withdrawn.

Kyle glanced up from studying a line of woven linen. ‘There is something troubling you?’ The lad would not meet his gaze; instead, he stared off down the long gangway that ran the length of the Lady’s Luck. ‘One of the crew kicked you aside? Cussed you up and down?’

Reuth gave a shrug of his thin shoulders. ‘No worse than usual. No, they’re not so bad. Remember, Tulan’s the ship’s master.’

‘Not one to coddle you too closely, though.’

Reuth laughed without humour. ‘No. That’s for certain.’

Kyle set the linen line aside and turned to another, which appeared to be woven of hair. He inspected it more closely and was surprised, and a touch unnerved, to see that it was not horse hair, as he had presumed, but human hair.

‘Pay no attention to what these ragged sailors say, Reuth. Continue studying your maps. You could become a navigator, or a pilot. That’s a rare skill. One these hands can’t even imagine.’ He didn’t add that he himself was barely literate – it was only after joining the Guard that he learned to read and write, just.

‘No. It’s not them.’

Kyle pulled on the woven line – it was strong. Perhaps it was somehow special; that is, special beyond the sacrifice made by the women of Mare for the welfare of their husbands and sons. Perhaps it was employed in the ship’s rituals surrounding the invocations of Ruse. ‘Not them?’ he asked absently.

‘No. It’s you.’

He raised his gaze to the lad to find him casting quick concerned glances his way. He lowered the line. ‘Oh? Me? How so?’

The lad licked his lips then cleared his throat into a fist. ‘You are an outlander. You served with the Malazans, yet you are not of them. You have the look and bearing of what we would call a barbarian, an inhabitant of the Wastes – your sun- and wind-darkened hue, your black hair and moustache.’

Kyle eased himself back, straightening slightly. ‘Yes? So?’

Reuth hesitated, then pushed on: ‘You carry that sword with you at all times. You never leave it aside in a bunk or a chest. You keep it hidden from sight, wrapped and covered …’

‘Yes? So?’

‘Well …’ The lad peered warily about then lowered his voice. ‘There are those on board who say you might be Whiteblade.’

Whiteblade. So there it was. No longer the Whiteblade, but just Whiteblade itself. A title, or epithet. How things change and transform in the retelling as each speaker slips in one or two embellishments to make tales their own – or to move them in the direction they think they ought to go.

‘You’re doing it again,’ the lad said.

Kyle studied the lad: he appeared serious, worried even, hunched forward as he was, his eyes searching. ‘Doing what?’

Reuth pointed to his neck. Kyle lowered his gaze and jerked a touch ruefully. The lad was right: he’d gotten hold of the amber stone he kept round his neck and was rubbing it as he thought.

‘What is it?’

‘Just an old worn piece of amber. The gift of a friend long ago.’

‘So – are you him? Whiteblade?’

He chose to give an unconcerned shrug. ‘And what if I was?’

Reuth leaned even closer. His long unwashed hair fell forward and he brushed it back with an impatient gesture that was a habit of his. ‘Then you must be careful. There are those here who would like to kill you, I think.’

‘Thank you, Reuth. I’ll have a care.’

The lad nodded earnestly. Edging forward even closer, he pressed his hands together and touched his fingers to his nose. ‘Ah … so … is it true what I hear?’

Kyle simply shook his head, smiling slightly. He picked up the sailor’s dirk he’d taken as his own, honed to a thin sickle-moon, and set to cutting a hemp line to trim it.

Reuth sighed his disappointment and sat back. ‘Well, I had to try.’

‘Thank you for the warning, Reuth. Now I think that the less time you are seen with me the better for you.’

At first the lad look stricken – as if he’d been told to go away – but then the wider implications came to him and he nodded once more. ‘Ah! I see. Well, don’t you worry about me. Tulan’s the Master, remember.’

Kyle waved him away with the short blade. ‘Go on with you now.’