A man clings desperately to the hull of a boat. It is a boat made of wood, not the bundled reeds of poorer fishermen, and so there is very little purchase for his trembling fingers. He digs broken nails and bleeding fingertips into the faint grooves between uncaring planks, to keep his place. If it were not for the water, buoying him and pressing him against the hull as the boat advances downriver, he would quickly lose his precarious place.

Above him, in the boat, killers.

Above them, unseen by all in the black of the night, the Faceless One. Watching.

And then there is one other.

~ ~ ~

What do you here, Reaper? The voice was feminine, silky, disapproving.

The Faceless One turned His head. Beside him, Vernith regarded Him with bright eyes. Her proud jackal head was framed by the nemes crown, but She forbore to wear the false beard.

I could ask you the same, He replied. She did not answer, nor did He expect Her to.

I merely observe, He finally informed Her.

What is your interest in this slave?

He shrugged. Just that. My interest.

Will you intervene?

The Faceless One considered, then shook His head. No. That one helped to prepare offerings for Me, but he is no worshipper of Mine.

Then tell Me Your interest. And in return, I will propose a question I suspect You have not yet thought to ask.

He neither liked nor disliked the usurper of the underworld. Or, to be more accurate, the Faceless One both liked and disliked Her, but not enough to excite in Him the desire towards any particular action. Still, it had been a long time since He had conversed with one of His kind. So He chose to reply.

The slave is involved in a larger issue that concerns Me. More I will not say.

More is not necessary. It is clear this slave is connected somehow to what You have done.

And what have I done?

You have created an aberration, Reaper. I know it, and soon all the other gods will as well, if they do not already.

I have not broken the compact, Vernith, so I care not what the others know or do not know. And the ‘aberration’ You speak of is my disciple. Have a care with Your words. Words have power, and consequence.

She placed a hand on His arm. How long had it been since He had been touched by another? He could not immediately recall.

If the aberration disrupts the burial rite of the Consort, a rite consecrated to Me-

Then You will do nothing, He interrupted, for you know as well as I that the woman is not dead, and therefore not Your concern.

Vernith changed tack then, a silent admission that the Faceless One’s argument was faultless. Your ‘disciple’ has lifted the curse from a ghoul pack.

The Faceless One turned to face Her directly. Steel entered His voice. Then he has righted, in part, a wrong for which You are responsible. One You have done nothing over millennia to atone for.

And what is it You think I could have done, Reaper?

Slowly, gently, He removed Her hand from His person. I do not know. But something greater than nothing seems appropriate to Me.

Vernith crossed Her arms beneath Her breasts, and He saw the fists that She made, hidden though Her hands were. It is a mercy that they survive at all. If I had attempted to do anything, they would no longer exist.

Speak not to Me of mercy, goddess. Mercy is a hateful concept. I am that which waits beyond mercy’s false promise. I am retribution.

She snorted. You are an old, inflexible thing, just as the one whose position I claimed was. Your intransigence will cause untold misery and chaos. And You will call it justice.

He considered Her words. You are nearly correct. I will call it retribution. Justice, true justice, is even more ephemeral than mercy.

Even if the empire falls in consequence, Old One, with all the blood and death that will follow?

He shrugged. Even then. Empires rise and fall. The desert is littered with their monuments. Now make good on our bargain; tell me the question you believe I have not considered.

Very well, She replied, turning her gaze if not her attention back to the mortal in the river. It is this: what do you think your ‘disciple’ in the desert will do, when it realizes how simple it would be to take your power and your place?

The Faceless One laughed. Of course an usurper’s thoughts would turn to usurpation. But simple is not the same thing as easy, Vernith. Not at all. And just as I am not your former master, the Architect is not you. He shrugged. If there is nothing else, I wish to observe what happens to the slave without distraction.

Vernith spoke no more. But She did not depart. She, too, watched the mortal drama playing out below.

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~ ~ ~

By the time Acacia and five of his men came alongside and boarded the second boat, only the dead were left to greet them. One of their targets lay at the bottom of the boat, an arrow through his neck. Another sat slumped by the tiller; an arrow through the back. His men were already scanning the water, bows drawn, for the missing men. It was a waning moon and visibility wasn’t what it might have been, but after a few moments the thrum of bowstrings from the starboard side, followed by a sharp cry. Acacia signaled the other boat to collect the corpse.

Two left. Acacia assumed they would have split up when they abandoned their boat, so he joined the guardsman on the port side in scanning the waters. It took a long time, but eventually Acacia’s patience was rewarded.

The man had been a strong swimmer. Acacia doubted he could have made it to the river’s bank as quickly as the target had. At such a distance in the dark, from the unstable deck of the boat, taking the man with an arrow required skill, or luck. Acacia did not believe in luck.

He took the recurve bow from the guardsman next to him, drew, sighted, centered his self and slowed his breath – and loosed.

A few seconds later the man on the bank stumbled, swayed. Fell to the mud.

Acacia passed the bow back to its owner. “Continue searching the water,” he signed. “There’s one left.”

A minute passed, then two. The second boat had reached the corpse and was hauling it aboard. Still, no sign of the final target. Acacia grew certain that the man hadn’t tried his chances in the river. There was nowhere to hide on the boat, save for a large wicker basket amidships. It was not large enough to hold a full-grown man. Still, he ordered it checked. All it contained were white crocks, barely longer than a hand.

So they were poachers. It explained their quick reaction to the Eternal Guard’s approach, at least. But it did not move him any closer to finding his stray.

He wasn’t on the boat. He wasn’t swimming away. That left only one place to search.

Acacia ordered two men to remove their armor and search the boat’s hull. They went over the side carrying only their daggers. It would be enough, Acacia knew. But when they returned, a shake of Pebble’s head told him their daggers were unblooded. Acacia ordered the same action taken for the second boat, with the same result.

Then he must have drowned. Acacia, not being a fool, would present it to Little Tooth as a fact, rather than a supposition. He was dedicated, but he was also ambitious. One did not become the second to a Greatest of Two Hundred by being complacent.

Little Tooth had ordered him not to return until it was done. Acacia would not willingly carry a black mark on his record for a single poacher, simply because he had not been able to recover the body. Anything might happen to it; it might be eaten by crocs, or it might become lodged somewhere on the river’s bottom, or it might be carried downstream further than they could estimate, or search for.

No. Recovering the body was a lost cause. Being punctilious about it would do no one any good.

And if the man had somehow survived, improbable as the idea was? Well. A poacher who had seen all of his companions slaughtered would keep his head down very far indeed, for a very long time. Acacia saw no danger in telling Little Tooth that the deed was done. And whatever he told Little Tooth, the Eternal Guard with him would back. His fate would be their fate, after all, for good or ill.

He signaled the second boat to collect the dead man on the shore and then rejoin them. Once it had, he ordered the crocs released so as not to offend the river god, and then transferred all the corpses to the second boat and set it alight.

They rowed back upriver to rejoin the procession in the light of its makeshift pyre.

~ ~ ~

Orthus had nearly lost his grip when the second boat made jarring contact with the one he clung to. They were silent, of course, but as the killers boarded, their movements were communicated to him through the wood and the boat’s small motions.

He was very, very afraid. All the Tongueless had to do was stand at the boat’s prow and look down, and his fate was sealed. As the moments mounted, his terror swelled. He could not remain where he was. At the very least, he had to move to the boat’s stern. It would be more difficult to spot him there. Or better, he could move to the second boat; they would not suspect anyone hiding there, since they had already claimed it. He hoped. But moving might attract their attention. His heart pounding, he was torn with indecision.

The thrum of a bowstring above, and the resulting death cry decided him. Who just died? he wondered, his heart aching and his guilt threatening to choke him. But the cold, hard part of him, the part that did not want to die, took control.

Move, or it will be you, next.

He took a deep, quiet breath, slipped fully beneath the water, and swam against the current toward the stern of the second boat.

He had barely reached his target when it began to pull away. He broke the surface. Desperately he grabbed at the cut anchor rope that dangled above his head, and missed – but saw that the tiller was rocking aimlessly back and forth. They were rowing away, using only their oars to propel and guide them, not bothering with the tiller.

Orthus grabbed hold of the wooden blade and clung to it for his life, praying he would not be noticed.

The boat did not travel very far before it stopped in the water once more. He risked a peek round the stern and saw that they were collecting a body from the water. He couldn’t tell whose. Guilt rose up in him once more, and he ruthlessly shoved it back down. Yes, it was his fault that all these men were dead, but he had not killed them. So he told himself, but the pain in his heart throbbed on, unconvinced.

He risked a look on the other side of the craft, and saw that they were now about halfway to the river bank. He did not think he was likely to get any closer.

Stay hidden, or swim?

He almost certainly would not get a better chance. If he were to do anything, now was best, while at least some of them were distracted and land was near.

Orthus breathed deep, prayed silently to any god who might be listening, then let go the tiller and sank beneath the surface.

~ ~ ~

The Faceless One watched the mortal attain the river’s bank, and collapse in the mud. He felt the goddess of the underworld depart, without a further word. There was little enough to say that hadn’t already been said, and what had been said mattered little. Only one thing the usurper had uttered stayed with him; when she had accused him of seeking a false justice.

He was a dark god, a god of blood and death. He was called merciless by mortals and immortals alike, and did not dispute the fact. He despised the very concept of mercy. But not because he was evil – and not because mercy was for the weak. Mercy was, in His philosophy, a quality found only in the incredibly strong.

Few mortals and fewer gods possessed that sort of strength.

And thousands of years had taught Him that something so rare could never be relied upon. Mercy amounted to a false hope. It was to be shunned.

And if mercy was a false hope, then how much more justice? Justice was a dream. No scale could ever be built to weigh or measure the injustices done in a single second of a single day.

If existence truly cherished and upheld the concepts of mercy and justice, there would be no need for Him, and He would without complaint let his essence dissipate in the divine wind.

No, usurper, youngling. I will not call what comes justice. I will call it retribution, and though it will not balance any scales, it is all I can do. And it is more than any of you others will do.

He had cast His die, and events would play out as fate or chance decreed. He could see the possible branchings as well as any of the Elevated, and they all branched out from the tomb in the desert.

All but one.

What had attracted Him to this place, this time, this mortal was the fact that he also carried the potential to influence the final outcome of the Reaper’s gamble. It was a faint chance; faint enough that Vernith had not noticed it. But compared to Him, the usurper was an infant.

The Faceless One grunted to himself. Vernith had Her part to play, but Her actions were almost wholly predictable. Her motivations were transparent. She would react, rather than act.

But this mortal, this runaway slave with a death sentence hanging over him… he was a variable that the Old God could not plan for. His potential was simply too obscure.

As the tongueless ones rowed away, the Reaper watched the slave rise cautiously from the mud and stumble northwards.