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out of choices.
    In silence Jezal watched as the ropes were thrown down to the quay and made fast, the long gangplank squealed out to the shore and scraped onto the stones. Bayaz called out to his apprentice. 'Master Quai! Time for us to disembark!' And the pale young man followed his master down from the ship without a backward glance, Brother Long-foot behind them.
    'Good luck, then,' said Jezal, offering his hand to Logen.
    'And to you.' The Northman grinned, ignored the hand and folded him in a tight and unpleasant-smelling embrace. They stayed there for a somewhat touching, somewhat embarrassing moment, then Ninefingers clapped him on the back and let him go.
    'Perhaps I'll see you, up there in the North.' Jezal's voice was just the slightest bit cracked, in spite of all his efforts. 'If they send me…'
    'Maybe, but… I think I'll hope not. Like I said, if I was you I'd find a good woman and leave the killing to those with less sense.'
    'Like you?'
    'Aye. Like me.' He looked over at Ferro. 'So that's it then, eh, Ferro?'
    'Uh.' She shrugged her scrawny shoulders, and strode off down the gangplank.
    Logen's face twitched at that. 'Right,' he muttered at her back. 'Nice knowing you.' He waggled the stump of his missing finger at Jezal. 'Say one thing for Logen Ninefingers, say he's got a touch with the women.'
    'Mmm.'
    'Aye.'
    'Right.' Jezal was finding actually leaving strangely difficult. They had been almost constant companions for the last six months. To begin with he had felt nothing but contempt for the man, but now that it came to it, it was like leaving a much-respected older brother. Far worse, in fact, for Jezal had never thought too highly of his actual brothers. So he dithered on the deck, and Logen grinned at him as though he guessed just what he was thinking.
    'Don't worry. I'll try to get along without you.'
    Jezal managed half a smile. 'Just try to remember what I told you, if you get in another fight.'
    'I'd say, unfortunately, that's pretty much a certainty.'
    Then there was really nothing Jezal could do but turn away and clatter down to the shore, pretending that something had blown into his eye on the way. It seemed a long walk to the busy quay, to stand next to Bayaz and Quai, Longfoot and Ferro.
    'Master Ninefingers can look after himself, I daresay,' said the First of the Magi.
    'Oh, yes indeed,' chuckled Longfoot, 'few better!'
    Jezal took a last look back over his shoulder as they headed off into the city. Logen raised one hand to him from the rail of the ship, and then the corner of a warehouse came between them, and he was gone. Ferro loitered for a moment, frowning back towards the sea, her fists clenched and a muscle working on the side of her head. Then she turned and saw Jezal watching her.
    'What are you looking at?' And she pushed past him and followed the others, into the swarming streets of Adua.
    The city was just as Jezal remembered it, and yet everything was different. The buildings seemed to have shrunk and huddled in meanly together. Even the wide Middleway, the great central artery of the city, felt horribly squashed after the huge open spaces of the Old Empire, the awe-inspiring vistas of ruined Aulcus. The sky had been higher, out there on the great plain. Here everything was reduced, and, to make matters worse, had an unpleasant smell he had never before noticed. He went with his nose wrinkled, dodging between the buffeting flow of passers-by with bad grace.
    It was the people that were strangest of all. It had been months since Jezal had seen more than ten at one time. Now there were suddenly thousands pressed in all around him, furiously intent on their own doings. Soft, and scrubbed, and decked out in gaudy colours, as freakish to him now as circus performers. Fashions had moved on while he was away facing death in the barren west of the World. Hats were worn at a different angle, sleeves had swollen to a wider cut, shirt collars had shrivelled to a length that would have