All that breaks must be discarded even as the thunder of faith returns ever fading echoes.
Prelude to Anomandaris
THE DAY THE FACES IN THE ROCK AWAKENED WAS CELEBRATED AMONG the Teblor by a song. The memories of his people were, Karsa Orlong now knew, twisted things. Surrendered to oblivion when unpleasant, burgeoning to a raging fire of glory when heroic. Defeat had been spun into victory in the weaving of every tale.
He wished Bairoth still lived, that his sagacious companion did more than haunt his dreams, or stand before him as a thing of rough-carved stone in which some chance scarring of his chisel had cast a mocking, almost derisive expression.
Bairoth could have told him much of what he needed to know at this moment. While Karsa’s familiarity with their homeland’s sacred glade was far greater than either Bairoth’s or Delum Thord’s, and so ensured the likenesses possessed some accuracy, the warrior sensed that something essential was missing from the seven faces he had carved into the stone trees. Perhaps his lack of talent had betrayed him, though that did not seem the case with the carvings of Bairoth and Delum. The energy of their lives seemed to emanate from their statues, as if merged with the petrified wood’s own memory. As with the entire forest, in which there was the sense that the trees but awaited the coming of spring, of rebirth beneath the wheel of the stars, it seemed that the two Teblor warriors were but awaiting the season’s turn.
But Raraku defied every season. Raraku itself was eternal in its momentousness, perpetually awaiting rebirth. Patience in the stone, in the restless, ever-murmuring sands.
The Holy Desert seemed, to Karsa’s mind, a perfect place for the Seven Gods of the Teblor. It was possible, he reflected as he slowly paced before the faces he had carved into the boles, that something of that sardonic sentiment had poisoned his hands. If so, the flaw was not visible to his eyes. There was little in the faces of the gods that could permit expression or demeanour-his recollection was of skin stretched over broad, robust bone, of brows that projected like ridges, casting the eyes in deep shadow. Broad, flat cheekbones, a heavy, chinless jaw… a bestiality so unlike the features of the Teblor…
He scowled, pausing to stand before Urugal which, as with the six others, he had carved level with his own eyes. Serpents slithered over his dusty, bared feet, his only company in the glade. The sun had begun its descent, though the heat remained fierce.
After a long moment of contemplation, Karsa spoke out loud. ‘Bairoth Gild, look with me upon our god. Tell me what is wrong. Where have I erred? That was your greatest talent, wasn’t it? Seeing so clearly my every wrong step. You might ask: what did I seek to achieve with these carvings? You would ask that, for it is the only question worth answering. But I have no answer for you-ah, yes, I can almost hear you laugh at my pathetic reply.’ I have no answer. ‘Perhaps, Bairoth, I imagined you wished their company. The great Teblor gods, who one day awakened.’
In the minds of the shamans. Awakened in their dreams. There, and there alone. Yet now I know the flavour of those dreams, and it is nothing like the song. Nothing at all.
He had found this glade seeking solitude, and it had been solitude that had inspired his artistic creations. Yet now that he was done, he no longer felt alone here. He had brought his own life to this place, the legacies of his deeds. It had ceased to be a refuge, and the need to visit was born now from the lure of his efforts, drawing him back again and again. To walk among the snakes that came to greet him, to listen to the hiss of sands skittering on the moaning desert wind, the sands that arrived in the glade to caress the trees and the faces of stone with their bloodless touch.
Raraku delivered the illusion that time stood motionless, the universe holding its breath. An insidious conceit. Beyond the Whirlwind’s furious wall, the hourglasses were still turned. Armies assembled and began their march, the sound of their boots, shields and gear a deathly clatter and roar. And, on a distant continent, the Teblor were a people under siege.
Karsa continued staring at the stone face of Urugal. You are not Teblor. Yet you claim to be our god. You awakened, there in the cliff, so long ago. But what of before that time? Where were you then, Urugal? You and your six terrible companions?
A soft chuckle from across the clearing brought Karsa around.
‘And which of your countless secrets is this one, friend?’
‘Leoman,’ Karsa rumbled, ‘it has been a long time since you last left your pit.’
Edging forward, the desert warrior glanced down at the snakes. ‘I was starved for company. Unlike you, I see.’ He gestured at the carved boles. ‘Are these yours? I see two Toblakai-they stand in those trees as if alive and but moments from striding forth. It disturbs me to be reminded that there are more of you. But what of these others?’
‘My gods.’ He noted Leoman’s startled expression and elaborated, ‘The Faces in the Rock. In my homeland, they adorn a cliffside, facing onto a glade little different from this one.’
‘Toblakai-’
‘They call upon me still,’ Karsa continued, turning back to study Urugal’s bestial visage once more. ‘When I sleep. It is as Ghost Hands says-I am haunted.’
‘By what, friend? What is it your… gods… demand of you?’
Karsa shot Leoman a glance, then he shrugged. ‘Why have you sought me out?’
Leoman made to say one thing, then chose another. ‘Because my patience is at an end. There has been news of events concerning the Malazans. Distant defeats. Sha’ik and her favoured few are much excited… yet achieve nothing. Here we await the Adjunct’s legions. In one thing Korbolo Dom is right-the march of those legions should be contested. But not as he would have it. No pitched battles. Nothing so dramatic or precipitous. In any case, Toblakai, Mathok has given me leave to ride out with a company of warriors-and Sha’ik has condescended to permit us beyond the Whirlwind.’
Karsa smiled. ‘Indeed. And you are free to harass the Adjunct? Ah, I thought as much. You are to scout, but no further than the hills beyond the Whirlwind. She will not permit you to journey south. But at least you will be doing something, and for that I am pleased for you, Leoman.’
The blue-eyed warrior stepped closer. ‘Once beyond the Whirlwind, Toblakai-’
‘She will know none the less,’ Karsa replied.
‘And so I will incur her displeasure.’ Leoman sneered. ‘There is nothing new in that. And what of you, friend? She calls you her bodyguard, yet when did she last permit you into her presence? In that damned tent of hers? She is reborn indeed, for she is not as she once was-’
‘She is Malazan,’ Toblakai said.
‘What?’
‘Before she became Sha’ik. You know this as well as I-’
‘She was reborn! She became the will of the goddess, Toblakai. All that she was before that time is without meaning-’
‘So it is said, ‘Karsa rumbled. ‘Yet her memories remain. And it is those memories that chain her so. She is trapped by fear, and that fear is born of a secret which she will not share. The only other person who knows that secret is Ghost Hands.’
Leoman stared at Karsa for a long moment, then slowly settled into a crouch. The two men were surrounded by snakes, the sound of slithering on sand a muted undercurrent. Lowering one hand, Leoman watched as a flare-neck began entwining itself up his arm. ‘Your words, Toblakai, whisper of defeat.’
Shrugging, Karsa strode to where his tool kit waited at the base of a tree. ‘These years have served me well. Your company, Leoman. Sha’ik Elder. I once vowed that the Malazans were my enemies. Yet, from what I have seen of the world since that time, I now understand that they are no crueller than any other lowlander. Indeed, they alone seem to profess a sense of justice. The people of Seven Cities, who so despise them and wish them gone-they seek nothing more than the power that the Malazans took from them. Power that they used to terrorize their own people. Leoman, you and your kind make war against justice, and it is not my war.’
‘Justice?’ Leoman bared his teeth. ‘You expect me to challenge your words, Toblakai? I will not. Sha’ik Reborn says there is no loyalty within me. Perhaps she is right. I have seen too much. Yet here I remain-have you ever wondered why?’
Karsa drew out a chisel and mallet. ‘The light fades-and that makes the shadows deeper. It is the light, I now realize. That is what is different about them.’
‘The Apocalyptic, Toblakai. Disintegration. Annihilation. Everything. Every human… lowlander. With our twisted horrors-all that we commit upon each other. The depredations, the cruelties. For every gesture of kindness and compassion, there are ten thousand acts of brutality. Loyalty? Aye, I have none. Not for my kind, and the sooner we obliterate ourselves the better this world will be.’
‘The light,’ Karsa said, ‘makes them look almost human.’
Distracted as he was, the Toblakai did not notice Leoman’s narrowing eyes, nor the struggle to remain silent.
One does not step between a man and his gods.
The snake’s head lifted in front of Leoman’s face and hovered there, tongue flicking.
‘The House of Chains,’ Heboric muttered, his expression souring at the words.
Bidithal shivered, though it was hard to tell whether from fear or pleasure. ‘Reaver. Consort. The Unbound-these are interesting, yes? For all the world like shattered-’
‘From whence came these images?’ Heboric demanded. Simply looking upon the wooden cards with their lacquered paintings-blurred as they were-was filling the ex-priest’s throat with bile. I sense… flaws. In each and every one. That is no accident, no failing of the hand that brushed them into being.
‘There is no doubting,’ L’oric said in answer to his question, ‘their veracity. The power emanating from them is a sorcerous stench. I have never before witnessed such a vigorous birth within the Deck. Not even Shadow felt-’
‘Shadow!’ Bidithal snapped. ‘Those deceivers could never unveil that realm’s true power! No, here, in this new House, the theme is pure. Imperfection is celebrated, the twist of chaotic chance mars one and all-’
‘Silence!’ Sha’ik hissed, her arms wrapped tight about herself. ‘We must think on this. No-one speak. Let me think!’
Heboric studied her for a moment, squinting to bring her into focus, even though she sat beside him. The cards from the new House had arrived the same day as the news of the Malazan defeats on Genabackis. And the time since then had been one of seething discord among Sha’ik’s commanders, sufficient to dampen her pleasure at hearing of her brother Ganoes Paran’s survival, and now leading her to uncharacteristic distraction.
The House of Chains was woven into their fates. An insidious intrusion, an infection against which they’d had no chance to prepare. But was it an enemy, or the potential source for renewed strength? It seemed Bidithal was busy convincing himself that it was the latter, no doubt drawn in that direction by his growing disaffection with Sha’ik Reborn. L’oric, on the other hand, seemed more inclined to share Heboric’s own misgivings; whilst Febryl was unique in remaining silent on the entire matter.
The air within the tent was close, soured by human sweat. Heboric wanted nothing more than to leave, to escape all this, yet he sensed Sha’ik clinging to him, a spiritual grip as desperate as anything he’d felt from her before.
‘Show once more the new Unaligned.’
Yes. For the thousandth time.
Scowling, Bidithal searched through the Deck, then drew out the card, which he laid down in the centre of the goat-hair mat. ‘If any of the new arrivals is dubious,’ the old man sneered, ‘it is this one. Master of the Deck? Absurd. How can one control the uncontrollable?’
There was silence.
The uncontrollable? Such as the Whirlwind itself?
Sha’ik had clearly not caught the insinuation. ‘Ghost Hands, I would you take this card, feel it, seek to sense what you can from it.’
‘You make this request again and again, Chosen One,’ Heboric sighed. ‘But I tell you, there is no link between the power of my hands and the Deck of Dragons. I am of no help to you-’
‘Then listen closely and I shall describe it. Never mind your hands-I ask you now as a once-priest, as a scholar. Listen. The face is obscured, yet hints-’
‘It is obscured,’ Bidithal interrupted in a derisive tone, ‘because the card is no more than the projection of someone’s wishful thinking.’
‘Cut me off again and you will regret it, Bidithal,’ Sha’ik said. ‘I have heard you enough on this subject. If your mouth opens again I will tear out your tongue. Ghost Hands, I will continue. The figure is slightly above average in height. There is the crimson streak of a scar-or blood perhaps-down one side of the face-a wounding, yes? He-yes, I am certain it’s a man, not a woman-he stands on a bridge. Of stone, shot through with cracks. The horizon is filled with flames. It seems he and the bridge are surrounded, as if by followers, or servants-’
‘Or guardians,’ L’oric added. ‘Your pardon, Chosen One.’
‘Guardians. Yes, a good possibility. They have the look of soldiers, do they not?’
‘On what,’ Heboric asked, ‘do these guardians stand? Can you see the ground they stand upon?’
‘Bones-there is much fine detail there, Ghost Hands. How did you know?’
‘Describe those bones, please.’
‘Not human. Very large. Part of a skull is visible, long-snouted, terribly fanged. It bears the remnants of a helmet of some sort-’
‘A helmet? On the skull?’
‘Yes.’
Heboric fell silent. He began rocking yet was only remotely aware of the motion. There was a sourceless keening growing in his head, a cry of grief, of anguish.
‘The Master,’ Sha’ik said, her voice trembling, ‘he stands strangely. Arms held out, bent at the elbows so that the hands depend, away from the body-it is the strangest posture-’
‘Are his feet together?’
‘Almost impossibly so.’
As if forming a point. Dull and remote to his own ears, Heboric asked, ‘And what does he wear?’
‘Tight silks, from the way they shimmer. Black.’
‘Anything else?’
‘There is a chain. It cuts across his torso, left shoulder down to right hip. It is a robust chain, black wrought iron. There are wooden discs on his shoulders-like epaulets, but large, a hand’s span each-’
‘How many in all?’
‘Four. You know something now, Ghost Hands. Tell me!’
‘Yes,’ L’oric murmured, ‘you have thoughts on this-’
‘He lies,’ Bidithal growled. ‘He has been forgotten by everyone-even his god-and he now seeks to invent a new importance.’
Febryl spoke in a mocking rasp. ‘Bidithal, you foolish man. He is a man who touches what we cannot feel, and sees what we are blind to. Speak on, Ghost Hands. Why does this Master stand so?’
‘Because,’ Heboric said, ‘he is a sword.’
But not any sword. He is one sword, above all, and it cuts cold. That sword is as this man’s own nature. He will cleave his own path. None shall lead him. He stands now in my mind. I see him. I see his face. Oh, Sha’ik…
‘A Master of the Deck,’ L’oric said, then sighed. ‘A lodestone to order… in opposition to the House of Chains-yet he stands alone, guardians or no, while the servants of the House are many.’
Heboric smiled. ‘Alone? He has always been thus.’
‘Then why is your smile that of a broken man, Ghost Hands?’
I grieve for humanity. This family, so at war with itself. ‘To that, L’oric, I shall not answer.’
‘I shall now speak with Ghost Hands alone,’ Sha’ik pronounced. But Heboric shook his head. ‘I am done speaking, for now, even with you, Chosen One. I will say this and nothing more: have faith in the Master of the Deck. He shall answer the House of Chains. He shall answer it.’
Feeling ancient beyond his years, Heboric climbed to his feet. There was a stir of motion beside him, then young Felisin’s hand settled on his forearm. He let her guide him from the chamber.
Outside, dusk had arrived, marked by the cries of the goats as they were led into the enclosures. To the south, just beyond the city’s outskirts, rumbled the thunder of horse hoofs. Kamist Reloe and Korbolo Dom had absented themselves from the meeting to oversee the exercises of the troops. Training conducted in the Malazan style, which Heboric had to admit was the renegade Fist’s only expression of brilliance thus far. For the first time, a Malazan army would meet its match in all things, barring Moranth munitions. Tactics and disposition of forces would be identical, ensuring that numbers alone would decide the day. The threat of the munitions would be answered with sorcery, for the Army of the Whirlwind possessed a full cadre of High Mages, whilst Tavore had-as far as they knew-none. Spies in Aren had noted the presence of the two Wickan children, Nil and Nether, but both, it was claimed, had been thoroughly broken by Coltaine’s death.
Yet why would she need mages? She carries an otataral sword, after all. Even so, its negating influence cannot be extended over her entire army. Dear Sha’ik, you may well defeat your sister after all.
‘Where would you go, Ghost Hands?’ Felisin asked.
‘To my home, lass.’
‘That is not what I meant.’
He cocked his head. ‘I do not know-’
‘If indeed you do not, then I have seen your path before you have, and this I find hard to believe. You must leave here, Ghost Hands. You must retrace your path, else what haunts you will kill you-’
‘And that matters? Lass-’
‘Look beyond yourself for a moment, old man! Something is contained within you. Trapped within your mortal flesh. What will happen when your flesh fails?’
He was silent for a long moment, then he asked, ‘How can you be so sure of this? My death might simply negate the risk of escape-it might shut the portal, as tightly sealed as it had been before-’
‘Because there is no going back. It’s here-the power behind those ghostly hands of yours-not the otataral, which is fading, ever fading-’
‘Fading?’
‘Yes, fading! Have not your dreams and visions worsened? Have you not realized why? Yes, my mother has told me-on the Otataral Isle, in the desert-that statue. Heboric, an entire island of otataral was created to contain that statue, to hold it prisoner. But you have given it a means to escape-there, through your hands. You must return!’
‘Enough!’ he snarled, flinging her hand away. ‘Tell me, did she also tell you of herself on that journey?’
‘That which she was before no longer matters-’
‘Oh, but it does, lass! It does matter!’
‘What do you mean?’
The temptation came close to overwhelming him. Because she is Malazan! Because she is Tavore’s sister! Because this war is no longer the Whirlwind’s-it has been stolen away, twisted by something far more powerful, by the ties of blood that bind us all in the harshest, tightest chains! What chance a raging goddess against that?
Instead, he said nothing.
‘You must undertake the journey,’ Felisin said in a low voice. ‘But I know, it cannot be done alone. No. I will go with you-’
He staggered away at her words, shaking his head. It was a horrible idea, a terrifying idea. Yet brutally perfect, a nightmare of synchronicity.
‘Listen! It need not be just you and I-I will find someone else. A warrior, a loyal protector-’
‘Enough! No more of this!’ Yet it will take her away-away from Bidithal and his ghastly desires. It will take her away… from the storm that is coming. ‘With whom else have you spoken of this?’ he demanded.
‘No-one, but I thought… Leoman. He could choose for us someone from Mathok’s people-’
‘Not a word, lass. Not now. Not yet.’
Her hand gripped his forearm once more. ‘We cannot wait too long, Ghost Hands.’
‘Not yet, Felisin. Now, take me home, please.’
‘Will you come with me, Toblakai?’
Karsa dragged his gaze from Urugal’s stone face. The sun had set with its characteristic suddenness, and the stars overhead were bright. The snakes had begun dispersing, driven into the eerily silent forest in search of food. ‘Would you I run beside you and your puny horses, Leoman? There are no Teblor mounts in this land. Nothing to match my size-’
‘Teblor mounts? Actually, friend, you are wrong in that. Well, not here, true, as you say. But to the west, in the Jhag Odhan, there are wild horses that are a match to your stature. Wild now, in any case. They are Jhag horses-bred long ago by the Jaghut. It may well be that your Teblor mounts are of the same breed-there were Jaghut on Genabackis, after all.’
‘Why have you not told me this before?’
Leoman lowered his right hand to the ground, watched as the flare-neck unwound down the length of his arm. ‘In truth, this is the first time you have ever mentioned that you Teblor possessed horses. Toblakai, I know virtually nothing of your past. No-one here does. You are not a loquacious man. You and I, we have ever travelled on foot, haven’t we?’
‘The Jhag Odhan. That is beyond Raraku.’
‘Aye. Strike west through the Whirlwind, and you will come to cliffs, the broken shoreline of the ancient sea that once filled this desert. Continue on until you come to a small city-Lato Revae. Immediately to the west lies the tip of the Thalas Mountains. Skirt their south edge, ever westward, until you come to River Ugarat. There is a ford south of Y’Ghatan. From the other side, strike west and south and west, for two weeks or more, and you will find yourself in the Jhag Odhan. Oh, there is some irony in this-there were once nomadic bands of Jaghut there. Hence the name. But these Jaghut were fallen. They had been predated on for so long they were little more than savages.’
‘And are they still there?’
‘No. The Logros T’lan Imass slaughtered them. Not so long ago.’
Karsa bared his teeth. ‘T’lan Imass. A name from the Teblor past.’
‘Closer than that,’ Leoman muttered, then he straightened. ‘Seek leave from Sha’ik to journey into the Jhag Odhan. You would make an impressive sight on the battlefield, astride a Jhag horse. Did your kind fight on horseback, or simply use them for transport?’
Karsa smiled in the darkness. ‘I will do as you say, Leoman. But the journey will take long-do not wait for me. If you and your scouts are still beyond the Whirlwind upon my return, I will ride out to find you.’
‘Agreed.’
‘What of Felisin?’
Leoman was silent for a moment, then he replied, ‘Ghost Hands has been awakened to the… threat.’
Karsa sneered. ‘And what value will that be? I should kill Bidithal and be done with it.’
‘Toblakai, it is more than you that troubles Ghost Hands. I do not believe he will remain in camp much longer. And when he leaves, he will take the child with him.’
‘And that is a better option? She will become no more than his nurse.’
‘For a time, perhaps. I will send someone with them, of course. If Sha’ik did not need you-or at least believe she does-I would ask you.’
‘Madness, Leoman. I have travelled once with Ghost Hands. I shall not do so again.’
‘He holds truths for you, Toblakai. One day, you will need to seek him out. You might even need to ask for his help.’
‘Help? I need no-one’s help. You speak unpleasant words. I will hear them no more.’
Leoman’s grin was visible in the gloom. ‘You are as you always are, friend. When will you journey into the Jhag Odhan, then?’
‘I shall leave tomorrow.’
‘Then I had best get word to Sha’ik. Who knows, she might even condescend to see me in person, whereupon I might well succeed in ending her distraction with this House of Chains-’
‘This what?’
Leoman waved a dismissive hand. ‘The House of Chains. A new power in the Deck of Dragons. It is all they talk about these days.’
‘Chains,’ Karsa muttered, swinging round to stare at Urugal. ‘I so dislike chains.’
‘I will see you in the morning, Toblakai? Before you depart?’
‘You shall.’
Karsa listened to the man stride away. His mind was a maelstrom. Chains. They haunted him, had haunted him ever since he and Bairoth and Delum rode out from the village. Perhaps even before then. Tribes fashioned their own chains, after all. As did kinship, and companions, and stories with their lessons in honour and sacrifice. And chains as well between the Teblor and their seven gods. Between me and my gods. Chains again, there in my visions-the dead I have slain, the souls Ghost Hands says I drag behind me. I am-all that I am-has been shaped by such chains.
This new House-is it mine?
The air in the clearing was suddenly cold, bitterly so. A final, thrashing rush as the last of the snakes fled the clearing. Karsa blinked his eyes into focus, and saw Urugal’s indurated visage… awakening.
A presence, there in the dark holes of the face’s eyes.
Karsa heard a howling wind, filling his mind. A thousand souls moaning, the snapping thunder of chains. Growling, he steeled himself before the onslaught, fixed his gaze on his god’s writhing face.
‘Karsa Orlong. We have waited long for this. Three years, the fashioning of this sacred place. You wasted so much time on the two strangers-your fallen friends, the ones who failed where you did not. This temple is not to be sanctified by sentimentality. Their presence offends us. Destroy them this night.’
The seven faces were all wakeful now, and Karsa could feel the weight of their regard, a deathly pressure behind which lurked something… avid, dark and filled with glee.
‘By my hand,’ Karsa said to Urugal, ‘I have brought you to this place. By my hand, you have been freed from your prison of rock in the lands of the Teblor-yes, I am not the fool you believe me to be. You have guided me in this, and now you are come. Your first words are of chastisement? Careful, Urugal. Any carving here can be shattered by my hand, should I so choose.’
He felt their rage, buffeting him, seeking to make him wither beneath the onslaught, yet he stood before it unmoving, and unmoved. The Teblor warrior who would quail before his gods was no more.
‘You have brought us closer,’ Urugal eventually rasped. ‘Close enough to sense the precise location of what we desire. And there you must now go, Karsa Orlong. You have delayed the journey for so long-your journey to ourselves, and on to the path we have set before you. You have hidden too long in the company of this petty spirit who does little more than spit sand.’
‘This path, this journey-to what end? What is it you seek?’
‘Like you, warrior, we seek freedom.’
Karsa was silent. Avid indeed. Then he spoke. ‘I am to travel west. Into the Jhag Odhan.’
He sensed their shock and excitement, then the chorus of suspicion that poured out from the seven gods.
‘West! Indeed, Karsa Orlong. But how do you know this?’ Because, at last, I am my father’s son. ‘I shall leave with the dawn, Urugal. And I will find for you what you desire.’ He could feel their presence fading, and knew instinctively that these gods were not as close to freedom as they wanted him to believe. Nor as powerful.
Urugal had called this clearing a temple, but it was a contested one, and now, as the Seven withdrew, and were suddenly gone, Karsa slowly turned from the faces of the gods, and looked upon those for whom this place had been in truth sanctified. By Karsa’s own hands. In the name of those chains a mortal could wear with pride.
‘My loyalty,’ the Teblor warrior quietly said, ‘was misplaced. I served only glory. Words, my friends. And words can wear false nobility. Disguising brutal truths. The words of the past, that so clothed the Teblor in a hero’s garb-this is what I served. While the true glory was before me. Beside me. You, Delum Thord. And you, Bairoth Gild.’
From the stone statue of Bairoth emerged a distant, weary voice. ‘Lead us, Warleader.’
Karsa flinched. Do I dream this? Then he straightened. ‘I have drawn your spirits to this place. Did you travel in the wake of the Seven?’
‘We have walked the empty lands,’ Bairoth Gild replied. ‘Empty, yet we were not alone. Strangers await us all, Karsa Orlong. This is the truth they would hide from you. We are summoned. We are here.’
‘None,’ came Delum Thord’s voice from the other statue, ‘can defeat you on this journey. You lead the enemy in circles, you defy every prediction, and so deliver the edge of your will. We sought to follow, but could not.’
‘Who, Warleader,’ Bairoth asked, his voice bolder, ‘is our enemy, now?’
Karsa drew himself up before the two Uryd warriors. ‘Witness my answer, my friends. Witness.’
Delum spoke, ‘We failed you, Karsa Orlong. Yet you invite us to walk with you once again.’
Karsa fought back an urge to scream, to unleash a warcry-as if such a challenge might force back the approaching darkness. He could make no sense of his own impulses, the torrential emotions threatening to engulf him. He stared at the carved likeness of his tall friend, the awareness in those unmarred features-Delum Thord before the Forkassal-the Forkrul Assail named Calm-had, on a mountain trail on a distant continent, so casually destroyed him.
Bairoth Gild spoke. ‘We failed you. Do you now ask that we walk with you?’
‘Delum Thord. Bairoth Gild.’ Karsa’s voice was hoarse. ‘It is I who failed you. I would be your warleader once more, if you would so permit me.’
A long moment of silence, then Bairoth replied, ‘At last, something to look forward to.’
Karsa almost fell to his knees, then. Grief, finally unleashed. At an end, his time of solitude. His penance was done. The journey to begin again. Dear Urugal, you shall witness. Oh, how you shall witness.
The hearth was little more than a handful of dying coals. After Felisin Younger left, Heboric sat motionless in the gloom. A short time passed, then he collected an armload of dried dung and rebuilt the fire. The night had chilled him-even the hands he could not see felt cold, like heavy pieces of ice at the end of his wrists.
The only journey that lay ahead of him was a short one, and he must walk it alone. He was blind, but in this no more blind than anyone else. Death’s precipice, whether first glimpsed from afar or discovered with the next step, was ever a surprise. A promise of the sudden cessation of questions, yet there were no answers waiting beyond. Cessation would have to be enough. And so it must be for every mortal. Even as we hunger for resolution. Or, even more delusional: redemption.
Now, after all this time, he was able to realize that every path eventually, inevitably dwindled into a single line of footsteps. There, leading to the very edge. Then… gone. And so, he faced only what every mortal faced. The solitude of death, and oblivion’s final gift that was indifference.
The gods were welcome to wrangle over his soul, to snipe and snap over the paltry feast. And if mortals grieved for him, it was only because by dying he had shaken them from the illusion of unity that comforted life’s journey. One less on the path.
A scratch at the flap entrance, then the hide was drawn aside and someone entered.
‘Would you make of your home a pyre, Ghost Hands?’ The voice was L’oric’s.
The High Mage’s words startled Heboric into a sudden realization of the sweat running down his face, the gusts of fierce heat from the now raging hearth. Unthinking, he had fed the flames with piece after piece of dung.
‘I saw the glow-difficult to miss, old man. Best leave it, now, let it die down.’
‘What do you want, L’oric?’
‘I acknowledge your reluctance to speak of what you know. There is no value, after all, in gifting Bidithal or Febryl with such details. And so I shall not demand that you explain what you’ve sensed regarding this Master of the Deck. Instead, I offer an exchange, and all that we say will remain between the two of us. No-one else.’
‘Why should I trust you? You are hidden-even to Sha’ik. You give no reason as to why you are here. In her cadre, in this war.’
‘That alone should tell you I am not like the others,’ L’oric replied.
Heboric sneered. ‘That earns you less than you might think. There can be no exchange because there is nothing you can tell me that I would be interested in hearing. The schemes of Febryl? The man’s a fool. Bidithal’s perversions? One day a child will slip a knife between his ribs. Korbolo Dom and Kamist Reloe? They war against an empire that is far from dead. Nor will they be treated with honour when they are finally brought before the Empress. No, they are criminals, and for that their souls will burn for eternity. The Whirlwind? That goddess has my contempt, and that contempt does naught but grow. Thus, what could you possibly tell me, L’oric, that I would value?’
‘Only the one thing that might interest you, Heboric Light Touch. Just as this Master of the Deck interests me. I would not cheat you with the exchange. No, I would tell you all that I know of the Hand of Jade, rising from the otataral sands-the Hand that you have touched, that now haunts your dreams.’
‘How could you know these-’ He fell silent. The sweat on his brow was now cold.
‘And how,’ L’oric retorted, ‘can you sense so much from a mere description of the Master’s card? Let us not question these things, else we trap ourselves in a conversation that will outlive Raraku itself. So, Heboric, shall I begin?’
‘No. Not now. I am too weary for this. Tomorrow, L’oric.’
‘Delay may prove… disastrous.’ After a moment, the High Mage sighed. ‘Very well. I can see your exhaustion. Permit me, at least, to brew your tea for you.’
The gesture of kindness was unexpected, and Heboric lowered his head. ‘L’oric, promise me this-that when the final day comes, you be a long way from here.’
‘A difficult promise. Permit me to think on it. Now, where is the hen’bara?’
‘Hanging from a bag above the pot.’
‘Ah, of course.’
Heboric listened to the sounds of preparation, the rustle of flower-heads from the bag, the slosh of water as L’oric filled the pot. ‘Did you know,’ the High Mage murmured as he worked, ‘that some of the oldest scholarly treatises on the warrens speak of a triumvirate. Rashan, Thyr and Meanas. As if the three were all closely related to one another. And then in turn seek to link them to corresponding Elder warrens.’
Heboric grunted, then nodded. ‘All flavours of the same thing? I would agree. Tiste warrens. Kurald this and Kurald that. The human versions can’t help but overlap, become confused. I am no expert, L’oric, and it seems you know more of it than I.’
‘Well, there certainly appears to be a mutual insinuation of themes between Darkness and Shadow, and, presumably, Light. A confusion among the three, yes. Anomander Rake himself has asserted a proprietary claim on the Throne of Shadow, after all…’
The smell of the brewing tea tugged at Heboric’s mind. ‘He has?’ he murmured, only remotely interested.
‘Well, of a sort. He set kin to guard it, presumably from the Tiste Edur. It is very difficult for us mortals to make sense of Tiste histories, for they are such a long-lived people. As you well know, human history is ever marked by certain personalities, rising from some quality or notoriety to shatter the status quo. Fortunately for us, such men and women are few and far between, and they all eventually die or disappear. But among the Tiste… well, those personalities never go away, or so it seems. They act, and act yet again. They persist. Choose the worst tyrant you can from your knowledge of human history, Heboric, then imagine him or her as virtually undying. In your mind, bring that tyrant back again and again and again. How, having done so, would you imagine our history then?’
‘Far more violent than that of the Tiste, L’oric. Humans are not Tiste. Indeed, I have never heard of a Tiste tyrant…’
‘Perhaps I used the wrong word. I meant only-in human context-a personality of devastating power, or potential. Look at this Malazan Empire, born from the mind of Kellanved, a single man. What if he had been eternal?’
Something in L’oric’s musings had reawakened Heboric. ‘Eternal?’ He barked a laugh. ‘Perhaps he is at that. There is one detail you might consider, perhaps more relevant than anything else that’s been said here. And that is, the Tiste are no longer isolated in their scheming. There are humans now, in their games-humans, who’ve not the patience of the Tiste, nor their legendary remoteness. The warrens of Kurald Galain and Kurald Emurlahn are no longer pure, unsullied by human presence. Meanas and Rashan? Perhaps they are proving the doors into both Darkness and Shadow. Or perhaps the matter is more complex than even that-how can one truly hope to separate the themes of Darkness and Light from Shadow? They are as those scholars said, an interdependent triumvirate. Mother, father and child-a family ever squabbling… only now the in-laws and grandchildren are joining in.’
He waited for a reply from L’oric, curious as to how his comments had been received, but none was forthcoming. The ex-priest looked up, struggled to focus on the High Mage-
– who sat motionless, a cup in one hand, the ring of the brewing pot in the other. Motionless, and staring at Heboric.
‘L’oric? Forgive me, I cannot discern your expression-’
‘Well that you cannot,’ the High Mage rasped. ‘Here I sought to raise the warning of Tiste meddling in human affairs-to have you then voice a warning in the opposite direction. As if it is not us who must worry, but the Tiste themselves.’
Heboric said nothing. A strange, whispering suspicion flitted through him for a moment, as if tickled into being by something in L’oric’s voice. After a moment, he dismissed it. Too outrageous, too absurd to entertain.
L’oric poured the tea.
Heboric sighed. ‘It seems I am to be ever denied the succour of that brew. Tell me, then, of the giant of jade.’
‘Ah, and in return you will speak of the Master of the Deck?’
‘In some things I am forbidden to elaborate-’
‘Because they relate to Sha’ik’s own secret past?’
‘Fener’s tusk, L’oric! Who in this rat’s nest might be listening in to our conversation right now? It is madness to speak-’
‘No-one is listening, Heboric. I have made certain of that. I am not careless with secrets. I have known much of your recent history since the very beginning-’
‘How?’
‘We agreed to not discuss sources. My point is, no-one else is aware that you are Malazan, or that you are an escapee from the otataral mines. Except Sha’ik, of course. Since she escaped with you. Thus, I value privacy-with my knowledge and with my thoughts-and am ever vigilant. Oh, there have been probes, sorcerous questings-a whole menagerie of spells as various inhabitants seek to keep track of rivals. As occurs every night.’
‘Then your absence will be detected-’
‘I sleep restful in my tent, Heboric, as far as those questings are concerned. As do you in your tent. Each alone. Harmless.’
‘You are more than a match for their sorceries, then. Which makes you more powerful than any of them.’ He heard as much as saw L’oric’s shrug, and after a moment the ex-priest sighed. ‘If you wish details concerning Sha’ik and this new Master of the Deck, then it must be the three of us who meet. And for that to occur, you will have to reveal more of yourself to the Chosen One than you might wish.’
‘Tell me this, at least. This new Master-he was created in the wake of the Malazan disaster on Genabackis. Or do you deny that? That bridge on which he stands-he was of, or is somehow related to, the Bridgeburners. And those ghostly guardians are all that remains of the Bridgeburners, for they were destroyed in the Pannion Domin.’
‘I cannot be certain of any of that,’ Heboric replied, ‘but what you suggest seems likely.’
‘So, the Malazan influence ever grows-not just on our mundane world, but throughout the warrens, and now in the Deck of Dragons.’
‘You make the mistake of so many of the empire’s enemies, L’oric. You assume that all that is Malazan is perforce unified, in intent and in goal. Things are far more complicated than you imagine. I do not believe this Master of the Deck is some servant of the Empress. Indeed, he kneels before no-one.’
‘Then why the Bridgeburner guardians?’
Heboric sensed that the question was a leading one, but decided he would play along. ‘Some loyalties defy Hood himself-’
‘Ah, meaning he was a soldier in that illustrious company. Well, things are beginning to make sense.’
‘They are?’
‘Tell me, have you heard of a Spiritwalker named Kimloc?’
‘The name is vaguely familiar. But not from around here. Karakarang? Rutu Jelba?’
‘Now resident of Ehrlitan. His history is not relevant here, but somehow he must have come into recent contact with a Bridgeburner. There is no other explanation for what he has done. He has given them a song, Heboric. A Tanno song, and, curiously, it begins here. In Raraku. Raraku, friend, is the birthplace of the Bridgeburners. Do you know the significance of such a song?’
Heboric turned away, faced the hearth and its dry heat, and said nothing.
‘Of course,’ L’oric went on after a moment, ‘that significance has now diminished somewhat, since the Bridgeburners are no more. There can be no sanctification…’
‘No, I suppose not,’ Heboric murmured.
‘For the song to be sanctified, a Bridgeburner would have to return to Raraku, to the birthplace of the company. And that does not seem likely now, does it?’
‘Why is it necessary a Bridgeburner return to Raraku?’
‘Tanno sorcery is… elliptical. The song must be like a serpent eating its tail. Kimloc’s Song of the Bridgeburners is at the moment without an end. But it has been sung, and so lives.’ L’oric shrugged. ‘It’s like a spell that remains active, awaiting resolution.’
‘Tell me of the giant of jade.’
The High Mage nodded. He poured out the tea and set the cup down in front of Heboric. ‘The first one was found deep in the otataral mines-’
‘The first one!’
‘Aye. And the contact proved, for those miners who ventured too close, fatal. Or, rather, they disappeared. Leaving no trace. Sections of two others have been discovered-all three veins are now sealed. The giants are… intruders to our world. From some other realm.’
‘Arriving,’ Heboric muttered, ‘only to be wrapped in chains of otataral.’
‘Ah, you are not without your own knowledge, then. Indeed, it seems their arrival has, each time, been anticipated. Someone, or something, is ensuring that the threat these giants impose is negated-’
But Heboric shook his head at that and said, ‘No, I think you are wrong, L’oric. It is the very passage-the portal through which each giant comes-that creates the otataral.’
‘Are you certain?’
‘Of course not. There are too many mysteries surrounding the nature of otataral to be certain of anything. There was a scholar-I forget her name-who once suggested that otataral is created by the annihilation of all that is necessary for sorcery to operate. Like slag with all the ore burned out. She called it the absolute draining of energy-the energy that rightfully exists in all things, whether animate or otherwise.’
‘And had she a theory as to how that could occur?’
‘Perhaps the magnitude of the sorcery unleashed-a spell that is all-devouring of the energy it feeds on.’
‘But not even the gods could wield such magic.’
‘True, but I think it is nevertheless possible… through ritual, such as a cadre-or army-of mortal sorcerers could achieve.’
‘In the manner of the Ritual of Tellann,’ L’oric nodded. ‘Aye.’
‘Or,’ Heboric said softly as he reached for the cup, ‘the calling down of the Crippled God…’
L’oric was motionless, staring fixedly at the tattooed ex-priest. He said nothing for a long time, whilst Heboric sipped the hen’bara tea. He finally spoke. ‘Very well, there is one last piece of information I will tell you-I see now the need, the very great need to do so, though it shall… reveal much of myself.’
Heboric sat and listened, and as L’oric continued speaking, the confines of his squalid hut dimmed to insignificance, the heat of the hearth no longer reaching him, until the only sensation left came from his ghostly hands. Together, there at the ends of his wrists, they became the weight of the world.
The rising sun washed all tones from the sky to the east. Karsa checked his supplies one last time, the foodstuffs and waterskins, the additional items and accoutrements necessary for survival in a hot, arid land. A kit wholly unlike what he had carried for most of his life. Even the sword was different-ironwood was heavier than bloodwood, its edge rougher although almost-but not quite-as hard. It did not slice the air with the ease of his oiled bloodwood sword. Yet it had served him well enough. He glanced skyward; dawn’s colours were almost entirely gone, now, the blue directly above vanishing behind suspended dust.
Here, in Raraku’s heart, the Whirlwind Goddess had stolen the colour of the sun’s own fire, leaving the landscape pallid and deathly. Colourless, Karsa Orlong? Bairoth Gild’s ghostly voice was filled with wry humour. Not so. Silver, my friend. And silver is the colour of oblivion. Of chaos. Silver is when the last of the blood is washed from the blade-
‘No more words,’ Karsa growled.
Leoman spoke from nearby. ‘Having just arrived, Toblakai, I am yet to even speak. Do you not wish my farewell?’
Karsa slowly straightened, slinging his pack over a shoulder. ‘Words need not be spoken aloud, friend, to prove unwelcome. I but answered my own thoughts. That you are here pleases me. When I began my first journey, long ago, none came to witness.’
‘I asked Sha’ik,’ Leoman replied from where he stood ten paces away, having just passed through the trail’s gap in the low, crumbled wall-the mud bricks, Karsa saw, were on their shaded side covered with rhizan, clinging with wings contracted, their mottled colourings making them almost identical to the ochre bricks. ‘But she said she would not join me this morning. Even stranger, it seemed as if she already knew of your intentions, and was but awaiting my visit.’
Shrugging, Karsa faced Leoman. ‘A witness of one suffices. We may now speak our parting words. Do not hide overlong in your pit, friend. And when you ride out with your warriors, hold to the Chosen One’s commands-too many jabs from the small knife can awaken the bear no matter how deep it sleeps.’
‘It is a young and weak bear, this time, Toblakai.’
Karsa shook his head. ‘I have come to respect the Malazans, and fear that you would awaken them to themselves.’
‘I shall consider your words,’ Leoman replied. ‘And now ask that you consider mine. Beware your gods, friend. If you must kneel before a power, first look upon it with clear eyes. Tell me, what would your kin say to you in parting?’
‘ “May you slay a thousand children.” ’
Leoman blanched. ‘Journey well, Toblakai.’
‘I shall.’
Karsa knew that Leoman could neither see nor sense that he was flanked where he stood at the trail’s gap in the wall. Delum Thord on the left, Bairoth Gild on the right. Teblor warriors, blood-oil smeared in crimson tones even the Whirlwind could not eradicate, and they stepped forward as the Teblor swung about to face the western trail.
‘Lead us. Lead your dead, Warleader.’
Bairoth’s mocking laugh clicked and cracked like the potsherds breaking beneath Karsa Orlong’s moccasins. The Teblor grimaced. There would be, it seemed, a fierce price for the honour.
None the less, he realized after a moment, if there must be ghosts, it was better to lead them than to be chased by them. ‘If that is how you would see it, Karsa Orlong.’ In the distance rose the swirling wall of the Whirlwind. It would be good, the Teblor reflected, to see the world beyond it again, after all these months. He set out, westward, as the day was born.
‘He has left,’ Kamist Reloe said as he settled onto the cushions.
Korbolo Dom eyed the mage, his blank expression betraying nothing of the contempt he felt for the man. Sorcerers did not belong in war. And he had shown the truth of that when destroying the Chain of Dogs. Even so, there were necessities to contemplate, and Reloe was the least of them. ‘That leaves only Leoman,’ he rumbled from where he lay on the pillows and cushions.
‘Who departs with his rats in a few days.’
‘Will Febryl now advance his plans?’
The mage shrugged. ‘It is hard to say, but there is a distinct avidness in his gaze this morning.’
Avidness. Indeed. Another High Mage, another insane wielder of powers better left untapped. ‘There is one who remains, who perhaps presents us with the greatest threat of them all, and that is Ghost Hands.’
Kamist Reloe sneered. ‘A blind, doddering fool. Does he even know that hen’bara tea is itself the source of the thinning fabric between his world and all that he would flee from? Before long, his mind will vanish entirely within the nightmares, and we need concern ourselves with him no more.’
‘She has secrets,’ Korbolo Dom muttered, leaning forward to collect a bowl of figs. ‘Far beyond those gifted her by the Whirlwind. Febryl proceeds headlong, unmindful of his own ignorance. When the battle with the Adjunct’s army is finally joined, success or failure will be decided by the Dogslayers-by my army. Tavore’s otataral will defeat the Whirlwind-I am certain of it. All that I ask of you and Febryl and Bidithal is that I am unobstructed in commanding the forces, in shaping that battle.’
‘We are both aware,’ Kamist growled, ‘that this struggle goes far beyond the Whirlwind.’
‘Aye, so it does. Beyond all of Seven Cities, Mage. Do not lose sight of our final goal, of the throne that will one day belong to us.’
Kamist Reloe shrugged. ‘That is our secret, old friend. We need only proceed with caution, and all that opposes us will likely vanish before our very eyes. Febryl kills Sha’ik, Tavore kills Febryl, and we destroy Tavore and her army.’
‘And then become Laseen’s saviour-as we crush this rebellion utterly. Gods, I swear I will see this entire land empty of life if need be. A triumphant return to Unta, an audience with the Empress, then the driven knife. And who will stop us? The Talon are poised to cut down the Claws. Whiskeyjack and the Bridgeburners are no more, and Dujek remains a continent away. How fares the Jhistal priest?’
‘Mallick travels without opposition, ever southward. He is a clever man, a wise man, and he will play out his role to perfection.’
Korbolo Dom made no reply to that. He despised Mallick Rel, but could not deny his usefulness. Still, the man was not one to be trusted… to which High Fist Pormqual would attest, were the fool still alive. ‘Send for Fayelle. I would a woman’s company now. Leave me, Kamist Reloe.’
The High Mage hesitated, and Korbolo scowled.
‘There is the matter,’ Kamist whispered, ‘of L’oric…’
‘Then deal with him!’ Korbolo snapped. ‘Begone!’
Bowing his head, the High Mage backed out of the tent.
Sorcerers. Could he find a way to destroy magic, the Napan would not hesitate. The extinction of powers that could slaughter a thousand soldiers in an instant would return the fate of mortals to the mortals themselves, and this could not but be a good thing. The death of warrens, the dissolution of gods as memory of them and their meddling slowly vanished, the withering of all magic… the world then would belong to men such as Korbolo himself. And the empire he would shape would permit no ambiguity, no ambivalence.
His will unopposed, the Napan could end, once and for all, the dissonant clangour that so plagued humanity-now and throughout its history.
I will bring order. And from that unity, we shall rid the world of every other race, every other people, we shall overpower and crush every discordant vision, for there can in the end be only one way, one way of living, of ruling this realm. And that way belongs to me.
A good soldier well knew that success was found in careful planning, in incremental steps.
Opposition had a way of stepping aside all on its own. You are now at Hood’s feet, Whiskeyjack. Where I have always wanted you. You and your damned company, feeding worms in a foreign land. None left to stop me, now…