The old drainage trench had once been a stream, long before the huts were knocked down and the overlords began building their houses of stone. Rubble and foul silts formed the banks, crawling with vermin. But there in my chest some dark fire flamed in quiet rage as I walked the track seeking the lost voice, the voice of that freed watery flow, the pebbles beneath the streaming tongue. Oh I knew so well those smooth stones, the child’s treasure of comforting form and the way, when dried, a single drop of tear or rain could make the colour blossom once more the found recollection of its home – this child’s treasure and the child was me and the treasure was mine, and mine own child this very morning I discovered, kneeling smeared on the rotting bank playing with shards of broken pots that knew only shades of grey no matter how deep and how streaming these tears. Before Trate
Nameless Fent
DREAMS COULD PASS BETWEEN THE BLINKS OF A MAN’S EYES, answered by wild casting about, disorientation, and an unstoppered flood of discordant emotions. Udinaas found he had slid down, was perched precariously on the ledge, his limbs stiff and aching. The sun had fallen lower, but not by much. Behind him, rising from a crumpled heap, was Feather Witch, the two halves of a broken tile falling from one hand to clatter on the stone a moment before sliding off into the brush and rocks below. Her hair disguised her face, hid the emotions writ there.
Udinaas wanted to scream, let loose his grief, and the sourceless anger beneath it. But what was new in being used? What was new in having nothing to reach for, nothing to strive towards? He pulled himself up from the edge of crumbling stone, and looked about.
The army was on the move. Something had changed. He saw haste below. ‘We must return,’ he said.
‘To what?’ Harsh, bitter.
‘To what we were before.’
‘Slaves, Udinaas.’
‘Yes.’
‘I’ve tasted it now. I’ve tasted it!’
He glanced over at her, watched as she sat straighter, dragging the hair from her eyes, and fixed him with a fierce glare. ‘You cannot live like this.’
‘I can’t?’
She looked away. Not wanting to see, he guessed. Not wanting to understand.
‘We’re marching to Trate, Feather Witch.’
‘To conquer. To… enslave.’
‘Details,’ he muttered, climbing cautiously to his feet. He offered her a hand. ‘Mayen wants you.’
‘She beats me, now.’
‘I know. You’ve failed to hide the bruises.’
‘She tears my clothes off. Uses me. In ways that hurt. I hurt all the time.’
‘Well,’ Udinaas said, ‘he doesn’t do that to her. Not that there’s much… tenderness. He’s too young for that, I suppose. Nor has she the power to take charge. Teach him. She’s… frustrated.’
‘Enough of your understanding this, understanding that. Enough, Indebted! I don’t care about her point of view, I’m not interested in stepping into her shadow, in trying to see the world how she sees it. None of that matters, when she twists, when she bites, when she pushes… just stop talking, Udinaas. Stop. No more.’
‘Take my hand, Feather Witch. It’s time.’
‘I’d rather bite it off.’
I know. He said nothing.
‘So he doesn’t hurt her, does he?’
‘Not physically,’ he replied.
‘Yes. What he does to her…’ she looked up, searching his eyes, ‘I do to you.’
‘And you’d rather bite.’
She made no reply. Something flickered in her gaze, then she turned away even as she took his hand.
He drew her onto her feet.
She would not look at him. ‘I’ll go down first. Wait a bit.’
‘All right.’
An army kicked awake, swarming the forest floor. To the north, the ashes of home. To the south, Trate. There would be… vengeance. Details.
A flicker of movement downslope, then… nothing.
Trull Sengar continued scanning for a moment longer, then he settled back down behind the tree-fall. ‘We have been discovered,’ he said.
Ahlrada Ahn grunted. ‘Now what?’
Trull looked to the left and the right. He could barely make out the nearest warriors, motionless and under cover. ‘That depends,’ he muttered. ‘If they now come in force.’
They waited, as the afternoon waned.
Somewhere in the forest below was a Letherii brigade, and within it a mage cadre that had detected the presence of Tiste Edur positioned to defend the bridge. Among the officers, surprise, perhaps consternation. The mages would be at work attempting to discern precise numbers, but that would prove difficult. Something in Edur blood defied them, remained elusive to their sorcerous efforts. A decision would have to be made, and much depended on the personality of the commander. Proceed in a cautious and measured way until direct contact was established, whereupon a succession of probes would determine the strength of the enemy. There were risks, however, to that. Drawing close enough to gauge the sharpness of the enemy’s fangs invited a bite that might not let go, leading to a pitched engagement where all the advantage lay with the Tiste Edur. Uphill battles were always costly. And often withdrawal proved bloody and difficult. Worse, there was a good chance of an all-out rout, which would lead to slaughter.
Or the commander could order the mage cadre to unleash a sorcerous attack and so lay waste the forest reaches above them. Such an attack, of course, served to expose the mages’ position to those Edur warlocks who might be present. And to the wraiths and demons attending them. If the attack was blunted, the cadre was in trouble.
Finally, the commander could choose to pull back. Yield the bridge, and return to the solid defences of High Fort, inviting a more traditional battle – the kind the Letherii had fought for centuries, against enemy forces of all sorts, and almost invariably with great success.
Was the commander overconfident and precipitous? If so, then Trull Sengar and his fifty warriors would either be slaughtered or forced back to the other side of the bridge, either result proving tactically disastrous for Hanradi Khalag and his advancing warriors. A contested crossing of the bridge would force Fear and Hanradi into unveiling the full extent of the sorcerous power accompanying the army – power intended to shatter the defenders of High Fort. Conversely, a cautious or timid commander would elect to retreat, and that would ensure an Edur success.
Trull edged his way back up to peer over the tree-fall. No movement below. The air seemed preternaturally still.
‘If they don’t close soon,’ Ahlrada said in a low voice, ‘they will have lost the advantage.’
Trull nodded. Sufficient concerns to occupy his mind, to steal his fullest attention. He did not have the luxury of thinking of other things. This, he decided, was preferable. A relief. And I can stay here, in this tense cast of my mind’s thoughts, from now on. It will take me through this war. It has to. Please, take me through this war.
The shadows were long on the slope below, cutting crossways, the shafts of dusty sunlight ebbing into golden mist through which insects flitted.
A whisper of sound – behind them, then on all sides.
Wraiths, streaming down, slipping past into the spreading gloom below.
‘They’ve arrived,’ Ahlrada said.
Trull slid back down and rolled onto his back. Padding between brush and trees upslope, silver-backed wolves. A half-dozen, then a score, lambent eyes flashing from lowered heads.
One beast approached Trull. It suddenly blurred, the air filling with a pungent, spicy scent, and a moment later Trull found himself looking into the amber eyes of B’nagga.
The Jheck grinned. ‘A thousand paces below, Trull Sengar. They are in full retreat.’
‘You made good time,’ Ahlrada said.
The grin widened. ‘The warriors are but two thousand paces from the bridge. My brothers found a body, hidden in the brush. Your work?’
‘An advance scout,’ Trull said.
‘The mages had tied a thread to him. They knew you were coming. No doubt that slowed them even more.’
‘So,’ Ahlrada said, ‘are we to contest their retreat?’
‘It was a thought. But no, the wraiths will do naught but hound them. Keep them on edge and moving at double-march. By the time they reach High Fort they will be footsore and bleary-eyed. We won’t be giving them much time to rest.’ He settled into a crouch. ‘I have news. First Maiden Fort has fallen. No battle – the garrison had already fled back to Fent Reach.’
‘As anticipated,’ Trull said.
‘Yes. If the Letherii choose to make a stand at Fent Reach, it will be a short siege. Even now, our ships have made landing and the warriors march on the city.’
‘No contact with any Letherii fleets?’ Trull was surprised. Those transports were vulnerable.
‘None. The emperor’s forces are poised above Trate, undetected as yet. Within the next few days, my friends, there will be four major battles. And, sword willing, the northern frontier shall fall.’
At the very least, we’ll have their fullest attention.
Blind drunk. A description Seren Pedac sought to explore, with all the fumbling murky intent of a mind poisoned into stupidity. But, somehow, she was failing. Instead of blind, she was painfully aware of the figures on all sides of her small table, the seething press and the loose rubble sound of countless voices. Stupidity had yet to arrive and possibly never would, as stolid sobriety held on, dogged and immovable and indifferent to the seemingly endless cups of wine she drank down.
Fevered excitement, scores of voices uttering their I-told-you-so variations to herds of nodding heads. Proclamations and predictions, the gleaming words of greed eager to be unleashed on the booty of battlefields crowded with dead Edur. Give ’em First Maiden Fort, aye. Why not? Pull the bastards in and in. You saw what the cadre did that night? They’ll do it again, this time against the ash-faced bastards themselves. I’ve got a perch halfway up the lighthouse, paid a fortune for it, I’ll see it all.
It’ll all be over at Fent Reach. They’ll get their noses bloodied and that’s when the cadre will hit the fleet in Katter Sea. I got an interest in a stretch on Bight Coast, salvage rights. Heading up there as soon as it’s over.
They let themselves get surrounded, I tell you. Twilight’s just waiting for the siege to settle in. What’s that? You saying she surrendered? Errant take us, man, what kind of lies you throwing about in here? You a damned traitor, you a damned Hull Beddict? Shut that mouth of yours or I’ll do it for you-
I’ll help, Cribal, that’s a promise. Sewing lips tight is easy as mending sails an’ I been doing that for years-
Where’d he go?
Ah, never mind him, Cribal-
Traitors need to be taught a lesson, Feluda. Come on, I see ’im making for the door-
Sittin’ alone don’t do no woman no good, sweetheart. Let a decent man take you away from all this…
Seren Pedac frowned, looked up at the figure looming over her table. Her mind replied, All right, even as she scowled and turned away.
‘Nothing worth its spit is being said here, lass. You want to drink. Fine, jus’ sit and drink. All I was offerin’ was a quieter place to do it, is all.’
‘Go away.’
Instead, the man sat down. ‘Been watchin’ you all evening. Jus’ another Letherii? Asked myself that once and once only. No, I think, not this one. So I ask, and someone says “That’s the Acquitor, Seren Pedac. Was up at the treaty that went sour. Was under contract with Buruk the Pale, the one that hung himself and damned if it wasn’t her that found him all fish-eyed and fouled.” And I think, that ain’t an easy thing. No wonder she’s sittin’ there tryin’ t’get drunk an’ it’s not working.’
She fixed her gaze on him, seeing him clearly for the first time. Seamed face, clean-shaven, hair shoulder-length and the hue of polished iron. His voice sounded again in her head, confirming what she saw. ‘You’re no Letherii.’
A broad smile, even, white teeth. ‘You got that right, and, no offence, but glad of it.’
‘You’re not Faraed. Nerek. Tarthenal. Not Fent, either, not even Meckros-’
‘What I am you never heard of, believe me, lass. A long way from home.’
‘What do you want?’
‘Was making an offer, but it needed to be done in quiet. Private-’
‘I’m sure-’
‘Not like that, though I’d consider my fortunes on the upswing if it was to happen the way you think I meant. No.’ He leaned forward, gesturing her closer as well.
Her smile ironic, she tilted over the table until their noses were almost touching. ‘I can’t wait.’
He withdrew a fraction. ‘Lass, you’re a breathin’ vineyard. All right, then, listen. We got ourselves a boat-’
‘We?’
‘A boat, and we’re leaving this pock-on-Hood’s-ass of a kingdom.’
‘Where to? Korshenn? Pilott, Truce? Kolanse?’
‘What would be the point of that? The first three you named are all paying tribute to Lether, and Kolanse is a mess from all we hear. Acquitor, the world’s a lot bigger than you might think-’
‘Is it? Actually, it’s smaller than I think.’
‘Same rubbish, different hole, eh? Maybe you’re right. But maybe not.’
‘Who are you?’
‘Just someone a long way from home, like I said. We clawed our way out of Assail, only to find ourselves here, and just by arriving in our damned sieve of a boat, we owed money. Just by steppin’ onto the dock, we owed more. It’s been seven months, and we’re so far in debt Prince K’azz himself couldn’t clear our way back out. Livin’ off scraps and doin’ ugly work and it’s rotting us all-’
‘You were a soldier.’
‘Still am, lass.’
‘So join a brigade-’
He rubbed at his face, closed his eyes for a moment, then seemed to reach a decision. He fixed her with his cool, blue eyes. ‘It’s shouting to the Abyss, lass, and not one Letherii’s listening. You people are in trouble. Serious trouble. Fent Reach surrendered. Now, Twilight’s a smart, able commander, so what made her do that? Think, Acquitor.’
‘She saw it was hopeless. She saw she couldn’t hold the city, and there was no way to retreat.’
He nodded. ‘You weren’t here when the harvest ships returned. You didn’t see what delivered ’em. We did. Lass, if dhenrabi worship a god then that was it, right there in the harbour.’
‘Who are dhenrabi?’
He shook his head. ‘We got room for people worth their salt. And you won’t be the only woman, so it’s not like that.’
‘So why me at all, then?’
‘Because you ain’t blind, Seren Pedac.’
Smiling, she leaned back, then looked away. Not drunk, either. ‘Who are you?’
‘It won’t mean a thing-’
‘Tell me anyway.’
‘Iron Bars, Second Blade, Fourth Company, Crimson Guard. Was in the service of Commander Cal-Brinn before we was all scattered between here and Hood’s gates.’
‘Meaningless and long. I’m impressed, Iron Bars.’
‘Lass, you got more sharp teeth than an enkar’al with a mouthful of rhizan. Probably why I like you so much.’
All right. ‘I’m not interested in your offer, Iron Bars.’
‘Try thinking on it. There’s time for that, provided you get out of Trate as soon as you can.’
She looked at him. ‘That doesn’t make any sense.’
‘You’d be right, if our boat was in the harbour here. But it isn’t. It’s in Letheras. We signed on as crew, through an agent.’ He shrugged. ‘As soon as we get out to sea…’
‘You’ll kill the captain and mates and turn pirate.’
‘We won’t kill anybody if there’s a way round it, and we’re not pirates. We just want to get home. We need to get home.’ He studied her for a moment, then rose. ‘If it works out right, we’ll look you up in Letheras.’
All right. ‘You’d be wasting your time.’
He shrugged. ‘Between here and then, Acquitor, a whole lot is going to change. Get out of this city, lass. As soon as you sober up, go. Just go.’
Then he was gone.
They caught him, dragged him into the alley and they’re sewing up his mouth – c’mon, let’s watch-
Just his mouth? He’s a damned traitor. No reason to go easy on the bastard. Sew him up everywhere, see how he likes that-
Wish it was Hull Beddict, that’s what I wish-
They’ll do a lot worse on ’im, mark my words. You just wait and see…
Her blue silks snapping in the wind, Nekal Bara stood atop the lighthouse tower and faced out to sea. Nothing was going as planned. Their pre-emptive attack had destroyed empty villages; the entire Tiste Edur people were on the move. And they’re about to arrive on our very doorstep.
The fleet that had appeared in Katter Sea, poised to interpose its forces to prevent the retreat of Twilight’s garrison at Fent Reach, had, upon the city’s surrender, simply moved on. Preternaturally swift, the blood-red sails of five hundred raiders now approached Trate Bay. And in the waters beneath those sleek hulls… a thing. Ancient, terrible, eager with hunger. It knew this path. It had been here before.
Since that time, and at the Ceda’s command, she had delved deep in her search to discover the nature of the creature the Tiste Edur had bound to their service. The harbour and the bay beyond had once been dry land, a massive limestone shelf beneath which raced vast underground rivers. Erosion had collapsed the shelf in places, creating roughly circular, deep wells. Sometimes the water below continued to flow as part of the rivers. But in some, the percolating effect of the limestone was blocked by concretions over time, and the water was black and still.
One such well had become, long ago, a place of worship. Treasures were flung into its depths. Gold, jade, silver, and living sacrifices. Drowning voices had screamed in the chill water, cold flesh and bone had settled on the pale floor.
And a spirit was fashioned. Fed on blood and despair, beseeching propitiation, the unwilling surrender of mortal lives. There were mysteries to this, she well knew. Had the spirit existed before the worship began, and was simply drawn to the gifts offered? Or was it conjured into existence by the very will of those ancient worshippers? Either way, the result was the same. A creature came into being, and was taught the nature of hunger, of desire. Made into an addict of blood and grief and terror.
The worshippers vanished. Died out or departed, or driven to such extreme sacrifices as to destroy themselves. There was no telling how deep the bed of bones at the bottom of that well, but, by the end, it must have been appalling in its vastness.
The spirit was doomed, and should have eventually died. Had not the seas risen to swallow the land, had not its world’s walls suddenly vanished, releasing it to all that lay beyond.
Shorelines were places of worship the world over. The earliest records surviving from the First Empire made note of that again and again among peoples encountered during the explorations. The verge between sea and land marked the manifestation of the symbolic transition between the known and the unknown. Between life and death, spirit and mind, between an unlimited host of elements and forces contrary yet locked together. Lives were given to the seas, treasures were flung into their depths. And, upon the waters themselves, ships and their crews were dragged into the deep time and again.
For all that, the spirit had known… competition. And, Nekal Bara suspected, had fared poorly. Weakened, suffering, it had returned to its hole, there beneath the deluge. Returned to die.
There was no way of knowing how the Tiste Edur warlocks had found it, or came to understand its nature and the potential within it. But they had bound it, fed it blood until its strength returned, and it had grown, and with that growth, a burgeoning hunger.
And now, I must find a way to kill it.
She could sense its approach, drawing ever nearer beneath the Edur raiders. Along the harbour front below, soldiers were crowding the fortifications. Crews readied at the trebuchets and ballistae. Fires were stoked and racks of hull-breaching quarrels were wheeled out.
Arahathan in his black furs had positioned himself at the far end of the main pier and, like her, stood facing the fast-approaching Edur fleet. He would seek to block the spirit’s attack, engage it fully for as long as it took for Nekal Bara to magically draw close to the entity and strike at its heart.
She wished Enedictal had remained in the city, rather than returning to his battalion at Awl. Indeed, she wished the Snakebelts had marched to join them here. Once the spirit was engaged, Enedictal could have then shattered the Edur fleet. She had no idea how much damage she and Arahathan would sustain while killing the spirit – it was possible they would have nothing left with which to destroy the fleet. It might come down to hand to hand fighting along the harbour front.
And that is the absurdity of magic in war – we do little more than negate each other. Unless one cadre finds itself outnumbered…
She had six minor sorcerors under her command, interspersed among the companies of the Cold Clay Battalion arrayed below. They would have to be sufficient against the Edur warlocks accompanying the fleet. Nekal Bara was worried, but not unduly so.
The red sails fluttered. She could just make out the crews, scampering on the foredecks and in the rigging. The fleet was heaving to. Beneath the lead ships, a dark tide surged forward, spreading its midnight bruise into the harbour.
She felt a sudden fear. It was… huge.
A glance down. To the lone, black-swathed figure at the very end of the main pier. The arms spreading wide.
The spirit heaved up in a swelling wave, gaining speed as it rushed towards the harbour front. On the docks, soldiers behind shields, a wavering of spear-heads. Someone loosed a ball of flaming pitch from one of the trebuchets. Fascinated, Nekal Bara watched its arcing flight, its smoke-trailing descent, down towards the rising wave. It vanished in a smear of steam.
She heard Arahathan’s roar, saw a line of water shiver, then boil just beyond the docks, lifting skyward a wall of steam even as the spirit’s bulk seemed to lunge a moment before striking it.
The concussion sent the lighthouse wavering beneath her feet and she threw her arms out for balance. Two-thirds of the way down, along a narrow iron balcony, onlookers were flung into the air, to pitch screaming down to the rocks below. The balcony twisted like thin wire in the hands of a blacksmith, the fittings exploding in puffs of dust. A terrible groaning rose up through the tower as it rocked back and forth.
Steam and dark water raged in battle, clambering ever higher directly before Arahathan. The sorceror was swallowed by shadow. The lighthouse was toppling. Nekal Bara faced the harbour, held her arms out, then flung herself from the edge.
Vanishing within a tumbling shaft of magic. Slanting downward in coruscating threads of blue fire that swarmed around a blinding, white core.
Like a god’s spear, the shaft pierced the flank of the spirit. Tore a path of incandescence into the dark, surging water.
Errant – he’s failing! Falling! She sensed, then saw, Arahathan. Red flesh curling away from his bones, blackening, snatched away as if by a fierce whirling wind. She saw his teeth, the lips gone, the grimace suddenly a maddening smile. Eyes wrinkled, then darkening, then collapsing inward.
She sensed, in that last moment, his surprise, his disbelief-
Into the spirit’s flesh, down through layer upon layer of thick, coagulated blood, matted hair, slivered pieces of bone. Encrusted jewellery, mangled coins. Layers of withered newborn corpses, each one wrapped in leather, each one with its forehead stove in, above a face twisted with pain and baffled suffering. Layers. Oh, Mistress, what have we mortals done? Done, and done, and done?
Stone tools, pearls, bits of shell-
Through-
To find that she had been wrong. Terribly wrong.
The spirit – naught but a shell, held together by the memory within bone, teeth and hair, by that memory and nothing more.
Within-
Nekal Bara saw that she was about to die. Against all that rose to greet her, she had no defence. None. Could not – could never – Ceda! Kuru Qan! Hear me! See-
Seren Pedac staggered out into the street. Pushed, spun round, knocked to her knees by fleeing figures.
She had woken in a dark cellar, surrounded by empty, broken kegs. She had been robbed, most of her armour stripped away. Sword and knife gone. The ache between her legs told her that worse had happened. Lips puffed and cut by kisses she had never felt, her hair tangled and matted with blood, she crawled across greasy cobbles to curl up against a stained brick wall. Stared out numbly on the panicked scene.
Smoke had stolen the sky. Brown, murky light, the distant sound of battle – at the harbour front to her left, and along the north and east walls ahead and to her right. In the street before her, citizens raced in seemingly random directions. Across from her, two men were locked in mortal combat, and she watched as one managed to pin the other, then began pounding the man’s head against the cobbles. The hard impacts gave way to soft crunches, and the victor rolled away from the spasming victim, scrambled upright, then limped away.
Doors were being kicked down. Women screamed as their hiding places were discovered.
There were no Tiste Edur in sight.
From her right, three men shambling like marauders. One carried a bloodstained club, another a single-handed sickle. The third man was dragging a dead or unconscious girl-child by one foot.
They saw her. The one with the club smiled. ‘We was coming to c’llect you, Acquitor. Woke up wanting more, did ya?’
She did not recognize any of them, but there was terrible familiarity in their eyes as they looked upon her.
‘The city’s fallen,’ the man continued, drawing closer. ‘But we got a way out, an’ we’re taking you with us.’
The one with the sickle laughed. ‘We’ve decided to keep you to ourselves, lass. Don’t worry, we’ll keep you safe.’
Seren curled tighter against the wall.
‘Hold there!’
A new voice. The three men looked up.
Iron-haired, blue-eyed – she recognized the newcomer. Maybe. She wasn’t sure. She’d never seen armour like that before: she would have remembered the blood-red surcoat. A plain sword at the stranger’s left hip, which he was not reaching towards.
‘It’s that foreign bastard,’ the man with the club said. ‘Find your own.’
‘I just have,’ he replied. ‘Been looking for her the last two days-’
‘She’s ours,’ said the sickle-wielder.
‘No closer,’ the third man growled, raising the child in one hand as if he meant to use the body for a weapon.
Which, Seren now saw, he had done already. Oh, please be dead, child. Please have been dead all along…
‘You know us, foreigner,’ the man with the club said.
‘Oh yes, you’re the terrors of the shanty town. I’ve heard all about your exploits. Which puts me at an advantage.’
‘How so?’
The stranger continued walking closer. She saw something in his eyes, as he said, ‘Because you haven’t heard a thing about mine.’
Club swung. Sickle flashed. Body whipped through the air.
And the girl-child was caught by the stranger, who then reached one hand over, palm up, and seemed to push his fingertips under the man’s chin.
She didn’t understand.
The man with the club was on the ground. The other had his own sickle sticking from his chest and he stood staring down at it. Then he toppled.
A snap. Flood and spray of blood.
The stranger stepped back, tucking the girl-child’s body under his right arm, the hand of his left holding, like a leather-wrapped handle from a pail, the third man’s lower jaw.
Horrible grunting sounds from the staggering figure to her right. Bulging eyes, a spattered gust of breath.
The stranger tossed the mandible away with its attendant lower palate and tongue. He set the child down, then stepped closer to the last man. ‘I don’t like what you did. I don’t like anything you’ve done, but most of all, I don’t like what you did to this woman here, and that child. So, I am going to make you hurt. A lot.’
The man spun as if to flee. Then he slammed onto the cobbles, landing on his chest, his feet taken out from under him – but Seren didn’t see how it had happened.
With serene patience, the stranger crouched over him. Two blurred punches to either side of the man’s spine, almost at neck level, and she heard breastbones snap. Blood was pooling around the man’s head.
The stranger shifted to reach down between the man’s legs.
‘Stop.’
He looked over, brows lifting.
‘Stop. Kill him. Clean. Kill him clean, Iron Bars.’
‘Are you sure?’
From the buildings opposite, faces framed by windows. Eyes fixed, staring down.
‘Enough,’ she said, the word a croak.
‘All right.’
He leaned back. One punch to the back of the man’s head. It folded inward. And all was still.
Iron Bars straightened. ‘All right?’
All right, yes.
The Crimson Guardsman came closer. ‘My fault,’ he said. ‘I had to sleep, thought you’d be safe for a bit. I was wrong. I’m sorry.’
‘The child?’
A pained look. ‘Run down by horses, I think. Some time past.’
‘What’s happening?’
‘Trate’s falling. The Edur fleet held off. Until Nekal Bara and Arahathan were finished. Then closed. The defences were swarmed by shadow wraiths. Then the warriors landed. It was bad, Acquitor.’ He glanced over a shoulder, said, ‘At about that time, an army came down from inland. Swept the undermanned fortifications and, not a hundred heartbeats ago, finally succeeded in knocking down the North Gate. The Edur are taking their time, killing every soldier they find. No quarter. So far, they’ve not touched non-combatants. But that’s no guarantee of anything, is it?’
He helped her to stand, and she flinched at the touch of his hands – those weapons, stained with murder.
If he noticed he gave nothing away. ‘My Blade’s waiting. Corlo’s managed to find a warren in this damned Hood-pit – first time in the two years we been stuck here. What the Edur brought, he says. That’s why.’
She realized they were walking now. Taking winding alleys and avoiding the main thoroughfares. The sound of slaughter was on all sides. Iron Bars suddenly hesitated, cocked his head. ‘Damn, we’ve been cut off.’
Dragged into the slaughter. Bemused witness to the killing of hapless, disorganized soldiers. Wondering if the moneylenders would be next. Udinaas was left staggering in the wake of the emperor of the Tiste Edur and twelve frenzied warriors as they waded through flesh, cutting lives down as if clearing a path through reeds.
Rhulad was displaying skill that did not belong to him. His arms were a blur, his every move heedless and fearless. And he was gibbering, the manic sound punctuated every now and then by a scream that was as much terror as it was rage. Not a warrior triumphant. Neither berserk nor swathed in drenched glory. A killer… killing.
An Edur warrior near him fell to a Letherii soldier’s desperate sword-thrust, and the emperor shrieked, lunged forward. The mottled sword swung, and blood splashed like water. His laughter pulled at his breath, making him gasp. Edur faces flashed furtively towards their savage ruler.
Down the street, carving through a rearguard of some sort. Udinaas stumbled over corpses, writhing, weeping figures. Blind with dying, men called for their mothers, and to these the slave reached down and touched a shoulder, or laid fingertips to slick foreheads, and murmured, ‘I’m here, my boy. It’s all right. You can go now.’
The apologetic priest, chain-snapped forward step by step, whispering hollow blessings, soft lies, forgiving even as he prayed for someone – something – to forgive him in turn. But no-one touched him, no fingertips brushed his brow.
For the burned villages. Retribution. Where were the moneylenders? This war belonged to them, after all.
Another hundred paces. Three more Edur were down. Rhulad and eight brethren. Fighting on. Where was the rest of the army?
Somewhere else.
If one could always choose the right questions, then every answer could be as obvious. A clever revelation, he was on to something here…
Another Edur screamed, skidded and fell over, face smacking the street.
Rhulad killed two more soldiers, and suddenly no-one stood in their path.
Halting in strange consternation, trapped in the centre of an intersection, drifts of smoke sliding past.
From the right, a sudden arrival.
Two Edur reeled back, mortally wounded.
The attacker reached out with his left hand, and a third Edur warrior’s head snapped round with a loud crack.
Clash of blades, more blood, another Edur toppling, then the attacker was through and wheeling about.
Rhulad leapt to meet him. Swords – one heavy and mottled, the other modest, plain – collided, and somehow were bound together with a twist and pronation of the stranger’s wrist, whilst his free hand blurred out and over the weapons, palm connecting with Rhulad’s forehead.
Breaking the emperor’s neck with a loud snap.
Mottled sword slid down the attacker’s blade and he was already stepping past, his weapon’s point already sliding out from the chest of another Edur.
Another heartbeat, and the last two Tiste Edur warriors were down, their bodies eagerly dispensing blood like payment onto the cobbles.
The stranger looked about, saw Udinaas, nodded, then waved to an alley-mouth, from which a woman emerged.
She took a half-dozen strides before Udinaas recognized her.
Badly used.
But no more of that. Not while this man lives.
Seren Pedac took no notice of him, nor of the dead Edur. The stranger grasped her hand.
Udinaas watched them head off down the street, disappear round a corner.
Somewhere behind him, the shouts of Edur warriors, the sound of running feet.
The slave found he was standing beside Rhulad’s body, staring down at it, the bizarre angle of the head on its twisted neck, the hands closed tight about the sword.
Waiting for the mouth to open with mad laughter.
‘Damned strangest armour I’ve ever seen.’
Seren blinked. ‘What?’
‘But he was good, with that sword. Fast. In another five years he’d have had the experience to have made him deadly. Enough to give anyone trouble. Shimmer, Blues, maybe even Skinner. But that armour! A damned fortune, right there for the taking. If we’d the time.’
‘What?’
‘That Tiste Edur, lass.’
‘Tiste Edur?’
‘Never mind. There they are.’
Ahead, crouched at the dead end of an alley, six figures. Two women, four men. All in crimson surcoats. Weapons out. Blood on the blades. One, more lightly armoured than the others and holding what looked to be some sort of diadem in his left hand, stepped forward.
And said something in a language Seren had never heard before.
Iron Bars replied in an impatient growl. He drew Seren closer as the man who’d spoken began gesturing. The air seemed to shimmer all round them.
‘Corlo’s opening the warren, lass. We’re going through, and if we’re lucky we won’t run into anything in there. No telling how far we can get. Far enough, I hope.’
‘Where?’ she asked. ‘Where are we going?’
A murky wall of blackness yawned where the alley’s blank wall had been.
‘Letheras, Acquitor. We got a ship awaiting us, remember?’
Strangest armour I’ve ever seen.
A damned fortune.
‘Is he dead?’
‘Who?’
‘Is he dead? Did you kill him? That Tiste Edur!’
‘No choice, lass. He was slowing us up and more were coming.’
Oh, no.
Vomit spilling out onto the sand.
At least, Withal mused, the shrieks had stopped. He waited, seated on grass just above the beach, while the young Edur, on his hands and knees, head hanging down, shuddered and convulsed, coughed and spat.
Off to one side, two of the Nachts, Rind and Pule, were fighting over a piece of driftwood that was falling apart with their efforts. Their games of destruction had become obsessive of late, leading the Meckros weaponsmith to wonder if they were in fact miming a truth on his behalf. Or the isolation was driving them insane. Another kind of truth, that one.
He despised religion. Set no gods in his path. Ascendants were worse than rabid beasts. It was enough that mortals were capable of appalling evil; he wanted nothing to do with their immortal, immeasurably more powerful counterparts.
And this broken god in his squalid tent, his eternal pain and the numbing smoke of the seeds he scattered onto the brazier before him, it was all of a piece to Withal. Suffering made manifest, consumed by the desire to spread the misery of its own existence into the world, into all the worlds. Misery and false escape, pain and mindless surrender. All of a piece.
On this small island, amidst this empty sea, Withal was lost. Within himself, among a host of faces that were all his own, he was losing the capacity to recognize any of them. Thought and self was reduced, formless and untethered. Wandering amidst a stranger’s memories, whilst the world beyond unravelled.
Nest building.
Frenzied destruction.
Fanged mouth agape in silent, convulsive laughter.
Three jesters repeating the same performance again and again. What did it mean? What obvious lesson was being shown him that he was too blind, too thick, to understand?
The Edur lad was done, nothing left in his stomach. He lifted his head, eyes stripped naked to the bones of pain and horror. ‘No,’ he whispered.
Withal looked away, squinted along the strand.
‘No more… please.’
‘Never much in the way of sunsets here,’ Withal mused. ‘Or sunrises, for that matter.’
‘You don’t know what it’s like!’
The Edur’s scream trailed away. ‘The nests are getting more elaborate,’ Withal said. ‘I think he’s striving for a particular shape. Sloped walls, a triangular entrance. Then Mape wrecks it. What am I to take from all that?’
‘He can keep his damned sword. I’m not going. Over there. I’m not going over there and don’t try to make me.’
‘I have nothing to do. Nothing.’
Rhulad crawled towards him. ‘You made that sword!’ he said in an accusatory rasp.
‘Fire, hammer, anvil and quenching. I’ve made more swords than I can count. Just iron and sweat. They were broken blades, I think. Those black shards. From some kind of narrow-bladed, overlong knife. Two of them, black and brittle. Just pieces, really. I wonder where he collected them from?’
‘Everything breaks,’ Rhulad said.
Withal glanced over. ‘Aye, lad. Everything breaks.’
‘You could do it.’
‘Do what?’
‘Break that sword.’
‘No. I can’t.’
‘Everything breaks!’
‘Including people, lad.’
‘That’s not good enough.’
Withal shrugged. ‘I don’t remember much of anything any more. I think he’s stealing my mind. He says he’s my god. All I need to do is worship him, he says. And everything will come clear. So tell xn Rhulad Sengar, is it all clear to you?’
‘This evil – it’s of your making!’
‘Is it? Maybe you’re right. I accepted his bargain. But he lied, you see He said he’d set me free, once I made the sword. He lies, Rhulad. That much I know. I know that now. This god lies.’
‘I have power. I am emperor. I’ve taken a wife. We are at war and Lether shall fall.’
Withal gestured inland. ‘And he’s waiting for you.’
‘They’re frightened of me.’
‘Fear breeds its own loyalty, lad. They’ll follow. They’re waiting too right now.’
Rhulad clawed at his face, shuddered. ‘He killed me. That man – not a Letherii, not a Letherii at all. He killed us. Seven of my brothers. And me. He was so… fast. It seemed he barely moved, and my kin were falling, dying.’
‘Next time will be harder. You’ll be harder. It won’t be as easy to find someone to kill you, next time. And the time after that. Do you understand that, lad? It’s the essence of that mangled god who’s waiting for you.’
‘Who is he?’
‘The god? A miserable little shit, Rhulad. Who has your soul in his hands.’
‘Father Shadow has abandoned us.’
‘Father Shadow is dead. Or as good as.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Because if he wasn’t, he’d have never let the Crippled God steal you. You and your people. He’d have come marching ashore…’ Withal fell silent.
And that, he realized, was what he was coming to. A blood-soaked truth.
He hated religion, hated the gods. And he was alone.
‘I will kill him. With the sword.’
‘Fool. There’s nothing on this island that he doesn’t hear, doesn’t see, doesn’t know.’
Except, maybe, what’s in my mind now. And, even if he knew, how could he stop me? No, he doesn’t know. I must believe that. After all, if he did, he’d kill me. Right now, he’d kill me.
Rhulad climbed to his feet. ‘I’m ready for him.’
‘Are you?’
‘Yes.’
Withal sighed. He glanced over at the two Nachts. Their contested driftwood was a scattering of splinters lying between them. Both creatures were staring down at it, bemused, poking fingers through the mess. The Meckros rose. ‘All right then, lad, let’s go.
She was behind the black glass, within a tunnel of translucent obsidian, and there were no ghosts.
‘Kurald Galain,’ Corlo said in a whisper, casting a glance back at them over one shoulder. ‘Unexpected. It’s a rotten conquest. That, or the Edur don’t even know it, don’t even know what they’re using.’
The air stank of death. Withered flesh, the breath of a crypt. The black stone beneath their feet was greasy and uncertain. Overhead, the ceiling was uneven, barely a hand’s width higher than Iron Bars, who was the tallest among the group.
‘It’s a damned rats’ maze,’ the mage continued, pausing at a branching.
‘Just take us south,’ Iron Bars said in a low growl.
‘Fine, but which way is that?’
The soldiers crowded round, muttering and cursing in their strange language.
Corlo faced Seren, his expression strangely taut. ‘Any suggestions, Acquitor?’
‘What?’
The mage said something in their native tongue to Iron Bars, who scowled and replied, ‘That’s enough, all of you. In Letherii. Since when was rudeness in the creed of the Crimson Guard? Acquitor, this is the Hold of Darkness-’
‘There is no Hold of Darkness.’
‘Well, I’m trying to say it in a way that makes sense to you.’
‘All right.’
Corlo said, ‘But, you see, Acquitor, it shouldn’t be.’
She simply looked at him in the gloom.
The mage rubbed the back of his neck, and she saw the hand come away glistening with sweat. ‘These are Tiste Edur, right? Not Tiste Andii. The Hold of Darkness, that’s Tiste Andii. The Edur, they were from the, uh, Hold of Shadow. So, it was natural, you see, to expect that the warren would be Kurald Emurlahn. But it isn’t. It’s Kurald Galain, only it’s breached. Over-run. Thick with spirits – Tiste Andii spirits-’
‘They’re not here,’ she said. ‘I’ve seen them. Those spirits. They’re not here.’
‘They are, Acquitor. I’m just keeping them away. For now…’
‘But it’s proving difficult.’
The mage nodded reluctantly.
‘And you’re lost.’
Another nod.
She tried to think, cut through the numbness – which seemed to be the only thing keeping away the pain of her battered flesh. ‘You said the spirits are not Edur.’
‘That’s right. Tiste Andii.’
‘What is the relationship between the two? Are they allied?’
Corlo’s eyes narrowed. ‘Allied?’
‘Those wraiths,’ Iron Bars said.
The mage’s gaze darted to his commander, then back again to Seren Pedac. ‘Those wraiths are bound. Compelled to fight alongside the Edur. Are they Andii spirits? Hood’s breath, this is starting to make sense. What else would they be? Not Edur spirits, since no binding magic would be needed, would it?’
Iron Bars stepped in front of Seren. ‘What are you suggesting?’
She remembered back to her only contact with the spirits, their hunger. ‘Mage Corlo, you say you’re keeping them away. Are they trying to attack us?’
‘I’m not sure.’
‘Let one through. Maybe we can talk to it, maybe we can get help.’
‘Why would it be interested in helping us?’
‘Make a bargain.’
‘With what?’
She shrugged. ‘Think of something.’
He muttered a string of foreign words that she guessed were curses.
‘Let one through,’ Iron Bars said.
More curses, then Corlo walked a few steps ahead to clear some space. ‘Ready weapons,’ he said. ‘In case it ain’t interested in talking.’
A moment later, the gloom in front of the mage wavered, and something black spread outward like spilled ink. A figure emerged, halting, uncertain.
A woman, tall as an Edur but midnight-skinned, a reddish glint to her long, unbound hair. Green eyes, tilted and large, a face softer and rounder than Seren would have expected given her height and long limbs. She was wearing a leather harness and leggings, and on her shoulders rode the skin of some white-furred beast. She was unarmed.
Her eyes hardened. She spoke, and in her words Seren heard a resemblance to Edur.
‘I hate it when that happens,’ Corlo said.
Seren tried Edur. ‘Hello. We apologize for intruding on your world. We do not intend to stay long.’
The woman’s expression did not change. ‘The Betrayers never do.’
‘I may speak in the language of the Edur, but they are no allies of ours. Perhaps in that, we share something.’
‘I was among the first to die in the war,’ the woman said, ‘and so not at the hands of an Edur. They cannot take me, cannot force me to fight for them. I and those like me are beyond their grasp.’
‘Yet your spirit remains trapped,’ Seren said. ‘Here, in this place.’
‘What do you want?’
Seren turned to Iron Bars. ‘She asks what we want of her.’
‘Corlo?’
The mage shrugged, then said, ‘We need to escape the influence of the Edur. We need to get beyond their reach. Then to return to our world.’
Seren relayed Corlo’s statements to the woman.
‘You are mortal,’ she replied. ‘You can pass through when we cannot.’
‘Can you guide us?’
‘And what is to be my reward for this service?’
‘What do you seek?’
She considered, then shook her head. ‘No. An unfair bargain. My service is not worth the payment I would ask. You require a guide to lead you to the border’s edge. I will not deceive. It is not far. You would find it yourselves before too long.’
Seren translated the exchange for the Crimson Guardsmen, then added, ‘This is odd…’
Iron Bars smiled. ‘An honest broker?’
She nodded wryly. ‘I am Letherii, after all. Honesty makes me suspicious.’
‘Ask her what she would have us do for her,’ Iron Bars said.
Seren Pedac did, and the woman held up her right hand, and in it was a small object, encrusted and corroded and unrecognizable. ‘The K’Chain Che’Malle counter-attack drove a number of us down to the shoreline, then into the waves. I am a poor fighter. I died on that sea’s foaming edge, and my corpse rolled out, drawn by the tide, along the muddy sands, where the mud swallowed it.’ She looked down at the object in her palm. ‘This was a ring I wore. Returned to me by a wraith – many wraiths have done this for those of us beyond the reach of the Edur. I would ask that you return me to my bones, to what little of me remains. So that I can find oblivion. But this is too vast a gift, for offering you so little-’
‘How would we go about doing as you ask?’
‘I would join with the substance of this ring. You would see me no more. And you would need to travel to the shoreline, then cast this into the sea.’
‘That does not seem difficult.’
‘Perhaps it isn’t. The inequity lies in the exchange of values.’
Seren shook her head. ‘We see no inequity. Our desire is of equal value as far as we are concerned. We accept your bargain.’
‘How do I know you will not betray me?’
The Letherii turned to Iron Bars. ‘She doesn’t trust us.’
The man strode to halt directly before the Tiste Andii woman. ‘Acquitor, tell her I am an Avowed, of the Crimson Guard. If she would, she can seek the meaning of that. By laying her hand on my chest. Tell her I shall honour our pact.’
‘I’ve not told you what it is yet. She wants us to throw the thing she’s holding into the sea.’
‘That’s it?’
‘Doing so will end her existence. Which seems to be what she wants.’
‘Tell her to seek the cast of my soul.’
‘Very well.’
The suspicious look in the woman’s eyes grew more pronounced, but she stepped forward and set her left hand on the man’s chest.
The hand flinched away and the woman staggered back a step, shock then horror, writ on her face. ‘How – how could you do – why?’
Seren said, ‘Not the response you sought, I think, Iron Bars. She is… appalled.’
‘That is of no concern,’ the man replied. ‘Does she accept my word?’
The woman straightened, then, to Seren’s question, she nodded and said ‘I cannot do otherwise. But… I had forgotten… this feeling.’
‘What feeling?’
‘Sorrow.’
‘Iron Bars,’ Seren said, ‘whatever this “Avowed” means, she is overwhelmed with… pity.’
‘Yes well’ he said, turning away, ‘we all make mistakes.’
The woman said, ‘I will lead you now.’
‘What is your name?’
‘Sandalath Drukorlat.’
‘Thank you, Sandalath. It grieves me to know that our gift to you is oblivion.’
She shrugged. ‘Those who I once loved and who loved me believe I am gone in truth. There is no need for grief.’
No need for grief. Where, then, does the pity lie?
‘Stand up, lads,’ Iron Bars said, ‘she’s making ready to go.’
Mape lay on the knoll like something dead, but the Nacht’s head slowly turned as Withal and Rhulad strode into view. She had stolen a hammer from the smithy some time back, to better facilitate her destruction of Pule’s nests and now carried it with her everywhere. Withal watched askance as the gnarled, black-skinned creature lifted the hammer into view eyes still fixed on him and the Tiste Edur, as if contemplating murder.
Of the three Nachts, Mape made him the most nervous. Too much intelligence glittered in her small black eyes, too often she watched with something like a smile on her apish face. And the strength the creatures had displayed was sufficient to make any man worried. He knew Mape could tear his arms from his shoulders, were she so inclined.
Perhaps the Crippled God had bound them, as demons could be bound, and it was this and this alone that kept the beasts from Withal’s throat. An unpleasant notion.
‘What’s to stop me,’ Rhulad asked in a growl, ‘from driving the sword right through his scrawny chest?’
‘Do not ask that question of me, Edur. Only the Crippled God can answer it. But I don’t think it could ever be that easy. He’s a clever bastard, and there in that tent his power is probably absolute.’
‘The vastness of his realm,’ Rhulad said, sneering.
Yes. Now why do those words, said in that way, interest me?
The ragged canvas shelter was directly ahead, smoke drifting from the side that had been drawn open. As they approached, the air grew hotter, drier, the grasses withered and bleached underfoot. The earth seemed strangely blighted.
They came opposite the entrance. Within, the god’s huddled form in the gloom. Tendrils of smoke rising from the brazier.
A cough, then, ‘Such anger. Unreasonable, I think, given the efficacy of my gift.’
‘I don’t want to go back,’ Rhulad said. ‘Leave me here. Choose someone else.’
‘Unwitting servants to our cause appear… from unexpected sources. Imagine, an Avowed of the Crimson Guard. Be glad it was not Skinner, or indeed Cowl. They would have taken more notice of you, and that would not have been a good thing. We’re not yet ready for that.’ A hacking cough. ‘Not yet ready.’
‘I’m not going back.’
‘You detest the flesh given you. I understand. But, Rhulad Sengar, the gold is your payment. For the power you seek.’
‘I want nothing more of that power.’
‘But you do,’ the Crippled God said, clearly amused. ‘Consider the rewards already reaped. The throne of the Tiste Edur, the woman after whom you lusted for years – now in your possession, to do with as you please. Your brothers, bowing one and all before you. And a burgeoning prowess with the sword-’
‘It’s not mine, though, is it? It is all I can do to hold on! The skill does not belong to me – and all can see that! I have earned nothing!’
‘And what value is all that pride you seek, Rhulad Sengar? You mortals baffle me. It is a fool’s curse, to measure oneself in endless dissatisfaction. It is not for me to guide you in the rule of your empire. That task belongs to you and you alone. There, make that your place of pride. Besides, has not your strength grown? You have muscles now surpassing your brother Fear’s. Cease your whimpering, Edur.’
‘You are using me!’
The Crippled God laughed. ‘And Scabandari Bloodeye did not? Oh, I know the tale now. All of it. The seas whisper old truths, Rhulad Sengar. Revered Father Shadow, oh, such an absurd conceit. Murderer, knife-wielder, betrayer-’
‘Lies!’
‘-who then led you into your own betrayal. Of your once-allies, the Tiste Andii. You fell upon them at Scabandari’s command. You killed those who had fought alongside you. That is the legacy of the Tiste Edur, Rhulad Sengar. Ask Hannan Mosag. He knows. Ask your brother, Fear. Your mother – the women know. Their memory has been far less… selective.’
‘No more of this,’ the Edur pleaded, clawing at his face. ‘You would poison me with dishonour. That is your purpose… for all you say.’
‘Perhaps what I offer,’ the Crippled God murmured, ‘is absolution. The opportunity to make amends. It is within you, Rhulad Sengar. The power is yours to shape as you will. The empire shall cast your reflection, no-one else’s. Will you flee from that? If that is your choice, then indeed I shall be forced to choose another. One who will prove, perhaps, less honourable.’
The sword clattered at Rhulad’s feet.
‘Choose.’
Withal watched, saw the Edur’s expression change.
With a scream, Rhulad snatched up the weapon and lunged-
– and was gone.
Rasping laughter. ‘There is so little, withal, that surprises me any more.’
Disgusted, the Meckros turned away.
‘A moment, Withal. I see your weariness, your displeasure. What is it that plagues you so? That is what I ask myself.’
‘The lad doesn’t deserve it-’
‘Oh, but he does. They all do.’
‘Aye,’ Withal said, eyes level as he stared at the Crippled God, ‘that does seem to be the sole judgement you possess. But it’s hardly clean, is it?’
‘Careful. My gratitude for what you have done for me wears thin.’
‘Gratitude?’ Withal’s laugh was harsh. ‘You are thankful after compelling me into doing your bidding. That’s a good one. May you be as generous of thought after I force you into killing me.’ He studied the hooded figure. ‘I see your problem, you know. I see it now, and curse myself for having missed it before. You have no realm to command, as do other gods. So you sit there, alone, in your tent, and that is the extent of your realm, isn’t it? Broken flesh and foul, stifling air. Skin-thin walls and the heat the old and lame desire. Your world, and you alone in it, and the irony is, you cannot even command your own body.’
A wretched cough, then, ‘Spare me your sympathy, Meckros. I have given the problem of you considerable thought, and have found a solution, as you shall soon discover. When you do, think on what you have said to me. Now, go.’
‘You still don’t understand, do you? The more pain you deliver to others, god, the more shall be visited upon you. You sow your own misery, and because of that whatever sympathy you might rightly receive is swept away.’
‘I said go, Withal. Build yourself a nest. Mape’s waiting.’
They emerged onto a windswept sward with the crashing waves of the sea on their right and before them the delta of a broad river. On the river’s other side stood a walled city.
Seren Pedac studied the distant buildings, the tall, thin towers that seemed to lean seaward. ‘Old Katter,’ she said. ‘We’re thirty leagues south of Trate. How is that possible?’
‘Warrens,’ Corlo muttered, sagging until he sat on the ground. ‘Rotted. Septic, but still, a warren.’
The Acquitor made her way down to the beach. The sun was high and hot overhead. I must wash. Get clean. The sea…
Iron Bars followed, in one hand the encrusted object where the spirit of a Tiste Andii woman now resided.
She strode into the water, the foaming waves thrashing round her shins.
The Avowed flung the object past her – a small splash not far ahead.
Thighs, then hips.
Clean. Get clean.
To her chest. A wave rolled, lifted her from the bottom, spun and flung her towards the shore. She clawed herself round until she could push forward once again. Cold salty water rising over her face. Bright, sunlit, silty water, washing sight from her eyes. Water biting at scabbed wounds, stinging her broken lips, water filling her mouth and begging to be drawn inside.
Like this.
Hands grasped her, pulled her back. She fought, but could not break loose.
Clean!
Her face swept by cold wind, eyes blinking in painful light. Coughing, weeping, she struggled, but the hands dragged her remorselessly onto the beach, flung her onto the sand. Then, as she tried to claw free, arms wrapped tight about her, pinning her own arms, and a voice gasped close to her ear, ‘I know, lass. I know what it’s about. But it ain’t the way.’
Heaving, helpless sobs, now.
And he held her still.
‘Heal her, Corlo.’
‘I’m damn near done-’
‘Now. And sleep. Make her sleep-’
No, you can’t die. Not again. I have need of you.
So many layers, pressing down upon these indurative remnants, a moment of vast pressure, the thick, so thick skin tracing innumerable small deaths. And life was voice, not words, but sound, motion. Where all else was still, silent. Oblivion waited when the last echo faded.
Dying the first time should have been enough. This world was foreign, after all. The gate sealed, swept away. Her husband – if he still lived – was long past his grief. Her daughter, perhaps a mother herself by now, a grandmother. She had fed on draconic blood, there in the wake of Anomander. Somewhere, she persisted, and lived free of sorrow.
It had been important to think that way. Her only weapon against insanity.
No gifts in death but one.
But something held her back.
Something with a voice. These are restless seas indeed. I had not thought my questing would prove so… easy. True, you are not human, but you will do. You will do.
These remnants, suddenly in motion, grating motion. Fragments, particles too small to see, drawing together. As if remembering to what they had once belonged. And, within the sea, within the silts, waited all that was needed. For flesh, for bone and blood. All these echoes, resurrected, finding shape. She looked on in horror.
Watched, as the body – so familiar, so strange – clawed its way upward through the silts. Silts that lightened, thinned, then burst into a plume that swirled in the currents. Arms reaching upward, a body heaving into view.
She hovered near, compelled to close, to enter, but knowing it was too soon.
Her body, which she had left so long ago. It was not right. Not fair.
Scrambling mindlessly along the sea bottom. Finned creatures darting in and out of sight, drawn to the stirred-up sediments, frightened away by the flailing figure. Multi-legged shapes scrabbling from its path.
A strange blurring, passed through, and then sunlight glittered close overhead. Hands broke the surface, firm sand underfoot, sloping upward.
Face in the air.
And she swept forward, plunged into the body, raced like fire within muscle and bone.
Sensations. Cold, a wind, the smell of salt and a shoreline’s decay.
Mother Dark, I am… alive.
The voice of return came not in laughter, but in screams.
All had gathered as word of the emperor’s death spread. The city was taken, but Rhulad Sengar had been killed. Neck snapped like a sapling. His body lay where it fell, with the slave Udinaas standing guard, a macabre sentinel who did not acknowledge anyone, but simply stared down at the coin-clad corpse.
Hannan Mosag. Mayen with Feather Witch trailing. Midik Buhn, now blooded and a warrior in truth. Hundreds of Edur warriors, blood-spattered with glory and slaughter. Silent, pale citizens, terrified of the taut expectancy in the smoky air.
All witness to the body’s sudden convulsions, its piercing screams. For a ghastly moment, Rhulad’s neck remained broken, rocking his head in impossible angles as he staggered to his feet. Then the bone mended, and the head righted itself, sudden light in the hooded eyes.
More screams, from Letherii now. Figures fleeing.
Rhulad’s ragged shrieks died and he stood, wavering, the sword trembling in his hands.
Udinaas spoke. ‘Emperor, Trate is yours.’
A sudden spasm, then Rhulad seemed to see the others for the first time. ‘Hannan Mosag, settle the garrison. The rest of the army shall camp outside the city. Send word to your K’risnan with the fleet: they are to make for Old Katter.’
The Warlock King stepped close and said in a low voice, ‘It is true, then. You cannot die.’
Rhulad flinched. ‘I die, Hannan Mosag. It is all I know, dying. Leave me now. Udinaas.’
‘Emperor.’
‘I need – find – I am…’
‘Your tent awaits you and Mayen,’ the slave said.
‘Yes.’
Midik Buhn spoke, ‘Emperor, I shall lead your escort.’
His expression confused, Rhulad looked down at his body, the smeared, crusted coins, the spattered furs. ‘Yes, brother Midik. An escort.’
‘And we shall find the one who… did this, sire… to you.’ Rhulad’s eyes flashed. ‘He cannot be defeated. We are helpless before him. He lies…’
Midik was frowning. He glanced at Udinaas.
‘Emperor,’ the slave said, ‘he meant the one who killed you and your kin. Here in this street.’
Clawing at his face, Rhulad turned away. ‘Of course. He wore… crimson.’
Udinaas said to Midik, ‘I will give you a detailed description.’
A sharp nod. ‘Yes. The city will be searched.’
But he’s gone, you fool. No, I don’t know how I know. Still, the man’s gone. With Seren Pedac. ‘Of course.’
‘Udinaas!’ A desperate gasp.
‘I am here, Emperor.’
‘Take me out of this place!’
It was known, now, and soon the Ceda would learn of it. But would he understand? How could he? It was impossible, insane.
He can do nothing. Will he realize this?
The warrior in gold trailed the slave, step by step, through the fallen city, Mayen and Feather Witch in their wake. Midik Buhn and a dozen warriors flanked them all, weapons at the ready. The passage was uncontested.
Withal sat on a bench in his smithy. Plain walls, stone and plaster, the forge cold and filled with ash. Paved floor, the small workshop three-walled, the open side facing onto a fenced compound where stood a cut-stone-rimmed well, a quenching trough, firewood and a heap of tailings and slag. A hut on the opposite side housed his cot and nothing else. The extent of his world. Mocking reminder of his profession, the purpose behind living.
The Crippled God’s voice whispered in his mind, Withal. My gift. I am not without sympathy, no matter what you might think. I understood. Nachts are poor company for a man. Go, Withal, down to the beach. Take possession of my gift.
He slowly rose, bemused. A boat? A raft? A damned log I could ride out with the tide? He made his way outside.
And heard the Nachts, chattering excitedly down on the strand.
Withal walked to the verge, and stood, looking down.
A woman was staggering from the water. Tall, black-skinned, naked, long red hair.
And the Meckros turned round, strode away.
‘You bastard-’
The Crippled God replied in mock consternation, Is this not what you want? Is she too tall for you? Her eyes too strange? Withal, I do not understand…
‘How could you have done this? Take possession, you said. It’s all you know, isn’t it? Possession. Things to be used. People. Lives.’
She needs your help, Withal. She is lost, alarmed by the Nachts. Slow to recall her flesh.
‘Later. Leave me alone, now. Leave us both alone.’
A soft laugh, then a cough. As you wish. Disappointing, this lack of gratitude.
‘Go to the Abyss.’
No reply.
Withal entered the hut, stood facing the cot for a time, until he was certain that the Crippled God was not lurking somewhere in his skull. Then he lowered himself to his knees and bowed his head.
He hated religion. Detested gods. But the nest was empty. The nest needed tearing apart. Rebuilding.
The Meckros had a host of gods for the choosing. But one was older than all the others, and that one belonged to the sea.
Withal began to pray.
In Mael’s name.