Fall of Light

TWENTY-TWO

The sea faded into mists behind them, and below a vast rolling plain appeared. Skillen Droe tilted the cant of his wings and began descending. The landing was rougher than K’rul had expected and he tumbled from his companion’s clutches, coming to a stop against the edge of a ring of stones mostly hidden by yellow grasses.

‘There is the dust of a settlement ahead,’ Skillen Droe said, folding his wings. ‘I am of no mind to invite arrows and curses, and besides, I weary of flight.’

Groaning, K’rul sat up. ‘We return to our world,’ he said, looking around. ‘We are in the lands of the Jheleck.’ He paused and eyed Skillen Droe. ‘I suppose they don’t like you either. I can’t recall if you’ve mentioned them already.’

‘It is not in my nature to offend people. Endeavouring to do well invariably yields unexpected consequences.’

‘And the Jheleck?’

Skillen Droe shrugged his sharp-angled shoulders. ‘Taking offence is all too often the retreat of a petty mind.’

‘Passive aggression, is what you mean,’ said K’rul, pushing himself to his feet. ‘The act of taking offence becomes a weapon, and its wielder feels empowered by the false indignation. That said, I doubt this is what afflicted the Jhelarkan.’ He tottered for a moment before recovering his balance. ‘My legs are half asleep and my skull is empty of blood. I am in need of a meal, I think, but the walk will do some good. An encampment, you say?’

‘A gathering, and some excitement. K’rul, we have met too many fellow Azathanai. Such encounters leave me despondent.’

They set out, at K’rul’s slow, halting pace. ‘We are afflicted with the stature of gods without the incumbent sense of responsibility. Our endless wandering is in fact an eternal flight from worshippers, no different from a father fleeing his wife and children.’

‘And between the man’s legs, the opportunity to repeat the whole mess. With another woman, in another place. K’rul, you impugn my good deeds.’

‘It’s all down to actually acknowledging the need to grow up, something so many men have trouble with. A weathered visage and a loose child behind it. A door slammed in the face of every potential lesson, the rapid thump of footsteps off into the night.’

‘An entire people can succumb to this same crime,’ observed Skillen Droe. ‘Irresponsible flight redefined as progress.’

‘Yes, the delusion of godhood belongs to us all, mortal and immortal alike. Can we say, with any certainty, whether some other god exists, a being beyond all of us, and we to it as children to a parent?’

‘Orphaned, then, for no hand clasps our own, no mother or father guides us. In our abandonment, K’rul, we but flail, lost and unknowing.’

They had been spotted. A dozen or so veered Jhelarkan now paced them on the plain, black and shaggy and loping as if moments from closing in for the kill.

‘I dare say,’ ventured K’rul, ‘we would twist from that hand’s grip at the first opportunity, even unto denying its very existence. You see, Skillen Droe, the dilemma of our wilfulness?’

‘I see that children will delude themselves into the guise of grown adults, aping adult concerns, whilst their child selves crouch amidst the basest of emotions, the jealousies and spites, the blind wants and desperate needs, few of which can ever be appeased without the shedding of blood, or the rendering of pain. Children ever delight in the suffering of others, particularly when delivered by their own hand. Does it not fall to ones such as us, K’rul, to set a moral standard?’

‘And how did that fare among these K’Chain Che’Malle of yours?’ K’rul asked. ‘Your moral guidance yields you the form of a winged assassin.’

‘Yes, well. Sometimes the notion of right and wrong is best delivered in a welter of furious slaughter.’

‘As the child within you lashes out.’

‘K’rul, I recall, at last, how often conversation with you becomes infuriating.’

‘I speak only to encourage humility, something we Azathanai woefully lack. For this reason, Skillen Droe, did I open my veins and let the blood of power flow into the world.’

‘A child encouraging other children. I see chaos in the offing.’

K’rul grunted. ‘It’s always in the offing, old friend.’

Four of the giant wolves pulled away from the pack and approached, tails lowered and ears flattened.

‘We are not welcome,’ said Skillen Droe, unfolding his wings once more.

‘Patience,’ K’rul replied, holding up his bloodless hands.

The wolves halted a few paces away, and the lead one sembled, rising on its hind legs as blurring took its form. The wolf fur rolled back to become a heavy cloak, and from the confused uncertainty of the creature’s transformation a woman’s face appeared, followed by the rest of her mostly naked body. She was whipcord lean, her belly flat and her breasts small. Startling blue eyes looked out from a heart-shaped face, framed in a mane of black hair.

‘More strangers,’ she said. ‘Despoiling sacred ground.’

‘Our apologies,’ K’rul said. ‘We saw no cairns.’

‘Because you don’t know what to look for. We are done with cairns, as the Tiste looters destroyed all that they found. Now, we sanctify the earth with blood and piss. With splintered bones. All who despoil holy ground are slain.’

K’rul sighed and turned to Skillen Droe. ‘It seems we will have to fly after all.’

‘No. As I said, I am weary. Though I do not desire it, I will kill these rude creatures if necessary. Ask this woman what afflicts the camp beyond? There is an Azathanai there. I can feel it. I believe the Jhelarkan celebrate the return of their ancient benefactor.’

‘Only you would call celebration an affliction.’ K’rul turned back to the woman. ‘My companion and I regret our trespass. We are but travelling through, seeking the shores of the Vitr. Even so, if Farander Tarag is in the camp beyond, we would pay our respects to our Azathanai kin.’

The woman scowled. ‘Farander Tarag has severed all ties to the Azathanai. Divided in perpetuity, they now embrace the wild, and join us in the ancient glory of the beasts. They will not greet you as kin. Begone, both of you.’

K’rul grunted in surprise. ‘A D’ivers ritual? Farander has reached back far indeed.’

Skillen Droe clacked his serrated jaws to signal something, perhaps contempt. ‘Farander Tarag always was something of a narcissist. This does not surprise me and nor should it surprise you, K’rul. Who else could suffer Farander’s company but Farander? Oh, and these blunt-browed creatures. The wild yields little of value to the mind capable of imagining beyond the horizon. The Jheleck are now benighted, sealing their fate.’

K’rul sighed. To the woman, he said, ‘Very well. Alas, my companion is too weary to fly, and so we can do nothing but walk. You cannot kill us, so enough of that nonsense. But be assured we will give wide berth to your encampment.’

The woman snarled, and then veered into her wolf form. Re-joining her kin, she wheeled with them and loped off to return to the pack.

K’rul glared at Skillen Droe. ‘Were your words only for me, Skillen?’

‘Of course not. What value a threat unheard?’

‘I see now how your poor manners invite discord.’

‘Your observation baffles me. I was nothing but polite, insofar as such a thing is possible when contemplating murder. Was my regret not palpable?’

‘No, not really.’ Shaking his head, K’rul set off again, this time angling westward to take them clear of the encampment. Skillen Droe strode at his side, wings folded once more.

‘The Tiste will know trouble should they attempt to invade Jheleck lands again. Of course, the ferocity of the wild knows little cunning, beyond what nature provides. In the hunt there is necessity. In defence of the defenceless, or of oneself harried into a corner, there is desperation. Neither feeds the vagaries of war.’ He clacked his jaws again. ‘Their retreat shall be endless, I predict, across every realm, age upon age. The wild can do nothing but die.’

‘Nonsense. Civilization is ephemeral. Domestication of beasts removes their ability to survive without constant attention. Enslavement and breeding of plants weakens them against pest and blight. Imprisoning water invites disease, and, at the last, the breaking of the soil exhausts its capacity to renew itself. Gothos might well be the Lord of Hate, but nothing of what he said was wrong.’

‘And so your argument is that, eventually, the wild will return.’

‘Yes.’

‘Yet, in unleashing sorcery upon all the realms, K’rul, you offer a weapon to defy the wild, in ways not yet imagined.’

K’rul glanced to the right, squinting at the dust-laden encampment and its swarming figures. ‘It may seem that way, yes, at first. But in the absence of magic, what else might civilization beat into weapons against the wild?’

Skillen Droe was silent for a long moment, and then he said, ‘The K’Chain Che’Malle enslaved natural laws. They transformed their world with the tools of technology.’

‘Indeed, and how have they fared?’

‘Their war against nature is complete. Now they twist the very blood in their children, to make forms new and deadly.’

‘And sent you packing.’

‘A crude and displeasing description of my leaving them to their own devices. In creating birds, they bent to the task of constructing cages for them. I chose to not linger, and if my departure proved somewhat tumultuous and discombobulating, it was no fault of mine. Indeed, had I not lost my sky-keep, I would have retired within its inviting confines, there to contemplate the peace of solitude.’

‘For most,’ said K’rul, ‘solitude invites angst.’

The pack still paced them to the east. The day’s modest warmth was fast fading and here and there, in hollows, patches of wind-sculpted, dirty snow were visible. The season’s turn this far north was still months away.

‘Angst. I have never understood that,’ Skillen Droe said.

‘For many, contemplation is like small, sharp teeth chewing from the inside out. We’re in the habit of swallowing down our demons, and then deceiving ourselves by believing they die in dissolution. Instead, they delight in their hidden refuge, and feed day and night.’

‘I know nothing of such demons.’

‘Give us distractions to craze the eye, deafen the ear, and dull the mind, and we can survive a lifetime of despair. For all your efforts, among one people after another, Skillen Droe, I fear that you have failed in listening to any of them. In future, focus on the artists, to best discern the honest cry of the lost.’

‘It is well known that a civilization intent on self-destruction will disempower its artists,’ said Skillen Droe. ‘I witness this again and again. You misunderstand my purpose, K’rul. I am not a saviour.’

‘Then why do you find yourself hiding in civilizations of the mortals?’

‘I get bored, K’rul.’

‘Bored with yourself?’

‘Bored with everything, and everyone. I search for something I cannot name. A beacon, perhaps, in the darkness of perpetual ignorance. A spark of defiance among the wilfully obtuse. This endless drone irritates me, the frenzied flurry of busyness for little purpose beyond perpetuating a dissatisfying life. The constructs of the intellect are delusional, and so I become the fist of unreason. The gods, I say, care nothing for machines. Care nothing for the lies of habit, nothing for the tyranny of how things were always done and therefore must always be. The gods are deaf to excuses, rationalizations, justifications. Instead, they listen in the silence beyond the machines for the whispered opening of a single heart.’

K’rul had halted during this speech. He studied his companion, this towering, reptilian assassin, slayer of dragons, who had uprooted mountains and lifted them into the sky. ‘You speak of love,’ he said. ‘This is your beacon, your spark of defiance.’

‘The K’Chain Che’Malle look into the night sky and build for it laws and principles, as if the act of definition suffices, serving as justification prior to invasion, conquest and exploitation. Should they ever succeed, they will infect the heavens with the same wars, the same venal desires and hungers, the same witless adherence to those laws and principles by which they shackle all they see, and all they claim to know. Tell me, K’rul, when you look up into this coming night, what do you see?’

‘What I see matters less than what I feel.’

‘And what do you feel?’

‘I feel … wonder.’

Skillen Droe nodded. ‘Just so. And wonder, my friend, is the intellect’s most feared foe. Its path is love, and love is the language of humility. The rational mind would stand over it with a bloodstained sword, and in the empty bleakness of its eyes you will see its triumph.’ The assassin shook his head and fanned wide his wings. ‘This I have learned, among the K’Chain Che’Malle. This, K’rul, is why I stand at your side. The magic you offer – oh, they will seek to cage it, in laws and principles, in rules and squalid structure. But we both know that they will fail, for their minds are trapped in cages of their own making, and all that lies beyond will remain forever unknown, and unknowable, to them. And this they cannot abide.’

‘They will fail,’ K’rul agreed, ‘because I am unknowable.’

‘Yes. And your gesture, K’rul, was an act of love, yielding unending wonder. What you have done will infuriate the world.’

K’rul shrugged. ‘That will … suffice.’

They resumed their journey.

* * *

A broad, flat stone, ten paces across, squatted above the tideline, at the very edge of the caustic miasma that drifted from the Vitr. Long before the unnatural sea’s birth, in the age when the Builders were content working with raw rock, earth and trees, this massive stone had been worked into an altar, its surface roughly flattened by antler picks, with the spiralling grooves left to the elements to soften through seasons of rain, snow, heat and cold.

But none of this had prepared the altar for the acidic bite of the Vitr’s roiling breath. The patterns upon its surface were mostly gone, and the grooves that remained were brittle to the touch. Just as faith died with a people’s death, so too this obelisk and the worship it embodied.

The Thel Akai, Kanyn Thrall, crouched upon the flat surface, leaning on his short-handled, double-bladed axe. The weapon had once belonged to a Thelomen chieftain. Its forger had pronounced it cursed, unsurprisingly, after Thrall had killed the chief in single combat. Such trophies could only be claimed with a touch of irony, an acknowledgement that edges cut both ways. Kanyn Thrall had smiled when he discarded his broken spear, its famed point blunted and barely recognizable beneath a welter of gore, and collected up the cursed axe.

Some weapons possessed only a single moment of triumph within them. Clearly, the axe he now held was biding its time.

With that thought foremost in his mind, lingering in an idle way, he tilted his head slightly as he regarded the dragon drawn up upon the Vitr’s strand, directly opposite him and interceding itself between him and the hovering, crackling gate of Starvald Demelain. The gate had been born, in rupturing fury, far to the south, where it had spilled out a broken storm of dragons, but it had since migrated here, sung close by his mistress’s siren call, and day after day she strengthened the anchors now holding the gate in place.

Songs like the silky strands of a spider, a web very nearly complete. All that remained, he reminded himself, was some sorry bastard’s soul torn loose and stuffed into the gaping wound that was Starvald Demelain. A soul to seal the maw, and pray it’s a mighty soul, a stubborn soul, a soul made to suffer.

Not mine, then.

The dragon had clearly split away from the broken storm – as, he suspected, had most of the others – and circled round, possibly to flee back through the gate. But then, what was stopping it?

Not me. Not my mistress. Not our guest, still half starved, still entirely lost. No, this dragon seems determined to stand in my stead. But I need no help guarding this gate.

And still it refuses to speak.

He reached one hand up to rub at his face, shocked yet again at the deep lines that furrowed it. Shifting slightly – even a Thel Akai born to crouch and squat could know aches in the posture, eventually – he turned his gaze back over his right shoulder, to where the Second Temple stood in tilted disregard amidst lifeless sand dunes. Second Temple. So she calls it, with that mocking smile. ‘While you, Kanyn Thrall, you claim the first one. That flat stone, that eroded failure soon to dissolve beneath the waters of the Vitr. Not that my abode will last much longer, of course. Still, I am optimistic. Its Chamber of Dreaming remains empty, but still, on late nights, I enter it, listening for her whisper.’

Foolish woman. Your lover drowned, and you’ll not again lie with your queen. Just as I will never again lie with my king, since no two men can ever shit out an heir. This is how things are, Ardata. Let’s make use of our guest’s soul, swollen as it is with self-pity, and stopper the gate shut, and then let us leave, seeking some other worthy cause.

He couldn’t see her. Somewhere inside the Second Temple, he surmised, drifting from empty room to empty room, fingers making patterns in the air that lingered like floating webs in her wake.

Come the night she’d take his cock, the lesser pleasure being the only pleasure, and he’d take her wet hole, for much the same reason. It was, all things considered, comical.

A Thel Akai tale to be sure, a long joke’s sudden punchline. I see the host rocking back in delighted laughter, enough to drown the sting to be sure. Though my king’s eyes would look on, veiled behind the fixed smile. Old men should never linger.

The guest, however, was there, seated upon a toppled column below the shattered steps, whetstone motionless in one hand, sword-blade resting across his thighs. He was staring out at the Vitr, his mouth somewhat open, somewhat hanging. A man not yet old enough to take stock of his orifices, snapping them shut to all worlds but the intimate one. No, instead he gawks, and gawps. He works at something and then that mouth hinges open, to show the heavy drama of his deed. Pant pant pant, each breath almost but not quite silent. Irritating as all the hells Ardata claims to have survived. Whatever ‘hells’ are.

He had stumbled into them some time back, this stranger, this guest. Walking, he told them, from a dead horse – the fool had carried the saddle to prove it – up from the south, a dying wanderer, or perhaps a refugee, or even a criminal. Choose the title you like, just add ‘dying’ to it and that’ll do.

Kanyn was of no mind to lend aid. His days of offering salvation were far behind him. But the Mistress had insisted, and it was only much later that the Thel Akai warrior had divined her unspoken motivation.

He eyed the swollen, swirling wound that was the gate of Starvald Demelain. Extraordinary that a single soul could seal it shut. But not mine. Not hers, either.

The dragon was staring at him, as it had been staring at him ever since he took his station opposite it, the very morning of its confounding arrival. As far as staring contests went, not even a Thel Akai could match a dragon’s baleful, unblinking regard. Instead, Kanyn would periodically meet those reptilian eyes and offer up a twisted expression, slowly shutting one eye while screwing up the other, perhaps, or dangling his tongue, or sending its glistening tip upward to touch his own nose. A finger to savage the itch in one ear, another to explore the caverns of his nose. A sudden farting sound, or coughing out a hidden handful of dirt and dust. Occasionally, he’d reach to his own genitals, as if about to begin playing with himself.

But that never went further. Besides the indignity of such a thing, the damned dragon’s eyes never even narrowed.

He contemplated walking up to it and pissing on its snout. ‘What would you say to that?’ he called out suddenly. ‘Bladder’s full, after all. Give a man who needs to piss a target and he’s happy. Shall we make me happy?’

The guest had looked over, and now he slipped down from the column and walked towards Kanyn Thrall. ‘Thel Akai, why do you bother?’

Kanyn squinted. ‘Already feigning banal uninterest in our winged interloper? That did not take long. I wonder, is that the secret gift of those low in intelligence, that makes them so well armoured against amazement? The cynic’s shallow wit, yes? I almost admire you. No, honestly. What bliss would I know had I half the wit! Tell me, at least, that you ate the horse.’

The guest halted. ‘Served me too well, sir, for such ignominy!’

‘So you hollowed your stomach instead. Horses are as quick to serve a master when dead as when living, you fool. That’s what blind servitude is all about.’

‘There are other kinds of service, Thel Akai.’

‘Such as?’

The man drew himself up slightly and Kanyn groaned inwardly, bracing himself for another grave pronouncement. ‘I left my brave mount where it fell, and in so doing, I served the honour I held for it.’

‘You honoured it by wasting it? Ah, I see. Naturally. Why didn’t I think of that? Now kindly strut back to that column, will you? You’re sucking up all the hot air.’

‘I do not know why you dislike me so.’

‘That’s right,’ Kanyn replied, looking back to the dragon and settling once more, ‘you don’t.’

‘Should I take offence?’

‘Why not? I daily leave a heap of it in that latrine pit behind the temple. Help yourself.’

After a moment, the guest turned away, and Kanyn heard the soft clack of the man’s mouth finally closing. Ah, see that? He’s learning. He studied the dragon again. Not beasts he was familiar with. This was the first one he had ever seen. Wheeling down from the skies of legend, fierce and massive, unknowable and – to anyone other than a Thel Akai – frightening.

But the Old Goddess had spewed out enough contempt on the matter of dragons, raising her huge fists before her to tell her children of skulls crushed flat, blood spraying from slitted nostrils, and all the rest. Tales to stain all wonder from her brood, a soaking of disdain.

Even so, it was a formidable beast.

‘Finally!’

The voice hissed deafeningly inside Kanyn Thrall’s head, startling him so much that he bit his own tongue. Cursing, he spat red and then straightened, hefting the axe into both hands. ‘Finally what, lizard?’

‘Old Goddess, is it? That would be Kilmandaros. Some Azathanai are too stupid to be gods, unless, of course, they breed even stupider children. In which case, why, paradise beckons!’

‘You speak in my head with the voice of a woman. What name do you claim?’

The dragon lifted her snout, and then stretched her jaws wide in the manner of a yawning cat. A mangled knot of wet armour was lodged between two jagged molars. The jaws closed again, with a faint squeal. ‘Are you worthy of knowing my name? The bitch of spiders calls you Kanyn Thrall. Thus, you have nothing to give me in return. I only bargain, Thel Akai. Gifts are for fools.’

‘I can give you something in return, dragon. My axe blade between your eyes. A name, if you please, to etch on to the iron, alongside the many others I have slain.’

‘Others? Other dragons? I think not, and let us be clear here, Kanyn Thrall, your other victories have all the bravado of rats crunched underfoot. I make breakfast of mortal heroes and shit out pitted iron at day’s end. I make morsels of Tiste champions, snacks of Thel Akai hunters, paltry meals of Jhelarkan, Dog-Runners, Thelomen and Jheck.’

Kanyn Thrall tilted his head back and laughed. ‘You’ve been listening in! Enough to harvest the names of many of those who dwell in this realm! But we well know the path of your passage, from the gate’s first manifestation on the south shore of the Vitr to here, and now. If you found a snack or two on the way, unsurprising. But champions and heroes? Thel Akai and Thelomen? You, dragon, are full of shit.’

After a long moment, the dragon subsided. ‘Disrespect is ill advised.’

‘A threat to make me quake! Do try another!’

‘I could take you in my talons, Kanyn Thrall of the Thel Akai, and stretch your soul across the wound.’

‘Come close and you will rue it.’

‘Look into my eyes, Kanyn Thrall. In them you may see … a warning.’

‘I see nothing but witless-’ In the last moment, he caught the reflection in those massive, reptilian orbs. Bellowing, he wheeled, but not in time, as a second dragon, skimming low over the Second Temple, lunged upon him, snapping down its talons to close about the Thel Akai.

The creature flung Kanyn Thrall into the air, and crooked wings lifting like sails to buffet the air, caught him a second time, talons punching through his scale armour to bite into his flesh. The axe spun away.

Kanyn was thrown to the ground, the impact breaking his right leg beneath the knee. He howled in pain, rolling on to his side, glaring down at the two glistening, snapped ends of the bones jutting through the skin.

The second dragon landed with a heavy thump beside the huge stone, its tail flicking from side to side. ‘Curdle, my love! I’ve told you about taunting Thel Akai!’

A new voice spoke from behind Kanyn. ‘And I told your lover about injuring my companions.’

The new dragon twisted its head round. ‘Ardata! Speaking of lovers, where is yours? She was a reluctant soul to be sure. Resisting the snare we made for her. Mayhap she escaped, but into what? Why, the Vitr, and that is a most forgetful sea! No matter, enough of us made use of her.’

Swathed in animal skins so old that patches of hair were missing, Ardata sedately approached with all the grace of an empress, until she stood over Kanyn Thrall. Glancing down, she frowned. ‘That’s an evil break. Lie still. We’ll have to deal with it and the rest of your wounds in a mundane way, since I’ve yet to explore this Denul Warren.’ Her thin face bore the deep lines of all who chose to dwell too close to the Vitr, although she had assured him that such details quickly faded with distance. ‘Youth is restored, my friend,’ she had told him, ‘although your old man complaints are another matter.’

Funny woman, ha ha. The Thel Akai studied her plain-featured face through the haze of pain, even as she spoke once more to the second dragon.

‘Telorast, you and Curdle were banished once from this realm. Do not expect to linger long this time around, either. You are still the biting fleas on the hide of this world.’

‘Hear that, love? The dog is of a mind to scratch. Are we frightened?’

‘Where have you been?’ Curdle demanded.

‘South of the Vitr, beyond the stubborn plain. I visited a modest fort, occupied by quaking Tiste, now as black as that plain’s grasses. Most curious.’

‘The Suzerain.’

‘No doubt. In any case, I chose a sweet form to entice them and so learned much. Light is born anew, Curdle, and the Tiste are divided between it and Dark. There is civil war. Isn’t that quaint?’

Curdle rose slightly, arching her spine as her wings unfolded. ‘And the Grey Shore?’

‘An uglier birth in the offing, beloved. Still in its throes.’

‘It will be ours!’

‘Shhh! The spiders are listening!’

Ardata turned as the Tiste guest joined them. The man held his sword, eyeing the dragons. ‘Put your blade away,’ she said to him. ‘Feed the brazier within the temple. Set two of my thin blades into the flames. Then, fetch water from the well and find something we can use to make splints. Is any of that beyond you?’

The young Tiste scowled. ‘No.’

‘Go, then. We will join you shortly.’ She swung back to the dragons. ‘Your ambitions overreach, again.’ She paused, and her voice hardened as she added, ‘You misused the Queen of Dreams, and that I will not forget.’

‘A threat?’ Telorast laughed, the hissing mirth filling Kanyn’s skull. ‘Feed us another Thel Akai, then.’ A moment later she sembled into the body of a Tiste woman, onyx-skinned, radiant, and naked. ‘Look at me, Curdle! There are pleasures to be found in this modest morsel! Match me in kind, so that we may clasp hands and beam most becomingly! In that smug way of couples no matter what the world. Come, let us preen!’

Curdle blurred as well, drawing inward to coalesce into another Tiste woman, this one taller than her lover, heavier-boned.

‘You’re somewhat fat,’ Telorast observed, pouting.

Curdle smiled. ‘I like it. More weight to throw around. In a crowd of Tiste, others will step from my path. Is that civil war over yet?’

Telorast shrugged. ‘White-skinned and black-skinned, at odds. Armies on the march, blah blah.’

‘Nothing worth our attention, then.’

‘Oh, we should draw close when the clash comes. The black-skinned army bears odd weapons. Tiste iron quenched in Vitr.’

At that, Ardata stepped back, her breath hissing. Even Curdle flinched.

‘Madness!’ Curdle cried, reaching up to bury her hands in her thick black hair. Frowning suddenly, she began running her fingers through that hair. ‘Oh, I like this, though.’

‘A worthy mane indeed,’ Telorast observed, sidling closer to her lover.

Ardata hissed again, in frustration, and then said, ‘Telorast! About those weapons-’

‘Oh, never mind. They’re not killing dragons, are they?’

Kanyn Thrall settled his head back. The pain was building in waves, as if his broken leg now rested on the brazier the damned guest kept feeding, a wild grin on the fool’s face. Blood sizzled and melted fat popped and hissed on the embers. Eyes closed, he grimaced.

A moment later Ardata’s cool hand settled on his brow. ‘Sleep now, friend. I can at least give you that.’

And so the world went away for a time.

* * *

Two uneventful days had passed since the Jhelarkan encampment. K’rul stood with Skillen Droe on a natural berm on which tufts of dead grasses made rows of tangled, brittle humps. The two Azathanai looked out over the pellucid, silvered sea of the Vitr as the sun died at their backs.

‘This leaks from somewhere,’ K’rul said after a time. ‘A fissure, some wellspring, a broken gate. It doesn’t bode well.’

‘When the Builders take notice they will do something about it.’

K’rul grunted. ‘Builders. They confound me.’

‘They answer to no one. They rarely speak at all. They are guided by forces too old for words. Too old, perhaps, for language itself. I see in them elemental nature, a knotting of implacable laws and principles beyond challenge. They are what all life struggles against, made manifest and so eternally unknowable.’

‘Living symbols? Animated metaphors?’ K’rul made a face. ‘I think not, unless termites and ants also serve your description. I believe the Builders to be essentially mindless.’

‘Then we do not disagree.’

‘You concern yourself with meaning. I suggest that they are without meaning.’ He nodded at the Vitr. ‘No different from this chaotic brew. Forces of nature indeed, but also possessing the same absence of will. Nature destroys and nature builds. Build up, tear down, begin again.’

‘They are the makers of worlds then.’

‘Worlds are born from the cinders of dead stars, Skillen Droe. No fire burns true. Something is always left behind.’ He glanced at his companion. ‘Or are you without such uninvited visions? The violent births, realm upon realm, age after age?’

Skillen Droe shrugged his sharp, angled shoulders. ‘I know them, yet deem them nothing more than our own birth memories, the eruption of light, the shock of cold air, the sudden comprehension of our innate helplessness. We enter the world unprepared and, if we will indeed prove to be mortal, we stumble to its end, also unprepared.’

‘And the Builders?’

‘The forces of nature will take note of us, on occasion, as if we were no more than flies buzzing before the face. Mortality is but a brief iteration, an enunciation of the ineffable; worthy of an instant’s wonder, until the after-image dims and fades before the eye, and then, aptly, forgotten.’ Skillen Droe spread his wings. ‘This air is foul. But you were right.’

‘About what?’

‘Dragons have passed this way. You said that one or two would be drawn back to the gate. And the gate has indeed wandered and now awaits us to the north. And yes, Ardata remains.’ He turned to eye K’rul. ‘Just as you said. Tell me, does this ever-flowing blood of yours lend you a new sensitivity? Does your awareness now encompass this entire realm? In loosing your blood, K’rul, have you perhaps deceived us all, and now make claim to unimagined power and influence? You create a new realm with this magic. It seeps out and stains all within reach, and that reach spreads. And who stands at its heart? Why, only modest K’rul, dripping generosity. So, I must ask: have you usurped us?’

K’rul scratched at the stubble of his beard. ‘Oh, I suppose so, Skillen Droe. But temper your indignation, my friend, for the one who stands at the heart stands there in weakness, not strength.’ He grimaced. ‘I am not Ardata, with her webs and hunger. The centre of my empire, such as it is, demands no sacrifice. I am that sacrifice.’

‘To worship is to lap at your blood, then, where it drips from the dais.’

‘Errastas and Sechul Lath discovered a more brutal way of feeding on blood, couched in the language of violence and death. Their path opposes mine, but that makes it no less powerful. Indeed, perhaps, given its seductive qualities appealing to the worst in us, it shall overpower me in time.’ He paused, and then sighed. ‘I do fear that, and yet, what moves I make against them, I cannot do alone.’

‘Me, your ignorant, naïve ally.’

‘And dragons.’

‘And Ardata?’

‘I don’t know, to be honest. I am curious, of course. What holds her there, upon the shores of the Vitr, beneath the gate of Starvald Demelain? Is it simply the loss of the Queen of Dreams? Or is there something else, something more? A web, after all, can be more than just a trap. It can also be a means of holding everything together, keeping it from tearing itself apart.’

‘You ascribe to her motives far too much generosity of spirit, K’rul. She is Azathanai, no different from you or me in our manner of disguising secret purpose, hidden motivations, beneath our laudable gestures.’ A long-fingered, talon-clad hand waved languidly. ‘Like this one, and your unseen Empire of Weakness. I do not comprehend you, K’rul. What ruler seeks to rule an empire by asking for the empathy of its citizens?’

‘And if empathy – and compassion – are that empire’s only source of strength?’

‘Then, my friend, you and it are doomed.’

K’rul considered that. ‘Errastas’s path is a dead end.’

‘Errastas’s path places no value in where it ends, dead or otherwise.’

‘Yes, you may have a point there.’

‘I will help you, but only so far, K’rul. I have no interest in attending your eventual demise. But for what we must do, here and now, Ardata will be essential. And she does not like me.’

‘I will speak on your behalf, Skillen Droe, and seek from her …’ he smiled, ‘a little empathy.’

They turned away from the Vitr then, and set out, angling somewhat inland from the sea’s caustic bite, and continued walking northward.

It was in K’rul’s mind that Ardata would counter his request with one of her own. He wondered if Skillen Droe understood that. But it is the dragons who will decide, and what could be more troubling than to elect dragons as the arbiters of what is just?

Night was settling upon the world, the first stars burning awake overhead. They continued on, both knowing without need for conversation that their walk would not end until they reached Starvald Demelain.

* * *

He had helped Ardata set the Thel Akai’s broken bones, both of them as thick around as his wrists. Looking down upon them, as he pulled on Thrall’s massive foot whilst she guided the bones back beneath the ruptured skin, he had never felt so insignificant. Against a warrior such as this, he was no more than a child, and for all the sting of his sword, Kanyn Thrall could simply sweep him aside, dismissing him as if beneath notice.

It was an ugly feeling, this humility. The deeds of his past, which had seemed vast and weighty, were little more than the small measures of a small life. When she set to tending the punctures in the Thel Akai’s torso, he had gone outside once more, to retrieve Kanyn Thrall’s beloved axe.

Ignoring the two Tiste women – who were anything but – he made his way down to the strand of the Vitr. In the short time that the axe had been lying on the dead sand, the bitter fumes had mottled the iron, stealing its proud polish. He grunted lifting the weapon from the ground, and staggered more than once as he made his way back up the berm.

The temple’s scattered ruins, the tumbled blocks and toppled columns, had the battered appearance of some past violence, as if the resident god or goddess had ended faith in a frenzy of rage. He had found rotted bones here and there, lending weight to his notions. Faith and slaughter all too often settled into a deadly embrace. He had fled Kurald Galain on the cusp of such a war, and had no regrets about that part of his leaving. But that flight had not prevented the transformation of his skin. Initially white as snow, he was now sun-burnished a radiant gold. What had at first appalled him now appealed, though he did find himself looking, with considerable admiration, upon the onyx perfection of Telorast and Curdle.

Leaning the axe against a broken block of limestone, he hesitated, and then settled down on the stone to watch the last of the light drain from the world.

Moments later the two women joined him, each taking a seat, one on either side, both close enough to brush arms and thighs.

‘Bold young warrior,’ murmured Telorast. ‘Tell me you like them nimble. She’d batter you bruised and senseless, while I, on the other hand, display more modest curves, but no less enticing, yes?’

‘I thought you two were lovers.’

‘Lovers, sisters, mother and daughter, these attributions are meaningless. Details from the past, and the past is dead. In this moment, there are only women and men. Mere proximity invites potential. Isn’t that right, Curdle?’

‘We’re always right, that’s true. How could it ever be otherwise? But this Tiste warrior here, he thinks highly of himself.’

‘Or once he did,’ Telorast observed, ‘but, alas, no more. Oh, Kurald Galain! How it delights in the vista of its own navel! Puckered horizons and root long since past drawing sustenance. But here you are, Tiste warrior, painted in Light, godly in youth, with nothing but clouds in your golden eyes.’

‘Blame Ardata,’ hissed Curdle. ‘She won’t use him in the proper way!’

‘She has a Thel Akai’s cock to play with, my love. Think on that.’

‘The prowess of Azathanai knows no bounds,’ Curdle said, nodding. ‘She must veer to fit him. Diabolical genius, but easily spoiled.’

‘Quickly bored.’

‘All sensitivity blunted. And now, Telorast, you went and nearly killed that giant cock!’

‘You didn’t want him in the first place!’

‘Didn’t I? Well, that’s true, I didn’t. But now that he’s useless, I’ve changed my mind!’

‘He’d split you in two, Curdle, even as bloated and big-boned as you’ve made yourself.’

‘I see plenty of flab on you, Telorast!’

‘Not flab. Roundness. There’s a difference. I don’t wobble when I walk. I sway.’

When he made to rise, both women reached out and pulled him back down.

‘We’re not done with you, warrior,’ Curdle said. ‘I’ve been watching you, you know. The blessing of Light is upon you. It defies the Vitr. That’s useful.’

‘Stop that,’ Telorast said. ‘You’re just confusing him.’

‘Confusion is good. It’ll make him more pliable. Warrior, at the least give me your name.’

‘Osserc, son of Lord Vatha Urusander, who is commander of the Legion.’

‘Son, lord, commander – shields to deflect, shields behind which to hide. Let us bring you out into the sunlight, Osserc.’

‘Enough of that, Curdle. Tell him something useful instead.’ Telorast rested a hand on his thigh. ‘A secret we can share. Just to show how generous we are. Tell him about the Grey Shore.’

Curdle flinched, and then leaned forward to glare at Telorast. ‘Are you mad? Our plans are perfect this time! Once we claim the throne, this Light-blessed creature will be our enemy!’

‘Liosan. Their name for Light, Curdle. Besides, this fool here isn’t going anywhere. Haven’t you worked that out yet? I just got here and I worked that out. Is the Vitr rotting your brain, sister? Is that it? Been here too long lusting after that Thel Akai?’

‘We were making eyes at each other. It was delightful! My brain hasn’t rotted. I’m not the one suggesting we blab about the Grey Shore.’

‘They’ll find another name for it,’ said Telorast. ‘They do things like that. We’re Eleint, remember?’

‘Someone really should kill the Suzerain.’

‘Agreed. This time, we’ll see it done. Find the right sword, point it his way, and see his black blood spray!’

‘I’m bored,’ said Curdle. ‘Fuck this warrior, my love. I want to watch.’

‘Do you?’

‘I said I did, didn’t I?’

‘The last time we did that the poor bastard got ripped to pieces.’

‘Not by my claws, Telorast!’

‘Well, it’s exciting when you watch!’

Curdle patted Osserc’s shoulder. ‘Don’t worry about anything like that happening, warrior. We were dragons then, and that’s different.’

Osserc cleared his throat, and said, ‘I have taken a vow of celibacy. Therefore I must decline the invitation. My apologies, uh, to you both.’

‘That vow needs breaking,’ Telorast said in a growl.

He saw, with some relief, that Ardata had emerged from the temple. She strode closer. ‘Leave off him, you two. I but tolerate your presence here and you’d do well to bear that in mind.’

‘She scuttles out from the ruin, Telorast! The web trembles as our power challenges it! See the terrible strain on her face?’

‘That would be the Vitr,’ said Telorast. ‘But that in itself is telling, isn’t it? Even the Azathanai are not immune.’

‘The Vitr will eat holes in this realm, Ardata,’ said Curdle, leaning forward slightly and settling a soft hand on Osserc’s thigh. ‘Do you comprehend this? Holes, gnawed through. Starvald Demelain was only the first.’ The hand squeezed. ‘There is sorcery flooding this world. There will be pressure. Wounds will burst open. The Vitr is the Great Devourer, the Hunger Never Appeased-’

‘Ooh, I like that one,’ Telorast said in a murmur, her own hand stealing over his other thigh to sidle into his crotch.

Osserc drew a sharp breath as he felt his cock answer to the light touch.

Ardata crossed her arms, but it seemed her attention was fixed solely upon Curdle. ‘Tell me more,’ she said.

‘Do we bargain now?’ Curdle smiled, her own hand stealing down, and when it found Telorast’s hand already there, fingers curling alongside his cock, it tried to pull away its rival.

Groaning, he pushed himself to his feet and quickly stepped clear of both women. Wheeling round, he glared down at two suddenly pouting faces. ‘I am past being a thing to be used,’ he said in a snarl.

‘That’s all right,’ said Telorast, ‘you’ll come back to it, eventually.’

Curdle nodded. ‘It’s in his nature. You saw that too, my love? My, we’re clever, aren’t we?’ She turned her attention back to Ardata. ‘Well?’

‘What do you wish?’

‘Oh, this man here for one,’ Curdle replied. ‘But also, a thing for the future. When the Grey Shore rises, and the way in is unopposed, you will ensnare Kilmandaros. Oh, not for ever, of course. Even you couldn’t manage that. But for a time.’

Telorast added, ‘Enough for my sister and me to fly to the heart unopposed, and to claim what awaits us there.’

Ardata scowled. ‘The Throne of Shadow.’

‘It belongs to us!’ Telorast shrieked.

After a moment, Ardata shrugged. ‘You spoke of holes.’

‘Wounds, gates, one for each aspect of sorcery,’ said Curdle. ‘The Vitr’s hunger for power is endless. It will make a space within itself for each aspect. Caverns, tunnels.’

‘Whence came this Vitr, Curdle?’

‘Starvald Demelain has always … leaked,’ Curdle replied. ‘In our home realm, we have sailed over silver seas, nested upon rotting crags jutting from the chaos. We have rushed above its wild torrent in the times when it has thundered through other realms-’

‘All realms,’ whispered Telorast. ‘Even the Suzerain’s.’

‘Then the Queen of Dreams-’

‘Swallowed by one such wound,’ Telorast replied, leaning back. ‘A modest one, a fissure leaking out from this very gate here, from Starvald Demelain. We who patrolled from the other side took note, and rode the sudden rush. Out! Out into this new world, hah!’

‘And her fate?’ Ardata asked in a cold tone.

Telorast glanced at Curdle, who shrugged but said nothing. Sighing, Telorast continued, ‘The Vitr steals memories – or, rather, it blinds the mind to the memories it holds. Made witless, one is reborn, and must make a new life.’

‘Where is she then?’

Telorast smiled. ‘You need to extend your web far, Ardata, to feel her telltale tremble. But it is my thought that the strange Azathanai who found herself among the Tiste, who held within her the gate of Light, of Liosan, and then flung it from herself as if discarding a burdensome cloak, why, that might well have once been your Queen of Dreams.’

Ardata stared at Telorast for a long moment before saying, ‘When was this?’

Curdle giggled. ‘Silly woman – look to the Tiste who came upon you and your Thel Akai lover! So brightly burnished by the indifferent gift of Light! How long was the journey? There is your answer.’

‘But recall, Ardata,’ chimed in Telorast, ‘she remembers you not.’

‘Your love has lost its tether,’ Curdle said, giggling again. ‘Poor Ardata.’

When Ardata started to turn away, Curdle jumped up. ‘A moment, Azathanai! We made a bargain!’

Osserc saw Ardata glance at him, and then she shrugged. ‘I own him not.’

‘But you do! A dying man resurrected!’

‘Oh, very well. Take him then, but leave him alive.’

‘Of course,’ Telorast said, smirking. ‘We apprehend your need for him.’

Curdle now turned to Osserc and smiled. ‘Your time is short, mortal. Reach now for all that may give you pleasure. There is no sweeter intensity than your final days.’

Frowning, Osserc took a step towards Ardata. ‘What is she talking about? What have you planned for me, Ardata?’

‘We need a soul,’ she replied. ‘To seal the gate.’

‘A soul? Mine?’

Her eyes were level. ‘It is a worthy end, Osserc. One other thing to consider: it is not permanent – nothing is. Sooner or later, you will be spat out, to find yourself unchanged from the day of your imprisonment. Ages might well have past. You may find yourself standing on a world you do not even recognize, an entire realm to explore. More than that, Son of Liosan, you will possess power such as you would never have known before. Even within the maw of a gate and in the midst of agony, power is exchanged.’

He stared at her in disbelief. ‘Agony? To be spat out from centuries of that – I would be a madman!’ He looked quickly to Curdle and Telorast, and then back to Ardata. ‘Find another! Use Kanyn Thrall!’

She slowly shook her head. ‘I value him more than I do you, Tiste. Besides, Curdle spoke true. I own your life, for it was I who returned it to you.’ She turned to Curdle and Telorast. ‘Eleint, give him pleasure, enough delights to sustain him for a time. But be quick about it – I have a lover to find.’

* * *

There were three Jhelarkan. They had veered two days past, loping to keep pace as Scabandari pushed his exhausted horse onward, northward, well away from the caustic fumes of the Vitr Sea to the east.

At midday of this third day, his horse stumbled, and in an instant the three shaggy, black-furred giant wolves closed in. Even as his mount righted itself, he brought his lance around to meet the leap of the wolf on his right. The point drove into the beast’s chest with a ripping, snapping sound, the heavy iron blade breaking ribs as it sank deep.

The impact yanked the lance’s shaft from his grip, but the leather butt on the saddle held – long enough to pull the entire saddle on to the horse’s flank, taking the warrior with it. He heard the shaft splinter beneath the bowing weight of the dying wolf.

In that time, a second wolf closed its massive jaws around the left hindquarter of the horse, using its own weight to drag the animal down. The third and last Jheleck hunter lunged under the horse’s neck, snapping up to tear open the beast’s throat. Screaming, the horse collapsed beneath the onslaught.

Scabandari threw himself clear of his toppling, thrashing mount, his ears filling with its mortal screams. Rolling, he regained his feet, dragging free his sword even as the third wolf spun round to launch itself at him.

His backhand swing caught the creature on its right shoulder, enough to push its momentum to one side – the jaws snapped empty air a hand’s breadth from his face, hot blood and warm spit spraying against his right cheek. Stepping further round, he plunged the sword’s point behind the Jheleck’s shoulder blade, pushing hard to reach the heart.

Coughing, the Jheleck fell on to its side, the motion nearly pulling the sword from Scabandari’s grip. Regaining his hold – frantically unaware of where the last wolf was – he tugged the weapon free and staggered back.

Growling, the last wolf crouched over the dead horse.

The Tiste cursed under his breath. ‘Content with that, are you? Well, I’m not.’ He advanced.

The wolf held its ground until the last moment, only to suddenly wheel and dart away, ten or twelve long strides, before spinning round again.

Cursing a second time, Scabandari approached his dead mount. With one eye on the circling wolf, he retrieved what he could of his supplies, including the last two water-skins strapped to the saddle. Neither had burst with the animal’s fall – the one source of satisfaction in this whole travail thus far.

Finally, with the skins over one shoulder, his bedroll, blanket and the remnants of dried foodstuffs in a pack slung over the other shoulder, he slowly backed away, sword held at the ready.

When he had moved some distance from the kill-site, he saw the wolf close in to feed on the horse carcass.

A true wolf would linger here for days, gorging itself on meat. But this Jheleck would desire vengeance for the slaying of its two kin. It would resume tracking him before too long. The next attack, the warrior guessed, would come at night.

He trudged on, ever northward. The trail he had been following was more or less gone, but it had been unrelenting in its northerly push, and so he felt confident that he remained on Osserc’s heels.

Close to dusk, he came upon Osserc’s dead horse, untouched by scavengers and only now bloating in the chill, dry winter air. Wayward winds from the east brought with them the biting acid of the Vitr – the shoreline had drawn closer here.

He made a cursory examination of the carcass. Osserc had taken no meat from the beast, which seemed an odd oversight, but he had collected up the saddle and tack, which was downright bizarre. Shaking his head, he continued on.

As the sun’s southerly light faded, he heard a howl in his wake.

‘Stupid pup. Even with your jaws on my throat, I’ll eviscerate you. It’s an exchange neither of us will win. By this, we proclaim our superior intelligence! Well, come along then, let us meet in the night, and between us raise yet another monument to foolishness.’ He paused in his steps, considering his words, and then nodded to himself. ‘Such delight resides in stating the obvious! As if mere words could tilt the world, sway it from its inevitable path. But then, what are we but the narrators of time’s senseless plunge ahead, with us pilgrims ever eager to raise banners wherever we make a stand. Yes, see me work the knife into this frozen earth …’ His words fell away as he saw, upon a rise ahead, two figures walking side by side, their backs to him.

One had the look of an old man.

The other was twice his companion’s height, serpent-tailed and leather-winged, a projecting, blunt snout making itself visible as the creature looked to left and to right in time with its slightly splayed strides.

Scabandari slowed his steps.

The wolf howled behind him, closer now. Close enough, as it turned out, for the two strangers to hear it, for they both halted and swung round.

Sighing, he resumed his march. The strangers waited for him to catch up.

The pale old man was the first to speak when Scabandari arrived. ‘You confound us,’ he said. ‘Where’s your saddle? I would have thought it majestically valuable, tooled by an artisan, or, perhaps, of leather supple enough to eat – rather than gamy horseflesh, one presumes.’

‘Wrong Tiste.’

‘Ah.’ The old man nodded. ‘Then … you pursue one before you?’

‘Not pursuit as such. More like … retrieval, as of a wayward child who has wandered off, unmindful of whatever modest responsibilities he might possess.’ He struggled to keep his eyes on the old man. The reptilian demon at the stranger’s side was repeatedly yawning, fangs clacking.

‘Well,’ the old man said, ‘children are like that. Now, as for the Soletaken on your trail …’

‘They wanted my horse. Two fell when I objected. The last one – the most witless of the three, I would imagine, but thus far the luckiest, now contemplates revenge.’

‘Not any more,’ the old man said, ‘as this faint breeze wanders south, and the Jheleck catches scent of Skillen Droe. You are safe enough, and since it seems that we walk the same path, you are welcome to accompany us.’

‘If it is not an imposition,’ Scabandari said.

‘Oh no,’ the old man said with a wan smile. ‘I would welcome proper conversation.’

‘Ah. Then your pet does not speak?’

The giant creature now swung its elongated head to the old man and seemed to stare down at him for a long moment, before suddenly snapping open its wings and, with a beating of the cold air, lifting from the ground.

‘Skillen,’ said the old man, ‘concurs with your assessment. The surviving wolf is indeed appallingly stupid. He will chase it off. Failing that, he will rip it to pieces.’

‘Oh, I plead some mercy in that regard,’ Scabandari replied, even as the reptile rose higher into the air above them. ‘The herds are gone, after all. All hunters must hunt, all eaters of meat must eat meat.’

‘Generous of you,’ the old man said, with an expression filled with approval. ‘Skillen hears you and will consider your plea. It is sufficient, you will be relieved to know, to offset that insult about his being my pet.’

‘My apologies for misapprehending, sir.’

‘I am K’rul. My companion and I are Azathanai. And you, Tiste?’

He bowed. ‘Scabandari, once of Urusander’s Legion, but now I suppose I must be considered a deserter.’

‘Yes, that explains your abandonment of Light’s blessing. It seems, Scabandari, that you march to the Grey Shore.’

He was unsure of the meaning of that. ‘I seek to retrieve Urusander’s son, Osserc.’

K’rul shrugged. ‘That may be as it may be, Scabandari, but your soul finds its own path.’

‘I know nothing of this Grey Shore.’

‘Nor should you, since it is yet to arrive.’

Scabandari frowned, and then smiled. ‘I think I shall enjoy our conversations, K’rul.’

‘Then we shall be as two men dying of thirst finding the same wellspring bubbling up from the rock. Too long have I battled my companion’s infernal obduracy.’

‘He speaks, then?’

‘Somewhat.’

Scabandari tilted his head in silent query.

‘With the empathy of a serpent and the largesse of a calculating bird of prey, Skillen Droe strains the value of converse.’

Scabandari nodded. ‘I have heard that Azathanai prefer solitude, by and large, but I shall not enquire as to the exigency that has brought two together, for such an arduous journey.’

K’rul’s smile faded. ‘No,’ he said, ‘best not. Ah, here returns my winged companion, with only a modest tuft of black hide in his talons.’

Scabandari nodded again. ‘I thought I heard a distant yelp.’

‘That Jheleck brave will dine well on his story.’

‘He was a she,’ the Tiste replied. ‘But, as you say, K’rul. Tell me if you will, what lies ahead?’

‘Well, if this Osserc survived the walk, we shall no doubt find him. Beyond that, it is hard to know for certain. Excepting one thing.’

‘And that is?’

‘We will have a conversation or two with a dragon, and if you can imagine my frustration with Skillen Droe, it is nothing compared to what I anticipate. Now, we are three again,’ he added as Skillen Droe landed nearby with a heavy thump. ‘And the place we all seek is not far now.’

* * *

‘My apologies, Ardata,’ said Kanyn Thrall. The agony from his shattered leg rose in waves, and the puncture wounds in his chest ached with every strained breath he managed. ‘I failed you.’

She stood looking down on him. ‘Are you chilled? You shiver and tremble. Has fever come upon you?’

‘I believe so,’ he replied. ‘Your ministrations may have failed as well. I hear voices. Women arguing and moaning in pleasure – this seems a strange union to me.’

‘They abuse Osserc,’ Ardata replied distractedly.

He frowned up at her, even as he drew the furs tighter about himself. ‘Who?’

‘The dragons have assumed Tiste forms. They are Soletaken, it seems, and possess, I now suspect, ancient blood of the First Tiste. It explains their singular obsession with thrones, and power.’

‘Your thoughts are elsewhere, Ardata. I weary you-’

‘Oh, shut up, Kanyn Thrall. Self-pity is most unattractive. Yes, my mind is on other things. Specifically, should I endeavour to kill two dragons? Osserc’s soul will seal the gate, and then I must leave here, journeying south. I fear those bitches will simply pluck him free the moment I depart. The only reason they might not is fear of yet more Draconic rivals in this realm. Do you see my dilemma?’

He studied her, jaws clenching as another wave of agony rippled through him. ‘My failing compounds it, then, and that, Ardata, is simple fact, not self-pity.’

She crouched down beside him and set a cool hand upon his forehead. ‘You are afire, Thel Akai. Against this I can do nothing.’

‘Then leave me here and be on your way, Ardata.’

‘My wife has returned from the Vitr,’ she said. ‘Her memory is lost. I must find her. I must return her to me.’

He nodded.

After another moment, Ardata straightened. ‘It is a curious mercy,’ she said, ‘that I must now drag Osserc from the clutches of two insatiable women.’

‘Given what awaits him, yes, most curious.’

‘Fare well, Kanyn Thrall.’

‘And you, Ardata.’

Even after she left the dusty chamber, he felt her presence. His fever had hatched a thousand spider eggs beneath his skin, and the creatures now swarmed. Let us not call this love, then. But still, woman, it seems your touch is eternal. Ah, bless me.

* * *

They heard the shrieking before they came within sight of the ruined temple. Scabandari glanced at K’rul. ‘Is this expected? Are we about to come upon some dread sacrifice to a long-dead god?’

Ahead, wild firelight flared and flickered, limning in light the ragged lines of the temple. Above this, something vast and ominous hovered in the air, dull and throbbing crimson.

In answer to Scabandari’s questions, K’rul sighed. ‘She hesitates. Not because her victim shrieks his terror at the fate awaiting him, but because she senses me and Skillen Droe.’

In that moment two huge winged shapes lifted into the air, rising up to flank the suspended wound.

Skillen Droe clacked his jaws and opened his own wings, but K’rul turned to his companion, one hand lifting. ‘A moment, assassin, if you please. Yes, they scented you, and know you for who you are.’

If the demonic reptile made reply, Scabandari could not hear it, but he saw K’rul shrug.

They continued on, approaching the temple grounds. Scabandari stared up at the dragons. Skillen Droe was not as large as they, and yet he sensed their fear and alarm. K’rul had named the creature assassin, after all. Yes, I can see that. In the southlands of the Forkassail there dwells a wasp that preys on spiders the size of my hand. Size means less than the venom of the sting, and I think now that Skillen Droe is a most venomous foe. ‘K’rul, you spoke of conversation with dragons, not battle.’

‘I did.’

‘Yet you bring this … companion.’

‘Yes. I need those dragons to listen to me.’

‘They are more likely to flee!’

K’rul gestured again at Skillen Droe, as if dismissing a silent complaint. ‘No, that is not likely, Scabandari. Dragons have little comprehension of retreat. They tend to stand and fight, even when death is inevitable. A sound measure of their arrogance.’

‘More sound the measure of their stupidity!’

‘Yes, that too.’

Something in that shrieking voice gnawed at Scabandari, and when it abruptly stopped he involuntarily quickened his pace. Reaching the first of the toppled columns, he saw before him a large bonfire. Beside it was a tall woman, her hair fiery red, her skin the hue of alabaster. At her feet was a huddled, weeping form.

Scabandari flinched as Skillen Droe sailed past him to land heavily close to the woman.

Breathing hard, K’rul came up behind Scabandari. ‘Ah,’ he said, ‘unfortunate.’

‘That man at her feet,’ said Scabandari, ‘is the man I came to find.’

‘I surmised as much. Alas, my friend, his soul is destined to seal the gate of Starvald Demelain.’

Baring his teeth, Scabandari drew his sword. ‘I think not.’

‘You cannot stand against this,’ K’rul said. ‘If the gate is not sealed, more Eleint shall come, not by the score, but by the thousands. This realm shall be destroyed in their senseless fury, for those dragons will war one upon the other. And should the Storm of the Mother manifest-’

‘Enough dire prophecy,’ Scabandari snapped. ‘That is the only son of Lord Urusander. His father needs him, if only to be reminded of the world to come. But more than that, Kurald Galain needs him.’ He moved forward, directly towards the red-haired woman, who had at last turned to face the newcomers. Something avid in her gaze made him stop in his tracks.

She offered him little more than a flicker of attention before unveiling a glare at K’rul. ‘You! Ah, now I see. This sorcery is your doing. Idiot. How does it defy me?’

‘You are Azathanai,’ K’rul replied. ‘My blood is not for you.’

‘You have interrupted me,’ she said then, with a momentary glance directed at Skillen Droe. ‘And you! I told you I never wanted to see you again!’

The look the reptilian assassin sent back at K’rul seemed somehow plaintive.

K’rul shook his head and then spoke again to the woman. ‘Ardata, tell the dragons to return. Skillen Droe is not here to shed blood. We have bargains to make, with you all.’

‘Bargains?’ Ardata’s smile was not particularly pleasant. ‘Oh, those two will enjoy that.’

Scabandari pointed the tip of his sword at Ardata. ‘Osserc is under my protection,’ he said. ‘Find another sacrifice.’

The woman scowled, and then shrugged before stepping back. ‘It seems our options have expanded. Come ahead then and wipe his nose, but should I decide that indeed Osserc remains the best choice, I will kill you to get to him, if necessary.’ She gestured down at the huddled form. ‘Is he worth that?’

Osserc looked up suddenly, eyes wide and red. They fixed upon Scabandari and he shrieked, ‘Take him instead!’

The dragons no longer hovered, though Scabandari could not recall seeing them depart, but now two Tiste women emerged from the gloom.

‘Look, Curdle, another warrior! One for each of us!’

K’rul cleared his throat. The sound was modest and yet it drew everyone’s attention. ‘We face a quandary to be sure,’ he said. ‘Ardata, neither Osserc nor Scabandari here is suitable for sealing Starvald Demelain.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean that the surviving Tiste of this world all carry the blood of the Eleint. It is the chaos at the core of their souls. If you send Osserc’s soul into the gate, he will seal nothing. Indeed, he will act as a clarion call to your kin. The same for Scabandari.’

Ardata whirled on the two Tiste women. ‘And did you know this?’ she demanded.

The one named Curdle shrugged. ‘Possibly.’

‘Possibly not,’ the other added.

‘Then you bargained falsely!’

Curdle’s brows lifted and she turned to her companion. ‘Did we, Telorast? I can’t recall.’

‘You asked for the pup and … what else? Oh yes, that thing about Kilmandaros. That was all of it, I’m sure, Curdle. So, no, we did not bargain falsely.’

‘Just as I thought,’ Curdle replied. She turned to Ardata. ‘The decision to use Osserc was yours, Ardata. It had nothing to do with us. But I might have hinted, being naturally generous, at the risk of aspected gates.’

‘She failed in taking the hint,’ Telorast observed, with a look of stern reproach at Ardata. ‘The Azathanai think themselves so clever.’

‘Eleint,’ said K’rul, ‘Skillen Droe is here seeking redemption. He has offered, in just this moment, to seal the gate with his soul.’

Scabandari caught faint motion from the entrance to the temple, and he turned to see a huge figure hobbling into the firelight. He backed up to stand before Osserc, who still kneeled, and risked a glance down. ‘Milord? I think it is time to return home, do you not agree?’

Wiping at his face, Osserc nodded. ‘I have been … Scabandari, I have been sorely abused.’

‘Indeed, milord.’ A moment later, Scabandari’s attention was drawn back to the two Tiste women, both of whom now strode closer.

‘Most generous,’ Curdle said in a faintly awed whisper. ‘The Slaughterer of Dragons seeks redemption. Did not honour die long ago? It seems not. Well then, on behalf of my kin, living and slain, I accept your offer, Skillen Droe. Seal Starvald Demelain.’

‘There is a catch,’ K’rul said.

Both women snapped their attention to him. ‘Ah, hear this, Curdle?’ crooned Telorast. ‘It could never be so easy, could it?’

‘I have need of you two,’ said K’rul. ‘In fact, I have need of all the Eleint who have come into this realm.’

‘What manner of need?’ Curdle demanded.

‘Guardianship.’

There was a long pause, and then Telorast hissed. ‘The Gates of Sorcery!’

‘My Warrens, yes. In return, you can feed upon your chosen aspect.’

‘Warrens,’ said Telorast. ‘Well named, Azathanai.’

‘But you are not to resist those mortals who would draw upon my sorcery,’ added K’rul.

‘Then against whom do we guard?’

‘Azathanai, for one. Your fellow Eleint, for another.’

Ardata suddenly cut in, ‘These two will defy you, K’rul. They seek the Throne of Shadow, upon the rise of the Grey Shore. It is their singular obsession.’

K’rul shrugged. ‘They need only convey my offer to their kin. What will come of the Grey Shore is not yet known.’ He returned his attention upon the Tiste women. ‘Well?’

Curdle scowled. ‘It seems too generous. All in the manner of gifts. Where is the loss for us? The sacrifice? K’rul is devious, the most devious of all the Azathanai. I am suspicious.’

‘I am indeed being overly generous,’ K’rul replied. ‘And this is my reason: another Azathanai seeks to usurp my Warrens, to corrupt them utterly. Should he succeed, even the Eleint of this realm will suffer a harsh fate. Control over the gates of my Warrens is essential, and so I turn to the only beings capable of becoming guardians – indeed, wards – of my sorcery.’

‘Now he flatters us,’ Telorast said.

‘He asks only that we voice the offer to our kin,’ Curdle pointed out. ‘You and me, love, we yield nothing.’

‘True.’

K’rul shrugged. ‘The only thing you two yield is your choice of Warrens. In fact, given your obsession, it seems that you will surrender them entirely in favour of a throne that may never appear. That of course is your choice.’

Telorast turned to her companion. ‘I see no reason to remain here, Curdle. Do you?’

‘None at all!’ Curdle replied. ‘K’rul, we accept your bargain! Where then are these unclaimed gates?’

‘Here and there. Follow the scent of magic and you will find them.’

Scabandari gasped as the two Tiste women seemed to blur, vanishing inside twin burgeoning clouds that moments later manifested as a pair of dragons. Wings hammering the air, scattering sparks from the bonfire, they lunged upward into the darkness.

In their sudden absence, no one spoke.

Then Scabandari gestured with his sword. ‘Who is this giant?’

As attention fixed upon the huge stranger, the man straightened, leaning against a column. ‘I am Kanyn Thrall. Fever has taken me and I shall soon be dead. Yet within, I feel the power of my soul. Sufficient, I should think, for one last service to you, Ardata-’

He got no further, as Skillen Droe leapt forward, wings wide, one clawed hand reaching out to grasp him. The bones of the wings seemed to crackle as the assassin carried Kanyn Thrall upward.

Ardata shrieked.

The winged assassin plunged into the maw of the gate of Starvald Demelain. Both vanished. An instant later, so too did the gate itself, like an iris closing until swallowed by the night.

Uncomprehending, Scabandari stared first at K’rul, and then at Ardata. ‘What just happened?’ he asked.

‘The gate is sealed,’ replied K’rul.

Ardata turned on him. ‘Deceit! You planned this!’

‘Don’t be a fool!’ snapped K’rul. ‘We knew nothing about that Thel Akai!’

‘And Skillen?’

‘Has a mind of his own. And really, should that surprise either of us, Ardata?’

‘Then – he has gone into the Draconean realm? Has he lost his mind! They will tear him to pieces!’

‘Well, they tried that last time, didn’t they?’

Ardata turned on Scabandari. ‘Look what you’ve done, Tiste!’

‘I merely pointed at the man, milady!’

Snarling, Ardata made to march off, towards the temple, but K’rul stepped into her path. ‘A moment,’ he begged. ‘I need your help.’

Her look of stunned incredulity was almost comical to Scabandari’s eyes, and yet she halted.

‘The gates of my Warrens, Ardata, the ones the dragons will now seek out.’

‘What of them?’

A brief look of intense frustration twisted K’rul’s face. ‘What value guardians, Ardata,’ he said in a painfully slow voice, ‘if they can leave whenever they please?’

She crossed her arms. ‘Go on.’

‘I need your talent … with webs. Or, in this case, chains.’

‘You … devious … bastard. Anything else you would ask of me?’

‘Yes. You need to sew up the carcass of a dragon upon the south shore of the Vitr Sea.’

‘Why?’

‘I need it.’

‘Why?’

‘It once belonged to Korabas, forever shunned by her kin, because she is-’

‘The Devourer of Magic. Abyss below, K’rul! But … a carcass?’

He rubbed at his face. ‘Yes, well. It’s complicated, but someone is at this very moment about to complete a ritual, opening a gate into the Warren of Death.’

‘Take note, K’rul, of my extraordinary self-control in that I am not at this moment strangling you.’

‘My faith in you is, as ever, well founded.’

‘And in return for all this?’

‘Your lover escaped the Vitr in the belly of Korabas, Ardata. She walked into the halls of Kharkanas, and took upon herself the Tiste name T’riss. Ardata, my power manifests across this entire realm. She may well seek to hide herself from other Azathanai, but from me that is not possible. Accordingly, when we are done, I will take you to her.’

‘A Warren of Death? You are truly mad, K’rul. Who rules it?’

He smiled. ‘As of yet, no one. Do we have a deal?’

‘Yes, although I am sure I will come to regret it. Every gate a snare, then? I admit, that part pleases me.’

‘I thought it might.’

They walked into the temple.

Scabandari returned now to Osserc, who had regained something of himself and now stood near the dying embers of the bonfire. ‘Milord, we have a fraught journey ahead of us.’

‘We’ll not survive it. Not without horses.’

‘I will make a request of K’rul, then.’

Osserc spat into the embers. ‘Bargain with the Azathanai and they will own your life, Scara. No, we will find another way, and if we die upon the trail, so be it. I have this night won nothing but the truth of my own pathetic soul. My friend, I stand here, shamed before you.’

Glancing away, Scabandari found himself studying the pallid gleam of the distant Vitr Sea. ‘We have the trail ahead, then, to forge in you a new soul.’

Osserc’s abrupt laugh was harsh, filled with self-contempt. ‘You have little to work with, I’m afraid.’

‘Regret is a worthy temper,’ Scabandari said. ‘It shall be where we begin.’

‘Your faith may prove misplaced, Scara.’

He smiled. ‘I am hardly immune to lessons still to learn, Osserc. Very well then, let us test the measure of each other, and the day we stand before the Wise City, open ourselves one more time to the other, and see all there is to be seen.’

After a long moment, Osserc nodded. ‘In a back chamber of the temple there are supplies. Water and food. I’ve not seen the Azathanai eat, or drink for other than simple pleasure.’

‘Then we’ll take what we can carry, and be on our way.’

‘Scara, it’s the middle of the night and I’m exhausted!’

‘As am I, but damned if I’ll camp in their company. Who knows what new need they might find for us?’