House of Chains

EPILOGUE

BY ANY STANDARDS, SHE WAS A GRIM WOMAN. Onrack the Broken watched her stand in the centre of the chamber and cast a harsh, appraising eye upon the disposition of her young killers. The grimace that twisted her handsome features suggested that she found nothing awry. Her gaze fell at last upon the Tiste Edur, Trull Sengar, and the grimace shifted into a scowl. ‘Must we watch our backs as well, with you here?’ Seated on the hewn floor, his back to an equally rough wall, Trull Sengar shrugged. ‘I see no easy way of convincing you that I am worthy of your trust, Minala. Apart from weaving for you my lengthy and rather unpleasant story.’

‘Spare me,’ she growled, then strode from the room.

Trull Sengar glanced over at Onrack and grinned. ‘No-one wants to hear it. Well, I am not surprised. Nor am I even stung. It is a rather squalid tale-’

‘I will hear your story,’ Onrack replied.

Near the entrance, Ibra Gholan’s neck creaked as the T’lan Imass looked back over one shoulder to regard Onrack for a moment, before returning to his position guarding the approach.

Trull Sengar barked a laugh. ‘This is ideal for an unskilled weaver of tales. My audience comprises a score of children who do not understand my native tongue, and three expressionless and indifferent undead. By tale’s end, only I will be weeping… likely for all the wrong reasons.’

Monok Ochem, who was standing three paces back from Ibra Gholan, slowly pivoted until the bonecaster faced Onrack. ‘You have felt it, then, Broken One. And so you seek distraction.’

Onrack said nothing.

‘Felt what?’ Trull Sengar asked.

‘She is destroyed. The woman who gave Onrack her heart in the time before the Ritual. The woman to whom he avowed his own heart only to steal it back. In many ways, she was destroyed then, already begun on her long journey to oblivion. Do you deny that, Onrack?’

‘Bonecaster, I do not.’

‘Madness, of such ferocity as to defeat the Vow itself. Like a camp dog that awakens one day with fever in its brain. That snarls and kills in a frenzy. Of course, we had no choice but to track her down, corner her. And so shatter her, imprison her within eternal darkness. Or so we thought. Madness, then, to defy even us. But now, oblivion has claimed her soul at last. A violent, painful demise, but none the less…’ Monok Ochem paused, then cocked its head. ‘Trull Sengar, you have not begun your tale, yet already you weep.’

The Tiste Edur studied the bonecaster for a long moment, as the tears ran down his gaunt cheeks. ‘I weep, Monok Ochem, because he cannot.’

The bonecaster faced Onrack once more. ‘Broken One, there are many things you deserve… but this man is not among them.’ He then turned away.

Onrack spoke. ‘Monok Ochem, you have travelled far from the mortal you once were, so far as to forget a host of truths, both pleasant and unpleasant. The heart is neither given nor stolen. The heart surrenders.’

The bonecaster did not turn round. ‘That is a word without power to the T’lan Imass, Onrack the Broken.’

‘You are wrong, Monok Ochem. We simply changed the word to make it not only more palatable, but also to empower it. With such eminence that it devoured our souls.’

‘We did no such thing,’ the bonecaster replied.

‘Onrack’s right,’ Trull Sengar sighed. ‘You did. You called it the Ritual of Tellann.’

Neither Monok Ochem nor Ibra Gholan spoke.

The Tiste Edur snorted. ‘And you’ve the nerve to call Onrack broken.’

There was silence in the chamber then, for some time.

But Onrack’s gaze remained fixed on Trull Sengar. And he was, if he was anything, a creature capable of supreme patience. To grieve is a gift best shared. As a song is shared.

Deep in the caves, the drums beat. Glorious echo to the herds whose thundering hoofs celebrate what it is to be alive, to run as one, to roll in life’s rhythm. This is how, in the cadence of our voice, we serve nature’s greatest need.

Facing nature, we are the balance.

Ever the balance to chaos.

Eventually, his patience was rewarded.

As he knew it would be.