Night of Knives

CHAPTER ONE

Out amid the chopping waves of the Strait of Winds, the sails of an approaching message cutter burned bloody carmine in the day’s last light. Temper set his spear against the battlement wall of Mock’s Hold and looked out over the edge of the stone crenel. A hundred fathoms below, the cliff swept down into froth and a roll of breakers. He glanced over his shoulder to the grey barrel wall of the inner keep: its slit windows shone gold. Shadows moved within.

He muttered into the wind, ‘Trapped between Hood and the damned Abyss.’

What could there possibly be for an Imperial official — a woman, an Imperial Fist — at this backwater post? He nearly jumped the first ship out when she’d arrived on the island three days ago. But he’d managed to drown that urge in the dark ale at Coop’s Hanged Man Inn. None of this, he told himself, over and over, had anything more to do with him.

He stretched and winced. The surprisingly chill evening had revived the twinge of an old back injury: a javelin thrust many years past. A Seven City skirmisher had ruined the best hauberk he’d ever owned, as well as come damned close to killing him. The wound had never healed right. Perhaps it was time again to see that young army medicer, Seal. He scratched his chin and wondered whether it was bad luck to recall death’s brush when the sun was lowering. He’d ask Corinn if he saw her.

Just three days ago he’d stood with hundreds of others at the harbour wall to watch the Imperial official disembark. Cries of surprise had run up and down the streets as first light revealed the blue-black sails and equally dark-tarred hull of a Malazan man-of-war anchored in the bay. Only too well did men and women of the city remember their last visitors: elements of the Third Army rendezvousing with recruits and enforcing the Imperial Regent’s new edict against magery. The riots that followed engulfed a quarter of the town in flames.

News of the ship’s arrival had drawn Temper up the narrow staircase at Coop’s. Finished shaving, he’d tossed a towel over his shoulder and ambled down to Front Way. He squinted between warehouses to the harbour and the bay beyond. Anji, Coop’s serving-girl and sometime mistress, came labouring up the Way carrying twin buckets of water. She lowered them to the cobbles, pushed her long brown hair from her flushed face and scowled in the harbour’s direction. ‘Gods, what is it now?’

Temper frowned. ‘A man-of-war. Front-line vessel. Built for naval engagements, convoy escort, blockades. Not your usual troop transport or merchant scow.’ And what in the name of Togg’s teats was it doing here?

‘Must be on its way south to Korel,’ said Anji. A hand shading her eyes, she turned her gaze to him. ‘You know, the war and all that.’

Temper hawked up a wad of phlegm and spat to one side. No one would order a man-of-war down to Korel all on its lonesome. And — from what he’d heard — Hood knew it would take more than one warship to turn the tide down south.

Skiffs bobbed into view out from the wharf. Long sweeps powered them across to the enormous vessel. Temper guessed the garrison commander, Pell, of honorary Sub-Fist rank himself, might be floundering seasick in one of them. He took a deep breath of the chill morning air. ‘Guess I’ll have a look.’

Anji again pushed back her long hair. ‘Why bother? For certain it means more of our blood spilled.’ She hefted the buckets. ‘As if we haven’t paid enough.’

The harbour view proved no more enlightening. At the warehouse district, Temper overheard whispers that the vessel must hold a new garrison commander, or that the Hold was being re-activated as command base for a new campaign against Korel. But he also heard the opposite: that the vessel carried Imperial Command from Korel, in full retreat. One old fisherman voiced the opinion that it might be the Emperor himself, returned. Men and women raised their hands in signs against evil and edged away. The fisherman lent Temper a wink.

Boxed cargo appeared at the vessel’s high side and the crew lowered it into skiffs that rocked along its skirts like water bugs around a basking sea beast. Rumour of retreat from Korel was of interest. Word from the south was one of ferocious local resistance, casualty rates high enough for official denial, and almost no advances made since the initial landings half a decade ago.

At other campaigns on continents far away Temper had travelled on ships identical to this. All carried the emblem on this one’s sails, the upright three-clawed sceptre gripping the Imperial orb. He’d witnessed port assaults during which these orbs glowed like pale suns, blasting walls and mole defences into rubble. During deep-sea engagements the orbs boiled waves, burst hulls into flame, and lashed summoned sea-demons.

Perhaps this vessel had returned from warfare at such a front. Korel was reputedly a series of archipelagos in which naval forces would make or break any campaign. That would explain its appearance here.

The first of the skiffs returned to the military wharf beneath Mock’s Hold. They carried personnel only. Dark and richly cloaked figures stepped onto floating docks. Temper’s eyes narrowed as he watched the men and women, hoods over heads, file from sight among the defences. He did not like the look of this — not at all. These figures were all too familiar in their dark leather boots and gloves. With a sick feeling in his gut, Temper remembered another garrison where vessels such as this could be found: at Unta across the strait; the Imperial capital.

The fisherman had lifted his chin towards the wharf. ‘Y’see? I was right.’ And he cackled hoarsely, then hacked into his fist.

Now, as he shivered in the cold evening air, Temper remembered watching that man-of-war and wondering: were they here for him? Had they tracked him three thousand leagues? If so, they were making quite a show of it. And that was, all things considered, careless.

Up on the battlements, the bell ending the day and Temper’s watch rang brassy and deep from Mock’s Tower. On its pike at Temper’s side, Mock’s Vane, the winged demon-shaped weathervane, shook and hummed as if caught in a steady gale. Temper frowned at the old relic; the winds were calm this evening.

Moments later he heard his superior, Lieutenant Chase, come tramping up the rampart steps. He sighed at the heavy measured pace. One of these days someone was going to have to take the young pup aside and explain that he wasn’t marching up and down the parade ground anymore. Still, being as green as a spring shoot also meant being punctual — and the long afternoon does dry a man’s throat.

Chase stopped directly behind. Temper ignored him. He listened to the surf, watched a lithe message cutter swoop like a gull across the whitecaps dangerously windward of the reefs at Old Lookout Isle. Wind-talent drove that navigation. That or a fiend-driven helmsman in an unholy rush to meet Hood.

A sword point dug into the small of his back. ‘Turn for recognition, soldier.’

‘Recognition? Chase, sometimes I wish we’d never met.’ Temper turned and planted his elbows on the gritty limestone crenel.

Chase sheathed his sword and straightened to proper parade ground angle. Tall feathers of some colourful bird fluttered at the peak of his iron helm. The brass and copper gilding on the breastplate of his cuirass gleamed, freshly polished. The youth’s leather boots alone looked to be worth more than Temper made in a year, and he looked down at his own patched open sandals, ragged cloth wrapping his legs, and the threadbare black and gold surcoat of a Malazan garrison regular.

‘Start acting the part of a real guard, old man,’ Chase warned. ‘At least while the official’s here. D’rek’s mysteries, man. I might’ve been — what is it? — one of her own.’’ He glanced up to the keep. ‘They would’ve handed you your heart as a warning.’

Temper stiffened at her own. Where had the lad picked that up? It’d been a long time since he last heard that old term for the Imperial security cadre, the Claws. Of course an Imperial Fist would have a detachment of Claws — for protection, intelligence gathering, and darker, unsavoury tasks. Sidelong, he studied the lieutenant and wondered: had that been a probe? But the youth’s clear brown eyes and smooth cheeks behind his helmet’s face-guards appeared no more capable of deceit than a clear grassland stream. Temper recovered, bit down on his paranoia, and thanked the twin gods of luck that Chase had missed it.

He spat onto the crumbling limestone blocks. ‘First of all, lad, I heard you coming. And no one ever hears them. And second, when they do come,’ Temper tapped a finger to his flattened nose, ‘you can always tell by the stench.’

Chase snorted his disbelief. ‘Gods, greybeard. I’ve heard talk of all the damned action you must’ve seen, but don’t pretend those Claws don’t curdle your blood.’

Temper ground his teeth together and quelled an urge to cuff the youth. But what could this pup know of things that turned the stomachs of even hardened veterans? Temper knew the Seven City campaigns; he’d been there when they took Ubaryd. They’d reached the Palace at night. The marble halls had been deserted but for the corpses of functionaries and guards too slow to flee the Emperor’s smashing of the Falah’d’s power. Upstairs they found the private chambers and the Holy One herself tied by silk ropes to a chair. Three Claws stood about her, knives out. Blood gleamed wetly on the blades and dripped from the moist bonds at the Falah’d’s wrists and ankles, pooled on the coral marble. He and Point had held back, unsure, but Dassem surged ahead and thrust aside the Claw standing before the woman. Her head snapped up, long curls flying back, and though her eyes had been gouged out and her mouth hung open, tongueless, blood streaming down her chin, she seemed to address Dassem directly. The Claws, two men and a woman, eyed each other. One backed away, raised his bloodied knife at what he saw in Dassem’s gaze. The Falah’d’s lips moved silently, mouthing some message or a plea. The female Claw’s eyes widened in sudden understanding and she opened her own mouth to shout, but too late. It happened so quickly it was as if Dassem had merely shrugged. The Falah’d’s head spun away. Blood jetted from her torso. The head toppled to the marble flagging. Its long black curls tangled in blood as it rolled.

Though Temper couldn’t be sure, it seemed the words she mouthed had been free me. Thus the end of the last Holy Falah’d of Ubaryd.

Temper rubbed the sickle moon scar that curved down his left temple to his chin and breathed deeply to calm himself. He forced himself to think of what Chase must see when looking at him: a broken-down veteran too incompetent or sodden to have passed corporal’s rank in a lifetime of soldiering. This was, after all, exactly the role he’d created for himself. He said, low and level, ‘They only disgust me.’

Chase stared, unsettled by the emotion in Temper’s voice, then scowled at the implied criticism of the Imperial Throne. He pointed to a corner barbican. ‘You’re relieved, old man.’

Off-duty, Temper hung his spear, surcoat, and regulation boiled-leather hauberk in the barracks armoury. He adjusted the rag swathings at his legs, then rewound the leather straps of his military sandals over them.

He searched for his single extravagance, a lined and brushed felt cloak from Falar. It was in the guardroom wadded up on a bench under Larkin’s wide ass. Seeing that, Temper almost turned and walked away. Larkin knew full well when the shift ended and had sat on the cloak as a challenge. Temper had no choice but to respond.

Larkin was holding court around a table, the other guards crowded close, shoulder to shoulder over the unvarnished slats where enamelled tiles — the Bones — lay arrayed in midplay. None paid the game any attention for Larkin was nearing the climax of yet another of his drawn-out stories.

Temper leaned against the squared timber that stood for the doorjamb, crossing his arms. Here was Larkin, only a month back from the Genabackan front, rotated out to garrison duty on a leg wound, and Temper believed he could already recite every one of the man’s engagements.

‘It was in Black Dog Forest,’ he drawled, dragging out the tale — clearly one of his favourites. The guards nodded, waiting, knowing what was to come, yet still savouring the anticipation.

‘The Crimson Guard…’

The troops, young and impatient with a garrison posting so far from any action, eyed one another. Some shook their heads in awe. Even Temper had to admit he felt it — a shiver of recognition and dread at the name. The mercenary company sworn to destroy the Empire. The force that had handed Malaz its first major defeat by repulsing the invasion of Stratem, and which now opposed the Empire on four continents.

‘Who’d you see?’ asked one guard, Cullen, island born, who claimed to have pirated off the Stratem coast in his youth. Larkin nodded, as did Temper. It was a good question, one asked by those who knew enough to ask.

Larkin cleared his throat, eased back into his story: ‘Was a general advance; a push to prise them out of the forest and open a road south to the Rhivi Plain. The commander, a Sub-Fist nobleman out of Dal Hon, had us in three columns to stretch them thin — superior numbers you see. The Guard was fleshed out by local recruits, Genabackan tribals called Barghast, townsmen, militia, foresters and other such trash. Daytime was fine, an easy campaign. For five days we advanced while they melted before us. So much for the invincible Guard! Of course a few Barghast and woodsmen potshot at us over stream crossings and uneven ground, but they ran away like cowards whenever we counterattacked. Then came the sixth night…’

Temper could only shake his head at the staggering stupidity of an advance by columns into unsecured deep forest. Of course they were allowed to advance. Of course the Guard, outnumbered, avoided any direct engagement. And finally, once the columns were isolated, far enough apart to prevent any hope of possible reinforcement, the attack had come.

The guards nodded their outrage at this shameful strategy and Temper wanted to shout: don’t listen to the damned fool! But he was a minority of one. Though a pompous ass, Larkin was popular, had seen recent action in distant lands and enjoyed being the centre of attention. Temper knew that the younger guards didn’t like or understand his silence, and that because of it some even doubted he had any experience to speak of. Any complaint from him would be dismissed as sour grumbling.

‘They attacked at night like plain thieves,’ Larkin spat, disgusted by such underhanded tactics.

Temper stopped himself from laughing out loud — well did he remember similar moonlit engagements, but with the Malazans themselves the attackers!

‘Was utter chaos. Screaming Barghast leaping out of the darkness. They were behind us, in front of us, circling our flanks. We were totally surrounded. There was nowhere to go. I joined a knot of men at a tall boulder lit by the light of brush fires. Together we held a perimeter, wounded at our rear. We repulsed three Barghast assaults.’

Larkin coughed into his fist, scowled, then fell silent. Temper gave him a hard look. Was it the horror, the memory of lost friends? Then why so eager to drag out the yarn every other night?

‘I saw three Guardsmen in the distance, through the undergrowth. I didn’t recognize any of them. Then Halfdan jogged past. I knew him by his size — half indeed!’

The guards chuckled at this cue. ‘Once served under Skinner, they say,’ added Cullen.

Larkin nodded.

‘Then another Guardsman came out of the night. I’ll never forget the way he stepped from the darkness… like some fiend out of Hood’s own Paths. His surcoat shone in the flames like fresh blood. Lazar it was, with his visored helm and black shield. We fought, but it was no use…’ Larkin slapped his game leg and shook his head.

Temper threw himself from the room. He cooled the back of his neck against the damp stone wall. Fener’s bones! The lying bastard. Fought Lazar! Temper himself had never faced the Guard but Dassem had clashed with them for decades — and that alone was enough to give anyone pause regarding their prowess. Dassem never spoke of those engagements. It was said the Avowed were unstoppable, but Dassem had slain every one who had challenged him: Shirdar, Keal, Bartok. Only Skinner, they say, had come away alive from their clash.

Laughter brought Temper’s attention around. The carved tiles of the Bones clacked against wood. He took a long breath, stepped back inside.

‘Larkin. You’re on my cloak.’

Larkin looked up, tapped a tile against the table. He hooked one beefy arm over the shoulder rest, gestured to the table where the tiles lay like a confused map of flagged paths. The paint of their symbols were chipped, the tiles soiled by generations of soldiers’ grimy fingers.

‘I’m playing,’ he grunted, and lowered his head.

‘Just raise your fat ass so I can get my cloak.’

Larkin didn’t answer. Two of the guards shrugged, pursed their lips and glanced their apologies to Temper. Larkin set his tile down by pressing it in place with the end of one thick finger. Temper strode foreword and plucked it from the table. Five sets of eyes followed Temper’s hand then swung back to Larkin.

Larkin let out his own version of a long-suffering sigh. ‘Don’t you know it’s bad luck to disrupt a game?’

Their eyes met. It was clear that the fool meant to put him, the only other veteran here, in his place. He’d been avoiding the man for just this very reason: questions of where he’d fought and with whom were the last he wanted to answer. He’d been doing his best to stay anonymous, but this was too much to stomach. He couldn’t have this ass lording it over him like a barracks bully.

‘Give me the damn piece,’ Larkin said, and he edged himself back from the table. ‘Or I’ll have to take it from you, old-timer.’

The guards lost their half-smiles, dropped their amused glances. One blew out a breath as if already regretting what was about to happen. Temper thrust out his hand, the tile in his open palm. ‘Take it.’ A part of him, the part Temper hadn’t heard in a year, urged the man on. Try it, the voice urged, smooth and edged at the same time. Just try it.

Larkin’s eyes, small and hidden in his wide face, shifted about the room as if wondering what was going on, just who was joking whom. This clearly wasn’t going the way he’d imagined. But then he shrugged his round shoulders, and in the way his lips drew down, confident and bored, Temper saw the reaction of a man far too full of himself to listen to anyone.

Shaking his head as if at the senile antics of the aged, Larkin reached for the tile, but Temper snatched his wide wrist and squeezed. The tile clattered to the table.

Larkin jerked as if bit by a serpent. His lips clenched in surprise and pain. The guards caught their breath. Larkin tried yanking back his arm. It didn’t move.

Temper smiled then at Larkin, and the man must’ve read something in that grin because his free hand went to the dirk at his waist. The short-bladed knife shot up from the table and Temper’s other hand snapped out and clasped that wrist with a slap.

Larkin’s laboured breathing filled the room. The blade twisted relentlessly to one side, edged its way toward his forearm. Panting, face red with effort, he lunged to his feet, the bench slamming backwards. The blade kissed his forearm, began sawing back and forth just up from the wrist. All the while Temper trapped the man’s eyes with his. Blood welled up, dripped to the table with quiet pats.

By his wrists, Temper heaved Larkin close, whispered into his ear: ‘Lazar would’ve sliced you open like a pig.’

Hands and arms clasped around Temper. They yanked, urged. The guards shouted but Temper wasn’t listening. Larkin threw back his head and roared. Then Temper released him and he stumbled backwards onto the flagged stone floor and sat cradling his arm. The guards pulled Temper into the hall where they whispered their amazement, watching him warily. One slipped a truncheon back into its mounting on the wall.

After a few minutes one came out with Temper’s rolled cloak. He heard them whisper how they’d never seen anything like it, but was preoccupied by the awful consequences of what he’d just done. Standing over the table, he’d seen droplets of blood spatter the Bones.

Soldier, Maiden, King, and the rune of the Obelisk. For damn sure that meant a boat full of bad luck about to cross his bow.

As far as Kiska could tell the crew of the message cutter acted as expected during docking: stowing gear, securing the ship against the first chill storm of Osserc’s Rule blowing over the island from the south. But details gave them away. Where were the chiding, the complaints, the banter of a crew at port? The eagerness to be ashore? And not one malingered. The hand supposedly doing just that — loitering at the gangway — scanned the wharf with the lazy indifference of a lookout. And she should recognize the pose; she had trained herself in the same posture.

Flat on the deck of the next ship opposite the pier, Kiska rested her chin in one gloved fist and quietly watched. The slightest drizzle was sifting down, slicking hair to her face, but she didn’t stir. The men were just killing time: re-coiling ropes, strapping down dunnage. Waiting. Waiting on one person, one action. That meant all worked for the same individual.

Odd. An Imperial message cutter crewed by sailors all of whom appeared to be guards for whoever had commissioned the ship. Kiska had grown up clambering over these wharves. To her such an arrangement smelled of clout, of influence great enough to procure one of these vessels — an accomplishment in itself — topped by the authority to replace the regular crew with his or her own private staff.

The question was what to do about the discovery? She looked to the mottled seaward wall of Mock’s Hold rearing above the harbour. Report it to the Claws? Why should she go to them after they’d made it so clear they had no use for her?

She recalled how she’d felt when dawn, just a few days before, had revealed the Imperial warship Inexorable anchored in the harbour. It had seemed the most important day of her life, an unlooked-for, and unhoped-for, second chance. But already she felt as if she’d aged a lifetime. No longer the girl who climbed over the tall stone walls enclosing the military wharf; that sneaked up onto the flat roof of a government warehouse to watch the docks. Had she lost something that child possessed? Or gained? A knowledge seared into everyone at some point in their life.

That morning she had watched while the first skiff returned from the ship burdened by seven hooded figures. Imperial officers from the capital, she was sure. From where else could they have come but Unta, across the straits? They clambered to the dock and drew off their travelling cloaks, folding them over arms and shoulders. At first she’d been disappointed: there were merchants in Malaz who dressed more richly than this: plain silk shirts, broad sashes, loose pantaloons. Yet one shorter figure failed to shed its cloak. That one gestured and Kiska thrilled to see the other six spread out. Bodyguards!

Who was this? A new garrison commander? Or an Imperial inspector dispatched from the capital to take Pell to task? If so, gods pity the Sub-Fist for what the officer would find in Mock’s Hold: chickens cackling in the bailey, pigs rooting in the cracked and empty reservoir. Kiska eased herself to her haunches as the party took the main route inland, up a gently rising hillside. She vaulted from roof to roof and balanced on the lip of a wall to reach an overlook which the party ought to pass beneath. Gulls exploded from her path, squalled their outrage.

She’d find out. She would present herself to the representative. Offer her services. Perhaps she’d gain a commission. An Imperial official such as this would certainly see that talents such as Kiska’s were wasted on this wretched island.

Up the narrow walled road the party approached. Kiska eased herself forward to watch. The first two, a slim man and a heavier woman, walked nonchalantly, hands clasped behind their backs. Kiska spied no weapons. What sort of bodyguards could these be? Aides, perhaps, or clerks. Nobles out for a walk among the rustics. This last thought raised a sour taste in her throat. The shorter figure appeared; hood so large as to hang past the face, hands hidden in long sleeves. Kiska strained to discern some detail from the loose, brushing folds of the cloak — black was it? Or darkest carmine night?

Something yanked her belt from behind, pulling her from her perch. She spun, lips open to yell, but a gloved hand pressed itself to her mouth. She stared up into hazel eyes in a man’s face, angular, dark with bluish tones, the tight curls of his hair gleaming in the dawning light. Napan, Kiska realized.

‘Who are you?’ he asked. Kiska did not recognize him from those who’d disembarked. In fact, she had never seen the man before — and she would have known if one such as this lived on the island.

The hand withdrew. Kiska cleared her throat, swallowed hard. Stunning eyes devoid of expression seemed to look right through her. Eyes like glass.

‘I… I live here.’

‘Yes. And?’

Kiska swallowed again. ‘I…’ Her gaze caught a brooch on the man’s left breast, a silver bird’s claw gripping a seed pearl. A Claw! Imperial intelligence officers, mages, enforcers of the Emperor’s will. This was a greater discovery than she’d imagined. No mere inspection, this. Only the highest-ranking officers rated Claw bodyguards. This visitor might even be an Imperial Fist. ‘I meant no harm!’ she gasped, and damned herself for sounding so… so inexperienced.

The Claw’s lips tightened in what Kiska took to be distaste. ‘I know you didn’t,’ and he stepped away. Soundless, she marvelled, even on a broken tiled roof spotted with bird droppings. Then she started, remembering. ‘Wait! Sir!’

At the wall’s ledge he paused. ‘Yes?’

‘Please. I want, that is, could I meet him or her — this official?’

The man’s hands twitched like wings then settled on the sash at his waist. ‘Why?’

Kiska stopped herself from clasping her hands together, took a deep breath. ‘I want to be hired. I want a chance. Please. I have talent, really, I do. You’ll see. All I need is a chance.’

The Claw’s hands slid from his sash, clasped themselves at his back. He gave a one-sided smile that didn’t make him look at all amused. ‘So. You have talent, have you?’

Kiska’s heart lurched. She faltered, but stammered on, ‘Yes. Yes, I do.’

The Claw shrugged. ‘This is a matter for the local commander. A Sub-Fist Pell, I believe. Take it up with him.’

’Yes, I have, but he-’

The man stepped noiselessly off the wall and disappeared. Kiska lunged to the edge. Nothing. A good three man-height’s fall to a cobbled road, empty. Kiska’s blood surged. She hugged herself, thrilled at the encounter. Amazing. The blunt mottled walls of Mock’s Hold beckoned above and she raised her fist.

She’d take it up all right. As high as she could! How could they possibly refuse her?

Crossing the inner bailey of Mock’s Hold, Temper shook out his cloak and pulled it over his shoulders. The courtyard was empty. All non-essential personnel had been cleared from the Hold. The guard complement either stood their posts or slept in the barracks. Everyone had been pulling double shifts since the nameless Imperial ‘High Official’ had arrived. She and her entourage had taken over the top three storeys of the inner keep, evicting the garrison commander, Pell, who now slept in the armoury drinking even more than his usual.

Why the visit? Temper had heard twenty opinions. Talk at the Hanged Man ran to the view that command at Unta was thinking about finally closing down the garrison and abandoning the island to the fishermen, the cliff rookeries, and the seal colony south at Benaress Rocks. In the meantime no extra shifts had been assigned his way. Seniority of age did carry some privileges. He smiled, anticipating an evening sampling Coop’s Old Malazan Dark.

At the fortified gatehouse, Lubben, the gatekeeper, limped out of the darkness within. His huge iron ring of keys rattled at his side. The hunch of his back appeared worse than usual, and his one good eye gleamed as he scanned the yard. Temper was about to ask what calamity had shaken him from his usual post snoring by the guardhouse brazier, when a flick of his hand warned him away.

‘Gate’s closed for the night, soldier.’

’Soldier? What’s the matter, Lubben? Gone blind from drink?’

Lubben jerked a thumb to the dark corridor at his rear, mouthed something Temper couldn’t hear.

‘What in the Enchantress’s unsleeping eyes is going-’ Temper broke off as someone else stepped soundlessly from the shadows. An Imperial Claw in an ankle-length black cloak, hood up. Lubben grimaced, offered Temper a small helpless shrug of apology. The Claw’s hood revealed only the lower half of a lined and lean face tattooed with cabalistic characters. Symbols that looked to Temper like the angular script of those who delve the Warren of Rashan, the Path of Darkness. The Claw turned to Lubben.

‘Trouble, gatekeeper?’

Lubben bowed deeply. ‘No, sir. No trouble at all.’

The hood swung to Temper, who immediately jerked his head down. Perhaps he was being too careful, but the Claw might interpret the act as deference. He’d seen in the past how deference pleased them.

‘What do you want, soldier?’

Temper squeezed his belt in both hands until his fingers numbed. Staring at the courtyard flagstones — two broken, four chipped — he began, cautiously. ‘Well, sir, I’m pretty much retired from service y’know, and I’ve a room of my own in town. I was only called up on account of the visit. Extra guards, y’see.’

‘Gatekeeper. Do you vouch for this man?’

Lubben flashed Temper a wink. ‘Oh, aye, sir. ‘Tis as the man says.’

‘I see.’

The Claw stepped close. Temper raised his head, but kept his gaze averted. Sidelong, he watched the Claw examine him. The last time he’d stood this close to one of these assassins had been a year ago and that time they’d been trying to kill him. He’d been prepared then, ready for the fight. All he felt now was shocked amazement at actually having run into one of the official’s escorts. Were they out patrolling as Chase suggested? Why this night?

‘You’re a veteran. Where are your campaign badges?’

‘I don’t wear them, sir.’

‘Ashamed?’

‘No, sir. Just consider myself retired.’

‘In a hurry to leave Imperial service?’

‘No, sir. I’ve just worked hard for my pension.’ Temper took a breath, then hurried on: ‘I’m building a boat you see. She’s the prettiest thing you’d ever-’

A hand rose from within the cloak to wave silence. ‘Very well. Gatekeeper, allow the man to pass.’

‘Aye, sir.’

At the far end of the entrance tunnel, Lubben lifted his ring of keys and unlocked the small thieves’ door in the main gate. Temper stepped through. Lubben poked his head out after him and grinned lop-sided, ‘You never told me you were building yourself a pretty little boat.’

‘Kiss Hood, you sawed-off hunchback.’

Laughing silently, Lubben answered with a gesture that needed no words then slammed the door. The lock rattled shut.

Temper started down Rampart Way’s steep slope. A staircase cut from the very stone of the cliff, it switched back four times as it descended the promontory’s side. Every foot of it lay within range of the Hold’s townward springalds and catapults. Above, a cloud front rolled in over the island, massing up from the Sea of Storms. The night looked to be shaping into one to avoid. Island superstition had it that the Stormriders themselves were responsible for the worst of the icy seasonal maelstroms that came raging out of the south.

The cliff rose as a knife-edge demarking the port city of Malaz’s northern border. Hugging its base was the Lightings, the rich estate district, taking what security it could from the shadow of the Hold above. South and west the city curved in a jumble of crooked lanes around the river and the marshy shore of Malaz Bay. Inland, modest hills rolled into the distance. Wood smoke drifted low over slate and flint roofs. A few lanterns glowed here and there. A weak drizzle drifted in behind the cloud front, obscuring Temper’s view of the harbour. Droplets brushed his neck like cold spit.

Of late the harbour served mainly as a military transit point, yet still retained some trade, a portion of which was even legitimate. All in all it was a lean shadow of what it had been. Deserted houses faced sagging warehouses and tottering, wave-eroded piers. Once home port to a piratical navy, then a thalassocracy, then an empire, the city now seemed crowded more by ghosts than people. It had given the empire its name, but had lost all tactical and strategic value, save as a staging point as the empire’s borders swept on to distant seas.

For a time, the Korelan invasion changed that, of course, and the residents had reawakened to renewed promise for the isle. But the campaign had since proven a disaster, an abyss of men and resources best left alone. The city, the island, now carried the haunted feel of a derelict. And thinking of that, Temper realized why this pimple on the backside of the empire should now receive the first message cutter he’d seen here: it was a missive for the official. The machinery of Imperial governance had returned, if ever so briefly, to where it had begun.

At the last switch back, Temper squinted up into the thin rain. Through a gap in the low clouds, Mock’s Hold appeared as if it was riding a choppy sea, overbalanced, about to capsize.

Temper rubbed a palm over his close-cropped hair to wipe away the rain and continued on. He wondered if this were a night for spirits even stronger than Coop’s Old Malazan Dark. Stretched out on cold ship planks, the memory of those grand dreams so alive just days ago made Kiska once again feel the heat of shame at her cheeks and throat. How childish she’d been! What a fool! Most of all she recalled her idiotic shock, her befuddled, dumb surprise when at the entrance to the Hold another bodyguard — a Claw, no doubt — took her aside by her arm — by her arm! — like a child.

Play elsewhere. We won’t be needing your services.

Recounting it over and over was almost enough to make her slam her fist against the decking. But she recovered and bit her lip instead, tasting salty blood on her tongue.

How could they? This was her territory! She’d grown up poking into every building and warehouse in the city. She’d memorized every twist and dead end of the narrow walled ways. Pell had even told her that if he could award commissions he’d have attached her to the garrison as intelligence officer. There was nothing on the island she couldn’t steal, had she been so inclined.

Problem was there wasn’t a damn thing on the island worth stealing. So she busied herself keeping an eye on the petty thieves and thugs: Spender’s outfit that ran the waterfront; the Jakatan pirates who preyed from time to time on coastal shipping. Anyone going to and from the harbour.

She’d simply been brushed aside. Maybe that was what hurt the most. Because it was needless and ill-considered; because she’d actually hoped they might have… she stopped herself from thinking through all that again. She couldn’t bear to remember her naive hopes, the things she’d bragged to people. They were indeed Imperial Claws. And escorting what indeed was an Imperial Fist. One of perhaps only a hundred administrators, governors, even generals of the armies.

Kiska clenched her teeth till they hurt. So what if she hadn’t graduated from one of those fancy officer schools at Unta, Li Heng, or Tali? So what if she had no access to any Warren magic? She was good enough to get the job done without it. Aunt Agayla had always said she had a natural talent for the work. As good as any intelligence officer, or so Kiska believed.

This official’s visit was a Gods-sent second chance, not to be missed, after last year’s stop-over of troop transports. Then, while resupplying, the army had enforced the Regent’s new edict against magery, and it all had spiralled out of control. Agayla had locked her away, saying it was for her protection, just when her talents and local knowledge could have been of most use. It had been the perfect opportunity for her to prove her value, to catch the attention of someone in authority that would recognize her worth. She had sworn then that she’d never again allow the woman to interfere with her chances to get off the island. Though, as the flames spread and the riots ended in indiscriminate slaughter, she grudgingly allowed that Agayla might well have saved her life. Nevertheless, while everyone else on the island wished the soldiers good riddance, hurrying them on their way with obscenities and curses, Kiska had watched the huge ungainly transports lumber from the bay with a feeling of desolation. At that moment she believed she’d never get off this gaol of an island, despite her talent.

And it was this talent that allowed her to spot the oddity of activity on this message cutter, even if she had to admit that she’d only come down to the harbour to sulk. She’d smelled the action immediately. This must bear on the presence of the official. Just a simple message? Why all the secrecy? And how strange that no message — or messenger — had yet to leave the ship. What were they all waiting for? Icy droplets tickled Kiska’s back but she refused so much as a twitch. The cutter had almost rammed its mooring in its haste to make the harbour and now they just sit-

Ah! Movement. One at a time four of the crew came down the gangway to the pier which stood slightly lower than the ship’s deck. They wore sealskin ponchos and kept their arms hidden beneath the wide leather folds. They took up positions around the bottom of the rope-railed walk. Kiska assumed that under the ponchos each man held a cocked crossbow, possibly of Claw design: screw-tension, bowless. A similar weapon was strapped to her right side, bought with all the money Kiska possessed in the world from a trader who’d had no idea how the unfamiliar mechanism worked.

After squinting into the thickening drizzle and eyeing the stacked cargo, one of the men signalled the ship. He wore a plainsman’s fur cap and boasted the long curled moustache of the Seti tribes. Shaking his head and spitting on the planking, his disgust at the crowded dock, the poor visibility, was obvious even from Kiska’s distant vantage.

A fifth man came down the gangway, medium height, slim. He wore a dark cloth cloak — hooded — leather gloves and boots. He stopped and glanced about. The gusting wind billowed the cowl and Kiska glimpsed a painfully narrow face, mahogany and smooth, with a startling glimmer of shining scalp.

The Seti guard flicked his hand again, signalling. The three others tightened around the man. Kiska recognized a variation of the sign language developed by the marine commando squads and later appropriated by just about every other Imperial corps, Claws included. One she had yet to find a teacher for.

They started up the pier. The drifting rain closed between, the five men blurring into a background of siege-walls and the gloom of an overcast evening. Yet she did not jump up to pursue. Remembering her teaching, she suspected others might remain behind with orders to follow at a distance.

It was her style to allow a quarry plenty of breathing space, especially if they believed themselves free of surveillance. She liked to think she had an instinct for her target’s route, as she always had even as a child blindfolded during street games of hide-and-seek. She liked to joke that she just followed what spoor was left. As it was, she almost yelped in surprise when a grey-garbed man stepped out from a dozen or so weather-stained barrels in front of her. Jerking down out of sight, Kiska watched. She’d been about to let herself over the ship’s side. Where in the Queen’s Mysteries had he come from? While she chewed her lip, the man peeked around the barrel, then continued on with an almost jaunty air, hands clasped behind his back, a bounce to his stride.

Another bodyguard? No one else had left the ship. She was certain of it. A rendezvous? Then why keep back? She decided to rely upon Agayla’s advice that anyone, until proven otherwise, could be an enemy.

She waited while he walked on, then slipped down to the dock. Assuming the fellow, whoever he was, wouldn’t lose the man from the ship, she’d follow him. At the guard hut she looked back to the barrels, realizing what had bothered her about the fellow’s sudden appearance. She’d given all the cargo a good search earlier. The pocket between those barrels had been empty, inaccessible without entering her line of sight.

That left only one option — one that was beyond her, but one this fellow obviously freely employed. The stink of Warren magic cautioned her. Perhaps she should report this after all. But to whom? The Claws had taken command of the Hold in the name of some unknown official. The thought of meekly submitting a report to the Claw she’d already met, or one of his brethren, made her throat burn. Damn them to the Queen’s own eternal mazes. She’d tag along for a while and see what turned up.

At the bottom of Cormorant Road, Temper spotted old Rengel fussing at the shutters of a ground-floor window, a pipe clasped in his teeth. The old man was grumbling to himself, as usual. The road lay empty save for the retired marine and sail-maker, which surprised Temper, seeing as it wasn’t yet the first bell of the night.

‘Evening.’

Rengel turned. ‘Hey? Evening?’ He forced the words through his teeth. Squinting, he nodded sourly, then returned to the shutter. ‘That it is. And an evil one. Surprised to see you about. Thought you’d know better.’

Temper smiled. Rengel’s conversation was either mawkishly nostalgic or blackly cynical, depending upon whether you found him drunk or sober. Temper judged him to be lightly soused at present, but the night was young. He inspected the low clouds coursing overhead.

‘Doesn’t look all that bad.’

‘Hey? Bad?’ Rengel look up, grimaced. ‘Not the blasted weather, you damned fool.’ He pulled at the shutter. ‘Blasted, rusted, Togg damned-to-Hood…’

Temper stepped up. ‘Let’s have a look.’

Rengel gave way, puffing furiously on his pipe. ‘Where is it you hail from anyway, lad?’

Studying the shutter’s latch, Temper smiled. When was the last time someone had called him lad? ‘Itko Kan, more or less. Why?’

Temper heard Rengel snort behind him. ‘If you’d been born here, you’d stay put tonight, believe me. You’d know. The riots an’ killin’ and such this year prophesied it. Maybe even summoned it. A Shadow Moon. The souls of the dead come out under a Shadow Moon. Them and worse.’

Temper worked the shutter free, swung it shut. ‘Shadow Moon? Heard of it. But I’m new here.’

‘They’re rare, thank the Gods.’ Rengel stepped close. Rustleaf, rendered glue, sweat and gin assaulted Temper’s nose. The old man swayed slightly, as if in a crosswind, and exhaled a great breath of smoke. ‘I was off island the last one, serving on the Stormdriver. But the one afore, I was just a lad, near fifty years ago. The pits of the shadows open up. Damned souls escape and new ones get caught. Devils run amok through the streets. I heard ’em. They howl like they’re after your soul.’ He jabbed the pipe-stem against Temper’s chest. ‘And avoid anyone touched. They’ll be snatched sure as I’m standing here.’

Touched. Common slang for anyone who knew the Warrens. The skills to access them could be taught, but it was much more common for someone to just be born with it — the Talent. No doubt in the old days people suspected of such taint did disappear on strange nights; in Temper’s opinion they were most likely dragged away by a superstitious mob to be burned or hanged. He gave Rengel a serious nod that the old man returned profoundly.

A woman shouted above. ‘Rengel!’

The widow Teal glared down over the slim railing of a second storey window. Temper smiled a greeting, but was always struck by her similarity to a fat vulture draped in a black shawl. She disappeared and the shutters banged closed.

Rengel clamped down on his pipe, grumbling under his breath. Temper rapped the shutter’s stained wood slats. ‘Solid as rock, I’d say. And I plan to be inside all night as well, so don’t fret. I’ll be testing the brew at the Hanged Man.’

The old man’s brows quivered with interest. ‘What’s that? Testing, heh?’ He grinned, puffing more smoke. ‘Well, don’t be too hasty in making a decision.’

Temper laughed. ‘Gods, no. Likely take till the morning.’

At the door, Rengel hesitated, urged Temper close with a crook of a finger. He growled in an undertone, ‘What d’you know of the Return?’

Temper shook his head, perplexed.

Impatient, or maybe disgusted, the old man waved him off. ‘Stay indoors, friend. Fiends and worse will rule this night.’

Temper backed away, unsure what to make of his warning. Rengel tapped the door, pointed to something — a mark chalked on the wood — then yanked it shut. The door’s rattle echoed down the narrow lane.

The sign of Coop’s Hanged Man Inn was just that: a painting of a hanged man, arms bound behind his back, his head bent at a sickening angle. Rain, falling freely, now brushed past in gusts. Temper’s cloak hung heavy and cold from his shoulders. He heard the surf rolling into the pilings just a few streets down, while the bay glistened in the distance like an extension of the rain.

The clouds still held some of the day’s light, but the gloom obscured anything a stone’s toss away. The evening was developing into a night to chill the bones and numb the spirit. He looked forward to slipping into his regular seat just within distance of the inn’s massive fireplace. He also hoped Corinn would stop by so he could ask her about Shadow Moons and this prophesy business… though it’d been nearly a week since he’d last seen her and, truth be told, he worried whether he’d ever see her again. He’d reached a few conclusions of his own. Return stank of the cult that worshipped Kellanved, the man who along with his partner, Dancer, had founded and built the Imperium. They’d been missing for years. Some thought both dead, others that they’d vanished into some kind of thau-maturgic seclusion.

Opposite the Hanged Man, across the wet cobbles, hunched the low stone wall of what was reportedly the oldest building in the city. It was an abandoned stone house, too far gone to repair. Temper had never paid it much attention, except that now old man Rengel’s tale called to mind another local superstition: that the house predated the town, and that its ruined walls and abandoned rooms had always been haunted.

Rumour also held that it was there Kellanved and Dancer, along with others including Dassem and the current Regent, Surly, had lived and plotted everything that followed. Eyeing it now, on a dark wet night, with the black limbs of dead trees outlined around it, and the bare and tumulus-looking grounds, it did appear sinister. The locals preferred the pretence it didn’t exist, but whenever they had to mention it, they called it the Deadhouse. Personally, he couldn’t believe any sane person could have lived there — which meant Kellanved and Dancer could very well have once stared out of its empty gaping windows. He shrugged and turned away. Sure it was haunted. To his mind, the entire Empire was haunted, one way or another.

Two men stood in the rain out in front of the Hanged Man, backs pressed against the windowless walls. They hung close enough to either side of the entrance for Temper to hear the droplets pattering off their leather cloaks. He’d felt their eyes on him as he approached. Now near they ignored him.

‘Bastard night for a watch,’ Temper grinned to the one on the right.

The man’s eyes flickered to him, looking him up and down, then squinted back into the rain. ‘We’re waiting on a friend.’

Temper paused at the steps down to the front entrance. Everyone knew the Hanged Man was a veteran’s bar, so there was little need for these two to pretend they weren’t keeping an eye out for friends inside. He almost called them on it but didn’t; they looked new. Maybe they just didn’t know the drill. Feeling old, he thumped down the steps.

Coop’s Inn was the other oldest building in the town of Malaz, or so Coop avowed. True or not, the building did stand much lower than the street, and its outer walls were large hand-hewn limestone blocks — the same sort as lay in nameless ruins all over the island. The inn’s common room was so far beneath street level that the steep stairwell leading to it was eerily like a ship’s companionway down to the lowest hold. Rainwater had poured down the worn steps and pooled at the threshold. Temper’s cloak dripped into the puddle as he shook the moisture from his head. He took hold of the oak door’s iron handle and, with the other hand, reached up to the chiselled scars that crossed as faintly as spider’s webbing along the low lintel. He believed everyone had their own personal superstitions, soldiers and sailors more than most. This was one of his. He thought of it as an acknowledgement of the forgotten folk who’d raised the stones in the first place. A sort of blessing — given or received, he wasn’t sure — and as a gesture towards his own continued safety. After all, he did live upstairs. Or rather he lived at ground level. His arrow-slit of a window stood barely an arm’s span above a rat-run between the inn and Seal’s whitewashed brick and timber house behind.

The Hanged Man’s common room was large and wide, the ceiling beams low enough to touch or, if one weren’t attentive, seriously damage one’s head on. They’d brought more than one drunk’s evening to an abrupt and painful end. Fat stone pillars stood in a double row down the chamber’s centre as if marking a path from the entrance to the crackling, rowboat-sized fireplace directly opposite. Long oak tables stretched to either side of this central walk, shadowed in differing distance to the fire. The stone walls were stark, unrelieved but for the occasional miniature vaulted recess, each now dimly illumined by a lamp. Most of the room’s light, however, came from bronze oil lanterns hung from crusted iron hooks set deep into the pillars and the walls. The huge fireplace lit the far end of the room with flickering amber light, dispelling the chill air of the chamber and adding, sullenly, to the illumination.

There was enough smoke to fog the room, but it was warm and dry at least. Temper loosened his cloak. To either side men talked, laughed, and drank. A much larger crowd than usual, and younger, more rowdy. Anji passed, a brownstone jug on one hip, refilling mugs. She gave Temper a harried nod, already weary. He smiled back, but she’d passed on. Poor gal, she’d been spoiled by the regular crowd of quiet old duffers who’d nurse a tumbler of liqueur for two or three bells each. Tonight she was more than earning her keep.

As Temper passed between the long tables he felt the weight of numerous eyes and paused, but no one returned his gaze. Instead, they stared at their cups or the gouged tabletop, murmuring to one another as if they hoped he would just move on like any unwelcome guest. Unusual behaviour from men who appeared hard and ragged enough to have been emptied out of a prison ship, or culled from the press gangs that fed the Empire’s constant need to replenish the oars of the Navy. Temper crossed to his regular seat, sensing the odd charged tension in the air.

Passing the last tables, he glimpsed a crowd of mangy looking fellows dressed in threadbare tunics and cloaks who struck him as nothing more than destitute street-sweepings. These men sat alongside others who suggested the cut of military service with their scars and heavier builds. An unusual crowd for Coop’s. But the old man, Rengel, had warned him to anticipate a night of strangeness.

Someone had taken his regular bench along the rear wall. Considering how crowded the room was, Temper half-expected it, but couldn’t avoid feeling irritated. Couldn’t Coop have kept it for him? What did he pay rent to the damn brewer for anyway? That tiny cell upstairs? The wretched food?

The man occupying his seat wore a leather vest over a padded linen shirt that hung in tatters down over the bench and leggings of iron-studded leather. Oiled leather wristlets half-covered forearms that bore a skein of scar tissue: puckered remnants of scoured flesh, thin pale crescents of bladed edge, and the angry pink mottling of healed burns. Head low to the table, he spoke to a companion shrouded in shadow.

For a moment Temper hesitated. He considered addressing the man. Not that he expected to retrieve his seat, but to challenge him enough to better glimpse his features. The fellow’s face remained averted. Stiffly so, it seemed to Temper. Intangibly, the space between the two momentarily seemed to contract. Coop materialized, stepping through a rear narrow door. He scanned the room, hands tucked behind his leather apron. He waved towards a sole empty table and Temper ambled over; he’d just stood a half-day watch and was damned if he would stay on his feet a moment longer.

Coop sat with him. ‘Sorry about that, Temp.’ He raised a decanter of peach brandy.

Temper nodded. ‘Quite the crowd,’ he offered, but Coop simply poured. He shrugged and raised the tumbler for a toast.

‘To the Empire,’ said Coop, raising his own glass.

‘To the bottom of the sea,’ returned Temper, and downed the shot.

Sucking his teeth, Coop pushed his seat back against the rear wall to better view the room. ‘Yes, a different bunch. But it’s just the one night y’know.’

‘A Shadow Moon.’

Coop looked up. ‘Yeah, that’s it. First I’d heard of it though.’ He pulled a rag from behind his apron and used it to wipe his glistening forehead then his retreating, curled red hair.

Temper slid a forearm onto the table, inclined his head to the room. ‘Rough looking…’

Coop waved the suggestion aside. ‘A quiet bunch, considering all the young bloods. Nothing broken yet except the seals from two casks of stout.’ He chuckled knowingly.

Temper sighed. In his eyes Coop’s main failing was his unflinching optimism. Coop’s steady supply of it would have made him suspect simple-mindedness had he not known otherwise. Perhaps, he thought, Coop was inclined to be hopeful, given all the coin passing his way.

He considered dropping in on Seal later. Gods knew the young army medicer could probably use the company tonight. But the lad was likely already up to his elbows in his own medicine chest. Then he thought of something better and gestured Coop closer. ‘Haven’t seen Corinn around, have you?’

The brewer cracked a broad smile and would’ve nudged Temper if his scowl didn’t promise a beating for it. His grin fell as he considered the question. ‘No, can’t say as I have. Sorry, Temp.’

With a shrug, Temper sat back. ‘Thought she would’ve at least said goodbye.’

‘Same old Temp, always thinking the worst. I’ll have a mug of Dark sent your way.’ Standing, he slapped Temper’s shoulder.

Temper waved Coop off and turned his chair to lean against the wall. Of the immediate tables, all crowded, only a couple of familiar faces stood out. They belonged to the two other men who rented rooms from Coop: Faro Balkat, a frail, dried old stick who swallowed Paralt water like it wasn’t the poison it was, and who rarely knew whether it was day or night; and Trenech. He was a giant of a fellow, as broad and seemingly bright as a bhederin, who did occasional bouncing and guard work for Coop in exchange for free beer.

Though Coop had dismissed his sour predictions, and Temper didn’t want to admit it, he was afraid that maybe he’d seen the last of Corinn — that despite a tongue sharper than a Talian dagger. He’d met her… what… less than a month ago? And in that time he’d surprised himself by how much he’d come to look forward to hearing her recount legendary campaigns over wine. He tried to remember their last conversation: had he said something worse than his usual stupid hints? Too crass a joke regarding a couple of old warhorses stabling together for warmth? Though they were both veterans and saw the world through the same cynical eyes, she treated him as if the mere pike-pusher he pretended to be. Maybe he was just daydreaming, but was it possible she saw more than that?

Anji pushed through the servant’s door beside the table, slamming down a pewter mug of Malazan Dark as she passed. He offered her a wave; she rolled her eyes at the way the evening was shaping up. As she passed a nearby table a fellow grabbed at her ass. She swung round and dumped a tall mug of ale over his lap and had to be stopped from breaking the mug across his skull. From all around came hoots and cheers of delight.

The outburst brought round the gaze of the fellow who’d claimed Temper’s seat. The burns on his forearms extended to his face, and in a flash Temper recognized the source: Imperial alchemical munitions. An incendiary, most likely.

The toughs quieted under the man’s glare and this surprised Temper. Among the soldiers he’d known, such a look would have provoked a tossed stool or mug or whatever lay close to hand. He watched sidelong as the fellow turned back to his companions. The man gestured broadly, as if imitating a sword cut, and a tattoo flashed briefly beneath the short sleeve of his tunic. An arched bridge, a background of licking flames: the emblem of the Bridgeburners.

Temper felt as if those flames had scorched his own heart. Halfway across the chamber sat a man he may have met in earlier days — a different life. The urge to flee made his arms twitch. He forced his head down, as if studying the depths of his drink. The odds were they’d never actually run into each other; he knew that. More, the Bridgeburner probably wouldn’t even notice him, and this would be nothing more than another heart-stopping brush with his past. He forced himself to take another drink. The warm Malazan Dark coated his throat. He almost laughed aloud at his nerves. Gods, man! A bare year out of action and behaving like a skittish colt!

Barely raising his head, he viewed the smoky room. It was a chilly, rainy night; his favourite seat was occupied; his past grinned like a death’s head from the neighbouring table, and once more Corinn had stood him up after, of late, spending most evenings with him swapping tales and maybe getting a certain look in her eyes at the last. All in all, the evening called for a dignified retreat. A bottle of his homeland’s red wine waited tucked beneath his pallet for just such an ill-starred evening.

Standing, he pushed back his chair. He felt as if every eye in the chamber were crawling over his back. He pulled open the servant’s door, ducked, and stepped into an antechamber that Coop had sketchily adapted to a storage room by the addition of a few shelves. The room was dark, cold, and cramped. Temper could touch both walls without stretching either arm. In the wall was a portal barely wide enough for his shoulders, though they were broader than most. It opened out onto circular stairs that led up to the kitchen and the rented rooms, as well as down to the lower cellars.

He started up the steps, feeling at his back the steady draught of cold air that welled constantly out of the building’s depths. He wondered at the puzzle of a Bridgeburner being here on the island. Now that he was on his way to his room, he felt an urge to sit down with the man and spin yarns of the old days. But the stories of the wanderings of retired or discharged veterans usually proved sad or unremarkable. He could imagine the fate of such a soldier outside the Bridgeburner squads: no posting would have been desirable. Even the role of marine would have been confining and frustrating. Direct dismissal from service was preferable. And following that, aimless drifting and befuddlement at civilian life.

Temper could sympathize: when his own place in the ranks had been taken from him he’d experienced something much the same. He’d even presented himself with false papers to the local garrison in order to return to the only life he’d ever felt was his own.

Yet there was more to this puzzle than just the one man. Passing the kitchens, Temper waved to Sallil, the cook, who nodded back, then returned to fanning himself at the rear door’s steep steps that led up into the alley. In the dark of the stairwell, Temper felt his way to the upper rooms, some rented by Anji and a few of her friends for occasional whoring, and one occupied by Coop himself. In the narrow hall it occurred to him that once before he’d seen a ragged gang of men such as the crowd below. They’d disembarked from a galley hailing from the island’s other settlement, Jakata, that had berthed overnight at the public wharves.

Outside his door, he paused, the puzzle solved. Jakatan-registered vessels enjoyed one of the rare charters that allowed ‘interception’ of non-Imperial shipping off the coasts of Quon Tali. In short, the long tradition of piracy survived in Jakata. This man, an ex-Bridgeburner, would find himself quite at home among such a lawless bunch.

They must have put in for the coming storm; no wonder they had posted two men to keep an eye out. There were probably merchant cartels represented here whose shipping had been liberated by these very same men.

Temper took out the keys he kept on a leather thong around his neck. He was reasonably sure he’d threaded together the how and why of the crowd downstairs. Now he could drink his wine and pay them no further mind. What remained to be seen was whether anything would come of this Shadow Moon nonsense.