Toll the Hounds

CHAPTER NINE

Expectation is the hoary curse of humanity. One can listen to words, and see them as the unfolding of a petal or, indeed, the very opposite: each word bent and pushed tighter, smaller, until the very packet of meaning vanishes with a flip of deft fingers. Poets and tellers of tales can be tugged by either current, into the riotous conflagration of beauteous language or the pithy reduction of the tersely colourless.

As with art, so too with life. See a man without fingers standing at the back of his house. He is grainy with sleep that yields no rest, no relief from a burdensome world (and all that), and his eyes are strangely blank and might be shuttered too as he stares out on the huddled form of his wife as she works some oddity in her vegetable patch.

This one is terse. Existence is a most narrow aperture indeed. His failing is not in being inarticulate through some lack of intellect. No, this mind is most finely honed. But he views his paucity of words — in both thought and dialogue — as a virtue, sigil of rigid manhood. He has made brevity an obsession, an addiction, and in his endless paring down he strips away all hope of emotion and with it em shy;pathy. When language is lifeless what does it serve? When meaning is rendered down what veracity holds to the illusion of depth?

Bah! to such conceits! Such anal self-serving affectation! Wax extravagant and let the world swirl thick and pungent about you! Tell the tale of your life as you would live it!

A delighted waggle of fingers now might signal mocking cruelty when you are observing this fingerless man who stands silent and expressionless as he studies his woman. Decide as you will. His woman. Yes, the notion belongs to him, art shy;fully whittled from his world view (one of expectation and fury at its perpetual failure). Possession has its rules and she must behave within the limits those rules prescribe. This was, to Gaz, self-evident, a detail that did not survive his own manic editing.

But what was Thordy doing with all those flat stones? With that peculiar pat shy;tern she was building there in the dark loamy soil? One could plant nothing be shy;neath stone, could one? No, she was sacrificing fertile ground, and for what? He didn’t know. And he knew that he might never know. As an activity, however, Thordy’s diligent pursuit was a clear transgression of the rules, and he might have to do something about that. Soon.

Tonight he would beat a man to death. Exultation, yes, but a cold kind. Flies buzzing in his head, the sound rising like a wave, filling his skull with a hundred thousand icy legs. He would do that, yes, and this meant he didn’t have to beat his wife — not yet, anyway; a few more days, maybe a week or so — he would have to see how things went.

Keep things simple, give the flies not much to land on, that was the secret. The secret to staying sane.

The wedges of his battered fingerless hands burned with eager fire.

But he wasn’t thinking much of anything at all, was he? Nothing to reach his face, his eyes, the flat line of his mouth. Sigil of manhood, this blank facade, and when a man has nothing else at least he could have that. And he would prove it to himself again and again. Night after night.

Because this is what artists did.

Thordy was thinking of many things, none of them particularly relevant — or so she would have judged if pressed to examination, although of course there was no one who might voice such a challenge, which was just as well. Here in her garden she could float, as aimless as a leaf blown down on to a slow, lazy river.

She was thinking about freedom. She was thinking about how a mind could turn to stone, the patterns solid and immovable in the face of seemingly unbearable pressures, and the way dust trickled down faint as whispers, unnoticed by any. And she was thinking of the cool, polished surface of these slate slabs, the waxy feel of them, and the way the sun reflected soft, milky white and not at all painful to rest eyes upon. And she was remembering the way her husband talked in his sleep, a pouring forth of words as if whatever dam held them back in his wakefulness was kicked down and out gushed tales of gods and promises, invitations and bloodlust, the pain of maimed hands and the pain of maiming that those hands delivered.

And she noted the butterflies dancing above the row of greens just off to her left, almost within reach if she stretched out a dirt-stained hand, but then those orange-winged sprites would wing away though she posed them no threat. Because life was uncertain and danger waited in the guise of peaceful repose.

And her knees ached and nowhere in her thoughts could be found expectation — nowhere could be found such hard-edged proof of reality as the framework of what waited somewhere ahead. No hint at all, even as she laid down stone after stone. It was all outside, you see, all outside.

The clerk at the office of the Guild of Blacksmiths had never once in his life wielded hammer and tongs. What he did wield demanded no muscles, no weight of impetus atop oaken legs, no sweat streaming down to sting the eyes, no gusts of scalding heat to singe the hairs on the forearms. And so, in the face of a true blacksmith, the clerk gloried in his power.

That pleasure could be seen in his small pursed lips turned well down at each end, could be caught in his watery eyes that rested everywhere and nowhere; in his pale hands holding a wooden stylus like an assassin’s dagger, the tip stained blue by ink and wax. He sat on his stool behind the broad counter that divided the front room as if guarding the world’s wealth and every promise of paradise that membership in this most noble Guild offered its hallowed, upright members (and the fat man winks).

So he sat, and so Barathol Mekhar wanted to reach over the counter, pluck the clerk into the air, and break him in half. Over and over again, until little more than a pile of brittle tailings remained heaped on the scarred counter, with the stylus thrust into it like a warrior’s sword stabbing a barrow.

Dark was the amusement in Barathol’s thoughts as the clerk shook his head yet again.

‘It is simple — even for you, I’m sure. The Guild demands credentials, specifically the sponsorship of an accredited Guild member. Without this, your coin is so much dross.’ And he smiled at this clever pun voiced to a smith.

‘I am new to Darajhistan,’ Barathol said, again, ‘and so such sponsorship is im shy;possible.’

‘Yes it is.’

‘As for apprenticeship-’

‘Also impossible. You say you have been a blacksmith for many years now and I do not doubt such a claim — the evidence is plain before me. This of course makes you over-qualified as an apprentice and too old besides.’

‘If I cannot be apprenticed how can I get a sponsor?’

A smile of the lips and shake of the head, A holding up of the palms. ‘I don’t make the rules, you understand.’

‘Can I speak to anyone who might have been involved in devising these rules?’

‘A blacksmith? No, alas, they are all off doing smithy things, as befits their profession.’

‘I can visit one at his or her place of work, then. Can you direct me to the near shy;est one?’

‘Absolutely not. They have entrusted me with the responsibilities of operating the administration of the Guild. If I were to do something like that I would be disciplined for dereliction of duty, and I am sure you do not want that on your conscience, do you?’

‘Actually,’ said Barathol, ‘that is a guilt I can live with.’

The expression hardened. ‘Honourable character is an essential prerequisite to becoming a member of the Guild.’

‘More than sponsorship?’

‘They are balanced virtues, sir. Now, I am very busy today-’

‘You were sleeping when I stepped in.’

‘It may have appeared that way.’

‘It appeared that way because it was that way.’

‘I have no time to argue with you over what you may or may not have perceived when you stepped into my office-’

‘You were asleep.’

‘You might have concluded such a thing.’

‘I did conclude it, because that is what you were. I suppose that too might result in disciplinary measures, once it becomes known to the members.’

‘Your word against mine, and clearly you possess an agenda, one that reflects poorly on your sense of honour-’

‘Since when does honesty reflect poorly on one’s sense of honour?’

The clerk blinked. ‘Why, when it is vindictive, of course.’

Now it was Barathol’s turn to pause. And attempt a new tack. ‘I can pay an advance on my dues — a year’s worth or more, if necessary.’

‘Without sponsorship such payment would be construed as a donation. There is legal precedent to back that interpretation.’

‘You’d take my coin and give me nothing in return?’

‘That is the essence of a charitable donation, is it not?’

‘I don’t think it is, but never mind that. What you are telling me is that I cannot become a member of the Guild of Blacksmiths.’

‘Membership is open to all blacksmiths wishing to work in the city, I assure you. Once you have been sponsored.’

‘Which makes it a closed shop.’

‘A what?’

‘The Malazan Empire encountered closed shops in Seven Cities. They broke them wide open. I think even some blood was spilled. The Emperor was not one to cringe before professional monopolies of any sort.’

‘Well,’ the clerk said, licking his slivery lips, ‘thank all the gods the Malazans never conquered Darujhistan!’

Barathol stepped outside and saw Mallet waiting across the street, eating some kind of flavoured ice in a broad-leaf cone. The morning’s heat was fast melting the ice, and purple water was trickling down the healer’s pudgy hand. His lips were similarly stained.

Mallet’s thin brows rose as the blacksmith approached. ‘Are you now a proud if somewhat poorer member of the Guild?’

‘No. They refused me.’

‘But why? Can you not take some kind of exam-’

‘No.’

‘Oh. . so now what, Barathol?’

‘What? Oh, I’ll open up a smithy anyway. Independent.’

‘Are you mad? They’ll burn you out. Smash up your equipment. Descend on you in a mob and beat you to death. And that’s just on opening day.’

Barathol smiled. He liked Malazans. Despite everything, despite the countless mistakes the Empire had made, all the blood spilled, he liked the bastards. Hood knew, they weren’t nearly as fickle as the natives of his homeland. Or, he added wryly, the citizens of Darujhistan. To Mallet’s predictions he said, ‘I’ve handled worse. Don’t worry about me. I plan on working here as a blacksmith, whether the Guild likes it or not. And eventually they will have to accept me as a member.’

‘That won’t feel very triumphant if you’re dead.’

‘I won’t be. Dead, that is.’

‘They’ll try to stop anyone doing business with you.’

‘I am very familiar with Malazan weapons and armour, Mallet. My work meets military standards in your old empire, and as you know, those are set high.’ He glanced across at the healer. ‘Will the Guild scare you off? Your friends?’

‘Of course not. But remember, we’re retired.’

‘And being hunted by assassins.’

‘Ah, I’d forgotten about that. You have a point. Even so, Barathol, I doubt us few Malazans can keep you in business for very long.’

‘The new embassy has a company of guards.’

‘True.’

‘And there are other Malazans living here. Deserters from the campaigns up north-’

‘That’s true, too, though they tend to hide from us — not that we care. In fact, we’d rather get their business at the bar. What’s the point in grudges?’

‘Those that come to me will be told just that, then, and so we can help each other.’

Mallet tossed the sodden cone away and wiped his hands on his leggings. ‘They tasted better when I was a young brat — although they were more expensive since a witch was needed to make the ice in the first place. Here, of course, it’s to do with some of the gases in the caverns below.’

Barathol thought about that for a moment as he looked upon the healer with his purple lips and saw, for the briefest moment, how this man had been when he was a child, and then he smiled once more. ‘I need to find a suitable location for my smithy. Will you walk with me, Mallet?’

‘Glad to,’ the healer replied. ‘Now, I know the city — what precisely are you looking for?’

And so Barathol told him.

And oh how Mallet laughed and off they went into the city’s dark chambers of the heart, where blood flowed in a roar and all manner of deviousness was possible. If the mind was so inclined. A mind such as Barathol Mekhar’s when down — down! — was thrown the ghastly gauntlet!

The ox, the selfsame ox, swung its head back and forth as it pulled the cartload of masonry into the arched gateway, into blessed shade for a few clumping strides, and then out into the bright heat once more — delicate blond lashes fluttering — to find itself in a courtyard and somewhere close was sweet cool water, the sound as it trickled an invitation, the smell soft as a kiss upon the broad glistening nose with its even more delicate blond hairs, and up rose the beast’s massive head and would not the man with the switch have pity on this weary, thirsty ox?

He would not. The cart needed unloading first and so the ox must stand, silently yearning, jaws working the cud of breakfast with loud, thick sounds of suction and wetly clunking molars, and the flies were maddening but what could be done about flies? Nothing at all, not until the chill of night sent them away and so left the ox to sleep, upright in bovine majesty beneath stars (if one was lucky) which, perhaps, was where the flies slept.

Of course, to know the mind of an ox is to waste inordinate amounts of time before recognizing the placid civility of a herbivore’s sensibilities. Lift gaze, then, to the two vaguely shifty characters edging in through the gate — not workers struggling to and fro in the midst of the old estate’s refurbishment; not clerks nor servants; not masons nor engineers nor inspectors nor weight-gaugers nor measurers. To all appearances malingerers, skulkers, but in truth even worse than that-

Twelve names on the list. One happily struck off. Eleven others found and then escaped like the slippery eels they no doubt were, being hunted by debt, ill luck and the vagaries of a clearly malicious universe intent on delivering misery and whatnot. But no matter such failure among the thugs sent out to enforce collection or deliver punishment — not the problem of these men, now, was it?

Bereft of all burdens, blessed with exquisite freedom, Scorch and Leff were here, in this soon-to-be-opulent estate that was even now rising from the dust of neglect and decay to enshroud like a cloak of jewels the mysterious arrival of a nobleborn — a woman, it was rumoured, all veiled, but see the eyes! Eyes of such beauty! Why, imagine them widening as I reach down-

— Scorch and Leff, edging in nervously, barely emerging from the shadow of the arched gate. Peering round, as if lost, as if moments from running off with stolen chunks of masonry or an armload of bricks or even a bag of iron wedges-

‘Ho — you two! What do you want here?’

Starting guiltily. Scorch staring wide-eyed at the grizzled foreman walking up to them — a Gadrobi so bowlegged he looked to be wading hip-deep through mud. Leff ducking his head as if instinctively dodging an axe — which said a lot about his life thus far, didn’t it — and then stepping one small pace forward and attempting a smile that fared so poorly it could not even be described as a grimace.

‘Is there a castellan we could talk to?’ Leff asked.

‘About what?’

‘Gate guards,’ Leff said. ‘We got lots of qualifications.’

‘Oh. Any of them relevant?’

‘What?’

Leff looked at Scorch and saw the panic spreading like a wildfire on his friend’s face. A match to his own growing dismay — madness, thinking they could just step up another rung on the ladder. Madness! ‘We. . we could walk her dogs, I mean?’

‘You could? I suppose you could, if the Mistress had any.’

‘Does she?’ Leff asked.

‘Does she what?’

‘Have any. Dogs we could walk.’

‘Not even ones you can’t walk.’

‘We can guard the gate!’ Scorch shouted. ‘That’s what we’re here for! To get hired on, you see, as estate guards. And if you don’t think we can swing a sword or use a crossbow, why, you don’t know us at all, do you?’

‘No, you’re right,’ the foreman replied. ‘I don’t.’

Leff scowled. ‘You don’t what?’

‘Stay here,’ the old man said, turning away, ‘while I get Castellan Studlock.’

As the foreman waded away through the dust — watched with longing by the ox beside the rubble heap — Leff turned on Scorch. ‘Studlock?’

Scorch shrugged helplessly. ‘I ain’t never heard of him. Why, have you?’

‘No. Of course not. I’d have remembered.’

‘Why?’

‘Why? Are you a Hood-damned idiot?’

‘What are we doing here, Leff?’

‘Torvald said no, remember? To everything. He’s too good for us now. So we’ll show him. We’ll get hired on this fancy estate. As guards. With uniforms and polished buckles and those braided peace-straps for our swords. And so he’ll curse himself that he didn’t want us no more, as partners or anything. It’s his wife, I bet — she never liked us at all, especially you, Scorch, so that’s what you’ve done to us and I won’t forget any time soon neither so don’t even think otherwise.’

He shut his mouth then and stood at attention since the foreman was returning and at his side pitter-pattered a figure so wrapped up in swaddles of cotton it took three steps for every pendulum pitch forward from the foreman. The feet beneath the ragged hem were small enough to be cloven hoofs. A hood covered thecastellan’s head and in the shadow of the hood’s broad mouth there was some shy;thing that might have been a mask. Gloved hands were drawn up in a way that reminded Leff — and, a moment later, Scorch — of a praying mantis, and if this was the estate castellan then someone had knocked the world askew in ways unimag shy;inable to either Leff or Scorch.

The foreman said, ‘Here they are, sir.’

Were there eyes in the holes of that smooth mask? Who could tell? But the head shifted and something told both men — like spider legs dancing up their spines — that they were under scrutiny.

‘So true,’ Castellan Studlock said in a voice that made Leff think of gravel under the fingernails while Scorch thought about the way there was always one gull that bullied all the rest and if the others just ganged up, why, equality and freedom would belong to everyone! ‘So true,’ said the swaddled, masked man (or woman, but then the foreman had said ‘sir’, hadn’t he), ‘there is need for estate guards. The Mistress will be arriving today, in fact, from the out-country. Proper presentation is desired.’ The castellan paused and then leaned forward from the waist and Leff saw the red glint of unhuman eyes in the holes of the mask. ‘You, what is your name?’

‘Leff Bahan, sir, is my name.’

‘You have been eating raw lake conch?’

‘What? Er, not recently.’

A wrapped finger darted upward and wagged slowly back and forth. ‘Risky. Please, open your mouth and stick out your tongue.’

‘What? Er, like this?’

‘That is fine, very fine, yes. So.’ The castellan leaned back. ‘Greva worms. You are infected. Pustules on your tongue. Dripping sinuses, yes? Itchy eyelids — the eggs do that, and when they hatch, why, the worms will crawl out from the corners of your eyes. Raw lake conch, tsk tsk.’

Leff clawed at his face. ‘Gods, I need a healer! I gotta go-’

‘No need. I will happily see your ailment treated — you must be presentable to the Mistress, yes, each standing at attention on either side of the gate. Well attired, hale of complexion and parasite-free. A small barracks is being readied. It will be necessary to hire at least three more to complete the requirements — do you have reliable friends capable of such work?’

‘Er,’ said Scorch when it was obvious that Leff had momentarily lost his facility for speech, ‘we might. I could go and see. .’

‘Excellent, and your name is?’

‘Scorch. Er, we got references-’

‘No need. I am confident in my ability to judge character, and I have concluded that you two, while not to be considered vast of intellect, are nevertheless inclined to loyalty. This here will mark an advancement in your careers, I am sure, and so you will be diligent as befits your secret suspicion that you have exceeded your competence. All this is well. Also, I am pleased to note that you do not possess any parasites of a debilitating, unsightly sort. So, Scorch, go yonder and find us one, two or three additional guards. In the meantime, I will attend to Leff Bahan.’

‘Right. Yes sir, I will do just that!’

The foreman was standing nearby, smirking. Neither Scorch nor a stunned Leff noticed this detail, and yes, they should have.

‘A woman needs her secrets,’ said Tiserra, lifting up an eggshell-thin porcelain cup and holding it in front of the bright sunlight. ‘This one is good, darling. No flaws.’ And the hag in the stall grinned, head bobbing.

Torvald Nom nodded happily, then licked his lips. ‘Isn’t this fun?’ he said. ‘Fine crockery to go into our new kitchen and the fancy oven on its four legs and all. Real drapes. Plush furniture, colourful rugs. We can get the storage shed rebuilt, too. Bigger, solid-’

Tiserra set the cup down and moved directly in front of him. ‘Husband.’

‘Yes?’

‘You’re trying too hard.’

‘I am? Well, it’s like a dream, you see, being able to come back home. Do all these things for you, for us. It still doesn’t feel real.’

‘Oh, that’s not the problem,’ she said. ‘You are already getting bored, Torvald Nom. You need more than just tagging along at my side. And the coin won’t last for ever — Beru knows I don’t make enough for the both of us.’

‘You’re saying I need to get a job.’

‘I will tell you a secret — just one, and keep in mind what I said earlier: we women have many secrets. I’m feeling generous today, so listen well. A woman is well pleased with a mate. He is her island, if you will, solid, secure. But sometimes she likes to swim offshore, out a way, floating facing the sun if you will. And she might even dive from sight, down to collect pretty shells and the like. And when she’s done, why, she’ll swim back to the island. The point is, husband, she doesn’t want her mate’s company when swimming. She needs only to know the island waits there.’

Torvald blinked, then frowned. ‘You’re telling me to get lost.’

‘Leave me my traipsing through the market, darling. No doubt you have manly tasks to pursue, perhaps at a nearby tavern. I’ll see you at home this evening.’

‘If that’s how you want it, then of course I will leave you to it, sweetness — and yes, I could do with a wander. A man has secrets, too!’

‘Indeed.’ And she smiled. ‘Provided they’re not the kind that, if I find out, I will have to hunt you down and kill you.’

He blanched. ‘No, of course not! Nothing like that!’

‘Good. See you later, then.’

And, being a brave man, a contented man (more or less), Torvald Nom happily fled his wife, as brave, contented men are wont to do the world over. Need to plough that field behind the windbreak, love. Going to head out now and drop the nets. Better sand down that tabletop. Time to go out and rob somebody, sweetness. Yes, men did as they did, just as women did as they did — mysterious and inexplicable as those doings might be.

And, so thinking, it was not long before Torvald Nom found himself walking into the Phoenix Inn. A man looking for work in all the wrong places.

Scorch arrived a short time later, pride and panic warring in his face, and my, how that pride blazed as he strutted up to where Torvald Nom was sitting.

Back at the estate Castellan Studlock brought Leff into an annexe to one side of the main building, where after some rummaging in crates stuffed with straw the muffled figure found a small glass bottle and presented it to Leff.

‘Two drops into each eye. Two more on to the tongue. Repeat two more times today and three times a day until the bottle is empty.’

‘That will kill them worms in my head?’

‘The Greva worms, yes. I cannot vouch for any others.’

‘I got more worms in my head?’

‘Who can say? Do your thoughts squirm?’

‘Sometimes! Gods below!’

‘Two possibilities,’ Studlock said. ‘Suspicion worms or guilt worms.’

Leff scowled. ‘You saying it’s worms cause those things? Guilt and suspicion? I ain’t never heard anything like that.’

‘Are you sometimes gnawed with doubt? Do notions take root in your mind? Do strange ideas slither into your head? Are you unaccountably frightened at the sight of a fisher’s barbed hook?’

‘Are you some kind of healer?’

‘I am what one needs me to be. Now, let us find you a uniform.’

Torvald Nom was rehearsing what he would tell his wife. Carefully weighing each word, trying out in his mind the necessary nonchalance required to deftly avoid certain details of his newfound employment.

‘It’s great that we’re all working together again,’ Scorch said, ambling happily at his side. ‘As estate guards, no less! No more strong-arm work for smelly criminals. No more hunting down losers to please some vicious piranha. No more-’

‘Did this castellan mention the wages?’

‘Huh? No, but it’s bound to be good. Must be. It’s demanding work-’

‘Scorch, it may be lots of things, but “demanding” isn’t one of them. We’re there to keep thieves out. And since all three of us have been thieves ourselves at one time or another, we should be pretty damned good at it. We’d better be, or we’ll get fired.’

‘We need two more people. He wanted three more and all I got was you. So, two more. Can you think of anybody?’

‘No. What family?’

‘What?’

‘This Mistress — what House does she belong to?’

‘Don’t know.’

‘What’s her name?’

‘No idea.’

‘She’s from the countryside?’

‘Think so.’

‘Well, has any noble died recently that might have pulled her in? Inheritance, I mean?’

‘How should I know? You think I bother keeping track of who’s dead in that crowd? They ain’t nothing to me, is my point.’

‘We should’ve asked Kruppe — he’d know.’

‘Well we didn’t and it don’t matter at all. We got us legitimate work, the three of us. We’re on our way to being, well, legitimate. So just stop questioning everything, Tor! You’re going to ruin it!’

‘How can a few reasonable questions ruin anything?’

‘It just makes me nervous,’ Scorch replied. ‘Oh, by the way, you can’t see the castellan.’

‘Why? Who else would I talk to about getting hired?’

‘No, that’s not what I mean. I mean you can’t see him. All wrapped up in rags. With a hood, and gloves, and a mask. That’s what I mean. His name is Studlock.’

‘You can’t be serious.’

‘Why not? That’s his name.’

‘The castellan is bundled like a corpse and you don’t find that somewhat un shy;usual?’

‘Could be afraid of the sun or something. No reason to be suspicious. You never met any strange people in your day, Tor?’

And Torvald Nom glanced across at Scorch, and found he had no reply to that at all.

‘I see you have found another candidate,’ Studlock said. ‘Excellent. And yes, he will do nicely. Perhaps as the Captain of the House Guard?’

Torvald started. ‘I haven’t said a word yet and already I’m promoted?’

‘Comparative exercise yields confidence in this assessment. Your name is?’

‘Torvald Nom.’

‘Of House Nom. Might this not prove a conflict of interest?’

‘Might it? Why?’

‘The Mistress is about to assume the vacant seat on the Council.’

‘Oh. Well, I have virtually no standing in the affairs of House Nom. There are scores of us in the city, of course, with ties stretching everywhere, including off-continent. I, however, am not involved in any of that.’

‘Were you cast out?’

‘No, nothing so, er, extreme. It was more a question of. . interests.’

‘You lack ambition.’

‘Precisely.’

‘That is a fine manicure, Torvald Nom.’

‘Er, thank you. I could recommend. .’ but that notion dwindled into a painful silence and Torvald tried hard to not glance down at the castellan’s bandaged fingers.

At this moment Leff appeared from round the other side of the main house. His lips and his eyes were bright orange,

Scorch grunted. ‘Hey, Leff. Remember that cat you sat on in that bar once?’

‘What of it?’

‘Nothing. Was just reminded, the way its eyes went all bulgy and crazed,’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘Nothing. Was just reminded, is all. Look, I brought Tor.’

‘I see that,’ snarled Leff. ‘I can see just fine, thank you.’

‘What’s wrong with your eyes?’ Torvald Nom asked.

‘Tincture,’ said Leff. ‘I got me a case of Greva worms.’

Torvald Nom frowned. ‘Humans can’t get Greva worms. Fish get Greva worms, from eating infected conch.’

Leff’s bulging orange eyes bulged even more. Then he spun to face the castellan.

Who shrugged and said, ‘Jurben worms?’

Torvald Nom snorted. ‘The ones that live in the caverns below? In pockets of green gas? They’re as long as a man’s leg and nearly as thick.’

The castellan sighed. ‘The spectre of misdiagnosis haunts us all. I do apologize, Leff. Perhaps your ailments are due to some other malady. No matter, the drops will wash out in a month or two.’

‘I’m gonna have squished cat eyes for another month?’

‘Preferable to Greva worms, I should think. Now, gentlemen, let us find the house clothier. Something black and brocaded in gold thread, I should imagine. House colours and all that. And then, a brief summary of your duties, shifts, days off and the like.’

‘Would that summary include wages?’ Torvald Nom asked.

‘Naturally. As captain you will be paid twenty silver councils per week, Tor shy;vald Nom. Scorch and Leff, as guards, at fifteen. Acceptable?’

All three quickly nodded.

He felt slightly shaky on his feet, but Murillio knew that had nothing to do with any residue of weakness left by his wound. This weakness belonged to his spirit. As if age had sprung on to his back with claws digging into every joint and now hung there, growing heavier by the moment. He walked hunched at the shoulders and this seemed to have arrived like a new habit, or perhaps it was always there and only now, in his extremity, had he become aware of it.

That drunken pup’s sword thrust had pierced something vital indeed, and no Malazan healer or any other kind of healer could mend it.

He tried forcing confidence into his stride as he made his way down the crowded street, but it was not an easy task. Half drunk. Breeches at my ankles. Worthwhile excuses for what happened that night. The widow Sepharla spitting venom once she sobered up enough to realize what had happened, and spitting it still, it seems. What had happened, yes. With her daughter. Oh, not rape — too much triumph in the girl’s eyes for that, though her face glowed with delight at her escort’s charge to defend her honour. Once the shock wore off. I should never have gone back to explain-

But that was yesterday’s nightmare, all those sparks raining down on the do shy;mestic scene with its airs of concern, every cagey word painting over the cracks in savage, short jabs of the brush. What had he expected? What had he gone there to find? Reassurance?

Maybe. I guess I arrived with my own brush.

Years ago, he would have smoothed everything over, almost effortlessly. A murmur here, a meeting of gazes there. Soft touch with one hand, the barest hint of pressure. Then again, years ago, it would never have happened in the first place. That drunken fool!

Oh, he’d growled those three words often in his head. But did they refer to the young man with the sword, or to himself?

Arriving at the large duelling school, he made his way through the open gate and emerged into the bright sunlight of the training ground. A score of young, sweating, overweight students scraped about in the dust, wooden weapons clattering. Most, he saw at once, lacked the necessary aggression, the killer’s instinct. They danced to avoid, prodding the stick points forward with a desultory lack of commitment. Their footwork, he saw, was abysmal.

The class instructor was standing in the shade of a column in the colonnaded corridor just beyond. She was not even observing the mayhem in the compound, intent, it seemed, on some loose stitching or tear in one of her leather gauntlets.

Making his way along one side of the mob getting lost in clouds of white dust, Murillio approached the instructor. She noted him briefly then returned her attention to the gauntlet.

‘Excuse me,’ Murillio said as he arrived. ‘Are you the duelling mistress?’

‘I am.’ She nodded without looking at the students, where a couple, of fights had started for real. ‘How am I doing so far?’

Murillio glanced over and studied the fracas for a moment. ‘That depends,’ he said.

She grunted. ‘Good answer. What can I do for you? Do you have some grandson or daughter you want thrown in there? Your clothes were expensive. . once. As it looks, I doubt you can afford this school, unless of course you’re one of those stinking rich who make a point of dressing all threadbare. Old money and all that.’

‘Quite a sales pitch,’ Murillio observed. ‘Does it actually work?’

‘Classes are full. There’s a waiting list.’

‘I was wondering if you need help. With basic instruction.’

‘What school trained you then?’

‘Carpala.’

She snorted. ‘He took one student every three years.’

‘Yes.’

And now she looked at him with an intensity he’d not seen before. ‘Last I heard, there were seven students of his left in the city.’

‘Five, actually. Fedel tumbled down a flight of stairs and broke his neck. He was drunk. Santbala-’

‘Was stabbed through the heart by Gorlas Vidikas — the brat’s first serious victory.’

Murillio grimaced. ‘Not much of a duel. Santbala had gone mostly blind but was too proud to admit it. A cut on the wrist would have given Gorlas his triumph.’

‘The young ones prefer killing to wounding.’

‘It’s what duelling has come to, yes. Fortunately, most of your students here are more likely to stab themselves than any opponent they might one day face, and such wounds are rarely fatal.’

‘Your name?’

‘Murillio.’

She nodded as if she’d already guessed. ‘And you’re here because you want to teach. If you’d taken up teaching when Carpala was still alive-’

‘He would have hunted me down and killed me, yes. He despised schools, in fact, he despised duelling. He once said teaching the rapier was like putting a poisonous snake into a child’s hand. He drew no pleasure from instruction and was not at all surprised when very nearly every one of his prize students either got themselves killed or wasted away as drunkards or worse.’

‘You did neither.’

‘No, that’s true. I chased women.’

‘Only now they’re too fast for you?’

‘Something like that.’

‘I am Stonny Menackis. This school exists to make me rich, and yes, it’s working. Tell me, will you be sharing your old master’s hatred of teaching?’

‘Not as vehemently, I imagine. I don’t expect to take any pleasure in it, but I will do what’s needed.’

‘Footwork.’

He nodded. ‘Footwork. The art of running away. And forms, the defensive cage, since that will keep them alive. Stop-hits to the wrist, knee, foot.’

‘Non-lethal.’

‘Yes.’

She sighed and straightened. ‘All right. Assuming I can afford you.’

‘I’m sure you can.’

She shot him a quizzical glance, and then added, ‘Don’t think about chasing me, by the way.’

‘I am finished with all that, or, rather, it’s finished with me.’

‘Good-’

At this moment they both noticed that an old woman had come up to them.

Stonny’s voice was suddenly. . different, as she said, ‘Myrla. What are you doing here?’

‘I’ve been looking for Gruntle-’

‘That fool went off with the Trygalle — I warned him and now he’s going to get himself killed for no good reason!’

‘Oh. It’s Harllo, you see. .’

‘What about him?’

The woman was flinching at everything Stonny said and Murillio suspected he would have done the same in the face of such a tone. ‘He’s gone missing.’

‘What? For how long?’

‘Snell said he saw him, two days back. Down at the docks. He’s never not come home at day’s end — he’s only five-’

‘Two days!’

Murillio saw that Stonny’s face had gone white as death and a sudden terror was growing in her eyes. ‘Two days!’

‘Snell says-’

‘You stupid woman — Snell is a liar! A damned thief!’

Myrla stepped back under the onslaught. ‘He gave us the coin you brought-’

‘After I nearly had to strangle him, yes! What’s Snell done to Harllo? What’s he done?’

Myrla was weeping now, wringing her arthritic hands. ‘Said he done nothing, Stonny-’

‘A moment,’ cut in Murillio, physically stepping between the two women as he saw Stonny about to move forward, gloved hand lifting. ‘A child’s gone missing? I can put out the word — I know all sorts of people. Please, we can do this logically — down at the docks, you said? We’ll need to find out which ships left harbour in the last two days — the trading season’s only just starting, so there shouldn’t be many. His name is Harllo, and he’s five years old-’ Gods below, you send him out into the streets and he’s only five? ‘Can you give me a description? Hair, eyes, the like.’

Myrla was nodding, even as tears streamed down her lined cheeks and her entire body trembled. She nodded and kept on nodding.

Stonny spun round and rushed away, boots echoing harshly down the corridor.

Murillio stared after her in astonishment. ‘Where — what?’

‘It’s her son, you see,’ said Myrla between sobs. ‘Her only son, only she don’t want him and so he’s with us but Snell he has bad thoughts and does bad things sometimes only not this, never this bad, he wouldn’t do anything this bad to Harllo, he wouldn’t!’

‘We’ll find him,’ said Murillio. One way or the other, Lady’s pull bless us, and bless the lad. ‘Now, please, describe him and describe him well — what he normally does each day — I need to know that, too. Everything you can tell me, Myrla. Everything.’

Snell understood, in a dim but accurate way, how others, wishing only the best in him, could have their faith abused at will, and even should some truth be dragged into the light, well, it was then a matter of displaying crushed self-pity, and the great defender would take him into her arms — as mothers do.

Can we hope that on rare occasions, perhaps late at night when the terrors crept close, he would think about how things he’d done could damage his mother’s faith, and not just in him, but in herself as well? The son, after all, is but an extension of the mother — at least so the mother believed, there in some inarticulate part of her soul, unseen yet solid as an iron chain. Assail the child and so too the mother is assailed, for what is challenged is her life as a mother, the lessons she taught or didn’t teach, the things she chose not to see, to explain away, to pretend were otherwise than what they were.

Weep for the mother. Snell won’t and he never would, saving all his future to weep exclusively for himself. The creeping terrors awakened startling glimmers of thought, of near-empathy, but they never went so far as to lead to any self recognition, or compassion for the mother who loved him unconditionally. His nature was the kind that took whatever was given to him as if it was a birthright, all of it, for ever and ever more.

Rage at injustice came when something — anything — was withheld. Things he righteously deserved, and of course he deserved everything he wanted. All that he wanted he reached for, and oh such fury if those things eluded his grasp or were then taken away!

In the absence of what might be imposed, a child will fashion the structure of the world as it suits itself. Created from a mind barely awake — and clearly not even that when it came to introspection — that world becomes a strange place in shy;deed. But let us not rail at the failings of nearby adults tied by blood or whatever, Some children are born in a cage — it’s already there, in their skulls — and it’s a dark cage.

He was wandering the streets, fleeing all the cruel questions being flung at him. They had no right to accuse him like that. Oh, when he was all grown up, nobody would be allowed to get after him like this. He’d break their faces. He’d step on their heads. He’d make them afraid, every one of them, so he could go on doing whatever he liked. He couldn’t wait to get older and that was the truth.

And yet, he found himself heading for Two-Ox Gate. He needed to know, after all. Was Harllo still lying there? He hadn’t hit him so hard, had he? Enough to kill him? Only if Harllo had been born weak, only if something was wrong with him from the start. And that wouldn’t be a surprise, would it? Harllo’s own mother had thrown him away, after all. So, if Harllo was lying dead in the grasses on that hilltop, why, it wasn’t Snell’s fault, was it? Something would have killed him sooner or later.

So that was a relief, but he’d better go and find out for sure. What if Harllo hadn’t died at all? What if he was out there somewhere, planning murder? He could be spying on Snell right now! — With a knife he’d found, or a knotted stick. Quick, cunning, able to dart out of sight no matter how fast Snell spun round on the street — he was out there! Waiting, stalking.

Snell needed to prove things, and that was why he was running through Maiten, where the stink of Brownrun Bay and the lepers was nearly enough to make him retch — and hah! Listen to them scream when struck by the bigger stones he threw at them! He was tempted to tarry for a time, to find one of the uglier ones he could stone again and again until the cries just went away, and wouldn’t that be a mercy? Better than rotting away.

But no, not yet, maybe on the way back, after he’d stood for a time, looking down at the flyblown corpse of Harllo — that would be the perfect conclusion to this day, after all. His problems solved. Nobody hunting him in the shadows. He’d throw stones fast and hard then, a human catapult — smack! Crush the flimsy skull!

Maybe he wasn’t grown up yet, but he could still do things. He could take lives.

He left the road, made his way up the hill. This was the place all right — how could he forget? Every detail was burned into his brain. The first giant tapestry in the history of Snell. Slaying his evil rival, and see the dragons wheeling in the sky above the lake — witnesses!

The slope unaccountably tired him, brought a tremble to his legs, just nervousness, of course. His shins stung as he rushed through the grasses, and came to the place.

No body.

Sudden terror. Snell looked round, on all sides — he was out there! Wasn’t hurt at all! He’d probably faked the whole thing, biting down on his pain with every kick. Hiding, yes, just to get Snell in trouble and when Gruntle came back there’d be Hood to pay! Gruntle who made Harllo his favourite because Harllo did things to help out but wasn’t it Snell who brought back that last sack of fuel? It was! Of course Gruntle wasn’t there to see that, was he? So he didn’t know anything because if he did-

If he did he’d kill me.

Cold, shivering in the lake wind, Snell ran back down the hill. He needed to get home, maybe not right home, but somewhere close — so he could jump Harllo when he showed up to tell his lies about what had happened. Lies — Snell had no bag of coins, did he? Harllo’s mother’s coins, hah, wasn’t that funny? She was rich enough anyway and Snell deserved that money as much as anyone else — he reached up and tenderly touched the swelling on his left cheek. The bitch had hit him, all to steal back the money. Well, she’d pay one day, yes, she would.

One day, yes, he’d be all grown up. And then. . look out!

It had taken the death of a once-famous duellist before people started treating Gorlas Vidikas as an adult, but now he was a man indeed, a feared one, a member of the Council. He was wealthy but not yet disgustingly rich, although that was only a matter of time.

Fools the world over worshipped gods and goddesses. But coin was the only thing worth worshipping, because to worship it was to see it grow — more and ever more — and all that he took for himself he took from someone else and this was where the real conquest happened. Day by day, deal by deal, and winning these games was proof of true faith and worship, and oh how deliciously satisfying.

Fools dropped coins into collection bowls. The rich cleaned those bowls out and this was the true division of humanity. But more than that: the rich decided how many coins the fools had to spare and how did that rate as power? Which side was preferable? As if the question needed asking.

Coin purchased power, like a god blessing the devout, but of both power and wealth there could never be enough. As for the victims, well, there could never be enough of them either. Someone was needed to clean the streets of the Estate Dis shy;trict. Someone was needed to wash clothes, bedding and the like. Someone was needed to make the damned things in the first place! And someone was needed to fight the wars when the rich decided they wanted still more of whatever was out there.

Gorlas Vidikas, born to wealth and bred to title, found life to be good. But it could be better still and the steps to improvement were simple enough.

‘Darling wife,’ he now said as she was rising to leave, ‘I must take a trip and will not return until tomorrow or even the day after.’

She paused, watching in a distracted way as the servants closed in to collect the dishes from the late breakfast — calloused hands darting in like featherless birds — and said, ‘Oh?’

‘Yes. I have been granted the overseer title of an operation out of the city, and I must visit the workings. Thereafter, I must take ship to Gredfallan Annexe to finalize a contract.’

‘Very well, husband.’

‘There was no advance notice of any of this,’ Gorlas added, ‘and, alas, I had ex shy;tended invitations to both Shardan and Hanut to dine with us this evening.’ He paused to smile at her. ‘I leave them in your capable hands — please do extend my apologies.’

She was staring down at him in a somewhat disconcerting way. ‘You wish me to host your two friends tonight?’

‘Of course.’

‘I see.’

And perhaps she did at that — yet was she railing at him? No. And was there perhaps the flush of excitement on her cheeks now? But she was turning away so he could not be sure. And walking, hips swaying in that admirable way of hers, right out of the room.

And there, what was done. . was done.

He rose and gestured to his manservant. ‘Make ready the carriage, I am leaving immediately.’

Head bobbing, the man hurried off.

Someone was needed to groom the horses, to check the tack, to keep the carriage clean and the brakes in working order. Someone was needed to ensure he had all he needed in the travel trunks. And, as it happened, someone was needed for other things besides. Like spreading the legs as a reward for past favours, and as a future debt when it was time to turn everything round.

They could take his wife. He would take them, one day — everything they owned, everything they dreamed of owning. After tonight, he would own one of them or both of them — both for certain in the weeks to come. Which one would produce Gorlas’s heir? He didn’t care — Challice’s getting pregnant would get his parents off his back at the very least, and might well add the reward of satisfying her — and so wiping that faint misery from her face and bringing an end to all those irritating sighs and longing faraway looks out of the windows.

Besides, she worshipped money too. Hood knew she spent enough of it, on pre shy;cious trinkets and useless indulgences. Give her a child and then three or four more and she’d be no further trouble and content besides.

Sacrifices needed to be made. So make it, wife, and who knows, you might even be smiling when it’s done with.

A bell and a half later the Vidikas carriage was finally clearing Two-Ox Gate and the horses picked up their pace as the road opened out, cutting through the misery of Maiten (and where else should the lost and the hopeless go but outside the city walls?) which Gorlas suffered with closed shutters and a scent ball held to his nose.

When he ruled he’d order a massive pit dug out on the Dwelling Plain and they would drag all these wasted creatures out there and bury the lot of them. It was simple enough — can’t pay for a healer and that’s just too bad, but look, we won’t charge for the burial.

Luxuriating in such thoughts, and other civic improvements, Gorlas dozed as the carriage rumbled onward.

Challice stood alone in her private chambers, staring at the hemisphere of glass with its trapped moon. What would she lose? Her reputation. Or, rather, that reputation would change. Hanut grinning, Shardan strutting in that knowing way of his, making sure his secret oozed from every pore so that it was anything but a secret. Other men would come to her, expecting pretty much the same. And maybe, by then, there would be no stopping her. And maybe, before too long, she’d find one man who decided that what he felt was love, and she would then begin to unveil her plan — the only plan she had and it certainly made sense. Eminently logical, even reasonable. Justifiable.

Sometimes the beast on its chain turns on its master. Sometimes it goes for his throat, and sometimes it gets there.

But it would take time. Neither Shardan Lim nor Hanut Orr would do — both needed Gorlas even though their triumvirate was a partnership of convenience. Any one of them would turn on the other if the situation presented itself — but not yet, not for a long while, she suspected.

Could she do this?

What is my life? Here, look around — what is it? She had no answer to that question. She was like a jeweller blind to the notion of value. Shiny or dull, it didn’t matter. Rare or abundant, the only difference lay in desire and how could one weigh that, when the need behind it was the same? The same, yes, in all its sordid hunger.

She could reduce all her needs to but one. She could do that. She would have to, to stomach what was to come.

She felt cold, could see the purple tracks through the pallid white skin of her arms as her blood flowed turgidly on. She needed to walk in sunlight, to feel the heat, and know that people would look upon her as she passed — on her fine cape of ermine with its borders of black silk sewn with silvered thread) on the bracelets on her wrists and down at her ankles — too much jewellery invited the thief’s snatch shy;ing hand, after all, and was crass besides. And her long hair would glisten with its scented oils, and there would be a certain look in her eyes, lazy, satiated, seduc shy;tively sealed away so that it seemed she took notice of nothing and no one, and this was, she well knew, a most enticing look in what were still beautiful eyes-

She found herself looking into them, there in the mirror, still clear even after half a carafe of wine at breakfast and then the pipe of rustleaf afterwards, and she had a sudden sense that the next time she stood thus, the face staring back at her would belong to someone else, another woman wearing her skin, her face. A stranger far more knowing, far wiser in the world’s dismal ways than this one before her now.

Was she looking forward to making her acquaintance?

It was possible.

The day beckoned and she turned away — before she saw too much of the woman she was leaving behind — and set about dressing for the city.

‘So, you’re the historian who survived the Chain of Dogs.’

The old man sitting at the table looked up and frowned. ‘Actually, I didn’t.’

‘Oh,’ said Scillara, settling down into the chair opposite him — her body felt strange today, as if even fat could be weightless. Granted, she wasn’t getting any heavier, but her bones were wearing plenty and there was a sense of fullness, of roundness, and for some reason all of this was making her feel sexually charged, very nearly brimming over with a slow, sultry indolence. She drew out her pipe and eyed the Malazan opposite. ‘Well, I’m sorry to hear that.’

‘It’s a long story,’ he said.

‘Which you’re relating to that ponytailed bard.’

He grunted. ‘So much for privacy.’

‘Sounds to be a good thing, getting it all out. When he found out I was in Sha’ik’s camp in Raraku, he thought to cajole details out of me. But I was barely conscious most of that time, so I wasn’t much help. I told him about Heboric, though.’

And Duiker slowly straightened, a sudden glint in his eyes burning away all the sadness, all the weariness. ‘Heboric?’

Scillara smiled. ‘Fisher said you might be interested in that.’

‘I am. Or,’ he hesitated, ‘I think I am.’

‘He died, I’m afraid. But I will tell you of it, if you’d like. From the night we fled Sha’ik.’

The light had dimmed in Duiker’s eyes and he looked away. ‘Hood seems determined to leave me the last one standing. All my friends. .’

‘Old friends, maybe,’ she said, pulling flame into the bowl. ‘Plenty of room for new ones.’

‘That’s a bitter consolation.’

‘We need to walk, I think.’

‘I’m not in the mood-’

‘But I am and Barathol is gone and your partners are upstairs chewing on conspiracies. Chaur is in the kitchen eating everything in sight and Blend’s fallen in love with me and sure, that’s amusing and even enjoyable for a time, but for me it’s not the real thing. Only she’s not listening. Anyway, I want an escort and you’re elected.’

‘Really, Scillara-’

‘Being old doesn’t mean you can be rude. I want you to take me to the Phoenix Inn.’

He stared at her for a long moment.

She drew hard on her pipe, swelled her lungs to thrust her ample breasts out and saw how his gaze dropped a fraction or two. ‘I’m looking to embarrass a friend, you see,’ she said, then released the lungful of smoke towards the black-stained rafters.

‘Well,’ he sourly drawled, ‘in that case. .’

‘Rallick’s furious,’ Cutter said as he sat down, reaching for the brick of cheese to break off a sizeable chunk which he held in his left hand, an apple in his right. A bite from the apple was quickly followed by one from the cheese.

‘Kruppe commiserates. Tragedy of destiny, when destiny is that which one chooses given what one is given. Dear Cutter might have retained original name had he elected a life in, say, Murillio’s shadow. Alas, Cutter in name is cutter in deed.’

Cutter swallowed and said, ‘Hold on. I wasn’t making a point of walking in Rallick’s shadow. Not anybody’s shadow — in fact, the whole idea of “shadow” makes me sick. If one god out there has truly cursed me, it’s Shadowthrone.’

‘Shifty Shadowthrone, he of the sourceless shade, a most conniving, dastardly god indeed! Chill is his shadow, cruel and uncomfortable is his throne, horrid his Hounds, tangled his Rope, sweet and seductive his innocent servants! But!’ And Kruppe held aloft one plump finger. ‘Cutter would not speak of walking in shadows, why, not anyone’s! Even one which sways most swayingly, that cleaves most cleavingly, that flutters in fluttering eyelashes framing depthless dark eyes that are not eyes at all, but pools of unfathomable depth — and is she sorry? By Ap shy;salar she is not!’

‘I hate you sometimes,’ Cutter said in a grumble, eyes on the table, cheese and apple temporarily forgotten in his hands.

‘Poor Cutter. See his heart carved loose from yon chest, flopping down like so much bloodied meat on this tabletop. Kruppe sighs and sighs again in the deep of sympathy and extends, yes, this warm cloak of companionship against the cold harsh light of truth this day and on every other day! Now, kindly pour us more of this herbal concoction which, whilst tasting somewhat reminiscent of the straw and mud used to make bricks, is assured by Meese to aid in all matters of digestion, including bad news.’

Cutter poured, and then took another two bites, apple and cheese. He chewed for a time, then scowled. ‘What bad news?’

‘That which is yet to arrive, of course. Will honey aid this digestive aid? Pro shy;bably not. It will, one suspects, curdle and recoil. Why in it, Kruppe wonders, that those who claim all healthy amends via rank brews, gritty grey repast of the raw and unrefined, and unpalatable potions, and this amidst a regime of activities in shy;vented solely to erode bone and wear out muscle — all these purveyors of the pure and good life are revealed one and all as wan, parched well nigh bloodless, with vast fists bobbing up and down in the throat and watery eyes savage in righteous smugitude, walking like energized storks and urinating water pure enough to drink all over again? And pass if you please to dear beatific Kruppe, then, that last pastry squatting forlorn and alone on yon pewter plate.’

Cutter blinked. ‘Sorry. Pass what?’

‘Pastry, dear lad! Sweet pleasures to confound the pious worshippers of suffer shy;ing! How many lives do each of us have, Kruppe wonders rhetorically, to so constrain this one with desultory disciplines so efficacious that Hood himself must bend over convulsed in laughter? This evening, dear friend of Kruppe, you and I will walk the cemetery and wager which buried bones belong to the healthy ones and which to the wild cavorting headlong maniacs who danced bright with smiles each and every day!’

‘The healthy bones would be the ones left by old people, I’d wager.’

‘No doubt no doubt, friend Cutter, a most stolid truth. Why, Kruppe daily encounters ancient folk and delights in their wide smiles and cheery well-mets.’

‘They’re not all miserable, Kruppe.’

‘True, here and there totters a wide-eyed one, wide-eyed because a life of raucous abandon is behind one and the fool went and survived it all! Now what, this creature wonders? Why am I not dead? And you, with your three paltry decades of pristine boredom, why don’t you just go somewhere and die!’

‘Are you being hounded by the aged, Kruppe?’

‘Worse. Dear Murillio moans crabby and toothless and now ponders a life of inactivity. Promise Kruppe this, dear Cutter — when you see this beaming paragon here before you falter, dribble at the mouth, mutter at the clouds, wheeze and fart and trickle and all the rest, do bundle Kruppe up tight in some thick impervious sack of burlap, find a nearby cliff and send him sailing out! Through the air! Down on to the thrashing seas and crashing rocks and filmy foams — Kruppe implores you! And listen, whilst you do so, friend Cutter, sing and laugh, spit into my wake! Do you so promise?’

‘If I’m around, Kruppe, I’ll do precisely as you ask.’

‘Kruppe is relieved, so relieved. Aaii, last pastry revolts in nether gut — more of this tea, then, to yield the bitumen belch of tasteless misery on earth. And then, shortly anon, it will be time for lunch! And see who enters, why, none other than Murillio, newly employed and flush and so eager with generosity!’

Iskaral Pust’s love was pure and perfect, except that his wife kept getting in the way. When he leaned left she leaned right; when he leaned right she leaned left. When he stretched his neck she stretched hers and all he could see was the mangled net of her tangled hair and beneath that those steely black eyes too knowing for her own good and for his, too, come to that.

‘The foolish hag,’ he muttered. ‘Can’t she see I’m leaning this way and that and bobbing up and down only because I feel like it and not because the High Priestess is over there amply presenting her deliciously ample backside — know shy;ing well, yes she does, how I squirm and drool, pant and palpitate, the temptress, the wilful vixen! But no! Every angle and this horrid nemesis heaves into view, damning my eyes! Maybe I can cleverly send her off on an errand, now there’s an idea.’ He smiled and leaned forward, all the armour of his charm trembling and creaking in the face of the onslaught of her baleful stare. ‘Sweet raisin crumpet, the mule needs grooming and tender care in the temple stables.’

‘Does it now?’

‘Yes. And since you’re clearly not busy with anything at the moment, you could instead do something useful.’

‘But I am doing something useful, dearest husband.’

‘Oh, and what’s that, tender trollop?’

‘Why, I am sacrificing my time to keep you from making a bigger fool of yourself than is normal, which is quite a challenge, I assure you.’

‘What stupidity is she talking about? Love oyster, whatever are you talking about?’

‘She’s made her concession that you are who you claim to be. And that’s the only thing keeping her from tossing us both out on our scrawny behinds. You and me and the mule and the gibbering bhokarala — assuming she can ever manage to get them out of the cellar. I’m a witch of the spider goddess and the High Priestess back there is not at all happy about that. So I’m telling you, O rotted apple of my eye, if I let you try and jump her we’re all done for.’

‘She talks so much it’s a wonder her teeth don’t fall out. But wait! Most of them already have! Shh, don’t laugh, don’t even smile. Am I smiling? Maybe, but it’s the indulgent kind, the kind that means well or if not well then nothing at all though wives the world over, when seeing it, go into apoplectic rage for no good reason at all, the cute, loveable dearies.’ He sighed and leaned back, trying to peer under her right armpit, but the peripheral vision thing turned that into a hairy nightmare. Flinching, he sighed again and rubbed at his eyes. ‘Go on, wife, the mule is pining and your sweet face is all he longs for — to kick! Hee hee! Shh, don’t laugh! Don’t even smile!’ He looked up. ‘Delicious wrinkled date, why not take a walk, out into the sunshine in the streets? The gutters, more like, hah! The runnels of runny sewage — take a bath! Piss up one of those lampposts and not a dog in Darujhistan would dare the challenge! Hah! But this smile is the caring kind, yes, see?’

The High Priestess Sordiko Qualm cavorted up to where they sat — this woman didn’t walk, she went as much sideways as forward, a snake of seduction, an enchantress of nonchalance, gods, a man could die just watching! Was that a whimper escaping him? Of course not, more likely Mogora’s armpit coming up for air made that gasping, squelching sound.

‘I would be most pleased,’ the High Priestess said in that well-deep voice that purred like every temptation imaginable all blended into one steaming stew of invitation, ‘if you two indulged in mutual suicide.’

‘I could fake mine,’ Iskaral Pust whispered. ‘Then she’d be out of our way — I know, High Priestess of all my fantasies, I can see how you wage war against your natural desires, your blazing hunger to get your hands on me! Oh, I know I’m not as handsome as some people, but I have power!’

Sighing, Sordiko Qualm cavorted away — but no, from behind it was more a saunter. Approaching was a cavort, leaving was a saunter. ‘Sordiko Saunter Qualm Cavort, she comes and goes but never quite leaves, my love of loves, my better love than that excuse for love I once thought was real love but let’s face it love it wasn’t, not like this love. Why, this love is the big kind, the swollen kind, the towering kind, the rutting gasping pumping exploding kind! Oh, I hurt myself.’

Mogora snorted. ‘You wouldn’t know real love if it bit you in the face.’

‘Keep that armpit away from me, woman!’

‘You’ve turned this temple into a madhouse, Iskaral Pust. You turn every temple you live in into a madhouse! So here we are, contemplating mutual murder, and what does your god want from us? Why, nothing! Nothing but waiting, always waiting! Bah, I’m going shopping!’

‘At last!’ Iskaral crowed.

‘And you’re coming with me, to carry my purchases.’

‘Not a chance. Use the mule.’

‘Stand up or I’ll have my way with you right here.’

‘In the holy vestry? Are you insane?’

‘Rutting blasphemy. Will Shadowthrone be pleased?’

‘Fine! Shopping, then. Only no leash this time.’

‘Then don’t get lost.’

‘I wasn’t lost, you water buffalo, I was escaping.’

‘I’d better get the leash again.’

‘And I’ll get my knife!’

Oh, how marriage got in the way of love! The bonds of mutual contempt drawn tight until the victims squeal, but is it in pain or pleasure? Is there a difference? But that is a question not to be asked of married folk, oh no.

And in the stables the mule winks at the horse and the horse feels breakfast twisting in her gut and the flies, well, they fly from one lump of dung to another, convinced that each is different from the last, fickle creatures that they are, and there is no wisdom among the fickle, only longing and frustration, and the buzz invites the next dubious conquest smelling so fragrant in the damp straw.

Buzz buzz.

Amidst masses of granite and feverish folds of bedrock veined with glittering streaks, the mining operation owned by Humble Measure was an enormous pit facing a cliff gouged with caves and tunnels. Situated equidistant between Darujhistan and Gredfallan Annexe and linked by solid raised roads, the mine and its town-sized settlement had a population of eight hundred. Indentured workers, slaves, prisoners, work chiefs, security guards, cooks, carpenters, potters, rope makers, clothes makers and menders, charcoal makers, cutters and nurses, butchers and bakers — the enterprise seethed with activity. Smoke filled the air. Old women with bleeding hands clambered through the heaps of tailings collecting shreds of slag and low quality chunks of coal. Gulls and crows danced round these rag-clad, hunched figures.

Not a single tree was left standing anywhere within half a league of the mine. Down on a slope on the lakeside was a humped cemetery in which sat a few hundred shallow graves. The water just offshore was lifeless and stained red, with a muddy bottom bright orange in colour.

Scented cloth held to his face, Gorlas Vidikas observed the operation which he now managed, although perhaps “managed” was the wrong word. The day to day necessities were the responsibility of the camp workmaster, a scarred and pock-faced man in his fifties with decades-old scraps of raw metal still embedded in his hands. He hacked out a cough after every ten words or so, and spat thick yellow mucus down between his bronze-capped boots.

‘The young ’uns go the fastest, of course.’ Cough, spit. ‘Our moles or so we call ’em, since they can squeeze inta cracks no grown-up can get through,’ cough, spit, ‘and this way if there’s bad air it’s none of our stronger workers get killed.’ Cough. . ‘We was havin’ trouble gettin’ enough young ’uns for a time there, until we started buyin’ ’em from the poorer fam’lies both in and outa the city — they got too many runts t’feed, ye see? An’ we got special rules for the young ’uns — nobody gets their hands on ’em, if you know what I mean.

‘From them it goes on up. A miner lasts maybe five years, barring falls and the like. When they get too sick we move ’em outa the tunnels, make ’em shift captains. A few might get old enough for foreman — I was one of them, ye see. Got my hands dirty as a lad and ’ere I am and if that’s not freedom I don’t know what is, hey?’

This workmaster, Gorlas Vidikas silently predicted, would be dead inside three years. ‘Any trouble with the prisoners?’ he asked.

‘Nah, most don’t live long enough to cause trouble. We make ’em work the deadlier veins. It’s the arsenic what kills ’em, mostly — we’re pullin’ gold out too, you know. Profit’s gone up three thousand per cent in the past year. E’en my share I’m looking at maybe buying a small estate.’

Gorlas glanced across at this odious creature. ‘You married?’

Cough, spit, ‘Not yet,’ and he grinned, ‘but you know what a rich man can buy, hey?’

‘As part of what I am sure will be an exceptional relationship,’ Gorlas said, where I profit from your work, ‘I am prepared to finance you on such an estate. A modest down payment on your part, at low interest. .’

‘Really? Why, noble sir, that would be fine. Yessy, very fine. We can do that all right.’

And when you kick off with no heirs I acquire yet another property in the Estate District. ‘It is my pleasure,’ he said with a smile. ‘Those of us who have done well in our lives need to help each other whenever we can.’

‘My thoughts too, ’bout all that. My thoughts exactly.’

Smoke and stenches, voices ringing through dust, oxen lowing as they strained, with overloaded wagons. Gorlas Vidikas and the dying workmaster looked down on the scene, feeling very pleased with themselves.

Harllo squirmed his way out from the fissure, the hand holding the candle stretched out in front of him, and felt a calloused grip wrap round his narrow wrist. The candle was taken and then Bainisk was pulling Harllo out, surprisingly tender but that was Bainisk, a wise veteran all of sixteen years old, half his face a streak of shiny scar tissue through which peered the glittering blue of his eyes — both of which had miraculously escaped damage. He was grinning now as he helped Harllo on to his feet.

‘Well, Mole?’

‘Iron, raw and cold and wide across as three of my hands laid flat.’

‘The air?’

‘I’m here, aren’t I?’

Laughing, Bainisk slapped him on the back. ‘You’ve earned the afternoon. Back to Chuffs you go.’

Harllo frowned. ‘Please, can’t I stay on here?’

‘Venaz giving you more trouble?’

‘Bullies don’t like me,’ Harllo said.

‘That’s ’cause you’re smart. Now listen, I warned him off once already and once is all the warning I give and he knows that so he won’t be bothering you. We need our moles happy and in one piece. It’s a camp law. I’m in charge of Chuffs, right?’

Harllo nodded. ‘Only you won’t be there, will you? Not this afternoon.’

‘Venaz is in the kitchen today. It’ll be all right.’

Nodding, Harllo collected his small sack of gear, which was a little heavier than usual, and set out for upside. He liked the tunnels, at least when the air wasn’t foul and burning his throat. Surrounded by so much solid stone made him feel safe, protected, and he loved most those narrowest of cracks that only he could get through — or the few others like him, still fit with no broken bones and still small enough. He’d only cracked one finger so far and that was on his right hand which he used to hold the candle and not much else. He could pull himself along with his left, his half-naked body slick with sweat despite the damp stone and the trickles of icy water.

Exploring places no one had ever seen before. Or dragging the thick snaking hoses down into the icy pools then calling out for the men on the pumps to get started, and in the candle’s fitful flickering light he’d watch the water level descend and see, sometimes, the strange growths on the stone, and in the crevices the tiny blind fish that — if he could reach — he slid into his mouth and chewed and swallowed, so taking something of this underworld into himself, and, just like those fish, at times he didn’t even need his eyes, only his probing fingers, the taste and smell of the air and stone, the echoes of water droplets and the click-click of the white roaches skittering away.

Earlier this morning he’d been sent down a crevasse, ropes tied to his ankles as he was lowered like a dead weight, down, down, three then four knots of rope, before his outstretched hands found warm, dry rock, and here, so far below ground, the air was hot and sulphurous and the candle when he lit it flared in a crossflow of sweet rich air.

In the yellow light he looked round and saw, sitting up against a wall of the crevasse not three paces away, a corpse. Desiccated, the face collapsed and the eye sockets shrunken holes. Both legs were shattered, clearly from a fall, the shards sticking through the leathery skin.

Furs drawn up like a blanket, and close to within reach of one motionless, skeletal hand was a rotted bag now split open, revealing two antler picks, a bone punch and a groundstone mallet. A miner, Harllo realized, just like him. A miner of long, long ago.

Another step closer, eyes on those wonderful tools which he’d like to take, and the corpse spoke.

‘As you please, cub.’

Harllo lunged backward. His heart pounded wild in the cage of his chest. ‘A demon!’

‘Patron of miners, perhaps. Not a demon, cub, not a demon.’

The candle had gone out with Harllo’s panicked retreat. The corpse’s voice, sonorous, with a rhythm like waves on a sandy beach, echoed out from the pitch black darkness.

‘I am Dev’ad Anan Tol, of the Irynthal Clan of the Imass, who once lived on the shores of the Jhagra Til until the Tyrant Raest came to enslave us. Sent us down into the rock, where we all died. Yet see, I did not die. Alone of all my kin, I did not die.’

Harllo shakily fumbled with the candle, forcing the oiled wick into the spring spark tube. Three quick hissing pumps of the sparker and flame darted up.

‘Nice trick, that.’

‘The tube’s got blue gas, not much and runs out fast so it needs refilling. There’s bladders upside. Why didn’t you die?’

‘I have had some time to ponder that question, cub. I have reached but one conclusion that explains my condition. The Ritual of Tellann.’

‘What made the evil T’lan Imass! I heard about that from Uncle Gruntle! Undead warriors at Black Coral — Gruntle saw them with his own eyes! And they kneeled and all their pain was taken from them by a man who then died since there was so much pain he took from them and so they built a barrow and it’s still there and Gruntle said he wept but I don’t believe that because Gruntle is big and the best warrior in the whole world and nothing could make him weep nothing at all!’ And Harllo had to stop then so that he could regain his breath. And still his heart hammered like hailstones on a tin roof.

From the Imass named Dev’ad Anan Tol, silence.

‘You still there?’ Harllo asked.

‘Cub. Take my tools. The first ever made and by my own hand. I was an Inventor. In my mind ideas bred with such frenzy that I lived in a fever. At times, at night, I went half mad. So many thoughts, so many notions — my clan feared me. The bonecaster feared me. Raest himself feared me, and so he had me thrown down here. To die. And my ideas with me.’

‘Should I tell everyone about you? They might decide to lift you out, so you can see the world again.’

‘The world? That tiny flame you hold has shown me more of the world than I can comprehend. The sun. . oh, the sun. . that would destroy me, I think. To see it again.’

‘We have metal picks now,’ Harllo said. ‘Iron.’

‘Skystone. Yes, I saw much of it in the tunnels. The Jaghut used sorcery to bring it forth and shape it — we were not permitted to witness such things. But I thought, even then, how it might be drawn free, without magic. With heat. Drawn out, given shape, made into useful things. Does Raest still rule?’

‘Never heard of any Raest,’ said Harllo. ‘Bainisk rules Chuffs and Workmaster rules the mine and in the city there’s a council of nobles and in faraway lands there’re kings and queens and emperors and empresses.’

‘And T’lan Imass who kneel.’

Harllo glanced up the shaft — he could hear faint voices, echoing down. ‘They want to pull me back up. What should I tell them about this place?’

‘The wrong rock, the white grit that sickens people. Foul air.’

‘So no one else comes down here.’

‘Yes.’

‘But then you’ll be alone again.’

‘Yes. Tell them, too, that a ghost haunts this place. Show them the ghost’s magical tools.’

‘I will. Listen, could be I might sneak back down here, if you like.’

‘Cub, that would be most welcome.’

‘Can I bring you anything?’

‘Yes.’

‘What?’

‘Splints.’

And now Harllo was making his way back to daylight, and in his extra-heavy bag there clunked the tools of the corpse. Antler and bone hardened into stone, tines jabbing at his hip.

If Venaz found out about them he might take them, so Harllo knew he had to be careful. He had to hide them somewhere. Where nobody went or looked or picked through things. Plenty to think about, he had.

And he needed to find something called “splints”. Whatever they were.

She insisted on taking his arm as they walked towards the Phoenix Inn, down from the Estate District, through Third Tier Wall, and into the Daru District. ‘So many people,’ she was saying. ‘This is by far the biggest city I’ve ever been in. I think what strikes me is how many familiar faces I see — not people I actually know, just people who look like people I’ve known.’

Duiker thought about that, and then nodded. ‘The world is like that, aye.’

‘Is it now? Why?’

‘I have no idea, Scillara.’

‘Is this all the wisdom you can offer?’

‘I even struggled with that one,’ he replied.

‘All right. Let’s try something else. I take it you see no point in history.’

He grunted. ‘If by that you mean that there is no progress, that even the notion of progress is a delusion, and that history is nothing more than a host of lessons nobody wants to pay attention to, then yes, there is no point. Not in writing it down, not in teaching it.’

‘Never mind, then. You choose.’

‘Choose what?’

‘Something to talk about.’

‘I don’t think I can — nothing comes to mind, Scillara. Well, I suppose I’d like to know about Heboric.’

‘He was losing his mind. We were trying to get to Otataral Island, where he wanted to give something back, something he once stole. But we never made it. Ambushed by T’lan Imass. They were going after him and the rest of us just got in the way. Me, Cutter, Greyfrog. Well, they also stole Felisin Younger — that seemed to be part of the plan, too.’

‘Felisin Younger.’

‘That’s the name Sha’ik gave her.’

‘Do you know why?’

She shook her head. ‘I liked her, though.’

‘Sha’ik?’

‘Felisin Younger. I was training her to be just like me, so it’s no wonder I liked her.’ And she gave him a wide smile.

Duiker answered with a faint one of his own — hard indeed to be miserable around this woman. Better if he avoided her company in the future. ‘Why the Phoenix Inn, Scillara?’

‘As I said earlier, I want to embarrass someone. Cutter, in fact. I had to listen to him for months and months, about how wonderful Darujhistan is, and how he would show me this and that. Then as soon as we arrive he ducks away, wanting nothing to do with us. Back to his old friends, I suppose.’

She was being offhand, but Duiker sensed the underlying hurt. Perhaps she and Cutter had been more than just companions. ‘Instead,’ he said, ‘you found us Malazans.’

‘Oh, we could have done much worse.’

‘Barathol had kin,’ said Duiker. ‘In the Bridgeburners. An assassin. Seeing your friend was like seeing a ghost. For Picker, Antsy. . Blend. Bluepearl. The old marines.’

‘One of those familiar faces belonging to someone you don’t know.’

He smiled again. ‘Yes,’ Oh, yes, Scillara, you are clever indeed.

‘And before you know it, some old marine healer is out doing whatever he can to help Barathol Mekhar. Only there’s this history — the stuff that doesn’t matter with our blacksmith friend. Having to do with Aren and the-’

‘Red Blades, aye.’

She shot him a look. ‘You knew?’

‘We all know. The poor bastard. Getting such a raw deal in his own homeland. Things like that, well, we can sympathize with, because we have our histories. The kind that can’t be ignored because they’ve put us right where we are, right here, a continent away from our home.’

‘Progress?’

‘That remains to be seen. And here we are. Phoenix Inn.’

She stood studying the decrepit sign for a long moment. ‘That’s it? It’s a dump.’

‘If the story is accurate, Kalam Mekhar himself went in there once or twice. So did Sorry, who later took the name of Apsalar, and that was where young Crokus met her — who is now known as Cutter, right? Putting it all together isn’t easy. Mallet was there for most of that. In there,’ he added, ‘you might even find a man named Kruppe.’

She snorted. ‘Cutter talked about him. Some oily fence and ex-thief.’

‘Ambassador at large during the Pannion War. The man who stood down Caladan Brood. Single-handedly confounding most of the great leaders on the continent.’

Her eyes had widened slightly. ‘Really? All that? Cutter never mentioned any of that.’

‘He wouldn’t have known, Scillara. He went off with Fiddler, Kalam and Apsalar.’

‘That’s a tale I’m slowly putting together myself,’ she said. ‘Apsalar. The woman Cutter loves.’

Ah.

‘Let’s go, then.’

And they set out across the street.

‘The kid’s been snatched, is my guess,’ Murillio concluded, settling back in his chair. ‘I know, Kruppe, it’s one of those things that just happens. Tanners grab children, trader ships, fishing crews, pimps and temples, they all do given the chance. So I know, there may not be much hope-’

‘Nonsense, Murillio loyal friend of Kruppe. In appealing to this round self you have displayed utmost wisdom. Moreover, Kruppe applauds this new profession of yours. Instructor yes, in all fine points of fine pointiness the art of duelling is writ bold in blood, yes? Bold too is this Stonny Menackis, old partner to none other than Gruntle of the Barbs, and was there not a third? A long-armed man who did not return from Capustan? And was his name not Harllo? Kruppe must plumb deeper depths of memory to be certain of such details, yet his instinct cries out true! And how can such a voice be denied?’

Cutter rubbed at the bristle on his chin. ‘I could head back down to the ship I came in on, Murillio. Talk to the dock waifs and the old women under the piers.’

‘I’d appreciate that, Cutter.’

‘Kruppe suspects a whispery warming of heart in dear Murillio for his new employer — ah, does Kruppe flinch at vehement expostulation? Does he wince at savage denial? Why, the answer is no to both!’

‘Leave off that, Kruppe,’ Murillio said. ‘The lad’s her son.’

‘Left in the care of others — is she so cold of heart, then? Do you rise to ex shy;traordinary challenge, mayhap? The best kind, of course, ever the best kind.’

‘There’s a story there,’ Murillio said. ‘Not all women make good mothers, true enough. But she doesn’t seem that kind. I mean, well, she struck me as someone with fierce loyalties. Maybe. Oh, I don’t know. It’d be nice to find the runt, that’s all.’

‘We understand, Murillio,’ Cutter said.

‘Rely upon Kruppe, dearest friend. All truths will yield themselves in the fullness of revelatory revelation, anon. But wait, fortuitous reunion of another sort beckons,’ and he leaned forward, small eyes fixing upon Cutter. Eyebrows waggled.

‘You’re scaring me-’

‘Terror shall burgeon imminently for poor Cutter.’

‘What are you-’

A hand settled on his shoulder, soft, plump.

Cutter closed his eyes and said, ‘I’ve got to stop sitting with my back to the door.’

Murillio rose, suddenly formal as he bowed to someone standing behind Cutter. ‘Historian. We have met once or-’

‘I recall,’ the man replied, moving round into Cutter’s sight as he collected two chairs from a nearby table. Thank the gods, not his hand.

‘Please do thank Mallet again-’

‘I will,’ the historian replied. ‘In the meantime, I’m not the one who should be doing the introductions.’ Those weary, ancient eyes fixed on Cutter. ‘You’re Cutter, yes?’

He twisted to look at the woman standing behind his chair. Seated as he was, his eyes were level with a pair of breasts covered in tight-fitting linen. And he knew them well. It was a struggle to lift his gaze higher. ‘Scillara.’

‘You call that an introduction?’ she asked, dragging up the other chair the historian had pulled close. She wedged herself in on Cutter’s right and sat down. ‘I’ve never seen bones picked so clean on a plate before,’ she observed, her eyes on the leavings of lunch.

Kruppe wheezed upright. He began waving his hands. ‘Kruppe hastens with proper welcome to this grand company to already beloved Scillara of the Knowing Eyes and other assorted accoutrements of charm Kruppe would dearly wish to knowingly eye, if not for the dastardly demands, of decorum. Welcome, cries Kruppe, even as he slumps back — oof! — exhausted by his enthusiasm and dimpled with desire.’

Murillio bowed to Scillara. ‘I won’t be as crass as dimpled Kruppe. I am Muril shy;lio, an old friend of Cro- Cutter’s.’

She began repacking her pipe with rust leaf. ‘Cutter spoke often of your charm, Murillio, when it comes to women,’ and she paused to smile.

Murillio sat back down a tad hard and Cutter saw, wryly amused, that he looked more awake now than he had in days, perhaps since the stabbing.

Kruppe was fanning his flushed face. Then he raised a hand. ‘Sulty! Sweet creature, the finest wine in the house! No, wait! Go down the street to the Peacock and buy us a bottle of their finest wine! The finest wine in their house, yes! Is something wrong, Meese? Kruppe meant no insult, honest! Sulty, be on with you, child! Meese, why-’

‘No more,’ cut in Murillio, ‘unless you want to pile on ever more insults to our faithful proprietor, until she comes over here and kills you outright.’

‘Dire misunderstanding! Enthusiasm and-’

‘Dimples, we know.’

Cutter spoke up, ‘Scillara was a camp follower in Sha’ik’s rebel city in Raraku. Er, not a follower like that, I mean-’

‘Yes I was,’ she said. ‘Just that.’ She struck sparks to the bowl. ‘Plaything to soldiers. In particular, Malazans. Renegades from Korbolo Dom’s turncoat army. His Dogslayers. I was then plucked from what would have been a short, benumbed existence by a Malazan priest with no hands, who dragged me across half of Seven Cities, along with Cutter here.’ She sent a stream of smoke upward, then continued. ‘Just inland of the Otataral Sea, we got jumped. The priest was cut down. Cut shy;ter got disembowelled and I had a baby — no real connection between the two, by the way, apart from bad timing. Some villagers found us and saved us — the son of Osserc showed up for that — and that’s how we collected Barathol Mekhar and Chaur, making up for the two we’d lost in the ambush.

‘Now, normally I don’t tell long-winded tales like this one, but what I gave you was necessary for you to understand a few important things. One: I left the baby in the village, with no regrets. Two: Cutter, who was with us because The Rope thought Felisin Younger needed protecting, nearly died and is now living with a feeling of having failed at his task, since Felisin was taken from us. Three: Cutter also has a broken heart, and no matter how much fun we eventually had, him and me, it’s clear that I can’t help him with that. And finally, four: he’s embarrassed by me because he probably thinks I’m too fat and he thinks you’ll all be thinking the same thing, too.’

All three men facing her fervently shook their heads at that, while Cutter sat head in hands.

Sulty arrived to slam down a thick-based dusty clay bottle and two more goblets. ‘Three councils, Kruppe!’

Kruppe set three silver coins into her hand without a whimper.

After a long moment, the historian sighed, reached out and uncorked the bot shy;tle. He sniffed the mouth. Brows lifted. ‘Empty the rubbish in your cups, please.’

They did and Duiker poured.

‘Cutter,’ said Murillio.

‘What?’

‘You were disembowelled? Gods below, man!’

‘Kruppe struggles to taste the wonder of this wondrous vintage, so gasted of flabber is he at said horrendous tale. The world is most cruel, yet salvation unfolds at the last, blessed be all the gods, goddesses, spirits, marsupials and amphibians and indeed all the rest. Made drunk by punches is poor Kruppe, rocked this way, knocked that, buffeted askew in every direction at once very nearly unto exploding. Beloved Scillara, you tell a most awkward tale, and tell it badly. Despite this, see us here, each one reeling at said poorly told revelations!’

‘Perhaps excessive in my efforts at summarizing, I’ll grant you,’ Scillara al shy;lowed. ‘But I thought: best to push through the uncomfortable stage, and now here we are, relaxed and eager to quaff down this fine wine. I have decided I like the Phoenix Inn.’

Duiker rose. ‘My task complete, I shall-’

‘Sit back down, old man,’ she said. ‘If I have to slap the life back into you I will. Less painful, one hopes, partaking of our company this day, don’t you think?’

The historian slowly sat back down.

Kruppe gusted out a sigh. ‘Pity us men at this table, we are outnumbered!’

‘I take it Cutter’s told nothing,’ Scillara observed. ‘Not even how we almost drowned when the moon broke up and fell out of the sky. Saved by a dragon.’

‘I will indeed stay,’ said Duiker, ‘provided you back up and tell us all this prop shy;erly, Scillara.’

‘As you like.’

‘From the moment you first met Heboric.’

‘This will take all night,’ she said. ‘And I’m hungry.’

‘Murillio will be delighted to purchase our suppers,’ declared Kruppe.

‘For once you are right,’ Murillio said.

‘I don’t think you’re too fat,’ said Cutter. ‘I don’t think anything like that, Scil shy;lara.’ Too good, yes. And why don’t you see how Barathol looks at you? As for me, well, Apsalar was smart enough to get away and I won’t begrudge her that. In fact, I doubt there’s a woman low enough for me anywhere in the world.

Was that too self-pitying? No, just realistic, he decided.

Oh, and by the way, everyone, that dragon is wearing silks and biding her time aboard her damned ship, right there in Darujhistan harbour. . Oh, and did I mention that the city is in imminent danger?

The bottle of wine was done and Sulty was sent off for another one. Meese was quickly appeased by the orders for supper and the knowledge that, eventually, the swill she stocked would be broached and consumed to excess.

As Scillara told her tale.

While Cutter’s mind, sodden with alcohol, wandered through all those thoughts that were anything but self-pitying. Not a woman anywhere. .

Lady Challice Vidikas sat at one end of the table, Shardan Lim on her left, Hanut Orr to her right. For this night she wore emerald green silks, the short coat tight-fitting, collarless to expose her unadorned, powdered throat and low-cut to reveal her scented breasts. Her hair was tied up, speared through with silver pins. Rouge blushed her cheeks. Kohl thickened her lashes. Earrings depended from her ears in tumbling, glittering array, the green of emerald and the blue of sapphire. The coat’s short sleeves revealed her bared arms, the skin soft, smooth, slightly plump, unstained by the sun. Leggings of brushed kid leather covered her lower limbs and on her feet was the latest style of sandals, the one with a high peglike heel.

Amber wine glimmered in crystal goblets. Candlelight painted soft and gold every detail in a pool that faded into gloom beyond the three at the table, so that the servants moved in shadows, appearing only to clear dishes, rearrange settings, and deliver yet more food.

She but picked at her meal, wanting to be somewhat drunk for what would come at the end of this night. The only question she was unable to answer was. . which one first?

Oh, there was sexual excitement — she could not deny that. Both men were hale and attractive, though in very different ways. And both equally obnoxious, but she thought she could live with that. For certain, her heart would play no role in what was to come, no giving over, no confusion that might lead to conflicted feelings, or feelings of any sort.

She could keep this simple. Everyone made use of what they had, didn’t they, especially when what they had proved desirable to others. This was how power accrued, after all. One man here, right or left, would have her this night — had they already decided which one between them? A toss of the knuckles. A wager in flesh. She was not sure — the evening was early yet and thus far she’d seen no overt signs of competition.

Hanut spoke, ‘Shardan and I have been discussing you all afternoon, Lady Challice.’

‘Oh? How flattering.’

‘It was on the night of my uncle’s murder, wasn’t it? At Lady Simtal’s estate — you were there.’

‘I was, yes, Hanut.’

‘That night, young Gorlas Vidikas saved your life.’

‘Yes.’

‘And so won your heart,’ said Shardan Lim, smiling behind his goblet as he sipped.

‘You make it sound an easy thing,’ she said, ‘winning my heart.’

‘Then gratitude made a good start,’ Shardan observed as Hanut settled back as if willing to listen and venture nothing else — at least for now. ‘He was very young, as were you. An age when charms seemed to flash blindingly bright.’

‘And I was dazzled,’ she said.

‘Gorlas did very well by it, I should say. One hopes he daily expresses his grat shy;itude. . when he is here, I mean. All the proper, entirely unambiguous gestures and the like.’

Hanut Orr stirred. ‘For too long, Lady Vidikas, the House of Orr and the House of D’Arle have been at odds on the Council. Generations of that, and, as far as I am concerned, for no good reason. I find myself wishing, often, that your father would meet me, to make amends, to forge something new and lasting. An alliance, in fact.’

‘An ambitious goal, Hanut Orr,’ said Challice. Unfortunately, my father thinks you are a preening, fatuous ass. A true Orr, in other words. ‘And you are most welcome, I’m sure, to make such an overture. I wish you the Lady’s tug.’

‘Ah, then I have your blessing in such an endeavour?’

‘Of course. Will that impress my father? That remains to be seen.’

‘Surely he cherishes you dearly,’ Shardan Lim murmured. ‘How could he not?’

I have this list. . ‘The House of Vidikas was ever a modest presence in the Council,’ she said. ‘A long, unbroken succession of weak men and women singularly lacking in ambition.’

Hanut Orr snorted and reached for his goblet. ‘Excepting the latest, of course.’

‘Of course. My point is, my father ascribes little weight to the desires of House Vidikas, and I am now part of that house.’

‘Do you chafe?’

She fixed her gaze on Shardan Lim. ‘A bold question, sir.’

‘My apologies, Lady Vidikas. Yet I have come to cherish you and so only wish you happiness and contentment.’

‘Why would you imagine I felt otherwise?’

‘Because,’ Hanut Orr drawled, ‘you’ve been knocking back the wine this night like a tavern harlot.’ And he rose. “Thank you, Lady Vidikas, for a most enjoyable evening. I must, alas, take my leave.’

Struggling against anger, she managed a nod. ‘Of course, Councillor Orr. Forgive me if I do not see you out.’

He smiled. ‘Easily done, milady.’

When he was gone, Shardan swore softly under his breath. ‘He was angry with you.’

‘Oh?’ The hand that raised the goblet to her lips was, she saw, trembling.

‘Hanut wants your father to come to him, not the other way round. He won’t be a squirming pup to anyone.’

‘A pup is never strong enough to make the first move, Shardan Lim. He misunderstood my challenge.’

‘Because it implies a present failing on his part. A failing of his nerve.’

‘Perhaps it does, and that should make him angry with me? How, precisely, does that work?’

Shardan Lim laughed and as he stretched out it was clear that, free now of Hanut Orr’s shadow, he was like a deadly flower opening to the night. ‘You showed him up for the self-important but weak-willed bully that he is.’

‘Unkind words for your friend.’

Shardan Lim stared down at his goblet as he drank a mouthful. Then he said in a growl, ‘Hanut Orr is no friend of mine.’

The wine was making her brain feel strangely loose, untethered. She no longer even tasted each sip, there had been so many of them, the servant a silent ghost slipping in to refill her goblet. ‘I think he believes otherwise.’

‘I doubt it. It was some damned conspiracy with House Orr that saw my father assassinated. And now it seems my family is snared, trapped, and the games just go on and on.’

This was a most unexpected side of the man and she did not know how to respond to it. ‘Such honesty humbles me, Shardan Lim. For what it is worth, I will keep what I have heard this night to myself.’

‘No need, but thank you anyway. In fact, I’d rather your husband well understood how things stand. Hanut Orr is a dangerous man. House Lim and House Vidikas share many things, principal among them the stigma of disrespect on the Council. Contempt, even. I have been curious,’ and now the look he turned upon her was sharp, searching. ‘This venture of your husband’s, ever pushing for this ironmonger of his to attain membership in the Council — what does Gorlas play at?’

She blinked in confusion. ‘I’m sorry, I have no idea.’

‘Might you find out? For me?’

‘I am not sure if I can — Gorlas does not confide in me on such matters.’

‘Does he confide in you at all?’ He went on without waiting for her reply (not that she had one). ‘Lady Vidikas — Challice — he is wasting you, do you understand? I see this — gods, it leaves me furious! You are an intelligent woman, a beautiful woman, and he treats you like one of these silver plates. Just one more possession, one more piece in his hoard.’

She set her goblet down. ‘What do you want from me, Shardan Lim? Is this some sort of invitation? A conspiracy of love? Trysts behind my husband’s back? While he travels here and there, you and I meeting up in some squalid inn? Getting intimate with each other’s bodies, then lying back and making pointless plans, endlessly lying to each other about a future together?’

He stared across at her.

All the servants had with uncharacteristic discreetness vanished into the side chambers, the kitchens, anywhere but this dining room. Even the wine server had disappeared. It occurred to Challice that Shardan’s manservant had probably been free with coin among the house staff and that sly, silent man was now outside in the courtyard, passing a pipe to eager-eyed menials, and they were all laughing, snickering, rolling their eyes and worse.

Too late, she realized, to change any of that. To scour the lurid thoughts from their petty minds.

‘You describe,’ Shardan Lim finally said, ‘a most sordid arrangement, with all the cynicism of a veteran in such matters. And that I do not believe. You have been faithful, Challice. I would not so care for you otherwise.’

‘Oh? Have you been spying on me, then?’ It was a mocking question that lost its carefree aura as the man voiced no denial, and she suddenly felt chilled to the bone. ‘Following another man’s wife around does not seem an honourable thing to do, Shardan Lim.’

‘Love has no honour.’

‘Love? Or obsession? Is it not your own hunger for possession that has you cov shy;eting a woman owned by another man?’

‘He does not own you. That is my point, Challice. Such notions of ownership are nothing but twisted lies disguised as love. I have no interest in owning you. Nor in stealing you away — if I had I would have found an excuse to duel your husband long ago, and I would have killed him without compunction. For you. To give you back your life.’

‘With you at the grieving widow’s side? Oh, that would look odd now, wouldn’t it? Me leaning on the arm of the man who murdered my husband. And you talk to me of freedom?’ She was, she realized, shocked sober. By what this man was re shy;vealing to her; by the stunning depth of his depraved desire.

‘Giving you back your life, I said.’

‘I will ask you again: what do you want?’

‘To show you what it means to be free. To cut your chains. Take me to your bed if you so desire. Or don’t. Send me out of here with your boot to my backside. The choice is yours. I want you to feel your freedom, Challice. In your soul — let it burn, bright or dark as you like, but let it burn! Filling you entirely.’

Her breaths came fast, shallow. Oh, this was a most unanticipated tactic of his. Give me nothing, woman. No, give it to yourself instead. Make use of me. As proof. Of your freedom. Tonight you can make yourself free again. The way it felt when you were younger, when there was no husband weighing down your arm. Before the solemn shackles were slipped on. A most extraordinary invitation indeed. ‘Where are my servants?’

‘Away for the rest of the night, Lady Vidikas.’

‘Just like Hanut Orr. Does he sit in some tavern right now, telling everyone-’

‘I arranged nothing with that bastard. And you must realize, he will talk whether anything happens or not. To wound you. Your reputation.’

‘My husband will then hear of it, even though nothing has happened.’

‘And should you stand before Gorlas and deny the rumours, will he believe you, Challice?’

No. He wouldn’t want to. ‘He will not accept being cuckolded.’

‘He will smile because he doesn’t care. Until it serves him to challenge one of us, me or Hanut, to a duel. On a point of honour. He is a fine duellist. A cruel one at that. He disregards all rules, all propriety. Victory is all that matters and if that means flinging sand into his opponent’s eyes he will do just that. A very dangerous man, Challice. I would not want to face him with rapiers bared. But I will if I have to.’ Then he shook his head. ‘But it won’t be me.’

‘No?’

‘It will be Hanut Orr. That is the man he wants for you. He’s given you to Hanut Orr — another reason he stormed off, since he finally understood that I would not permit it.’

‘So in Gorlas’s stead this night you have defended my honour.’

‘And failed, because Hanut is skewering your reputation even as we speak. When I said you can make use of me, Challice, I meant it. Even now, here, you can tell me to seek out Hanut — yes, I can guess where he is right now — and call him out. I can kill him for you.’

‘My reputation. .’

‘Is already ruined, Lady Vidikas, and I am truly sorry for that, Tell me what you would have me do. Please.’

She was silent. It was getting difficult to think clearly. Consequences were crashing down like an avalanche and she was buried, all air driven from her lungs. Buried, yes, in what had not even happened.

Yet.

‘I will try this freedom of yours, Shardan Lim.’

He rose, one hand settling on the grip of his rapier. ‘Milady.’

Oh, how noble. Snorting, she rose. ‘You’ve taken hold of the wrong weapon.’

His eyes widened. Was the surprise real or feigned? Was there a glimmer of triumph in those blue, blue eyes? She couldn’t find it at all.

And that frightened her.

‘Shardan. .’

‘Milady?’

‘Make no wishes for a future. Do you understand me?’

‘I do.’

‘I will not free my heart only to chain it anew.’

‘Of course you won’t. That would be madness.’

She studied him a moment longer, and received nothing new for that effort. ‘I am glad I am not drunk,’ she said.

And he bowed.

Making, in that one gesture, this night of adultery so very. . noble.

Night seeps into Darujhistan, a thick blinding fog in which people stumble or hide as they walk the alleys and streets. Some are drawn like moths to the lit areas and the welcoming eternal hiss of gas from the wrought iron poles. Others seek to move as one with the darkness, at least until some damned piece of crockery snaps underfoot, or a pebble is sent skittering. And everywhere can be seen the small glitter of rodent eyes, or heard the slither of tails.

Light glows through shutters and bubbled glass windows, but never mind the light and all peaceful slumber and discourse and all the rest such illumination might reveal! Dull and witless the expectations so quickly and predictably surrendered!

A woman in whose soul burned freedom black and blazing arches her back as only the second man in her life slides deep into her and something ignites in her mind — Gorlas ever used his fingers in this place, after all, and fingers cannot match — gods below!

But leave that now — truly, imagination suffices to wax eloquent all the clumsy shifting about and strange sounds and the fumbling for this and that, and then that — no more! Out into the true darkness, yes, to the fingerless man stalking his next victim.

To a new estate and Captain Torvald Nom of the House Guard, moments from leaving for the night with all security in the so-capable hands of Scorch and Leff (yes, he worked hard on that), who pauses to watch a black two-person carriage trundle into the courtyard, and whose eyes thin to verymost slits of suspicion and curiosity and a niggling feeling of. . something, as a cloaked, hooded figure steps into view and slides like a bad thought up the stairs and into the main house. Who. . ponder no longer, Torvald Nom! On your way, yes, back home to your loving and suitably impressed wife. Think of nothing but that and that alone and be on your way!

A guard with occasional chest pains is questioning patrons of a bar, seeking witnesses who might have seen someone set out to follow that local man into the alley in order to beat him to death and would no one step forward on behalf of that hapless victim? Might do, aye, if’n any of us liked him, y’see. .

In a crypt (irrationally well lit, of course) sits a man plotting the downfall of the city, starting with a handful of Malazans, and he sits most contented in the absence of shadows or any other ambivalence imposed upon reality.

Out in Chuffs, as moles sleep in their tiny cots, Bainisk sits down beside Harllo’s bed to hear more stories about Darujhistan, for Bainisk was born in Chuffs and has never left it, you see, and his eyes glow as Harllo whispers about riches and all sorts of wonderful foods and great monuments and statues and blue fire everywhere and before long both are asleep, Harllo in his lumpy bed and Bainisk on the floor beside it, and across the way Venaz sees this and sneers to display his hatred of both Bainisk and Bainisk’s new favourite when Venaz used to be his best, but Bainisk was a betrayer, a liar and worse and someday Harllo would pay for that-

Because Harllo was right. He was a boy who drew bullies like a lodestone and this was a cruel fact and his kind were legion and it was a godly blessing how so many survived and grew up to wreak vengeance upon all those people not as smart as they were, but even that is a bitter reward and never quite as satisfying as it might be.

Back to Darujhistan, with relief, as a Great Raven launches herself skyward from the tower of Baruk’s estate, watched with evil satisfaction by a squat, overweight demon staring out from a spark-spitting chimney mouth.

And this was a night like any other, a skein of expectations and anticipations, revelations and perturbations. Look around. Look around! On all sides, day and night, light and dark! Every step taken with the firm resolve to believe in the solid ground awaiting it. Every step, one after another, again and again, and no perilous ledge yawns ahead, oh no.

Step and step, now, step and step-