She felt herself lifted into the air.
‘Make no struggle, lass. Relax, and you’ll float up beside me, then pivot upright.’
She forced herself to grow still, but the result was one of rigid immobility.
Pearl chuckled. ‘Lacks grace, but it will do.’
A half-dozen heart-beats later she was beside him, hovering upright.
‘Try to relax again, Lostara.’
She glared at him, but he was staring upward once more. Reluctantly, she followed his gaze.
‘It’s still alive, you know,’ Pearl whispered.
‘Who could have done this?’
‘Whoever it was, we have a lot for which to thank him, her . . . or them. This thing devours magic. Consumes warrens.’
‘All the old legends of dragons begin with the statement that they are the essence of sorcery. How, then, could this thing even exist?’
‘Nature always seeks a balance. Forces strive for symmetry. This dragon answers every other dragon that ever existed, or ever will.’
Lostara coughed and spat once more, then she shivered. ‘The Imperial Warren, Pearl. What was it before it was . . . turned to ash?’
He glanced over at her, eyes narrowing. He shrugged and began brushing dust from his clothes. ‘I see no value in lingering in this horrendous place—’
‘You said there was a gate down here—not that one, surely—’
‘No. Beyond that ledge. I suspect the last time it was used was by whoever or whatever nailed this dragon onto the cross. Surprisingly, they didn’t seal the gate behind them.’
‘Careless.’
‘More like supremely confident, I would think. We’ll make our descent a little more orderly this time, agreed? You need not move—leave this to me.’
‘I despise that suggestion in principle, Pearl, but what I hate more is that I see no choice.’
‘Haven’t you had your fill of bared bones yet, lass? A simple sweet smile would have sufficed.’
She fixed him with a look of steel.
Pearl sighed. ‘A good try, lass. We’ll work on it.’
As they floated out over the ledge, Lostara looked up one last time, but not at the dragon, rather at the starscape beyond. ‘What do you make of that night sky, Pearl? I do not recognize the constellations . . . nor have I ever before seen those glowing swirls in any night sky I’ve looked at.’
He grunted. ‘That’s a foreign sky—as foreign as can be. A hole leading into alien realms, countless strange worlds filled with creatures unimaginable—’
‘You really don’t know, do you?’
‘Of course I don’t!’ he snapped.
‘Then why didn’t you just say so?’
‘It was more fun conjecturing creatively, of course. How can a man be the object of a woman’s interest if he’s always confessing his ignorance?’
‘You want me to be interested in you? Why didn’t you say so? Now I will hang on your every word, of course. Shall I gaze adoringly into your eyes as well?’
He swung on her a glum look. ‘Men really have no chance, do they?’
‘Typical conceit to have thought otherwise, Pearl.’
They were falling gently through darkness. The sorcerous globe of light followed, but at some distance, smudged and faint behind the suspended dust.
Lostara looked downward, then snapped her head up and closed her eyes, fighting vertigo. Through gritted teeth she asked, ‘How much farther do we sink, do you think?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You could’ve given a better answer than that!’ When he made no reply she glanced over at him through slitted eyes. He looked positively despondent. ‘Well?’ she demanded.
‘If these are the depths of despair, lass, we’re almost there.’
As it turned out, another hundred heartbeats passed before they reached the dust-laden floor. The sphere of light arrived a short while later, illuminating the surrounding area.
The floor was solid rock, uneven and littered with still more bones. No walls were in sight.
The magic that had slowly lowered them dissipated. Pearl took two strides then gestured, and, as if he had flung aside an invisible current, the glimmering outlines of a gate appeared before them. The Claw grunted.
‘Now what?’ Lostara asked.
‘Thyr. Or, to be more precise, the Elder Warren from which Thyr derived. I can’t recall its name. Kurald something. Tiste. Not Edur, not Andü, but the other one. And . . .’ he added in a low voice, ‘the last things to use it left tracks.’
Lostara stared down at the threshold. Somewhat obscured, but discernible none the less. Dragons. ‘I can make out at least three sets,’ she said after a moment.
‘More like six, maybe more. Those two sets’—he pointed—‘were the last to leave. Big bastards. Well, that answers the question of who, or what, was capable of subduing the Otataral Dragon. Other dragons, of course. Even so, it could not have been easy.’
‘Thyr, you said. Can we use it?’
‘Oh, I imagine so.’
‘Well, what are we waiting for?’
He shrugged. ‘Follow me, then.’
Staying close, she fell in step behind him.
They strode through the gate.
And stumbled into a realm of gold fire.
Wild storms on all horizons, a raging, blinding sky.
They stood on a scorched patch of glittering crystals, the past passage of immense heat having burnished the sharp-edged stones with myriad colours. Other such patches were visible here and there.
Immediately before them rose a pillar, shaped like an elongated pyramid, withered and baked, with only the surface facing them dressed smooth. Words in an unknown language had been carved on it.
The air was searing in Lostara’s lungs, and she was sodden with sweat.
But it was, for the moment, survivable.
Pearl walked up to the pillar.
‘We have to get out of here!’ Lostara shouted.
The firestorms were deafening, but she was certain he heard her, and chose to ignore it.
Lostara rarely tolerated being ignored. She strode after him. ‘Listen to me!’
‘Names!’ He spun to her. ‘The names! The ones who imprisoned the Otataral Dragon! They’re all here!’
A growing roar caught her attention, and she turned to face right—to see a wall of flame rolling towards them. ‘Pearl!’
He looked, visibly blanched. Stepped back—and his foot skidded out from beneath him, dropping him hard onto his backside. Blankly, he reached down under him, and when he brought his gloved hand back up, it was slick with blood.
‘Did you—’
‘No!’ He clambered upright—and now they both saw the blood-trail, cutting crossways over the patch, vanishing into the flames on the other side.
‘Something’s in trouble!’ Pearl said.
‘So are we if we don’t get moving!’
The firestorm now filled half the sky—the heat—
He grasped her arm and they plunged around the pillar—
—into a glittering cavern. Where blood had sprayed, gouted out to paint walls and ceiling, and where the shattered pieces of a desiccated warrior lay almost at their feet.
A T’lan Imass.
Lostara stared down at it. Rotted wolf fur the colour of the desert, a broken bone-hafted double-bladed axe of reddish-brown flint almost entirely obscured beneath a pool of blood. Whatever it had attacked had struck back. The warrior’s chest was crushed flat. Both arms had been torn off at the shoulders. And the T’lan Imass had been decapitated. A moment’s search found the head, lying off to one side.
‘Pearl—let’s get out of here.’
He nodded. Then hesitated.
‘Now what?’
‘Your favourite question,’ he muttered. Then he scrambled over to collect the severed head. Faced her once more. ‘All right. Let’s go.’
The strange cave blurred, then vanished.
And they were s
tanding on a sun-bleached rock shelf, overlooking a stony basin that had once known a stream.
Pearl grinned over at her. ‘Home.’ He held up the ghastly head before him and spoke to it. ‘I know you can hear me, T’lan Imass. I’ll find for you the crotch of a tree for your final resting place, provided I get some answers.’
The warrior’s reply was strangely echoing, the voice thick and halting. ‘What is it you wish to know?’
Pearl smiled. ‘That’s better. First off, your name.’
‘Olar Shayn, of the Logros T’lan Imass. Of Ibra Gholan’s clan. Born in the Year of the Two-Headed Snake—’
‘Olar Shayn. What in Hood’s name were you doing in that warren? Who were you trying to kill?’
‘We did not try; we succeeded. The wounds delivered were mortal. It will die, and my kin pursue to witness.’
‘It? What, precisely?’
‘A false god. I know no more than that. I was commanded to kill it. Now, find for me a worthy place of rest, mortal.’
‘I will. As soon as I find a tree.’
Lostara wiped sweat from her brow, then went over to sit on a boulder. ‘It doesn’t need a tree, Pearl,’ she said, sighing. ‘This ledge should do.’
The Claw swung the severed head so that it faced the basin and the vista beyond. ‘Is this pleasing enough, Olar Shayn?’
‘It is. Tell me your name, and you shall know my eternal gratitude.’
‘Eternal? I suppose that’s not an exaggeration either, is it? Well, I am Pearl, and my redoubtable companion is Lostara Yil. Now, let’s find a secure place for you, shall we?’
‘Your kindness is unexpected, Pearl.’
‘Always is and always will be,’ he replied, scanning the ledge.
Lostara stared at her companion, surprised at how thoroughly her sentiments matched those of the T’lan Imass. ‘Pearl, do you know precisely where we are?’
He shrugged. ‘First things first, lass. I’d appreciate it if you allowed me to savour my merciful moment. Ah! Here’s the spot, Olar Shayn!’
Lostara closed her eyes. From ashes and dust . . . to sand. At least it was home. Now, all that remained was finding the trail of a Malazan lass who vanished months ago. ‘Nothing to it,’ she whispered.
‘Did you say something, lass?’
She opened her eyes and studied him where he crouched anchoring stones around the undead warrior’s severed head. ‘You don’t know where we are, do you?’
He smiled. ‘Is this a time, do you think, for some creative conjecture?’
Thoughts of murder flashed through her, not for the first time.
Chapter Thirteen
It is not unusual to see the warrens of Meanas and Rashan as the closest of kin. Yet are not the games of illusion and shadow games of light? At some point, therefore, the notion of distinctions between these warrens ceases to have meaning. Meanas, Rashan and Thyr. Only the most fanatic of practitioners among these warrens would object to this. The aspect all three share is ambivalence; their games the games of ambiguity. All is deceit, all is deception. Among them, nothing—nothing at all—is as it seems.
A Preliminary Analysis of the Warrens
Konoralandas
FIFTEEN HUNDRED DESERT WARRIORS HAD ASSEMBLED AT THE southern edge of the ruined city, their white horses ghostly through the clouds of amber dust, the glint of chain vests and scaled hauberks flashing dully every now and then from beneath golden telabas. Five hundred spare mounts accompanied the raiders.
Korbolo Dom stood near Sha’ik and Ghost Hands atop a weathered platform that had once been the foundation of a temple or public building of some sort, allowing them a clear view of the assembling warriors.
The Napan renegade watched, expressionless, as Leoman of the Flails rode up for a last word with the Chosen One. He himself would not bother with any false blessings, for he would much prefer that Leoman never return. And if he must, then not in triumph in any case. And though his scarred face revealed nothing, he well knew that Leoman entertained no delusions about Korbolo’s feelings for him.
They were allies only in so far as they both served Sha’ik. And even that was far less certain than it might have outwardly seemed. Nor did the Malazan believe that the Chosen One was deluded as to the spite and enmity that existed between her generals. Her ignorance existed solely in the plans that were slowly, incrementally settling into place to achieve her own demise. Of that Korbolo was certain.
Else she would have acted long before now.
Leoman reined in before the platform. ‘Chosen One! We set out now, and when we return we shall bring you word of the Malazan army. Their disposition. Their rate of march—’
‘But not,’ Sha’ik cut in sternly, ‘their mettle. No engagements, Leoman. The first blooding of her army will be here. By my hand.’
Mouth pressing into a thin line, Leoman nodded, then he said, ‘Tribes will have conducted raids on them, Chosen One. Likely beginning a league beyond the walls of Aren. They will have already been blooded—’
‘I cannot see such minor exchanges as making a difference either way,’ Sha’ik replied. ‘Those tribes are sending their warriors here—they arrive daily. Your forces would be the largest she would have to face—and I will not have that. Do not argue this point again, Leoman, else I forbid you to leave Raraku!’
‘As you say, Chosen One,’ Leoman grated. His startling blue eyes fixed on Ghost Hands. ‘If you require anything, old man, seek out Mathok.’
Korbolo’s brows rose.
‘An odd thing to say,’ Sha’ik commented. ‘Ghost Hands is under my protection, after all.’
‘Minor requirements only, of course,’ Leoman said, ‘such as might prove distracting, Chosen One. You have an army to ready, after all—’
‘A task,’ Korbolo cut in, ‘which the Chosen One has entrusted in me, Leoman.’
The desert warrior simply smiled. Then he collected his reins. ‘May the Whirlwind guard you, Chosen One.’
‘And you, Leoman.’
The man rode back to his waiting horse warriors.
May your bones grow white and light as feathers, Leoman of the Flails. Korbolo swung to Sha’ik. ‘He will disobey you, Chosen One.’
‘Of course he will.’
The Napan blinked, then his gaze narrowed. ‘Then it would be madness to yield the wall of sand to him.’
She faced him, her eyes questioning. ‘Do you fear the Adjunct’s army, then? Have you not said to me again and again how superior you have made our forces? In discipline, in ferocity? This is not Onearm’s Host you will be facing. It is a shaky mass of recruits, and even should they have known hardening in a minor engagment or two, what chance have they against your Dogslayers? As for the Adjunct . . . leave her to me. Thus, what Leoman does with his fifteen hundred desert wolves is, in truth, without relevance. Or are you now revising all your opinions, Korbolo Dom?’
‘Of course not, Chosen One. But a wolf like Leoman should remain leashed.’
‘Leashed? The word you’d rather have used is killed. Not a wolf, but a mad dog. Well, he shall not be killed, and if indeed he is a mad dog then where better to send him than against the Adjunct?’
‘You are wiser in these ways than I, Chosen One.’
Ghost Hands snorted at that, and even Sha’ik smiled. The blood was suddenly hot in Korbolo’s face.
‘Febryl awaits you in your tent,’ Sha’ik said. ‘He grows impatient with your lateness, Korbolo Dom. You need not remain here any longer.’
From heat to ice. The Malazan did not trust himself to speak, and at the Chosen One’s dismissive wave he almost flinched. After a moment, he managed to find his voice, ‘I had best find out what he wants, then,’ he said.
‘No doubt he views it as important,’ Sha’ik murmured. ‘It is a flaw among ageing men, I think, that brittle self-importance. I advise you to calm him, Korbolo Dom, and so slow his pounding heart.’
‘Sound advice, Chosen One.’ With a final salute, Korbolo strode to the plat
form’s steps.
Heboric sighed as the Napan’s bootsteps faded behind them. ‘The poor bastard’s been left reeling. Would you panic them into acting, then? With Leoman now gone? And Toblakai as well? Who is there left to trust, lass?’
‘Trust? Do you imagine I trust anyone but myself, Heboric? Oh, perhaps Sha’ik Elder knew trust . . . in Leoman and Toblakai. But when they look upon me, they see an impostor—I can see that well enough, so do not attempt to argue otherwise.’
‘And what about me?’ Heboric asked.
‘Ah, Ghost Hands, now we come to it, don’t we? Very well, I shall speak plain. Do not leave. Do not leave me, Heboric. Not now. That which haunts you can await the conclusion of the battle to come. When that is done, I shall extend the power of the Whirlwind—back to the very edge of the Otataral Isle. Within that warren, your journey will be virtually effortless. Otherwise, wilful as you are, I fear you will not survive the long, long walk.’
He looked at her, though the effort earned him little more than a blur where she stood, enfolded in her white telaba. ‘Is there anything you do not know about, lass?’
‘Alas, far too much, I suspect. L’oric, for example. A true mystery, there. He seems able to fend off even the Whirlwind’s Elder magic, evading my every effort to discern his soul. And yet he has revealed much to you, I think.’
‘In confidence, Chosen One. I am sorry. All I can offer you is this: L’oric is not your enemy.’
‘Well, that means more to me than you perhaps realize. Not my enemy. Does that make him my ally, then?’
Heboric said nothing.
After a moment, Sha’ik sighed. ‘Very well. He remains a mystery, then, in the most important of details. What can you tell me of Bidithal’s explorations of his old warren? Rashan.’
He cocked his head. ‘Well, the answer to that, Chosen One, depends in part on your own knowledge. Of the goddess’s warren—your Elder warren fragment that is the Whirlwind.’
‘Kurald Emurlahn.’
He nodded. ‘Indeed. And what do you know of the events that saw it torn apart?’
‘Little, except that its true rulers had ceased to exist, thus leaving it vulnerable. The relevant fact is this, however: the Whirlwind is the largest fragment in this realm. And its power is growing. Bidithal would see himself as its first—and its penultimate—High Priest. What he does not understand is that there is no such role to be taken. I am the High Priestess. I am the Chosen One. I am the single mortal manifestation of the Whirlwind Goddess. Bidithal would enfold Rashan into the Whirlwind, or, conversely, use the Whirlwind to cleanse the Shadow Realm of its false rulers.’ She paused, and Heboric sensed her shrug. ‘Those false rulers once commanded the Malazan Empire. Thus. We are all here, preparing for a singular confrontation. Yet what each of us seeks from that battle is at odds. The challenge, then, is to cajole all those disparate motives into one, mutually triumphant effect.’
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