House of Chains

by Steven Erikson

  To fight with such a weapon would demand changes to the style with which Karsa was most familiar. Wood flexed, slid with ease over shield rims, skipped effortlessly along out-thrust sword-blades. This flint sword’s serrated edges would behave differently, and he would have to adjust, especially given its massive weight and length.

  The handle proved the most challenging. Flint did not welcome roundness, and the less angular the handle became, the less stable the striking platforms. For the pommel he worked the stone into a step-fractured, oversized diamond shape. The nearly right-angled step-fractures would normally be viewed as dangerous flaws, inviting a focus for shattering energies, but the gods had promised to make the weapon unbreakable, so Karsa dismissed his instinctive worry. He would wait until he found suitable materials for a cross-hilt.

  He had no idea how much time passed during his making of the sword. All other considerations vanished for him—he felt no hunger, no thirst, and did not notice as the walls of the cavern grew slick with condensation, as the temperature ever rose, until both he and the stone were sheathed in sweat. He was also unmindful of the fire in the boulder-lined hearth that burned ceaselessly, unfuelled, the flames flickering with strange colours.

  The sword commanded all. The feel of his companion ghosts resonated from the blade into his fingertips, then along every bone and muscle in his body. Bairoth Gild, whose cutting irony seemed to have somehow infused the weapon, as had Delum Thord’s fierce loyalty—these were unexpected gifts, a mysterious contortion of themes, of aspects, that imbued a personality to the sword.

  Among the legends there were songs celebrating cherished weapons and the Teblor heroes who wielded them. Karsa had always held that the notion of weapons possessing wills of their own was little more than a poet’s conceit. And those heroes who had betrayed their blades and so suffered tragic ends, well, in each tale, Karsa had no difficulty in citing other, more obvious flaws in their actions, sufficient to explain the hero’s demise.

  The Teblor never passed down weapons to heirs—all possessions accompanied the one who had died, for what worth a ghost bereft of all it had acquired in its mortal life?

  The flint sword that found shape in Karsa’s hands was therefore unlike anything he had known—or heard of—before. It rested on the ground before him, strangely naked despite the leather he had wrapped around the grip. No hilt, no scabbard. Massive and brutal, yet beautiful in its symmetry, despite the streaks of blood left by his lacerated hands.

  He became aware of the searing heat in the cavern, and slowly looked up.

  The seven gods stood facing him in a flattened crescent, the hearth’s flames flickering across their battered, broken bodies. They held weapons to match the one now lying before him, though scaled down to suit their squat forms.

  ‘You have come in truth,’ Karsa observed.

  The one he knew as Urugal replied, ‘We have. We are now free of the Ritual’s bindings. The chains, Karsa Orlong, are broken.’

  Another spoke in a low, rasping voice. ‘The Warren of Tellann has found your sword, Karsa Orlong.’ The god’s neck was mangled, broken, the head fallen onto a shoulder and barely held in place by muscle and tendons. ‘It shall never shatter.’

  Karsa grunted. ‘There are broken weapons in the caverns beyond.’

  ‘Elder sorcery,’ Urugal answered. ‘Inimical warrens. Our people have fought many wars.’

  ‘You T’lan Imass have indeed,’ the Teblor warrior said. ‘I walked upon stairs made of your kin. I have seen your kind, fallen in such numbers as to defy comprehension.’ He scanned the seven creatures standing before him. ‘What battle took you?’

  Urugal shrugged. ‘It is of no significance, Karsa Orlong. A struggle of long ago, an enemy now dust, a failure best forgotten. We have known wars beyond counting, and what have they achieved? The Jaghut were doomed to extinction—we but hastened the inevitable. Other enemies announced themselves and stood in our path. We were indifferent to their causes, none of which was sufficient to turn us aside. And so we slaughtered them. Again and again. Wars without meaning, wars that changed virtually nothing. To live is to suffer. To exist—even as we do—is to resist.’

  ‘This is all that was learned, Karsa Orlong,’ said the T’lan Imass woman known as Siballe. ‘In its totality. Stone, sea, forest, city—and every creature that ever lived—all share the same struggle. Being resists unbeing. Order wars against the chaos of dissolution, of disorder. Karsa Orlong, this is the only worthy truth, the greatest of all truths. What do the gods themselves worship, but perfection? The unattainable victory over nature, over nature’s uncertainty. There are many words for this struggle. Order against chaos, structure against dissolution, light against dark, life against death. But they all mean the same thing.’

  The broken-necked T’lan Imass spoke in a whisper, his words a droning chant. ‘The ranag has fallen lame. Is distanced from the herd. Yet walks on in its wake. Seeking the herd’s protection. Time will heal. Or weaken. Two possibilities. But the lame ranag knows naught but stubborn hope. For that is its nature. The ay have seen it and now close. The prey is still strong. But alone. The ay know weakness. Like a scent on the cold wind. They run with the stumbling ranag. And drive it away from the herd. Still, it is stubborn hope. It makes its stand. Head lowered, horns ready to crush ribs, send the enemy flying. But the ay are clever. Circle and attack, then spring away. Again and again. Hunger wars with stubborn hope. Until the ranag is exhausted. Bleeding. Staggering. Then the ay all attack at once. Nape of neck. Legs. Throat. Until the ranag is dragged down. And stubborn hope gives way, Karsa Orlong. It gives way, as it always must, to mute inevitability.’

  The Teblor bared his teeth. ‘Yet your new master would harbour that lame beast. Would offer it a haven.’

  ‘You cross the bridge before we have built it, Karsa Orlong,’ Urugal said. ‘It seems Bairoth Gild taught you how to think, before he himself failed and so died. You are indeed worthy of the name Warleader.’

  ‘Perfection is an illusion,’ Siballe said. ‘Thus, mortal and immortal alike are striving for what cannot be achieved. Our new master seeks to alter the paradigm, Karsa Orlong. A third force, to change for ever the eternal war between order and dissolution.’

  ‘A master demanding the worship of imperfection,’ the Teblor growled.

  Siballe’s head creaked in a nod. ‘Yes.’

  Karsa realized he was thirsty and walked over to his pack, retrieving a waterskin. He drank deep, then returned to his sword. He closed both hands about the grip and lifted it before him, studying its rippled length.

  ‘An extraordinary creation,’ Urugal said. ‘If Imass weapons could have a god . . .’

  Karsa smiled at the T’lan Imass he had once knelt before, in a distant glade, in a time of youth—when the world he saw was both simple and . . . perfect. ‘You are not gods.’

  ‘We are,’ Urugal replied. ‘To be a god is to possess worshippers.’

  ‘To guide them,’ Siballe added.

  ‘You are wrong, both of you,’ Karsa said. ‘To be a god is to know the burden of believers. Did you protect? You did not. Did you offer comfort, solace? Were you possessed of compassion? Even pity? To the Teblor, T’lan Imass, you were slavemasters, eager and hungry, making harsh demands, and expecting cruel sacrifices—all to feed your own desires. You were the Teblor’s unseen chains.’ His eyes settled on Siballe. ‘And you, woman, Siballe the Unfound, you were the taker of children.’

  ‘Imperfect children, Karsa Orlong, who would otherwise have died. And they do not regret my gifts.’

  ‘No, I would imagine not. The regret remains with the mothers and fathers who surrendered them. No matter how brief a child’s life, the love of the parents is a power that should not be denied. And know this, Siballe, it is immune to imperfection.’ His voice was harsh to his own ears, grating out from a constricted throat. ‘Worship imperfection, you said. A metaphor you made real by demanding that those children be sacrificed. Yet you were—and remain—un
mindful of the most crucial gift that comes from worship. You have no understanding of what it is. But even that is not your worst crime. No. You then gave us your own burdens.’ He shifted his gaze. ‘Tell me, Urugal, what have the Teblor done to deserve that?’

  ‘Your own people have forgotten—’

  ‘Tell me.’

  Urugal shrugged. ‘You failed.’

  Karsa stared at the battered god, unable to speak. The sword trembled in his hands. He had held it up for all this time, and now, finally, its weight threatened to drag his arms down. He fixed his eyes on the weapon, then slowly lowered the tip to rest on the stone floor.

  ‘We too failed, once, long ago,’ Siballe said. ‘Such things cannot be undone. Thus, you may surrender to it, and so suffer beneath its eternal torment. Or you can choose to free yourself of the burden. Karsa Orlong, our answer to you is simple: to fail is to reveal a flaw. Face that revelation, do not turn your back on it, do not make empty vows to never repeat your mistakes. It is done. Celebrate it! That is our answer, and indeed is the answer shown us by the Crippled God.’

  The tension drained from Karsa’s shoulders. He drew a deep breath, released it slowly. ‘Very well. To you, and to the Crippled God, I now give my answer.’

  Rippled stone made no silent passage through the air. Instead, it roared, like pine needles exploding into flame. Up, over Karsa’s head, wheeling in a sliding circle that then swept down and across.

  The edge taking Siballe between left shoulder and neck. Bones snapping as the massive blade ploughed through, diagonally, across the chest, severing the spine, down and through the ribcage, sweeping clear just above her right hip.

  She had lifted her own sword to intercept at some point, and it had shattered, flinging shards and slivers into the air—Karsa had not even felt the impact.

  He whipped the huge blade in a curving arc in his follow-through, lifting it to poise, suddenly motionless, over his head.

  The ruined form that was Siballe collapsed in clattering pieces onto the stone floor. The T’lan Imass had been cut in half.

  The remaining six had raised their own weapons, but none moved to attack.

  Karsa snarled. ‘Come ahead, then.’

  ‘Will you now destroy the rest of us?’ Urugal asked.

  ‘Her army of foundlings will follow me,’ the Teblor growled, sneering down at Siballe. Then he glared up once more. ‘You will leave my people—leave the glade. You are done with us, T’lan Imass. I have delivered you here. I have freed you. If you ever appear before me again, I will destroy you. Walk the dreams of the tribal elders, and I will come hunting you. And I shall not relent. I, Karsa Orlong, of the Uryd, of the Teblor Thelomen Toblakai, so avow.’ He took a step closer, and the six T’lan Imass flinched. ‘You used us. You used me. And, for my reward, what did you just offer?’

  ‘We sought—’

  ‘You offered a new set of chains. Now, leave this place. You have all you desired. Get out.’

  The six T’lan Imass walked towards the cave mouth. A momentary occluding of the sunlight spilling into the front cavern, then they were gone.

  Karsa lowered his sword. He looked down at Siballe.

  ‘Unexpected,’ she said.

  The warrior grunted. ‘I’d heard you T’lan Imass were hard to kill.’

  ‘Impossible, Karsa Orlong. We . . . persist. Will you leave me here?’

  ‘There is to be no oblivion for you?’

  ‘Once, long ago, a sea surrounded these hills. Such a sea would free me to the oblivion you speak of. You return me to a fate—and a punishment—that I have spent millennia seeking to escape. I suppose that is apt enough.’

  ‘What of your new master, this Crippled God?’

  ‘He has abandoned me. It would appear that there are acceptable levels of imperfection—and unacceptable levels of imperfection. I have lost my usefulness.’

  ‘Another god that understands nothing of what it is to be a god,’ Karsa rumbled, walking over to his pack.

  ‘What will you do now, Karsa Orlong?’

  ‘I go in search of a horse.’

  ‘Ah, a Jhag horse. Yes, they can be found to the southwest of here, on the odhan. Rare. You may be searching for a long time.’

  The Teblor shrugged. He loosened the strings that closed the mouth of the pack and walked over to the shambles that was Siballe. He lifted the part of her containing the head and right shoulder and arm.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Do you need the rest?’

  ‘No. What—’

  Karsa pushed her head, shoulder and arm into his pack, then drew the strings once more. He would need a harness and a scabbard for the sword, but that would have to wait. He shrugged into the pack’s straps, then straightened and leaned the sword over his right shoulder.

  A final glance around.

  The hearth still raged with a sorcerous fire, though it had begun flickering more rapidly now, as if using up the last of its unseen fuel. He thought about kicking gravel over it to douse it, then shrugged and turned to the cave mouth.

  As he came to the entrance, two figures suddenly rose before him, blocking the light.

  Karsa’s sword whipped across his path, the flat of the blade thundering against both figures, sending them flying off the ledge.

  ‘Get out of my way,’ the warrior growled, stepping out into the sunlight.

  He spared neither intruder another glance as he set off along the trail, where it angled southwest.

  Trull Sengar groaned, then opened his eyes. He lifted his head, wincing at the countless sharp pains pressing into his back. That flint sword had thrown him down a scree of stone chips . . . although it had been hapless Onrack who had taken the brunt of the blow. Even so, his chest ached, and he feared his ribs were bruised, if not cracked.

  The T’lan Imass was awkwardly regaining its feet a dozen paces away.

  Trull spat and said, ‘Had I known the door was barred, I would have knocked first. That was a damned Thelomen Toblakai.’

  The Tiste Edur saw Onrack’s head snap round to stare back up at the cave.

  ‘What is it?’ Trull demanded. ‘He’s coming down to finish us?’

  ‘No,’ the T’lan Imass replied. ‘In that cave . . . the Warren of Tellann lingers . . .’

  ‘What of it?’

  Onrack began climbing the rock slide toward the cavern’s mouth.

  Hissing his frustration, Trull clambered upward and followed, slowly, pausing every few steps until he was able to find his breath once more.

  When he entered the cave he gave a shout of alarm. Onrack was standing inside a fire, the rainbow-coloured flames engulfing him. And the T’lan Imass held, in its right hand, the shattered remains of another of its kind.

  Trull stepped forward, then his feet skidded out from under him and he fell hard onto a bed of sharp flint chips. Pain thundered from his ribs, and it was some time before he could breathe once more. Cursing, he rolled onto his side—gingerly—then carefully climbed upright. The air was hot as a forge.

  Then the cavern was suddenly dark—the strange fire had gone out.

  A pair of hands closed on Trull’s shoulders.

  ‘The renegades have fled,’ said Onrack. ‘But they are close. Come.’

  ‘Right, lead on, friend.’

  A moment before they emerged into the sunlight, sudden shock raced through Trull Sengar. A pair of hands.

  Karsa skirted the valley side, making his way along what passed for a trail. Countless rockslides had buried it every ten paces or so, forcing him to scramble across uncertain, shifting gravel, raising clouds of dust in his wake.

  On second consideration, he realized that one of the two strangers who had blocked his exit from the cave had been a T’lan Imass. Not surprising, since the entire valley, with all its quarries, mines and tombs, was a site holy to them . . . assuming anything could be holy to creatures that were undead. And the other—not human at all. But familiar none the less. Ah, like the ones on the sh
ip. The grey-skinned ones I killed.

  Perhaps he should retrace his route. His sword had yet to drink real blood, after all. Barring his own, of course.

  Ahead, the trail cut sharply upward, out of the valley. Thoughts of having to repeat this dust-fouled, treacherous route decided him. He would save the blooding of his sword for more worthy enemies. He made his way upward.

  It was clear the six T’lan Imass had not taken this route. Fortunate for them. He had lost his patience with their endless words, especially when the deeds they had done shouted louder, loud enough to overwhelm their pathetic justifications. He reached the crest and pulled himself onto level ground. The vista stretching to the southwest was as untamed as any place Karsa had yet to see in Seven Cities. No signs of civilization were apparent—no evidence at all that this land had ever been broken. Tall prairie grasses waved in the hot wind, cloaking low, rolling hills that continued on to the horizon. Clumps of low, bushy trees filled the basins, flickering dusty green and grey as the wind shook their leaves.

  The Jhag Odhan. He knew, suddenly, that this land would capture his heart with its primal siren call. Its scale . . . matched his own, in ways he could not define. Thelomen Toblakai have known this place, have walked it before me. A truth, though he was unable to explain how he knew it to be so.

  He lifted his sword. ‘Bairoth Delum—so I name you. Witness. The Jhag Odhan. So unlike our mountain fastnesses. To this wind I give your name—see how it races out to brush the grasses, to roll against the hill and through the trees. I give this land your name, Bairoth Delum.’

  That warm wind sang against the sword’s rippled blade with moaning cadence.

  A flash of movement in the grasses, a thousand paces distant. Wolves, fur the colour of honey, long-limbed, taller than any he had ever before seen. Karsa smiled.

  He set forth.

  The grasses reached to just beneath his chest, the ground underfoot hardpacked between the knotted roots. Small creatures rustled continually from his path, and he startled the occasional deer—a small breed, reaching no higher than his knees, that hissed like an arrow between the stalks as it fled.