Forge of Darkness (Kharkanas Trilogy 1)

by Steven Erikson

  When the Houseblades reached them, the line of heavy cavalry was virtually level, the riders only three deep in ranks, and they smashed against a broad swath of the enemy forces. Sandalath gasped to see horses flung into the air, legs kicking, while in places the Bordersword riders seemed to vanish beneath the hoofs of the warhorses. The roiling dust turned pink above the line of impact. Moments later, the entire engagement disappeared into the dust, until only the clanging cacophony of fighting reached them.

  She caught the flash of white shields on the left, black shields on the right, but then even those were gone. On the slope below and to her right, she could see Captain Ivis, still mounted and flanked by poles bearing signal flags – but those flags had not changed since the charge first began. She saw the same flags on angled spires set above the gate towers. There was no evidence of panic, and the signallers stood motionless at their stations.

  Is this really how it is?

  * * *

  The wedge formation of the heavy cavalry, so inviting to the lighter mounted Borderswords, had suddenly ceased to exist, and before they could react to the lightning transformation before them, the two lines of horse-soldiers collided.

  Directly in front of Rint was a Houseblade sheathed in leather plates covering chain, his visor lowered and so made into something faceless. He saw the man’s lance slide up to plunge through the neck of Rint’s horse, and as the Houseblade released his grip on the weapon he flung up his shield to take Rint’s stabbing sword. The weapon clanged against copper riveted to wood beneath the black felt, rebounded high. His horse staggered beneath him and then pitched on to one shoulder.

  Rint sought to pull free, but the animal rolled on to his right leg. Wrenching agony announced the tearing loose of his thigh bone from his hip socket. The scream that broke from him tore his throat.

  The Houseblade had ridden past, but another came up behind him, a woman from the long hair spilling out from under the rim of her helm. Her lance drove down, punched into Rint just under his left collar bone. The heavy iron blade snapped the bone, its point pushing through to crunch into and then scrape along the underside of his shoulder blade. She tore it free as she rode past.

  Rint sought to lift his sword to swing at the horse’s legs.

  Instead, a hoof lashed down, landing on his throat. There was an instant of impossible weight, and then it lifted clear, snapping against his jaw as it went.

  He stared into the dust-filled sky overhead. Somehow, air slipped through the wreckage of his throat and filled his lungs. The pulse in the side of his neck throbbed like a fist under the skin.

  That was quick.

  Dying was within reach, but something held him back. He struggled to order his thoughts, struggled to understand what was keeping him here, lying on the ground in his own blood. He had never felt so cold, so heavy and so weak.

  He tried to turn his head, to look for his sister, but nothing worked. He realized then that he could not feel his body, beyond that immense weight pressing down upon him. The sounds of fighting were falling away, or perhaps his hearing was failing.

  We are defeated. As easily as that, the Borderswords are no more. I want to die now. I want to go away.

  He squinted into the sky, and now at last saw the tree – where it had come from, how he could have missed it here on this field, were questions he could not answer, but he saw the summer wind in the branches, rushing through the dusty green leaves. And high on one branch sat his sister, young and fierce, not wanting to come down.

  He would have to go up and get her, again. It was always the way and it infuriated him. But he would not show that, since he could hear people laughing, offering up suggestions.

  Rint stood and began climbing. It was easy. It had always been easy, since this tree was made for climbing. He coughed in the dust, wiped again and again at his eyes, and his chest hurt as it fought for every breath. No matter. She was drawing nearer.

  At last he came up beside her, and edged out along the branch. But when he looked over, to berate her for making him have to come up and get her, he saw that Feren had vanished, and in her place sat Olar Ethil.

  The witch was horribly burned, her skin peeling off to reveal blistered red meat. She crouched hunched over, rocking, and the eyes she turned upon him glittered as if they still held the flames that had done this to her.

  She held out to him her blackened hand. ‘Fear not,’ she said in a broken voice. ‘It is time. I vowed to greet you on this day, Rint, and I always keep my vows.’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘It’s time to go home. Supper’s ready.’

  ‘Rint of the Borderswords, Tiste-child of Night, I forgive you for what you did to me.’

  He found that he was crying.

  Her hand hovered, beckoning. ‘It is not hard, when you understand things, this forgiveness. The word itself blesses both sides. Come to me, then.’

  ‘Where is Feren?’

  ‘Not far.’

  ‘Where is her daughter?’

  ‘Not far.’

  ‘I want to go to them.’

  ‘Rint, it’s a big tree.’

  He took that hand, felt it crumble to ash in his grip, but whatever remained was strong enough to hold on to.

  I won’t fall. It’s all right then.

  I won’t fall ever again.

  * * *

  The sounds of battle diminished slightly, and there was boiling motion coming through the dust. Sandalath saw scores of white shields appear on one side, and then black shields on the other flank, all drawing closer, and moments later those shields numbered in the hundreds. ‘Oh!’ cried Sandalath. ‘Is it over?’

  ‘Can’t say, hostage,’ Venth admitted. ‘Seemed awfully quick.’ He wiped again at his eyes.

  ‘Venth, I am sorry for the horses out there, on both sides.’

  ‘As am I, hostage. Abyss knows, they deserve better.’

  Now the flags were being changed, as the Houseblades withdrew at a slow canter. She saw some reeling in their saddles, and a few riderless horses accompanied them. The troops began re-forming, wheeling round to present an even line, while a few rode on, back towards the keep – the wounded men and women who could fight no more on this day.

  The wind was lifting the dust up and past the field of battle, and she saw now the hundreds of fallen strewn all the way back to the distant stone wall. Those shapes formed humps, some seething with wounded soldiers and wounded beasts, but even between the humps no ground was clear. Sudden nausea took Sandalath and she reached out to a merlon to steady herself.

  ‘Abyss take us,’ Venth muttered. ‘That was brutal. See, they chased off even the skirmishers. If not for that wall, none of them would have escaped.’

  Perhaps three hundred or so riders had retreated past the wall and now milled on the nearest field of stubble. Sandalath shook her head. ‘Where are the rest of them?’ she asked.

  ‘Dead and dying, hostage.’

  ‘But … almost no time has passed!’

  ‘Longer than you might think,’ he said. ‘But less than you’d think reasonable, I’ll admit.’

  ‘Is it over?’

  ‘I think it might be. They’ve not enough to mount a second attack. I see but a score or so fallen Houseblades on that field.’ He pointed to the new flags. ‘The captain is recalling them all, and that higher flag is announcing a yielding of the field itself, meaning both sides can head out to recover the wounded.’

  ‘Won’t they fight each other all over again?’

  ‘Hostage, everyone who leaves a battlefield enters a land of bogs, a swamp that sinks them to their knees. They’ve not the will to fight on, nor the strength neither. In exhaustion and silence, they will scour the bodies of their fallen comrades, looking for friends and kin. I will wager the captain offers his healers and cutters as soon as our own are taken care of … perhaps tomorrow.’

  ‘And will the Borderswords accept them?’

  He shrugged. ‘I cannot say, since we know not their grievance
with us.’

  She studied the field, and the few figures now staggering among the dead. ‘It seems such a waste, horse master.’

  ‘War is a shout against futility, hostage, but its echo never lasts long.’

  She considered his words, and shivered against their chilling touch.

  ‘There will be wounded animals,’ said Venth.

  ‘Of course. Let us head down then.’

  The horse master led the way down the ladder. Sandalath followed. As she joined him on the landing below she drew close to the locked door. A moment later she gasped. ‘Venth!’

  ‘Hostage?’

  ‘Someone paces behind this!’

  He came close. Then he shook his head. ‘I hear nothing.’

  ‘No,’ she replied. ‘Not now. But when I first came close – I heard footsteps. Heavy, shuffling.’

  Venth hesitated, and then he reached for the latch. He tried lifting it and failed. Stepping back he shrugged. ‘I am sorry, hostage. Perhaps it was your imagination. Heavy, you say? Then not the girls.’

  She thought back. ‘No,’ she said. ‘They were heavy.’

  ‘Only Lord Draconus possesses the key to this chamber, hostage. There was dust on the latch, and this marks the only entrance – you can see as much. The room’s walls here are a single layer of stone, and the chamber beneath this one has no trap in the ceiling. And no windows, of course.’

  ‘I know, horse master. Yes, perhaps I imagined it. Mother always said I was prone to such fancies. Come, let us continue on. I have no liking for this place.’

  * * *

  Drifting back from some timeless abyss, she opened her eyes.

  A Houseblade was above her, his seamed face hovering close. She saw him lift a hand and then set its palm against her forehead. It was warm but rough with calluses. She should have despised that touch, but she couldn’t. Above the man, thin clouds were stretched across the sky.

  ‘Can you hear me?’ he asked. ‘I am Captain Ivis. Your companions have … departed. They left to us their wounded. I did not imagine they would find defeat as bitter as they did, to so abandon you.’ He glanced away briefly, eyes squinting, and then looked down at her again. ‘You were knocked unconscious, but seem otherwise uninjured. We have gathered up a few Bordersword horses. When you feel able, we will send you back to your people. But I need to know – why did you attack us?’

  The question seemed absurd, too absurd to even answer.

  The captain scowled. ‘What is your name?’

  She contemplated refusing to answer, but there seemed to be no point in that. ‘Lahanis.’

  ‘Well, you’re young. Too young for this to be your war.’

  ‘It was mine!’ she hissed, reaching up and pushing his hand from her brow. ‘You attacked our villages, slaughtered everyone! We tracked you back – we hunted you down!’

  ‘Lahanis, we did no such thing.’ He studied her for a moment, and then cursed under his breath and turned to someone she couldn’t see. ‘Those Legion companies. I should have chased them off. I should have demanded to know why they camped a stone’s throw from the keep.’

  ‘We were made to take the blame for that slaughter, sir?’

  ‘Corporal, I know you sharpened up on the night of the murders, so where does your brain go when you’re in my company?’

  ‘I wish I knew, sir.’

  Ivis met Lahanis’s eyes. ‘Listen to me. You were deceived. If I had ridden out to parley with your commanders—’

  ‘You would have been cut down before you got out a single word,’ she said. ‘We weren’t interested in talking.’

  ‘So your standard told me,’ Ivis said. ‘Stupid!’

  She flinched at that.

  ‘Not you,’ he said. ‘Lahanis, listen. Ride to your kin, to the survivors. You say you tracked us back here. Is that true, or did you backtrack?’

  ‘We backtracked, sir. We were even hoping we’d reach the keep before you returned from the last village you burned.’

  ‘Abyss below, who was commanding you?’

  She shook her head. ‘No one, really. Traj, I suppose. He shouted the loudest. Maybe Rint.’

  ‘Rint?’ Ivis suddenly straightened, looking round. ‘Venth!’ he shouted. ‘Over here on the double!’

  Lahanis struggled to sit up. She was lying on a cot in the keep’s compound. There were other wounded, but with blankets swaddling them there was no way to tell if they were Borderswords or Houseblades – she recognized none of the faces she could see. The back of her skull was tender; her neck was stiff and throbbing with pain.

  A third man arrived. ‘Captain? I have injured horses—’

  ‘What were the names of the Borderswords who rode with Lord Draconus?’

  The man blinked. ‘Sir? Well, I can’t remember, to be honest.’

  Hands to the sides of her head, Lahanis spoke. ‘Rint, Feren, Ville and Galak. They all came back to us. They said your lord sent them home.’

  ‘Why? When?’

  Lahanis shrugged. ‘Not long. I don’t know why.’

  Ivis stood, rubbing at the back of his neck, his gaze on the gates.

  ‘Sir, the horses—’

  ‘Go on, horse master. Corporal Yalad.’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Attend to Lahanis here, and select a horse for her to ride. I am going to my office to pen a missive – she doesn’t leave until I return with it. Lahanis, will you at least bear my message to your kin?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Do you believe me, then?’

  ‘I was in one of the villages,’ she said. ‘I saw your standards. But no soldier was armoured the way yours are, and none rode warhorses, or used those curved swords. Sir, you didn’t kill us.’

  For a moment it seemed that the man was about to cry. ‘I have now,’ he said, turning away. He walked off, his shoulders hunched, his steps uncertain.

  The young corporal squatted down beside her. ‘Hungry?’ he asked. ‘Thirsty?’

  ‘Just get that horse,’ she said.

  But he did not move. ‘Captain’s a little … measured, when it comes to scribing. There is time, Bordersword. So?’

  She shrugged. ‘Water, then.’ As he headed off she closed her eyes. It was me they all listened to. I saw the standards. We could all read the trail. But it was me. You didn’t kill us, captain. I did.

  They had disarmed her – even her eating knife was missing from its thin leather sheath. If she had such a weapon within reach, she would take her own life.

  But no. I will deliver the captain’s message. Then, before my kin, I will open my throat. I will give them my name to curse. She saw the corporal returning with a waterskin. Hungry? Thirsty? Scratch behind the ear? As soon as he arrived, she reached out and took the skin from him. ‘Now get me that horse.’

  * * *

  Seven heavily burdened wagons, each one drawn by a brace of oxen, had begun their journey at the Hust Forge, travelling southward to the borderlands where awaited the Hust Legion encampment. Their pace was slow, stalled at times when an axle split or a wheel stripped its rim on the rough cobbles of the road.

  Bearing his lord’s command calling the Hust to war, Galar Baras caught up with the train half a day out from the camp. He had ridden hard and his mount was weary, and after the haunting solitude of his journey thus far he welcomed the company of drovers, wagon masters, carpenters, smiths, cooks and guards, many of whom he knew from the Forge settlement where he had been born and then raised. For all that, it was a muted welcome. News of the slaughter at the wedding hung like a pall over everyone. For many, he knew, it was not so much the sudden deaths of Lord Jaen and his daughter that sobered the crew and made conversations infrequent and hushed; rather, it was what the killings portended.

  War had returned to Kurald Galain. This time, however, the enemy came not from beyond the realm’s borders. Galar could not imagine the mind of a Tiste in the moments that led up to the slaying of a fellow Tiste. For himself, it was difficult to think of any ot
her Tiste as being anything but kin. Yet now it seemed that every face, with its familiar array of traits, was but a mask, and behind some of those masks lurked an enemy, a stranger with strange thoughts.

  There was nothing obvious to make simple this designation of friend or foe; not the chalky white skin and angular body of the Forulkan, nor the savage bestiality of the Jheleck. Of course, there had always been bandits and other criminals, who made a profession from preying upon their own kind, but then Galar did not understand them either. Such fools dispensed with trust, and so suffered lives of loneliness and fear. Even among their own kind, such fraternity as existed was rife with betrayal and treachery. The existence of a lifelong criminal was a pitiful one, for all the wealth they might gather, and for all the power they might come to possess.

  In a world emptied of virtues, all things became vices, including wealth and even family, and each day arrived with bleaker aspect than the last.

  This war will unleash the criminal in all of us, I fear.

  As he rode in the company of this train of wagons, he could feel the future settling on everyone, thick and suffocating, under heavy skies that might never break.

  This last day of the journey seemed to mock all of that, with its cerulean sky and the warm wind that came up from the south. The low hills flanking the road showed the pocks of old mines, from which rough tracks wended down; and here and there could be seen old basins excavated out centuries past, where foul water had settled and, upon drying up, left discoloured, toxic sands. Galar could see the remains of wooden structures: buildings and trestles, scaffolding and ramps, but the forests that had once cloaked these hills and the broad shallow valleys around them were long gone.

  There were legacies to be found in every scene of ruination, and as much as Galar sought to grasp only those that led to triumph, even to hold these too tightly could cut him to the bone.

  He rode at the head of the column, avoiding the dust. Henarald’s delivery of the sword to Lord Anomander, and the blessing that had – or had not – occurred in the Chamber of Night still left Galar rattled, and he need only catch a glimpse of his hand gripping the reins, seeing the ebon hue of his skin, to be reminded of that time. In revisiting that fated day in the Citadel, he found himself shaking his head again and again: at times in wonder, but more often in disbelief. Every uttered word had seemed to blaze with fire – even those words that Galar had himself spoken had felt like incantations, or fragments plucked from some disordered, ethereal poem that all who were present somehow shared.