‘Too many words,’ Karsa cut in.
They had reached the base of the tower. There was no entrance on the seaward side. The trail curved round to the other side, a well-trod path of limestone dust. Huge slabs of the yellow rock lay in heaps—many of them appearing to have been dragged in from other places and bearing chisel and cut marks. The tower itself was constructed of identical material, though its gnarled aspect remained a mystery until Karsa and Torvald drew closer.
The Daru reached out and ran his fingers along one of the cornerstones. ‘This tower is nothing but fossils,’ he murmured.
‘What are fossils?’ Karsa asked, studying the strange shapes embedded in the stone.
‘Ancient life, turned to stone. I imagine scholars have an explanation for how such transformation occurred. Alas, my education was sporadic and, uh, poorly received. Look, this one—it’s a massive shell of some sort. And there, those look like vertebrae, from some snake-like beast…’
‘They are naught but carvings,’ Karsa asserted.
A deep rumbling laugh made them swing round. The man standing at the bend in the path ten paces ahead was huge by lowlander standards, his skin so dark as to seem black. He wore no shirt, only a sleeveless vest of heavy mail stiffened by rust. His muscles were vast, devoid of fat, making his arms, shoulders and torso look like they had been fashioned of taut ropes. He wore a belted loincloth of some colourless material. A hat that seemed made of the torn remnant of a hood covered his head, but Karsa could see thick, grey-shot beard covering the lower half of the man’s face.
No weapons were visible, not even a knife. His teeth flashed in a smile. ‘Screams from the sea, and now a pair of skulkers jabbering in Daru in my tower’s front yard.’ His head tilted upward slightly to regard Karsa for a moment. ‘At first I’d thought you a Fenn, but you’re no Fenn, are you?’
‘I am Teblor—’
‘Teblor! Well, lad, you’re a long way from home, aren’t you?’
Torvald stepped forward. ‘Sir, your command of Daru is impressive, though I am certain I detect a Malazan accent. More, by your colour, I’d hazard you are Napan. Are we then on Quon Tali?’
‘You don’t know?’
‘Alas, sir, I am afraid not.’
The man grunted, then turned back up the trail, ‘Carvings, ha!’
Torvald glanced back at Karsa, then, with a shrug, set off after the man.
Karsa followed.
The door was situated on the inland side. The path forked in front of it, one trail leading to the tower and the other to a raised road that ran parallel to the coastline, beyond which was a dark band of forest.
The man pushed open the door and ducked inside.
Both Torvald and Karsa had involuntarily paused at the fork, staring up at the enormous stone skull that formed the lintel above the low doorway. It was as long as the Teblor was tall, running the entire width of the wall. The rows of dagger-like teeth dwarfed even that of a grey bear.
The man reappeared. ‘Aye, impressive, isn’t it? I’ve collected most of the bastard’s body, too—I should’ve guessed it would be bigger than I’d first thought, but it was the forearms I found, you see, and they’re puny, so there I was picturing a beast no taller than you, Teblor, but with a head of equal size. No wonder they died out, I told myself. Of course, it’s mistakes like these that teach a man to be humble, and Hood knows, this one’s humbled me good. Come inside; I’m brewing some tea.’
Torvald grinned up at Karsa. ‘See what happens when you live alone?’
The two entered the tower.
And were stunned by what awaited them. The tower was hollow, with only a flimsy scaffold projecting out from the seaside wall, just below the lone window. The floor was a thick, crunching carpet of stone chips. Weathered poles reared up on all sides at various angles, joined by crossbeams here and there and festooned with ropes. This wooden framework surrounded the lower half of a stone skeleton, standing upright on two thick-boned legs—reminiscent of a bird’s—with three-toed, hugely taloned feet. The tail was a chain of vertebrae, snaking up one of the walls.
The man was seated near a brick-lined hearth beneath the scaffold, stirring one of the two pots resting in the coals. ‘See my problem? I built the tower thinking there’d be plenty of room to reconstruct this leviathan. But I kept uncovering more and more of those Hood-damned ribs—I can’t even attach the shoulder blades, much less the forearms, neck and head. I was planning on dismantling the tower eventually, anyway, so I could get at the skull. But now all my plans are awry, and I’m going to have to extend the roof, which is tricky. Damned tricky.’
Karsa moved over to the hearth, bent down to sniff at the other pot, wherein a thick, soupy liquid bubbled.
‘Wouldn’t try that,’ the man said. ‘It’s what I use to fix the bones together. Sets harder than the stone itself, takes any weight once it’s cured.’ He found some extra clay cups and ladled the herbal tea into them. ‘Makes good dishware, too.’
Torvald dragged his eyes from the huge skeleton looming over them and approached to collect his cup. ‘I am named Torvald Nom—’
‘Nom? Of the House of Nom? Darujhistan? Odd, I’d figured you for a bandit—before you became a slave, that is.’
Torvald threw Karsa a grimace. ‘It’s these damned shackle scars—we need a change of clothes, something with long sleeves. And moccasins that go up to the knees.’
‘Plenty of escaped slaves about,’ the Napan said, shrugging. ‘I wouldn’t worry too much about it.’
‘Where are we?’
‘North coast of Seven Cities. The sea yonder is the Otataral Sea. The forest covering this peninsula is called the A’rath. Nearest city is Ehrlitan, about fifteen days on foot west of here.’
‘And what is your name, if I may ask?’
‘Well, Torvald Nom, there’s no easy answer to that question. Locally, I’m known as Ba’ienrok, which is Ehrlii for “Keeper”. Beyond that, in the fierce and unpleasant world, I’m not known at all, except as someone who died long ago, and that’s how I plan on keeping it. So, Ba’ienrok or Keeper, take your pick.’
‘Keeper, then. What is in this tea? There are flavours I do not recognize, and from someone born and raised in Darujhistan, that detail alone is close to impossible.’
‘A collection of local plants,’ Keeper replied. ‘Don’t know their names, don’t know their properties, but I like their taste. I long ago weeded out the ones that made me sick.’
‘Delighted to hear that,’ Torvald said. ‘Well, you seem to know a lot about that fierce and unpleasant world out there. Daru, Teblor…That wrecked boat down below, was that yours?’
Keeper slowly rose. ‘Now you’re making me nervous, Torvald. It’s not good when I get nervous.’
‘Uh, I’ll ask no more questions, then.’
Keeper jabbed a fist against Torvald’s shoulder, rocking the Daru back a step. ‘Wise choice, lad. I think I can get along with you, though I’d feel better if your silent friend said a thing or two.’
Rubbing at his shoulder, Torvald turned to Karsa.
The Teblor bared his teeth. ‘I have nothing to say.’
‘I like men with nothing to say,’ Keeper said.
‘Lucky for you,’ Karsa growled. ‘For you would not wish me as an enemy.’
Keeper refilled his cup. ‘I’ve had worse than you, Teblor, in my day. Uglier and bigger and meaner. Of course, they’re mostly all dead, now.’
Torvald cleared his throat. ‘Alas, age takes us all, eventually.’
‘That it does, lad,’ Keeper said. ‘Too bad none of them had the chance to see for themselves. Now, I expect you’re hungry. But to eat my food, you’ve got to do something to earn it first. And that means helping me dismantle the roof. Shouldn’t take more than a day or two.’
Karsa looked around. ‘I will not work for you. Digging up bones and putting them together is a waste of time. It is pointless.’
Keeper went perfectly still. ‘Pointless?’ He b
arely breathed the word.
‘It’s that woeful streak of Teblor pragmatism,’ Torvald said hastily. ‘That and a warrior’s blunt manners, which often come across as unintentionally rude—’
‘Too many words,’ Karsa cut in. ‘This man wastes his life with stupid tasks. When I decide I am hungry, I will take food.’
Though the Teblor was anticipating a violent reaction from Keeper, and though Karsa’s hand was close to the grip of his bloodsword, he was unable to avoid the blurred fist that lashed out, connecting with his lower ribs on his right side. Bones cracked. The air in his lungs exploded outward. Sagging, Karsa staggered back, incapable of drawing breath, a flood of pain darkening his vision.
He had never been hit so hard in his life. Not even Bairoth Gild had managed to deliver such a blow. Even as consciousness slipped from him, he swung a look of astonished, unfeigned admiration on Keeper. Then he collapsed.
When he awoke, sunlight was streaming through the open doorway. He found himself lying in the stone chips. The air was filled with mortar dust, descending from above. Groaning with the pain of cracked ribs, Karsa slowly sat up. He could hear voices from up near the tower’s ceiling.
The bloodsword still hung from its straps on his back. The Teblor leaned against the stone leg bones of the skeleton as he climbed to his feet. Glancing up, he saw Torvald and Keeper, balanced in the wood framework directly beneath the ceiling, which had already been partly dismantled. The Daru looked down.
‘Karsa! I would invite you up but I suspect this scaffold wouldn’t manage your weight. We’ve made good progress in any case—’
Keeper interrupted with, ‘It’ll take his weight. I winched up the entire spine and that weighs a lot more than a lone Teblor. Get up here, lad, we’re ready to start on the walls.’
Karsa probed the vaguely fist-shaped bruise covering his lower ribs on his right side. It was painful to draw breath; he was unsure whether he would be able to climb, much less work. At the same time, he was reluctant to show weakness, particularly to that muscle-knotted Napan. Grimacing, he reached up to the nearest crossbeam.
The climb was agonizing, torturously slow. High above, the two lowlanders watched in silence. By the time Karsa reached the walkway beneath the ceiling, dragging himself alongside Keeper and Torvald, he was sheathed in sweat.
Keeper was staring at him. ‘Hood take me,’ he muttered, ‘I was surprised that you managed to stand at all, Teblor. I know that I broke ribs—damn’—he lifted a splinted, bandage-swathed hand—‘I broke bones of my own. It’s my temper, you see. It’s always been a problem. I don’t take insults too well. Best just sit there—we’ll manage.’
Karsa sneered. ‘I am of the Uryd tribe. Think you that a lowlander’s tap concerns me?’ He straightened. The ceiling had been a single slab of limestone, slightly projecting beyond the walls. Its removal had involved chiselling away the mortar at the joins, then simply sliding it to one side until it toppled, crashing into pieces down at the foot of the tower. The mortar around the wall’s large, rough blocks had been cut away down to the edge of the scaffold. Karsa set his shoulder against one side and pushed.
Both men snatched at the bloodsword’s straps as the Teblor toppled forward, a huge section of wall vanishing in front of him. A thunderous concussion from below shook the tower. There was a moment when it seemed that Karsa’s weight would drag all three of them over, then Keeper hooked a leg around a pole, grunting as the straps drew taut at the end of one arm. All hung in balance for a heartbeat, then the Napan slowly curled his arm, drawing Karsa back onto the platform.
The Teblor could do nothing to help—he had come close to fainting when he had pushed the stones over, and pain roared through his skull. He slowly sank to his knees.
Gasping, Torvald pulled his hands free of the straps, sat down on the warped boards with a thump.
Keeper laughed. ‘Well, that was easy. Good enough, you’ve both earned breakfast.’
Torvald coughed, then said to Karsa, ‘In case you were wondering, I went back down to the beach at dawn, to retrieve Silgar and Damisk. But they weren’t where we’d left them. I don’t think the slavemaster planned on travelling with us—he likely feared for his life in your company, Karsa, which you have to admit is not entirely unreasonable. I followed their tracks up onto the coast road. They had headed west, suggesting that Silgar knew more of where we are than he’d let on. Fifteen days to Ehrlitan, which is a major port. If they’d gone east, it would have been a month or more to the nearest city.’
‘You talk too much,’ Karsa said.
‘Aye,’ Keeper agreed, ‘he does. You two have had quite a journey—I now know more of it than I’d care to. No cause for worry, though, Teblor. I only believed half of it. Killing a shark, well, the ones that frequent this coast are the big ones, big enough to prove too much for the dhenrabi. All the small ones get eaten, you see. I’ve yet to see one offshore here that’s less than twice your height in length, Teblor. Splitting one’s head open with a single blow? With a wooden sword? In deep water? And what’s that other one? Catfish big enough to swallow a man whole? Hah, a good one.’
Torvald stared at the Napan. ‘Both true. As true as a flooded world and a ship with headless Tiste Andii at the oars!’
‘Well, I believe all that, Torvald. But the shark and the catfish? Do you take me for a fool? Now, let’s climb down and cook up a meal. Let me get a harness on you, Teblor, in case you decide to go to sleep halfway down. We’ll follow.’
The flatfish that Keeper cut up and threw into a broth of starchy tubers had been smoked and salted. By the time Karsa finished his two helpings he was desperately thirsty. Keeper directed them to a natural spring close to the tower, where both he and Torvald went to drink deep of the sweet water.
The Daru then splashed his face and settled down with his back to a fallen palm tree. ‘I have been thinking, friend,’ he said.
‘You should do more of that, instead of talking, Torvald Nom.’
‘It’s a family curse. My father was even worse. Oddly enough, some lines of the Nom House are precisely opposite—you couldn’t get a word out of them even under torture. I have a cousin, an assassin—’
‘I thought you had been thinking.’
‘Oh, right. So I was. Ehrlitan. We should head there.’
‘Why? I saw nothing of value in any of the cities we travelled through on Genabackis. They stink, they’re too loud, and the lowlanders scurry about like cliff-mice.’
‘It’s a port, Karsa. A Malazan port. That means there are ships setting out from it, heading for Genabackis. Isn’t it time to go home, friend? We could work for our passage. Me, I’m ready to enter the embrace of my dear family, the long-lost child returned, wiser, almost reformed. As for you, I’d think your tribe would be, uh, delighted to have you back. You’ve knowledge now, and they are in dire need of that, unless you want what happened to the Sunyd to happen to the Uryd.’
Karsa frowned at the Daru for a moment, then he looked away. ‘I shall indeed return to my people. One day. But Urugal guides my steps still—I can feel him. Secrets have power so long as they remain secret. Bairoth Gild’s words, to which I gave little thought at the time. But now, that has changed. I am changed, Torvald Nom. Mistrust has taken root in my soul, and when I find Urugal’s stone face in my mind, when I feel his will warring with my own, I feel my own weakness. Urugal’s power over me lies in what I do not know, in secrets—secrets my own god would keep from me. I have ceased fighting this war within my soul. Urugal guides me and I follow, for our journey is to truth.’
Torvald studied the Teblor with lidded eyes. ‘You may not like what you find, Karsa.’
‘I suspect you are right, Torvald Nom.’
The Daru stared for a moment longer, then he climbed to his feet and brushed sand from his ragged tunic. ‘Keeper has the opinion that it isn’t safe around you. He says it’s as if you’re dragging a thousand invisible chains behind you, and whatever’s on the ends of each one of them is
filled with venom.’
Karsa felt his blood grow cold within him.
Torvald must have noted a change in the Teblor’s expression, for he raised both hands. ‘Wait! He only spoke in passing, it was nothing really, friend. He was simply telling me to be careful in your company—as if I didn’t already know that. You are Hood’s own lodestone—to your enemies, that is. In any case, Karsa, I’d advise you not to cross that man. Pound for pound he’s the strongest man I’ve ever met—and that includes you. Besides, while you’ve regained some of your old strength, you’ve a half-dozen broken ribs—’
‘Enough words, Torvald Nom. I do not intend to attack Keeper. His vision troubles me, that is all. For I have shared it, in my dreams. Now you understand why I must seek out the truth.’
‘Very well.’ Torvald lowered his hands, then sighed. ‘Still, I’d advise Ehrlitan. We need clothes and—’
‘Keeper spoke the truth when he said I am dangerous to be around, Torvald Nom. And that danger is likely to increase. I will join you on the journey to Ehrlitan. Then, I will see to it that you find a ship, so that you may return to your family. When this is done, we shall part ways. I shall, however, keep the truth of your friendship with me.’
The Daru grinned. ‘It’s settled, then. Ehrlitan. Come, let us return to the tower, so we may give our thanks to Keeper for his hospitality.’
They began making their way along the trail. ‘Rest assured,’ Torvald continued, ‘that I shall hold the truth of your friendship in me as well, though it’s a truth no-one else is likely to believe.’
‘Why is that?’ Karsa asked.
‘I was never very good at acquiring friends. Acquaintances, minions and the like—that was easy. But my big mouth—’
‘Sends potential friends fleeing. Yes, I understand. Clearly.’
‘Ah, now I see. You want to throw me on the first ship just to get away from me.’
‘There is that,’ Karsa replied.
The Malazan Empire Page 291