Sometimes Cartheron walked with him, though any extended period of exertion tired the old campaigner and he would sit instead, grumbling about the food, the cold chambers, or the lack of circulation in his feet.
Other times the former lieutenant Giana Jalaz joined him. She, too, was quite eager for word from the outside world. King Voti of Mantle, it turned out, had been generous in rewarding the defence of his keep. His people had been residing here for a very long time on the shores of the Sea of Gold and had had ample opportunity to amass a considerable hoard of its namesake. All hidden below in chambers carved from the rock – all of which could have been swept away by the ice-serpent had not Cartheron intervened.
In any case, Giana was eager to transport her newfound riches home, where a certain plot of land awaited repurchase from the rapacious moneylenders of Mott. Jute knew also that a rather large chest sat in Malle’s chambers with his name upon it. None of that interested him, however, more than the sight of a certain vessel returning from its southern journey.
This day Cartheron sat in the sun while Jute paced back and forth, casting the occasional glance to the channel. Nearby, carpenters hammered and sawed a new stairway from the surplus of fallen logs surrounding them.
‘She made it, I’m certain,’ Cartheron assured him for the hundredth time as his pacing brought him past. ‘Question is, how far south did she go? Did she drop them off on the Bone Peninsula? Plenty of towns and cities down there, I understand.’
Jute nodded. Yes, he’d been through all that countless times in his mind. Always, he asked himself, what would I have done? How far would I have taken them? All the way to Genabackis? Gods, please, no!
He kneaded the still raw slash across his arm, shuddered in the chill air wafting off the ice. ‘We could build a new vessel before she returned,’ he complained.
Cartheron laughed. ‘Usually it’s the womenfolk home fretting for years – how does it feel to be on the other end?’
‘Ieleen and I always travelled together.’
The ex-High Fist straightened in his chair. ‘Ho? What’s this?’
Jute squinted out to the very mouth of the channel. Something dark was moving there amid the drifting chunks of frosty-blue ice.
‘Looks like a visitor,’ Cartheron observed.
It was still too far away for Jute to identify, but its general size and cut appeared encouraging.
‘Looks three-masted,’ Cartheron affirmed.
Crew were poling aside the ice as the vessel came on. Recognition came to Jute as the lines of its hull and the arrangement of its sails resolved into familiar lines. It was the Silver Dawn.
He waved frantically from the cliff’s edge. They drew nearer; sails were reefed and sweeps emerged. The Dawn advanced warily up the centre of the channel. It neared the wreckage of the docks and fallen lumber of the stairway in the waters at the base of the cliff.
Jute continued waving, one-handed, as his off-arm was still too stiff to raise.
And from the stern, next to the long tiller arm, though he knew she did not possess normal vision to see him as others did, a figure there returned his wave. His beloved Falaran sea-witch.
*
In the end, the ferocious relentless wind drove them to seek shelter at the Jaghut matriarch’s dwelling amid the bare rock of the peaks. It was no more than a heap of stones, a tomb rather than a home. He and Fisher took turns fetching wood for the meagre fire they kept.
Of the Matriarch they saw little; she invited them in yet quit the dwelling herself. Kyle felt uncomfortable for having driven her from her own home, yet he was also thankful for her absence, as the slim cave was hardly large enough for him and Fisher.
The bard passed the time composing on the kantele. Kyle listened with one ear while he scanned the lifeless windswept rocky slopes, his legs out, half asleep. One morning he overheard the bard singing faintly to himself as he strummed.
‘In these rows there are tales
For every line, every broken smile
Draw close then
And dry these tears
For I have a story to tell’
He also heard lines concerning ancient races of giants, hidden valleys, maidens of war, and powerful weapons whose curses doom their bearers. These last phrasings made him eye the bard sidelong.
By the fourth night he’d started wondering how to broach the subject of moving on when a huge dark shape emerged from the gloom. The Matriarch announced: ‘Someone is coming.’
Fisher eased the instrument back into its satchel and Kyle tightened his bear-hide cloak about his shoulders. They set out, leaning away from the slicing winds.
The bare broken rocks clattered and grated beneath their boots as they slowly ascended. They sought the place the Matriarch had told them was beneath where the Forkrul came and went. It was a hike of a few leagues from her dwelling.
Below, the clouds had not entirely dispersed. Broad sweeping vistas of woods and glittering lakes spread out for as far as the eye could discern. Except for one entire face of the range. Here, a broad river of ice descended from the wider field below. It gleamed sapphire and white, looking much like a serpent of frost.
The desiccating winds had long cracked Kyle’s lips and clawed his throat raw. He and Fisher had also taken turns fetching snow and ice to melt for drinking water. But it was never enough, and this was their greatest want.
They tramped on. Kyle focused upon raising one foot after the other. These extreme heights, Fisher had explained, can poison the lungs and bring delusions and mirages to those who would trespass. All Kyle knew was that no matter how deeply he inhaled, he seemed to never have enough breath. And breathing too hard made him dizzy.
The light deepened to a murky purple, tinged by blood red in the west. Fisher raised a hand for a halt. Kyle came abreast of him; the bard was squinting up where the slope steepened. Movement. A dark figure descending.
He and Fisher waited. Whoever it was, he appeared wounded or exhausted; he would stagger then pause, righting himself, only to lurch onward once more. Kyle cast an uncertain glance to Fisher, who motioned that they should wait.
It was Jethiss. He still wore the old armoured hauberk he’d salvaged. Yet something was odd about his outline. As he neared, his steps now audible over the rocks, Kyle’s breath truly caught as he saw that the man’s left sleeve of leather hung loose. It swung empty in the winds.
Somehow, in some manner, the man had lost an arm.
Only now did the Andii appear to become aware of them; he halted, taken aback, then changed direction to approach. Though the air was bitingly frigid and the winds punishing, a sheen of sweat covered his face and ran dripping from his chin. The Andii possessed near black-hued skin, yet Kyle would have said that the man was pale – perhaps from shock, or loss of blood.
He halted, weaving slightly, before them, his chest heaving, and nodded his greeting.
Kyle’s gaze fell to fix upon the strange weapon now sheathed at his side. The pommel was an oddly contoured knob. It and the grip appeared to be constructed of the same material: pale, like ivory, but not glowing like his white blade. Portions of the pommel and grip were smooth while others possessed a rough and porous look. Slowly, the realization came of just what he was looking at – what the sword had been moulded from – and he raised his appalled gaze to where the man’s sleeve hung empty.
Not even the cruellest gods would dare …
Jethiss nodded to them again, affirming their guess. He raised his arm to wipe the sweat from his face, swallowed hard. ‘The justice of the Forkrul,’ he whispered hoarsely, ‘is harsh indeed.’
‘A sword worthy of you …’ Fisher breathed in wonder, his face sickly.
The Andii was breathing heavily. The trial he’d endured must have been ghastly. He nodded his agreement at Fisher’s words. ‘Yes.’
‘And your memories?’
‘With me once more.’
‘Then,’ Fisher asked, ‘would you give us your name?’
‘Mother Dark offered a title.’
Fisher’s breath caught. He spoke low, as if not daring to say the words aloud: ‘Son of Darkness …’
Jethiss gestured, inviting them to descend with him. ‘Now more of an honorific, in truth.’
The Andii’s tone was light, but Kyle saw with what trouble he walked, the rigid control he was forcing upon himself to remain erect. He wanted to reach out to help steady the man, but his instincts told him that he mustn’t.
‘There was a terrible battle,’ Jethiss murmured aloud as they descended. ‘At the feet of a gate. I wandered lost for an unknown time. A woman’s voice spoke to me from the Eternal Night. She told me I was needed to stand as I had before. But that the cost would be great. That I would have to lose myself to find myself anew.’ He pressed a hand to Fisher’s shoulder. ‘And so I have. My old name no longer fits. I am Jethiss. As for the title … we shall see if I prove worthy.’
‘Where will you go?’ Kyle asked, careful to give the man room as he walked at his left side.
‘I would travel to Coral,’ Jethiss answered. ‘There is a modest barrow there I would pay my respects to. A good friend. Many evenings we spent together playing Kef Tanar.’ He offered them a smile. ‘I would be honoured if you would accompany me.’
‘The honour is mine,’ Fisher answered.
‘And mine,’ Kyle added, feeling eminently comfortable with the idea of travelling with the Andii. It seemed to him altogether fitting and strangely proper that the White Blade should be found walking alongside what he imagined, one day, might come to be known as the Blade of Bone.
GLOSSARY
Elder Races
Tiste Andii: Children of Darkness
Tiste Edur: Children of Shadow
Tiste Liosan: Children of Light
K’Chain Che’Malle: one of the Four Founding Races, presumed extinct
Imass: an ancient race of which only the undead army, the T’lan Imass, remain
T’lan Imass (the Armies of the Diaspora)
Logros, Guardians of the First Throne
Kron, First to the Gathering
Betrule (lost)
Ifayle (lost)
Orshayn (lost)
Kerluhm (lost)
Trell: an ancient race of nomadic pastoralists
Jaghut: an ancient race of recluses
Thelomen / Toblakai: an ancient race, pre-agriculturalists
The Warrens
Kurald Galain: The Elder Warren of Darkness, Elder Night
Kurald Emurlahn: The Elder Warren of Shadow, Elder Shadow
Kurald Thyrllan: The Elder Warren of Light: Elder Light, also known as Liosan
Omtose Phellack: The Elder Jaghut Warren of Ice
Tellann: The Elder Imass Warren of Fire
Starvald Demelain: The Eleint Warren
Thyr: The Path of Light
Denul: The Path of Healing
Hood’s Path: The Path of Death
Serc: The Path of the Sky
Meanas: The Path of Shadow and Illusion
D’riss: The Path of the Earth
Ruse: The Path of the Sea
Rashan: The Path of Darkness
Mockra: The Path of the Mind
Telas: The Path of Fire
About the Author
IAN CAMERON ESSLEMONT has worked as an archaeologist and has taught and travelled in South East Asia and the Far East. He now lives in Fairbanks, Alaska with his wife and children. His previous novels, Night of Knives, Return of the Crimson Guard, Stonewielder, Orb Sceptre Throne and Blood and Bone are all set in the epic fantasy world he co-created with Steven Erikson.
To find out more about the world of Malaz, visit www.malazanempire.com
Also by Ian C. Esslemont
NIGHT OF KNIVES
RETURN OF THE CRIMSON GUARD
STONEWIELDER
ORB SCEPTRE THRONE
BLOOD AND BONE
For more information on Ian C. Esslemont and his books, see his website at www.malazanempire.com
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ASSAIL
A BANTAM BOOK: 9780593064481
Version 1.0 Epub ISBN 9781409043348
Published in Great Britain
in 2014 by Bantam Press
an imprint of Transworld Publishers
Copyright © Ian Cameron Esslemont 2014
Ian Cameron Esslemont has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.
This book is a work of fiction and, except in the case of historical fact, any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
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Table of Contents
About the Book
Title Page
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Dramatis Personae
Prologue
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
Chapter XIV
Chapter XV
Epilogue
Glossary
About the Author
Also by Ian C. Esslemont
Copyright
Assail Page 66