The Malazan Empire Series: (Night of Knives, Return of the Crimson Guard, Stonewielder, Orb Sceptre Throne, Blood and Bone, Assail) (Novels of the Malazan Empire)

by Ian C. Esslemont

  ‘What in the name of D’rek was all that about?’

  Looking ahead, the mage pushed aside his wind-tossed hair. ‘Nothing, Hurl.’

  ‘Nothing? You mean there’s a real curse? Jalor’s dead. Storo is nearly. Shaky’s gone—’

  ‘Shaky died before we did anything, Hurl.’

  ‘Don’t split hairs. I see a trend. How long have you known about this curse?’

  Silk gestured helplessly. ‘Hurl, it’s nothing to take seriously. Nothing specific. It’s probably just something made up by minstrels and such who love the subject. That’s all.’

  ‘Probably…probably? How do you know?’

  ‘Because neither Kellanved nor Tayschrenn deal in curses, yes? It wasn’t to their taste.’

  ‘So I’m supposed to trust to that?’

  ‘Yes.’ He faced her, gave his best reassuring smile that she’d seen him lie through hundreds of times. ‘Listen. He was just trying to shake you up. Undermine your confidence. That’s all.’

  ‘Yeah, well, he succeeded.’

  They met up with the rest of their detachment and by mutual consent neither said anything more on the subject. Reaching the city, Hurl travelled with her newly assigned six bodyguards to the North Outer Round to check on the repairs. There the seething activity astonished her. Hundreds of workers clearing up, repairing walls, salvaging material. It seemed that the residents of Li Heng had finally come around to their own defence. The cynic in Hurl wondered whether Ryllandaras’s appearance had anything to do with their sudden new enthusiasm. But there was another explanation. She could not deny that after Rell’s performance forestalling the beast the city had embraced him. It was now common to hear them shouting ‘Protector!’ after him and even throwing flowers. It had got to the point that he didn’t go out on to the streets any more. The city, it seemed, had convinced itself that, in its hour of most dire need, it had found its new Protector. And for her part, Hurl was not entirely certain that they hadn’t.

  At the North Plains Gate she spotted Sunny surrounded by a crowd of shouting tradesmen, and he raised a hand to acknowledge her while heaping insults on them. She climbed stairs to the wall ramparts. The gate, beyond repair, was being permanently sealed. A wall of stone blocks was being raised up behind temporary wood and rubble outer barriers. At the battlements she found Liss. The Seti shamaness, or mage, or whatever she might be, was staring north over the prairie, empty now but for broken, abandoned equipment, humped burials and wind-lashed tatters.

  ‘How’s Storo?’ Hurl asked.

  A cocked brow. ‘As good as can be expected. Mending a clean sword cut, a blade puncture, or knitting a broken bone is easy compared to trying to align flesh torn and mangled by talons. He’s lost his arm, an eye, and we may yet lose him to his internal wounds. But why ask me? You should go to see him yourself.’

  Hurl shook her head. He would not want her to see him as he was, helpless and broken. Liss pursed her lips but said nothing. She returned to moodily watching the plain.

  ‘Will he be back?’ Hurl asked. Both understood that by he, Hurl now meant someone else.

  Liss nodded weakly. ‘Yes. Eventually. Right now there’s easy pickings out there.’ The shamaness’s demeanour seemed to be falling by the hour. Her hair hung in greasy strings, her skin looked unhealthily pale and, unbelievably, she smelled worse than when Hurl first met her – something which had she been asked at the time she would not have thought possible.

  ‘And the Seti? Are they safe?’

  A tired smile. ‘Thank you, Hurl, my gal. Yes. For the time being. They are safe. Yet can a people be said to be safe from themselves? This White Jackal worship must not be allowed to gain its stranglehold once more. It is a regression for us – a childlike dependency.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Indeed, she felt very sorry. More and more it was coming to seem that they should not have done what they did. That she had made a terrifying mistake that would haunt her for the rest of her life. Perhaps there really was a curse.

  The shamaness slapped Hurl on the back. ‘Don’t worry yourself, lass. What’s done is done. Now, it’s up to me to do something.’

  ‘You?’ She eyed her suspiciously. ‘What do you mean?’

  Liss turned her hands back and forth before her eyes, examined her layered ragged skirts. ‘Just something I’ve put off for maybe too long, that’s all. Maybe the time’s come.’

  For what? Hurl wanted to ask but something stopped her, a vague unformed dread that whispered you do not want to know. It occurred to her that perhaps she was a coward after all.

  The journey north had been smooth, though the Kite did not perform nearly so lithely as before without Ereko’s steady hand at the tiller. Jan, Stalker and Kyle traded off keeping the sail as taut as possible. The brothers kept to the middle of the open boat, preparing the food and generally getting on each other’s nerves. Traveller was a dark brooding presence at the prow that everyone avoided. It was as if Ereko, though not human himself, had been the only thing keeping a human presence within the swordsman. Kyle knew that the Lost brothers believed he blamed Traveller for Ereko’s death. And for a time he had. But now he wondered how much choice the man had – the entire confrontation had had the air of an inevitable convergence, the long-delayed closure of a circle. Unavoidable. And Ereko had warned of the melancholy spell of the weapon at the man’s side. It was clear now to him that what had happened had been just as hard on Traveller, if not harder. Hadn’t he been friends with the Thel Akai for so much longer? It seemed to him unhealthy that the man be allowed to brood for so long and he realized that if anyone was going to do anything, it could only be him. On the fifth day he worked up the resolve to approach and sit near the prow.

  ‘So, Quon,’ he said after a time.

  Through his long black hair hanging down, the man’s dark ocean eyes shifted from his hands hanging limply at his legs to Kyle. Something stirred, flickering within them, a kind of distant recognition, and a hand came up to squeeze them. He raised his head. ‘Yes. Quon.’

  ‘May I ask why?’

  A tired shrug. ‘You have a case to make with the Guard. That is where the Guard is headed.’

  ‘And you?’

  ‘I will make my way from there.’

  ‘Will you help?’

  A smile of amusement. ‘No, Kyle. My presence would only…complicate matters.’

  ‘Cowl will just kill me out of hand.’

  ‘No. You’ll be safe enough with the brothers. And there is the blade you carry. You have no idea what you really have here and that I think is the way things were intended.’

  His sword? ‘What do you mean?’

  An easy shrug. ‘It is a powerful weapon. Others might have used it to gather riches, power. But nothing like that has even occurred to you, has it?’

  Kyle thought about that – the fact was he didn’t have the first idea how to go about such things.

  ‘Then, what about you?’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Yes.’

  The man took a deep breath, scanned the waters. ‘I’m hunting someone, Kyle. Someone determined to avoid me. But eventually I will corner him. Then there will be an accounting long delayed.’

  ‘Vengeance?’

  A sharp glance, softened. ‘Yes. But not just for me, for a great deal. A very great deal.’

  An errant wave sent spray across Badlands who howled his shock. Coots laughed uproariously, his mouth full. A smile touched Traveller’s features, though it appeared to Kyle to be the wintry, distant smile of an adult watching the amusing antics of children. Or…what was that word he’d overheard the Guardsmen using when discussing the leader of the race they called the Andii? And the Magus? An Ascendant.

  ‘Well, perhaps we can help?’

  Traveller looked to him, his smile holding. ‘Thank you, Kyle. But no. This is something I have sworn to do. I must pursue it in my own way.’

  ‘Well, if that is as it must be.’ He rose to go.

  ‘Kyle?’ Trave
ller called after him.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Thank you. And…I’m very sorry. I know you were very fond of him.’

  ‘Yes. I’m sure you were too.’ Kyle turned away and his eyes met those of Jan, watching from the stern, who looked away, back out over the water, as was his habit.

  The next morning Kyle awoke to find Stalker at the tiller, standing, peering ahead, and at the bow Traveller standing as well. ‘What is it?’ he asked Coots. The man was tending the small cooking fire in a metal bowl, cutting up the roots they boiled for a starchy stew. He gave an unconcerned shrug.

  ‘Some kind of storm ahead.’

  At the stern he caught the eye of Stalker, who gestured forward. A dark bruising of clouds darkened the sky. ‘Can we go around?’

  The scout merely arched one dusty blond brow. ‘This is my third course correction since dawn. Each time – there it is.’ To one side Jan lay curled up in blankets. Kyle considered questioning him but decided against it; if Stalker or Traveller wanted to, they could do it.

  ‘What does Traveller say?’

  ‘He said to stop trying to go around. Just head on north-east.’

  Kyle went to the bow. Traveller’s gaze was fixed ahead. He was wearing his armour coat beneath his leathers and his sword belted at his side. A sizzling anger rode his taut shoulders and stare. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Someone’s interfering. Someone who should know better than to get in my way.’

  ‘Who?’

  The man looked about to answer but stopped himself, shaking his head. ‘Never mind. Just keep your eyes sharp.’

  ‘What should we do?’

  ‘Do? Eat, check your weapons.’

  Coots prepared a meal of boiled mush with fish and mouldy old bread. The Lost brothers busied themselves testing the edges of the multitude of blades each carried at belts, vests and boots. Jan had no weapon at all that Kyle could see so he fished around to come up with an old long-knife that he never used and offered it to the man. Jan looked up, surprised and pleased. Then his gaze slid aside and Kyle followed it to find Traveller watching, his face held rigid, unreadable. Jan pushed the weapon through his belt.

  The edge of the unnatural cloudbank drew close. The sea curving around its front held its normal swell and trough of tall smooth waves touched by the thinnest of spume at their crests. Beneath the clouds, under the gathering dark of thick shadow, the sea appeared calm, the wind diminished. Traveller turned from the prow. ‘Get down. Secure yourselves. Tie the rudder.’ Stalker roped the rudder’s long arm. The brothers twined their arms in taut ropes. Kyle found a secured rope and pushed an arm through. Jan sat against the ship’s side, his legs out. Eerily silent, the tall looming wall of darkness rose above them like a cliff, severing the light. The Kite was engulfed.

  Loss of headway was immediate. Kyle was thrown forward. Equipment and stores shifted, tumbling. The Kite groaned, planks creaking, the sail flapping loose. Waves surged around them, flooding the freeboard. In the disorienting diffuse light everything seemed flat and distant, colourless. Traveller was shouting something from the prow but his words sounded strange, distorted. Kyle was punched forward once more. Stores crashed over the brothers who roared their anger. The grinding of the keel and planking announced the Kite scraping up on a shore where no shore should be. A savage blow stunned Kyle.

  After a time his vision cleared – he’d been disoriented for a moment. Blinking, he stood, steadying himself. A dark plain of mud stretched into the distance to an even darker treeline. Behind them, a sullen sheet of water as flat as black glass but for the wake of their passage. Overhead, dull sky the colour of slate. ‘Cheerful place,’ Jan observed, rubbing his shoulder.

  Coots erupted from a pile of stores, cursing, a hand pressed to one eye. Badlands laughed uproariously. Stalker rubbed his hip. Traveller was examining the planking at the prow. ‘Damaged?’ Stalker called to him.

  ‘Can’t say. We’re stranded in any case.’

  ‘Travellers! Greetings!’ someone called in Talian from the distance. Kyle peeked over the side. A man was standing in the muck. A great thatch of black hair framed a long pale face. His robes hung down in the mud and he was either very short or sunk in the slime.

  Traveller vaulted the gunnel to land before the fellow only to promptly sink past the shins of his boots. Regardless, he managed to grasp hold of the front of the fellow’s robes and twist a grip. The man flailed at Traveller’s arm, the long loose cloth of his sleeves – long enough to hang in the mud – slapping wetly.

  ‘Take us to the scheming rat,’ Traveller snarled. ‘He’s finally earned a few choice words from me.’

  ‘Yes!’ the man squawked. ‘That is, no. No screeching bats here. They’re in the woods.’

  Startled, Traveller released the fellow, who straightened his robes, smearing mud all over his front. ‘I am come to deliver you to my master, Shadowthrone. You are blessed by his condescension.’

  ‘Who are you?’ Traveller asked.

  ‘Whorou?’ the man said, squinting. ‘Damned awkward name. Common enough though, isn’t it?’ He stuck out a muddy hand. ‘Hethe.’

  Traveller did not raise his. After a time the fellow lowered his, wiped it on his smeared robes. ‘Yes, well. We must be off! Come!’ The fellow waddled away, his robes dragging behind, curls of green-brown mud falling from its trailing edges. After a few paces he turned, beckoning. ‘Come, come!’

  ‘Aw, for the Lady Thief’s sake,’ Coots grumbled. He collected a few stores and skins of water, and lowered himself from the side. His sandalled feet sank entirely beneath the quivering gelid surface. He shivered, gasping. ‘Damn, that’s cold!’

  The rest followed, dropping one by one into the muck then labouring on after Traveller and their guide. Soon Kyle was almost short of breath as each foot became encased in a leaden weight of clinging mud. Stalker and Badlands had drawn knives and were shaving the layers from their feet and flicking it away. The stink was ripe with the fetid reek of decomposing sea creatures. Kyle had to turn his face away when he reached down to shave off the mud.

  ‘Damned undignified, hey?’ Badlands said to his brother, and Traveller turned sharply at that, his gaze narrowing, only to snort as if at some joke known only to himself, and set off again slowly shaking his head. The brothers exchanged mystified looks.

  Ahead, the mudflats yielded to a climbing strand of black gravel. To the left stretched a dark forest of tangled grey underbrush and squat trees. Their guide was leading them to the right where the shore climbed to eroded hillocks thatched in thick tangled grasses. Kyle wondered if he was falling behind. Either that, or their guide was sinking further and further into the mud, or getting shorter. Most of his robes now trailed him in a long train and his sleeves dragged as well. Stalker and Kyle exchanged uncertain looks.

  Beneath his hanging robes, the man, or whatever he was, now clearly stood no more than waist-high to Kyle. Taking a few quick steps Traveller lunged ahead to grab the sodden trailing cloth and yank it. It came away revealing a short, hairy, winged, monkey-like creature that spun, hunching and snarling.

  Everyone froze, staring.

  Surprised, the creature drew itself up and, with an uncanny mimicry of wounded dignity, snatched the robes back from Traveller and marched off. Traveller turned to face everyone, completely astonished. He bent his head back as if entreating some unknown blessing from the sky – patience, perhaps – then rubbed his neck and exhaled loudly. ‘Apologies. It’s my fault. An old argument between myself and the one awaiting us. He was always of the opinion that…I took myself too seriously.’

  Ahead, the creature had reached the gravel and now struggled to dress itself. The effort degenerated into a battle of life and death between beast and garment. The creature flailed amid the wet folds, hissing and kicking, squalling its rage. Its bullet-head emerged, fangs clenched on a mouthful of the cloth. It mimicked throttling folds in its hairy hands then disappeared again amid the sagging wet mess. Traveller simply walked on
past. Everyone followed, stamping the mud from their sandals and boots. Last, Kyle saw the creature pop its head up. Its yellow eyes deep beneath prominent brow ridges blinked their confusion. It scampered ahead dragging its tattered adversary after it.

  Cresting the eroded hillock, Kyle saw a plain dotted with abrupt hills, or what resembled hills. Their sides appeared too steep to be natural. Traveller was walking on, heading in the direction of a dark lump in the distance, though just how far away it might be Kyle had no way of judging. Everything seemed strangely distorted here, wherever here was. He jogged up to Stalker. ‘So, where are we?’

  The scout was adjusting his studded leather hauberk and kicking mud from his knee-high leather moccasins. He scowled his disgust. ‘Shadow Hold, I’d say.’

  ‘Shadow Hold? What’s that?’

  ‘That’s what we call it where we’re from. You could call it the Warren of Shadow, or Meanas, or whatever you like. Take your pick – it don’t care a whit.’

  Kyle slowed. So, Shadow. The Wanderer, Trickster, Deceiver. A power to avoid, or treat with most carefully, according to the shamans and warlocks of his people. Now they were in its grip. And the swordsman with them claimed to know its master personally – and to have an argument with him. True, so far it did not strike Kyle as particularly menacing. If anything, it struck as, well, disorganized and slightly deranged.

  The beast had gained the advantage once again and, throwing the ragged robes over its shoulders, stuck its chest out and marched in a direction slightly askew of their line of advance. Eventually, finding itself off alone, it would squawk and run to gain the front once more, raise its chin and set off resolutely in the wrong direction. All these antics took place under the very nose of Traveller who displayed no outward hint of noticing, though Kyle thought his back increasingly rigid and sword-straight as the journey continued.

  The hills proved to be domes constructed of cyclopean stones, ancient, overgrown, some displaying cracks or collapsed sides where the blocks scattered the plain as if having been thrown outwards by some tremendous force.