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

  Quint looked to his spear, its gouged and battered blade, the Lady’s Grace thinning, so faint, then to this titanic approaching crag of water greater than any he had seen in over fifty years, rearing now over him taller than six fathoms.

  Damn you …

  He raised the spear, shaking it in the searing extremity of his rage.

  Damn everyone! Damn everything! Damn—

  The mountain of water slammed into the wall to tumble, undercut, overflowing like a waterfall, washing, scouring, unstoppable. When it thinned, draining to both sides from the course of the wall, the stone core remained, uneven, punished, gouged of everything, empty of all movement.

  On into the evening a fresh layer of snow began to fall over all: the grey undisturbed waters of the inlet, and the bare stones of the wall where no footfalls marred it. Through the night it froze into a fresh clean layer of frost and ice.

  All through the fighting below Hiam knelt, praying. He prayed for forgiveness. For penance. And for guidance. He ignored the cries, the blasts and the upheaval. Hands clasped, eyes screwed shut, entreating, begging. Lady! Please answer! How have we displeased you? Where have we transgressed? Please! In the name of our devotion. Will you not grace me with your guidance?

  At one point something enormous ploughed into the tower in an avalanche roar that seemed the end of the world. The impact drove Hiam against a wall and left the tower tilted, threatening to fall at any moment, but he did not turn from his single-minded observance. Surely his zeal would be rewarded now, at this moment of testing.

  After a time he knew not how long – nor did he care – an answer came. The Lady’s voice whispered as if into his ear: You failed me, Lord Protector!

  He bowed to the floor, abject in his piety. ‘My Lady! How? How did we fail? What was our transgression? Let us make amends.’

  Amends? You failed! They are upon me! You let them through! You swore to protect me!

  ‘M’Lady, our holy concord remains between us. We will protect the lands as we swore—’

  The lands? The lands? You protect me! Me! And you have failed even at that simple task, you wretched fool.

  Hiam sat up, puzzled. ‘We swore to protect all the lands – under your blessing and guidance, of course.’

  The lands? You fool! Your blood protected me from my old enemies! And now they are coming!

  ‘Our blood protected … you?’

  Yes! Fool! Blood sacrifice forestalls them. But now they are through! What is left to me? Who will—Wait! I sense them close. The ancient enemy. They have followed me even unto here. How will I hide? You! Why did you not die for me? Do so – now!

  And the Lady’s presence snapped away, leaving Hiam reeling. His mind couldn’t catch at anything. His hands went to his neck. All this time … then all this time … No. It was too terrible to contemplate. Too horrific. A monstrous crime.

  He rose from the floor, backed to a wall as if retreating from an invisible enemy. It was a lie. A deception. Somehow. But no. That had been the Lady. He knew her presence.

  He had finally come to the true foundation of his faith and he wished he’d never done so.

  His scorched thoughts turned to all the brethren who had preceded him – good men and women all. So many. Down through the ages. His heart went out to them in an ache of love that could not be borne. Countless! All trusting to the truth of their cause … Yes, trusting and … used.

  He crossed to a gaping window, stared out at the snow-flecked night without seeing it. He knew what to do. What was one more death? He would die – but not for her.

  No. Most certainly not for her.

  Hiam climbed up on to the windowsill and threw himself from the tower, to tumble down into the heaving white-capped waters below.

  Dockworkers among the maze of waterfront wharves serving the Korelri capital of Elri were still discussing the morning’s tremor – how the tall pilings wavered like ships’ masts! – when, before their eyes, the tide suddenly withdrew to an extent unheard of in any account. Fish lay jumping and gasping in the tidal muck abandoned by the waters. The rotted stumps of ancient docks reared like ragged teeth far out into the mudflats of the bay. Citizens still dazed from the shaking gathered on the waterfront to watch this eerie phenomenon.

  A strange greenish cast grew in the sky to the west. A sound like a distant windstorm gathered. People stopped talking to listen and watch, hushed. Something was approaching up the bay – a wide green banner or wall hurrying in upon them like a landslide. The noise climbed to a raging whistling rush of wind that snapped cloaks and banners away. Citizens now screamed, pointing, or turned to run, or merely stared entranced as the wall swelled into an overtopping comber now breaking some seven fathoms high. It crashed through the shoreline without slowing or faltering and rushed on inland, taking villages, roads and fields on its way to slam smashing through the south-facing fortifications of Elri, demolishing those walls, toppling stone guard towers, gouging a three-block swath through jammed houses and shops.

  As the water slowly withdrew it left behind a stirred, glutinous mass of brick, mud, shattered timbers and building stone. It sucked everything loose with it down the slope and back out into the bay, never to be seen again. And it left behind an empty shoreline of mud a full rod beyond its original contours.

  Far within the channel maze of the saltwater marsh east of Elri, Orzu pulled his pipe from his mouth to sniff the air and eye the strange colour of the sky to the west. He leapt to his feet, threw the pipe aside and set his hands to his mouth, bellowing: ‘Everyone aboard! Now! Quick-like!’ The Sea-Folk stared, frozen where they squatted at cook fires or sat tying reeds. ‘Now!’ Orzu ordered. ‘Abandon it all! Cut the ropes!’

  Cradling her child to her chest, Ena clambered on board. ‘What is it, Da?’

  ‘The Sea’s Vengeance, lass. Now tie yourself down.’ Aside, to another boat, he roared, ‘Throw all that timber overboard, Laza! Lighten the load.’

  Ena wrapped one arm in a rope, tried to peer over the great fields of wind-lashed reeds bobbing taller than any man. A storm was hurrying in upon them. It cast a light over everything like none she’d ever seen before. It was as if the entire world was underwater.

  Something was coming. She could hear it; a growling, rising in intensity. ‘Is it another shudder of the great earth goddess?’ she called.

  ‘The old sea god’s been awakened. And he’s angry.’ Orzu gestured urgently. ‘Mother! Drop that baggage and jump in now!’

  The boat lurched. Ena peered over the side: the waters had risen. She glanced back west in time to see some dark wall advancing like night, consuming the leagues of waving grasses.

  ‘Here it comes!’ Orzu bellowed.

  The vessel slammed sideways, twisting like a thrown top. Ena banged her head against the side, struggled to shield the babe pressed to her breast. When she next looked up they were charging north, water-borne, bobbing amid a storm of wreckage: uprooted trees, the roofs of huts, driftwood logs, all in a churning mulch of detritus mixed with a flux of mud. She watched a cousin’s boat become wedged between the boles of two enormous logs and crushed to shards. Her family members jumped to the roof of a hut spinning nearby.

  The wave carried them over the sand cliffs bordering the marshlands and on inland, ever slowing, diminishing, thinning. Until finally, in its last ebbing gasp, it lifted them up to lie canted on the slope of a hillside far from the sight of the coast. She sat watching in wordless amazement as the waters swept back as if sucked, leaving behind in their wake a trail of ugly churned mud, soil, and stranded oddities such as the wall of a reed hut, or their boat itself: a curious ornament for a farmer’s field.

  Orzu thumped down next to her and gave her head a look. ‘Are you all right then, child?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And the babe?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And you, mother!’ he yelled.

  ‘Fine, no thanks to you!’ she grumbled.

  ‘Do you think our friends had som
ething to do with this?’ Ena asked, still rather dazed.

  Orzu slapped the boat’s side. ‘Well … that I don’t know. But now I guess I’ll have to do what I’ve been threatening to do all this time.’

  ‘Which is?’ She wasn’t certain which of his threats he might be referring to.

  ‘Take up farming.’

  Ena snorted. That might last a day.

  ‘Let’s round everyone up then,’ he said, patting all his pockets in search of his pipe.

  The reassembled armies of Rool waited while its commanders, led by their Overlord himself, debated strategy. The camp had been cleaned up from the fires and panic of the series of tremors. Thankfully, while there had been some property damage, and some horses had been lost as they ran terrified, there had been little loss of life.

  In a new tent, huddled next to a brazier, though he somehow felt warm enough for the first time in a decade, the Overlord Yeull was of the opinion that these invader Malazans, elements of the Fourth and Eighth Armies, must have fared much more poorly in the rough highlands, where landslides and rockfalls were so common.

  A knot of army officers stood together, rather nervously eyeing the Overlord where he sat slumped, his face set in its habitual glower.

  ‘Do they mean to come upon Kor from the mountains?’ a young captain wondered aloud.

  Yeull snorted. ‘They’re fools. They don’t know the country. The Barrier range is a maze of defiles and razorback ridges. They’ll starve.’

  The officers, none of whom had ever set foot in Korel, nodded sagely.

  A messenger entered, bowed next to the Overlord to whisper, his voice low. The Overlord frowned even more. ‘What?’

  The messenger gestured outside. Scowling, Yeull pushed himself erect, straightened his thick bear cloak – though he was tempted to throw off the suffocating thing – and headed for the entrance. ‘Let’s have a look.’

  The officers followed. Outside, Yeull shaded his eyes to gaze to the south-west where the coast curved in a bay that gave way to a headland. The tide appeared to have withdrawn significantly when it should be in. Mudflats lay exposed in an ugly brown and grey swath. Yeull ground his teeth. More Ruse trickery from that traitor bitch? What could she have in mind?

  Ussü’s warning came to him but he pushed it aside. The man had reached the end of his usefulness. The Lady appeared to have finally dragged him into senility. In any case, they were safe here so far from the shore – he’d made sure of that. Nothing to … He squinted out past the bay, where the strait appeared to be experiencing unusually rough conditions. Something was coming into the bay. A tall bulge of water like a tidal bore, but fast, faster than any wave he’d ever heard of.

  Amazed shouts sounded around him; soldiers pointing.

  That was a lot of water and the bay was very shallow. Yeull’s gaze traced the long gentle rise up from the shore cliffs to their camp.

  Lady, no … It could not be possible. No. I refuse to believe it.

  The great rolling bulge was not only impossibly tall, it was also impossibly broad: it stretched all the way across the bay, perhaps even across the strait itself.

  It numbed his imagination just to try to conceive of that volume of water, and that amount of destructive potential bearing down upon him.

  The damned end of the world, just like these crazy Korelri were always going on about.

  The wave did not strike the shore so much as absorb it, continuing on without any hesitation. Soldiers now broke to run in open panic.

  Yeull stood his ground. Officers called begging for instructions but he ignored them. No. Impossible. It will not happen.

  The churning front of mud, silt, sand, tumbling shore wreckage, even suspended hulks from the shore assault, all crashing and spinning, now came flying up the grade towards them. Its blasting roar was as of an avalanche. Yeull’s shoulders sagged. Gods damn you, Greymane. This is you, isn’t it? This is why these Chosen hated you so. These Korelri fanatics finally met someone as crazy as them. Don’t you know your name will go down as the greatest villain this region has ever known? Malazans won’t be able to enter this region for generations – you’ve lost all these lands for ever …

  Inexorable, blasting two stone farmhouses to rubble and splinters as it came, the wavefront ploughed into the camp. It swept over tents, collected supplies, masses of men. Yeull’s last sight was of a maw of crashing tree trunks headed right for him.

  On board the Malazan flagship, the Star of Unta, Devaleth had waited through the night and the dawn of the next day. At her urging the combined Malazan and Blue fleet had withdrawn to the centre of Crack Strait. Here they’d waited while, as far as she could tell, nothing happened. To their credit, neither Nok nor the Blue Admiral Swirl approached to pester her with questions or demands for explanations. They had accorded her the title High Mage, and seemed also willing to grant her due credibility as well.

  All that changed in the early morning when a rumbling as of a thunderstorm rolled over the massed fleet. Devaleth looked to the west. That was a much greater report than she’d been expecting. To have reached them this far, so loudly …

  Then far off, through the Warren of Ruse, she felt the sea lurch. Sea-Father forgive them! It was like the undersea tremors they taught about at the Ruse Academy. Immense volumes of water displaced, creating … She backed away from the side of the vessel. Nok stood nearby, concern on his craggy narrow face.

  ‘What is it, High Mage?’ he asked.

  She found her voice, pulled her hand from her neck. ‘A wave, Admiral. Much larger than I had anticipated. A great flood. We must run before it. Order the fleet to spread out, head east – now. I will do all I can smooth our passage.’

  Nok bowed, went to give the orders. After he went Devaleth gripped the side to stop her weakened legs from giving way. Smooth our passage! Laugh, great Sea-Father! May as well try to hold back an earth tremor with one’s bare hands. Everyone must be warned of this.

  Captain Fullen, temporarily in command of the garrison at Banith, had a heart-stopping moment shaving when an apparition flickered into existence in his tent. He almost cut himself fatally when he jerked, surprised, as a hollow distorted voice spoke: ‘Commander …’

  He spun, pressing a cloth to his cheek, to see a shimmering image of the Mare mage, the new High Mage. ‘A great wave is approaching, ’ the woman continued. ‘You may have until noon. You must take steps to evacuate Banith immediately. Take all steps necessary. Admiral Nok orders this.’

  The image wavered then disappeared. Fullen stared where it had appeared, wiped the blood and soap from his face. Togg deliver him … just like the old tales of how things used to get done in the Empire. And he’d thought he’d never see the like!

  He ran from the tent, bellowing orders as he went.

  A similar apparition appeared in many coastal cities, Balik and Molz in Katakan, Danig and Filk in Theft.

  In Stygg, deep within the pleasure palace of Ebon, its ruler gaped at the image, heard its warning, then quickly acted upon its appearance: he gathered together all the twenty self-styled sorcerers, warlocks and witches he paid to protect him from such things and had them executed immediately.

  Only in Mare, at Black city and Rivdo, were the warnings given any credence, though they originated from a damned traitor.

  Devaleth also attempted to reach to the west, to Dour and Wolt in Dourkan, but the shattering disruptions she met in Ruse threw her back and she could not reach.

  After sending what few warnings she could, she sat to gather her strength. She reached out to Ruse, extending her summons as far as she ever had – the burgeoning puissance nearing from the west called to her but she kept away, knowing it would consume her in an instant. Instead, she decided upon an old water-witch’s trick from her youth: sea-soothing. Like oil upon water, the localized rounding off of rough water. It was simple, easy to sustain, and this would free her to concentrate upon drawing from the yammering waterfall of power coursing through Ruse – potency
that would flick her to ashes in a moment’s slip of concentration.

  Horrified cries rose but she did not crack open her eyes. Ropes suddenly drew tight about her, binding her to a cabin wall, but she was far gone from her flesh – she rode the shockwave itself as it coursed through Ruse. Above a swelling roar Nok’s voice sounded, ordering more sail. Devaleth worked to gather a pool of calm: a smooth surface like a slick of oil that would ride above the churning froth bearing down upon them. Accomplishing this, she worked now on spreading it to protect as much of the fleet as she could reach.

  The roar intensified beyond bearing; nothing could penetrate its ear-shattering continual thunderclap. The Star of Unta suddenly lurched forward, picking up speed like a child’s toy. It struck an impossible forward attitude. A rope’s explosive snap penetrated the roar; boards groaned. Equipment tumbled down the deck, rolling and crashing for the bow. The ropes constraining Develath held her back. Someone screamed, falling forward, rolling along the decking. She fought at the limits of her strength – not to maintain the workings of the Warren, but to hold back the immense forces striving to break through her grip like an enraged bear striking at the thinnest of cloth. If even the smallest fraction of it should squeeze through it would annihilate her and the vessel together.

  The Star of Unta now rode a waterfall slope, its angle pitched almost straight down. The crest! We were upon the crest! Devaleth bore down with all her might to maintain the mental contours of the sea-soothing charm. How grateful she was for its simplicity, its timehoned elegance. And we in Mare sneer at these water-witches! They know what works, and do not mess with it!

  With another ominous chorus of groanings the vessel heaved itself flatter, falling at the stern. A mast-top snapped, falling with a deckshuddering crash. Devaleth maintained her concentration, moving now with the wavefront, easing the passage of every vessel she could reach.