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

  ‘But – that would be murder!’

  He winced. ‘Keep your voice down, lass. And yeah – it would. But these boys are pirates and wreckers for generations. Nothing new for them.’

  ‘No. I don’t believe it.’

  Like always. Denial of the discomfiting truth. He hugged his pannier to his lap. ‘Yeah. Well. Let’s just hope so.’

  The Spawns grew to the south. They became a collection of jagged black-rock islands. The only signs of life were wheeling cawing seabirds and faint tendrils of smoke rising here and there amid the peaks. They didn’t look all that big, only the main island, which at sea level looked as wide as a mountain. From there it climbed steep and saw-edged into a series of knife-like crags. He wondered why it hadn’t sunk lower. Could it have landed on shoals? Surely the Rivan Sea wasn’t so shallow this far out. It also struck him that the entire mammoth structure listed to one side. Antsy canted his head as he followed the angle down to where the waves crashed in a distant white surf at the waterline. Burn preserve him! Was it floating?

  At last a reef-like collection of black rocks reared ahead, sharp-edged and spotted with bird-droppings. The sea hissed and the muted roar of surf reached Antsy. At a yell from the mainmast the anchor was dropped. Men ran for the sails, taking them in. Their bare feet thumped over the deck timbers. Some readied the ship’s boat, a flat-bottomed punt.

  Malakai appeared at Antsy’s side. ‘We’ll disembark now.’

  ‘Aye.’

  The punt was lowered into the rough waters and four sailors climbed down to handle it. Their equipment was lowered by rope. Antsy climbed down first then called for Orchid. She was lowered in a sling that he helped guide from below. Next came Malakai. Last, Corien swung down on one of the punt’s ropes. The sailors pushed off using long polished poles. Everyone crouched as low as possible as the tiny punt yawed alarmingly.

  Poling from rock to rock the sailors made good time. Soon the ship was lost to sight behind a maze of stone shards that varied from man-height to ship-size. The farther they penetrated into the eerie reef the smoother the water became until it was as if they were crossing a land-locked lagoon.

  ‘Look there,’ Orchid cried, pointing.

  To one side a pointed stone shard resembling an immense fang reared at an angle from the waters. Its contours troubled Antsy until he recognized its features: a circular staircase cut from the very rock spiralled upwards, ending at empty air. The sight brought home the outrageousness, the impertinence, of their intentions. Orchid sobered, losing her excited grin, and she rubbed her arms as if chilled. Even the sailors grew quiet. They peered everywhere at once and Antsy didn’t think it was from the difficulty of the passage. Only Malakai and, surprisingly, Corien appeared unaffected by the atmosphere of alien grandeur.

  Every little sound echoed into distorted noise: the harsh cawing of the seabirds, the crack of the poles against rock, unseen falling stones, and the constant slap of the waves. Beneath the water Antsy caught the glint of the day’s dying light glimmering from sunken metal, possibly even silver or gold. Multicoloured fish darted, nibbling at the first growth of algae and seaweed.

  Orchid began humming a slow dirge-like tune. The humming became words that she whispered to the passing shattered basaltic rock.

  Mother Dark he forswore

  Death’s own blade he bore.

  Dragon’s blood course his veins,

  Immortal,

  He walks till end of Light:

  Anomander,

  Night’s own fickle Knight.

  Everyone turned to her. Even the sailors stopped poling. Blinking as if returning from a long daydream she blushed furiously, her dark features flushing, and she lowered her head. ‘From an epic poem composed during the Holy City period of the Seven Cities region,’ she said.

  Corien cleared his throat. ‘Thank you. Very appropriate.’

  The sailors eyed one another but none commented. They returned to their poling, following a route known only to them. The main island reared over them now, rising sheer from the surf as a cliff. The sailors started edging the punt round it. Between the shards, off to one side, Antsy spotted an anchored ship rocking in the waves. It was long and low-slung in the water, single-masted. A war galley. Shields hung all along its side just above the oar-ports. In the dying light it was hard to tell, but the shields appeared somehow decorated. Then it was gone in the maze of rocks. Antsy turned away shaking his head; it was almost as if he’d imagined it.

  The punt yawed dangerously now, threatening to capsize. The waves batted it like the toy it was. A number of times it was almost swamped as the surf threatened to suck it against the rocks of the cliff. A darker shadow, the mouth of a cave some way above the waterline, came into view round the curve ahead and as they drew near Antsy spotted a rope ladder hanging from it into the surf. The sailors poled the boat to just beneath. ‘Get your gear,’ one yelled over the crash of the waves.

  ‘Get closer!’ Antsy demanded, but started gathering the equipment. Corien grabbed one set of waterskins and Antsy silently thanked him.

  ‘Now, go!’ a sailor shouted.

  ‘Wait just a damned minute!’

  When the punt dipped in the surf Malakai suddenly leapt to land on a tiny stone ledge. He trailed the rope behind him. Antsy pressed it into Orchid’s hands. ‘Hold on.’

  ‘I can’t swim!’

  ‘Then hold on, dammit!’

  The poles cracked against the rocks as the sailors desperately fended the boat from the cliff. Orchid yelled something lost in the crash of waves and jumped for the end of the rope ladder. The punt nearly tipped over. She disappeared into the foaming blue-black waves. Malakai hauled on the rope. Antsy remembered the girl’s amazingly strong grip. She appeared again, thrown up by the surf, driven against the rock wall, to which she clung. Malakai began making his way to her, dragging the rope ladder with him.

  Corien took the punt’s side next. While the man timed his jump Antsy belted the two panniers he had been carrying to himself. ‘How do we get off the damned island?’ he yelled to the nearest sailor.

  The man waved him away. ‘Go, damn you!’

  Antsy pointed to the cave. ‘Is this where we get off, too?’

  Corien leapt and hit the side where he hung by both hands. He clambered up the uneven cliff face.

  ‘Jump or we take you back with us!’ a sailor barked, and swung his pole at Antsy.

  All right – we’ll have to do this the hard way then. Antsy drew a dirk and yanked the nearest sailor down into the bottom of the boat. All four screamed insults. The punt bounced like a cork. Antsy shoved two fingers’ length of the dirk blade into the man’s side. The sailor jerked, then held himself utterly still. The other three were too busy holding the punt off from the cliff to come to his aid. ‘You know!’ Antsy yelled. ‘What’s the story on getting out?’

  ‘Let me go or we’re all dead!’

  ‘Answer!’

  ‘All right! Hood’s grin, man!’

  Then the bottom of the punt launched up into Antsy, clouting him in the mouth, and there was a shout of warning, a snapping of wood, and the water sucked him down into its cold embrace. The sailor he still had by the belt kicked at him; the two panniers of equipment dragged him down like stone weights. He cut the straps of one, hoping it was the right choice. A wall of black stone veined with bubbles flew at him. The collision knocked out his remaining breath and he gulped in a mouthful of water. He scrabbled for a grip over the slimy rock. He knew he was drowning and it outraged him that there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it. It wasn’t goddamned fair.

  It seemed that the world, with all its infinite traps, had finally caught up with him.

  He came to coughing and vomiting up seawater. Someone held him upright in chest-high surging waves: Malakai. The man was shouting something: ‘Did you lose it! Where is it?’

  Still dry-heaving, Antsy dug at the remaining pannier; it was his. He grinned his relief to Malakai who grunted, nodding.
The man also had a grip on the rope ladder and he swung Antsy to it. ‘Damned fool.’

  At the back of the cave was a flight of ascending steps cut into the rock, barely as wide as his shoulders. It was pitch black but for the light from the cave mouth. Antsy felt his way on all fours. Seawater dripped from him on to the stairs, which were cold beneath his hands, and as slippery as polished marble. He kept almost falling until he realized that the stairs tilted crazily to one side. He smelled something, an old familiar smell – it came from something smeared over the stairs, and because it had been some time it took him a moment to recognize the tang of dried blood.

  ‘Almost at the top,’ came Orchid’s voice from above.

  Hands took his shoulders and she led him to a wall. He leaned against it, grateful. She seemed to be having no trouble in the absolute black. ‘Corien?’

  ‘Gone ahead.’

  ‘How far?’ from Malakai, sharp.

  ‘Not far,’ came Corien’s voice.

  Antsy couldn’t take it any longer: ‘I can’t see a goddamned blasted thing!’

  Silence, the muted roar of the surf. ‘Anyone else?’ asked Malakai.

  ‘I’ve always had excellent night vision,’ said Orchid.

  ‘Before I came I visited an alchemist. He gave me an unguent,’ Corien said.

  ‘Can you give some to Red?’

  ‘Ah. Sorry. There’s really only enough for one.’

  Antsy felt his way along the wall to the top of the stairs. He squinted down; there, dull grey, a glimmering.

  ‘Don’t we have any light?’ Orchid asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Malakai answered, reluctantly. ‘But I’d rather not announce our presence by shining it everywhere.’

  ‘Well, you should’ve thought of that when you hired us.’

  Corien chuckled his appreciation of the point.

  A long silence followed that. Antsy peered about the black, which seemed to him no longer absolute. His vision was adjusting; he could make out blobs of greater and lesser darkness, catch hints of movement. Someone slid down one wall to a sitting position. ‘We’ll wait,’ said Malakai. ‘We’re wet and it’s night. ‘We’ll have more light in the morning.’

  Everyone sat. Equipment banged to the floor. ‘What was that about, Red?’ Corien asked. ‘There on the boat?’

  Antsy debated not bothering to answer but decided that since they were all stuck together he might as well make the effort. ‘I wanted some information so I put a knife to one of them. We capsized.’

  Corien laughed a loud barracks-room bray. ‘Remind me not to withhold information from you in the future.’

  Antsy allowed himself a sour half-smile. He hugged his pannier to his chest. He was soaked, cold, and his mouth hurt like the devil. This was not going the way he’d imagined. Then he laughed, thinking of something: ‘I’m sure as Hood not keeping watch tonight.’

  Orchid and Corien chuckled.

  ‘I will. Everyone get some sleep,’ growled Malakai.

  No one spoke again that night.

  Kiska had no idea how long they sat imprisoned in their cliff-face cave. Or even that such concepts as days or hours even mattered here at what now truly seemed to be the ‘Shores of Creation’. Leoman practised with his morningstars at the widest point of the cave-fissure. Kiska had her chance to practise close work with the stave. She tested herself until her arms burned then threw herself down to sleep.

  But sleep would not come. Instead, her thoughts wandered to one of her last assignments within the Claw. One of a team pursuing indigenous leaders in Seven Cities. Assassination, disruption of nativist movements, the seeding of spies and provocateurs. Ugly work. Murder, torture, extortion, blackmail. That was where she fell away from the Claw. Not out of squeamishness, or adherence to any sort of misplaced moral philosophy – if they weren’t doing it to others then others’d be doing it to them, after all – no, it was purely professional disgust. The politicking within the Claw. The careerist lies and backstabbing. The toadying and outright favouritism in promotions. At first it only disgusted her and she kept her distance.

  But then it happened to her.

  It had been a routine operation. The target was an entrenched anti-occupation movement gaining strength around Aren. She’d been second in command of the Hand assigned the clean-up. They were lucky to have two locally recruited agents: Seven Cities natives who favoured the Malazan mission of suppressing the wasteful feuding, the opening up of the culture to the wider world.

  These two were tasked with infiltrating the movement.

  During this time the Hand waited and watched. Buildings were noted. Members were marked. The Hand held off until word was passed of a major meet or gathering. The night was set. Kiska’s Hand was positioned; the sign was given; they moved.

  They stepped right into an ambush.

  Somehow, these Seven Cities patriots had gotten word of the attack. A number proved to be hardened veterans from the first war of invasion. When it all was over the small dank cellar was a bloodbath. Only she and the Hand commander remained standing.

  On searching the side rooms she found their agents. Both had been monstrously tortured. Mauled and carved almost beyond recognition as human. Bound and hanging like meat. Unbelievably, one still lived. Though eyeless, his stomach eviscerated, the innards dangling in loops, he mouthed that the insurgents had been tipped off. That he’d overheard their boasting of a source within the Claw itself.

  Both Kiska and Lotte, the Hand commander, immediately knew who it probably was. The man was Lotte’s rival for promotion to the regional directorate. Kiska was all for murdering him that night. Right then and there with the blood still wet on their boots and gloves. But Lotte demurred. He was willing to grant his rival this round. The operation would be reported as botched, a black mark on his record, and the other fellow would get the directorship.

  But with Kiska’s help he vowed to see to it that the man’s tenure would be one long series of failures and setbacks in the region. He would be removed. And then, Lotte proposed, himself and Kiska could potentially rule the Seven Cities holdings from behind the scenes. In the dark of the cellar, the stink of blood and bile a miasma in the air, the dead a carpet round their feet, and Lotte’s gaze bright upon her weighing, guarded, Kiska thought it prudent to agree.

  But her faith in the virtue of her calling had been shaken – no, more than shaken … it had been stabbed through the heart. Lost among the self-promotion and careerist manoeuvring within the order was any concern or responsibility to their larger mission serving the Empire. It seemed that the entire Malazan goal of subduing the Seven Cities region could go down in flames so long as one Claw operative managed to sabotage his rivals. And also dead were two infinitely valuable local agents, loyal and dedicated to the Malazan cause. Betrayed for a cheap leg-up in one bureaucrat’s career. Kiska was sickened beyond disgust by the utter short-sighted selfishness of it.

  Shortly after that she abandoned the Claw and fled to the service of High Mage Tayschrenn. There they dared not touch her, and there she remained until that day: the day that saw not only the Empress’s fall, but Tayschrenn’s disappearance. The fall of the Empire’s greatest High Mage to this Yathengar, a Seven Cities priest-mage, crazed with the desire for revenge for the occupation of his lands and the insults to his city gods. To destroy his enemy the man had actually summoned raw Chaos to drive a hole in creation itself. And the two had been sucked within.

  So now she sought him. Across all the face of creation, it seemed, she sought her master. Again she scoured among her feelings for the reasons for such pursuit. The most uncomfortable suspicion was of course that she longed for his attention, his embrace as a man. She studied that urge as ruthlessly as possible to come to the conclusion: no. She no longer dreamt of such a liaison – the stuff of some syrupy courtly romance. When she’d been younger she’d allowed herself the illusion. But no longer. Perhaps some scholar would argue she sought him as the father figure she’d never truly known as a chil
d. Perhaps. What she thought far more germane was that she considered him possibly the only one left who could enforce some sort of standard of behaviour, or moral direction, upon the Empire. If that were at all possible.

  All very high-sounding in purpose and aspiration.

  But the suspicion pricked her: perhaps the truth was far less noble. Perhaps she was here because she was afraid the Claw would eventually come for her. The organization was famous for never forgetting. But no, all that was so long ago and far away. They had much bigger things to concern themselves with. And she had leverage. She knew things about the Empire. Things no one wanted whispered.

  Yet was that not another good reason to see you gone?

  She opened her eyes to the familiar narrow cave. Something was different. She heard whispering, a murmuring out beyond the cave mouth. Leoman lay asleep, his breath even, the pulse at his neck steady. Thinking of Seven Cities: this man had served in the resistance against Malazan occupation alongside Yathengar, or at least in sympathy with him. And in that region he had delivered a heart-thrust to the Empire with the conflagration at Y’Ghatan.

  The dizzying idea came to her that in her actions she was somehow aiding him in some hidden goals against the Empire. Perhaps she should take the opportunity now to slay him in his sleep, or regret it later. Yet she knew she could not bring herself to commit murder. She was no assassin, though trained in their techniques.

  She rose and glided soundlessly to the opening.

  It was unguarded. The lumpish beings who had barricaded them in had moved off. They were whispering – well, croaking, belching and lisping – among themselves. It was the gloomy dusk of night. Alien stars glimmered overhead. It occurred to her that if she wished she could make up new constellations among them. The Stave and the Morningstar perhaps.

  The lumpy guards squealed and burbled as they caught sight of her, and they came limping up to surround her. It seemed to her that she could smack them to pieces with her staff, but she felt only pity for them. Pity and sadness. She couldn’t bring herself to strike any one of them.