‘Stilled every fire,’ Haut said. ‘Nothing burns. The exhalation of heat, the very vigour of life, all stopped. As within, so without. But then, is this not what death is? Stepping out from time’s incessant flow? Slipping from sight?’ He sighed, and then shrugged. ‘We are in the Long Night, we who choose to follow him. But you, Korya, here you do not belong.’
‘And I’m to knock Arathan unconscious and drag him away from here?’
‘Gothos holds at bay Hood’s … imposition. He creates a refuge, signified by his Folly, his unending tome, his eternal narrative. To defy the death of time, he would tell a story.’
‘His story.’
‘It may be his,’ Haut agreed. ‘Indeed, it may be precisely what he says it is. A suicide note, a confessional to failure. And yet, do you see this subtle defiance? While the tale continues, there can be no surrender to despair.’
‘No,’ she snapped, ‘of course not. The lord has his hate, after all.’
‘Burning hot as the sun, yes.’
‘Does his hate include Hood?’
‘Hood? Abyss take me, no. He loves the man as only a brother can.’
‘Yet, a brother not.’
Haut shrugged. ‘And now Gethol, returned from something worse than death. A prison we all thought was eternal. Sometimes the deeds of the past, Korya, lead to a place where no words are possible. And yet, does not the love remain? Thus, the three of them, one the spark of hate, one the sigh of grief, and one – well, one stands between the two.’
‘Will Gethol join Hood, then?’
‘I would think not, but all of that is between them. When I spoke of Gothos’s refuge, I meant to say that Arathan is protected.’
‘What of me?’
‘You are a Mahybe, Korya, a vessel formed to contain. By this alone, death cannot reach you.’
She grunted. ‘Oh, you’ve made me immortal, have you?’ When he said nothing, she slowly turned from the dead night sky above the plain. ‘Haut?’
‘Hold on to your potential,’ he said, ‘for as long as you can. There’s enough room inside you for a dozen lifetimes, maybe more. That’s down to your resilience and your cleverness.’
‘To what end?’
‘One day, the Azathanai Errastas will seek domination over the sorcery now suffusing this realm. And he will make it a thing of spilled blood, and should he succeed, magic will prove the cruellest gift of all.’
‘You would set me against an Azathanai?’
Haut offered her a wry smile. ‘Already I pity him.’
* * *
‘What took so long?’ Lasa Rook moaned plaintively, pulling sweaty strands of blonde hair from her face. ‘Look upon the beasts, O Lord of Duration, and see how the quick and the fierce suffices. By the tumbled rock-pile, Hanako, you have worn me out!’
He sat up, blinking, his twin hearts only now slowing their savage syncopation. He squinted into the north.
Lasa Rook continued, ‘Was it worth the wait? Does my bruised flower answer? No. Instead, the mumble below continues, tremors of the flesh and the spirit trembling like a startled fawn in the night. Oh, dear pup, you have dragged the moon to the ground! You have spun the stars with such abandon as to shatter the wheel! The body reels, the earth shudders. Now look upon me in the days to come and see the knowing glint in my eye, the sly knowledge of our terrible secret—’
‘Not so secret,’ Hanako said.
She sat up, her hair full of twigs and grass blades, and twisted round. ‘Hanako! We are attended by three hoary ghosts! Aaii! They stagger in the manner of revenants, with crumpled visages and eyes withered like dusty dates!’
‘Your husbands,’ Hanako said, ‘drawn to us, no doubt, by your shrieks.’ He lumbered to his feet. ‘Apologies dry upon my tongue. Shame and remorse chill my hearts, and in the face of righteous challenge, I shall raise no blade to defend myself.’
‘Oh,’ Lasa Rook said, squinting. ‘They are not dead then?’
‘No, only exhausted, it seems. Worn out by this deadly pursuit, and now here, their worst fears realized.’
She climbed to her feet, still naked, and brushed the dust from her arms, and then her breasts. ‘You have licked off all my sweet scents, Hanako. This puts me at a disadvantage. Say nothing. Leave this to me. They are my husbands, after all.’
Groaning under his breath, Hanako swung round to the south. The night sky above that horizon looked peculiar. ‘You promised that we would defend Erelan Kreed, and yet here we are. My lust, Lasa Rook, has broken our vow. Now he walks alone. For all we know, the dragon has already found him.’
‘Oh, enough of that nonsense, Hanako! See these dejected, broken men, my pets all bedraggled and forlorn. Are these the faces lighting with love and delight? Halt the world, my husbands have found me! Caught naked and lathered, flushed and sated beyond all measure! By my crime I have belittled them all! What recompense is possible? What price forgiveness?’
The three men drew closer and then stopped with a dozen paces between them and Lasa Rook, who stood facing them, brazen and tall.
After a long, tense moment, the eldest of them pointed at Hanako though his gaze remained fixed on his wife. His mouth worked soundlessly for a time, and then, in a strangled voice, he said, ‘You never once slashed any of us to bloody ribbons!’
Lasa Rook shot a look at Hanako, her brows raised. ‘Oh,’ she said as she turned back to her husbands, ‘that.’ She shrugged. ‘Many are the beasts lying in the grasses, each a habit unto itself. Some will ambush. Others yawn and doze till comes the night, when all manner of savagery is unleashed. Yet others flick their tails, watchful and opportunistic. I am a woman of appetites and curiosity, Garelko.’
‘But … another husband? How many do you need?’ Garelko pulled at his thin hair. ‘Oh, it’s never enough with you, Lasa Rook! No, you need to hunt down the finest warrior of all the mountain tribes! Slayer of more Thelomen than any of us can count!’ He pointed a shaking finger at Hanako. ‘And … you! You!’
‘Oh, be quiet – and you, Tathenal, not a word! Same for you, Ravast! I thought you all dead! Dragon-slain! Devoured, digested, shat out!’ Hands now on her hips, she shook her head and continued in a lower tone, ‘I grew doubtful of the three of you. How deep your love for me? In our home, ah, I caught a sniff of complacency.’
‘Complacency?’
‘Yes, Garelko! Was it mere contentment? Or love’s sordid decay? A challenge was needed. So I set out, on the slithery tail of a Jaghut’s raging grief. Would my husbands dare follow? Would they even notice my absence?’
Garelko pointed again at Hanako. ‘And this one? Was he too a test?’
‘Oh, who knows what set him on this trail. Such a young brave already weary of mundane challenges! But against that which cannot be defeated, ah, now there is a fate worthy of legend! Or,’ she added with a sigh, ‘some such thing.’
‘We heard your screams!’ Ravast suddenly blurted.
‘As you were meant to, were you indeed still alive – and what surer siren could I devise to bring you running?’ She waved a careless hand back towards Hanako. ‘Oh, he was fun I’ll grant you, a beast indeed, to now challenge your inventiveness in all the years of delight still to come!’
‘You’ll not stay with him?’ Garelko asked. ‘You’ll not claim him as another husband?’
‘Three are chore enough,’ she replied. ‘Besides, heed his destination! Do I seem a woman tired of life? Still, was not this journey an exciting one?’
Sourly, Tathenal said, ‘Dams have broken, wife, and now unseen rivers of wild thought devour the ground beneath us all. None are as we once were. Not even you. I see in Hanako’s eyes a renewed resolve. He will indeed march with that dread legion, and I will walk at his side. We have new enemies within each of us now, challenges to our sense of who we truly are, and these, my love, must be answered.’
When Tathenal moved forward to take his position at Hanako’s side, Lasa Rook’s eyes followed with raw dismay.
‘Oh my,�
� she breathed. And her gaze snapped back round when Ravast spoke.
‘Beloved wife,’ the young warrior said, ‘I will take the measure of this grieving Jaghut, and upon the threshold of a choice that cannot be unmade, only then will I decide my path.’
Garelko’s expression was suddenly ravaged. ‘Now, Lasa Rook,’ he said in a broken rasp, ‘see what you have done?’
‘Oh I see,’ she retorted, crossing her arms. ‘Clever punishment! Listen well, the three of you! I will accompany you to the Jaghut’s silly camp, where you can well contemplate joining the ragged mob that has fallen for his madness! But I shall not cross the threshold, even if you would all leave me a widow in truth! I am young still and the villages are bursting with handsome men, some of whom are even useful!’ She paused, and then resumed, ‘So contemplate well my lively future, husbands, and of troubled waters beneath the ground, consider most soberly their paltry gifts. From beyond the Harrowed Gate, husbands, you might well hear my lustful cries challenge the world itself!’
When she swung round to face Hanako, he saw the fierceness of her gaze, and was shaken. Turning to Tathenal, he said, ‘Go back with her, sir. The three of you, drag this woman home, bound and gagged if you must.’
‘The pup rejects me? After one tussle in the grass?’
He frowned at her. ‘You misunderstand, Lasa Rook. I am come to love you, but you burn too hot for me, and this fire in you is the raging glory of life, not death. Should you march down to the Jaghut … I fear a moment of fury, and a choice that cannot be unmade. Not for one such as you the realm of death, and so I beg you – I beg you all – go home.’ He swung his gaze south. ‘If I hurry, I will catch Erelan Kreed, and so guard his flank.’
Lasa Rook hissed, ‘You’re not actually contemplating joining those fools, are you? Was this not simply a lark? A cheerful cavort in the manner of spectators witnessing a mummery of absurdity? Hanako of the Scars, you are too young for the rock-pile!’
He shook his head. ‘I have my reasons, Lasa Rook, and they shall remain mine, forever unspoken, yet no less indurate. And now there is Erelan Kreed, whom I will not abandon. What glory is found in turning aside? What truth can be revealed unless one indeed walks through the gate? No, I will find what I seek.’
She now glared at the four of them. ‘You … you men!’
When Hanako set out, the others fell in behind him. He heard a sharp low cry from Garelko and turned to see Lasa Rook gripping his right ear as she hissed, ‘Convince these idiots, old man, or you’ll rue your failure!’
‘I’ll try! I swear it!’
Setting his gaze southward again, Hanako hurried on. ‘Forgive me my pace,’ he called out. ‘Find your own to suit – it matters not.’
‘What do you mean, Hanako?’ Tathenal asked.
In reply, Hanako pointed ahead. ‘See the sky? There, my friends, the world holds its breath.’
He heard their soft exclamations and low muttering, as yet another argument erupted between Lasa Rook and her husbands.
Hanako was glad of the lovemaking. That had been a fire in need of dousing. Now his mind felt clear, his resolve harsh and bold with new resilience.
Death, I will face you at last. Unblinking, I will face that which all who are said to be heroic must face. And I will have my answer.
But I am no fool. Lord of the Rock-Piles, I’ll not deny you. Each time, you win in the end. Indeed, you never lose. And so I will ask you, O Lord of Death, what worth the victory … in such a crooked game?
* * *
Gethol’s mottled face bore an expression of old pain and suffering that Arathan suspected was permanent. Five centuries buried beneath the earth, bound in roots, must have taken such a toll that he wondered how the Jaghut remained sane. Assuming sanity was ever there in the first place. These are Jaghut, after all.
Gethol was staring at Arathan with a strangely remote contemplation, as if in studying the young black-skinned Tiste Andii, he was in fact looking through to something else. The uncanny regard unnerved Arathan, but he was not prepared to reveal that to this brother of Gothos. He stared back.
After the passage of some time, Gothos glanced up from his desk and said, ‘Is this really necessary?’
Gethol frowned and then, with a shrug, he looked away. ‘This charge of yours. This bastard son of Draconus.’
‘Yes, what of him?’
‘Yes,’ Arathan added, ‘what of me?’
Grunting, Gethol said, ‘Some things are better left unsaid, I suppose.’
Gothos set his stylus down. ‘I imagine you said very little for a rather long time, Gethol.’
‘This is true.’
‘All those useless words.’
‘Spake the writer leaning over his tome.’
‘If I presume in error, brother, do enlighten me.’
Gethol lifted a gnarled hand and eyed it speculatively. ‘My talons need trimming. Still, I am thankful I possessed them, although I expect the Seregahl I dragged into my place might venture a different opinion.’
‘Were your eyes open?’ Gothos asked.
‘No, of course not. That would sting, and besides, there is very little to see. Consider the interred, the buried man, be he in sandy soil or sodden peat. Note the closed eyes, the peaceful expression, the firm set of the mouth.’
‘Like that, then.’
‘No,’ Gethol replied, ‘nothing like that. Most buried people are dead, after all. Death seems to insist upon a solemn mien. Then again, in choosing an eternal expression, I imagine peaceful is preferable to, say, the rictus of terror.’
‘And yours, brother?’
‘Oh, I would suggest … disappointment?’
Gothos sighed and rubbed at his face with ink-stained fingers. ‘We all volunteered, Gethol. It was just ill-luck that—’
‘My fateful misstep, yes. It was, perhaps, more a case of my unexpected downturn in fortune. One does not rise in the morning, say, considering ending the day in black soil and bound by the roots of a tree, or, for that matter, being imprisoned for five centuries.’
‘Yes, that does seem unlikely,’ Gothos replied. ‘Still, the contemplation of what the fates hold in store must surely accompany each morning’s greeting.’
‘You always were the one obsessed with solemn contemplation, brother, not me.’
‘I deem it a measure of intellect.’
‘A failure I am proud to acknowledge,’ Gethol replied, baring his blackened tusks.
‘Hence the misstep.’
The grin fell away.
‘It is invariably those lacking in intellect,’ Gothos expounded, ‘who unceasingly rue their misfortune. The curse of the witless is to beat one’s head against the obstinate wall of how things really are, rather than what they insist upon their being. Thud, thud, thud. I envisage indeed an expression of dull disappointment, year upon year, century upon century.’
‘I blame Hood,’ Gethol growled.
‘Of course you do.’
The brothers nodded in unison, and then fell silent.
Arathan leaned back in his chair, looking at each one in turn. He crossed his arms. ‘You two are ridiculous,’ he said. ‘I believe the time has come to take my leave of you. Gothos, my gratitude for your … forbearance. The food, drink and the work you had me do. While I gather you and Haut have decided on where I am to go now, I humbly point out that I am of an age to make my own decisions. And I will now walk to Hood’s side, there to await the opening of the gate.’
‘Alas,’ Gothos said, ‘we cannot permit that. You made yourself a gift to me, after all, on behalf of your father. I don’t recall relinquishing my possession of that gift. Gethol?’
Gethol returned to eyeing Arathan speculatively. ‘I have only just arrived, but you’ve made no mention of anything like that.’
‘Just so. As for Haut, Arathan, bear in mind that young Korya Delath, who must now return to Kurald Galain, will be without a protector.’
‘So find someone else,’ Arathan snapped. ‘Why
not Gethol here? It’s not as though he has anything to do.’
‘Curiously,’ mused Gethol, ‘I am of a mind to do just that. Accompany you and Korya, that is.’
‘Then she has an escort and you two don’t need me tagging along! Besides, Father sent me here to be beyond the reach of his rivals in the court of the Citadel.’
Gothos cleared his throat. ‘Yes, about that.’
‘You have heard something?’ Arathan sat forward. ‘How? You’ve never left this damned chamber!’
‘Perturbations in the ether,’ Gothos said, frowning.
‘Perturbations in the what?’
The frown deepened at Arathan’s incredulity.
Gethol snorted.
Sighing, Gothos said, ‘A Forulkan traveller arrived in Hood’s camp yesterday. A delightfully dour female named Doubt. She spoke of events to the east.’
‘What kind of events?’
‘Oh, let me not imply that they have already occurred. Rather, a path has been set upon that has but one destination.’ He blew out his breath. ‘In keeping with my unassailable observations on the inherent self-destructiveness of civilization—’
‘Not again,’ Gethol groaned as he climbed to his feet. ‘Now at last we come to the reason why I dived beneath that tree in the house’s yard – the only escape left to me. I believe I will pay one last visit to Hood, if only to partake in the joy of stinging awake his shame.’ He eyed Arathan. ‘You may join me there, assuming you survive the imminent monologue.’ He strode from the chamber.
‘Milord,’ said Arathan to Gothos, ‘spare me the lecture, if you please. I would know the details of what has happened, or is about to happen.’
‘Well, that is just it, young Arathan. By the time you and Korya return to Kurald Galain, the smoke will have cleared as it were. The dust settled, the mass burial trenches filled in, and so on and so forth. From this it is probably safe to assume the ousting of your father. Indeed, I would be surprised to find him anywhere in that realm.’
‘Then, what will I be returning to?’
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