The Bonehunters

by Steven Erikson

  Kalam looked up at the looming bulk of the sky keep. 'I'd rather not think about that.'

  Snorting sounds from Stormy as he launched into the venison strips.

  'Do you suspect,' Quick Ben ventured as he sat down, 'there is some significance to the selection provided us?' He collected an alabaster goblet and poured himself a helping of the Paran white. 'Or is it the sheer decadence that he wants to rub our noses in?'

  'My nose is just fine,' Stormy said, tipping his head to one side and spitting out a bone. 'Gods, I could eat all of this myself! Maybe I will at that!'

  Sighing, Kalam joined them at the table. 'All right, at least this gives us time to talk about things.' He saw the wizard glance suspiciously at Stormy. 'Relax, Quick, I doubt Stormy can hear us above his own chewing.'

  'Hah!' the Falari laughed, spitting fragments across the table, one landing with a plop in the wizard's goblet. 'As if I give a Hood's toenail about all your self-important preen­ing! You two want to talk yourselves blue, go right ahead — I won't waste my time listening.'

  Quick Ben found a silver meat-spear and delicately picked the piece of venison from the goblet. He took a tentative sip, made a face, and poured the wine away. As he refilled the goblet, he said, 'Well, I'm not entirely convinced Stormy here is irrelevant to our conversation.'

  The red-bearded soldier looked up, small eyes narrowing with sudden unease. 'I couldn't be more irrelevant if I tried,' he said in a growl, reaching again for the bottle of red.

  Kalam watched the man's throat bob as he downed mouthful after mouthful.

  'It's that sword,' said Quick Ben. 'That T'lan Imass sword. How did you come by it, Stormy?'

  'Huh, santos. In Falar only poor people eat those ugly fish, and the Kartoolii call it a delicacy! Idiots.' He collected one and began scooping the red, oily flesh from the clay shell. 'It was given to me,' he said, 'for safekeeping.'

  'By a T'lan Imass?' Kalam asked.

  'Aye.'

  'So it plans on coming back for it?'

  'If it can, aye.'

  'Why would a T'lan Imass give you its sword? They generally use them, a lot.'

  'Not where it was headed, assassin. What's this? Some kind of bird?'

  'Yes,' said Quick Ben. 'Grouse. So, where was the T'lan Imass headed, then?'

  'Grouse. What's that, some kind of duck? It went into a big wound in the sky, to seal it.'

  The wizard leaned back. 'Don't expect it any time soon, then.'

  'Well, it took the head of a Tiste Andii with it, and that head was still alive — Truth was the only one who saw that — the other T'lan Imass didn't, not even the bonecaster. Small wings — surprised the thing could fly at all. Not very well, hah, since someone caught it!' He finished the Grisian and tossed away the bottle. It thumped in the thick dust. Stormy then reached for the Napan belack. 'You know what's the problem with you two? I'll tell ya. I'll tell ya the problem. You both think too much, and you think that by thinking so much you get somewhere with all that thinking, only you don't. Look, it's simple. Something you don't like gets in your way you kill it, and once you kill it you can stop thinking about it and that's that.'

  'Interesting philosophy, Stormy,' said Quick Ben. 'But what if that "something" is too big, or too many, or nastier than you?'

  'Then you cut it down to size, wizard.'

  'And if you can't?'

  'Then you find someone else who can. Maybe they end up killing each other, and that's that.' He waved the half-empty bottle of belack. 'You think you can make all sortsa plans? Idiots. I squat down and shit on your plans!'

  Kalam smiled at Quick Ben. 'Stormy's onto something there, maybe.'

  The wizard scowled. 'What, squatting—'

  'No, finding someone else to do the dirty work for us. We're old hands at that, Quick, aren't we?'

  'Only, it gets harder.' Quick Ben gazed up at the sky keep. 'All right, let me think—'

  'Oh we're in trouble now!'

  'Stormy,' said Kalam, 'you're drunk.'

  'I ain't drunk. Two bottlesa wine don't get me drunk. Not Stormy, they don't.'

  'The question,' said the wizard, 'is this. Who or what defeated the K'Chain Che'Malle the first time round? And then, is that powerful force still alive? Once we work out the answers to those—'

  'Like I said,' the Falari growled, 'you talk and talk and talk and you ain't getting a damned thing.'

  Quick Ben settled back, rubbing at his eyes. 'Fine, then. Go on, Stormy, let's hear your brilliance.'

  'First, you're assuming those lizard things are your enemy in the firs' place. Third, if the legends are true, those lizards defeated themselves, so what in Hood's soiled trousers are you panicking 'bout? Second, the Adjunct wanted to know all 'bout them and where they're going and all that. Well, the sky keeps ain't going nowhere, and we already know what's inside 'em, so we done our job. You idiots want to break into one — what for? You ain't got a clue what for. And five, you gonna finish that white wine, wizard? 'Cause I ain't touching that rice piss.'

  Quick Ben slowly sat forward and slid the bottle towards Stormy.

  No better gesture of defeat was possible, Kalam decided. 'Finish up, everyone,' he said, 'so we can get outa this damned warren and back to the Fourteenth.'

  'Something else,' said Quick Ben, 'I wanted to talk about.'

  'So go ahead,' Stormy said expansively, waving a grouse leg. 'Stormy's got your answers, yes he does.'

  'I've heard stories... a Malazan escort, clashing with a fleet of strange ships off the Geni coast. From the descriptions of the foe, they sound like Tiste Edur. Stormy, that ship of yours, what was it called?'

  'The Silanda. Dead grey-skinned folk, all cut down on the deck, and the ship's captain, speared right through, pinned to his Hood-damned chair in his cabin — gods below, the arm that threw that...'

  'And Tiste Andii... heads.'

  'Bodies were below, manning the sweeps.'

  'Those grey-skinned folk were Tiste Edur,' Quick Ben said. 'I don't know, maybe I shouldn't put the two together, but something about them makes me nervous. Where did that Tiste Edur fleet come from?'

  Kalam grunted, then said, 'It's a big world, Quick. They could've come from anywhere, blown off course by some storm, or on an exploratory mission of some kind.'

  'More like raiding,' Stormy said. 'If they attacked right off like they did. Anyway, where we found the Silanda in the first place — there'd been a battle there, too. Against Tiste Andii. Messy.'

  Quick Ben sighed and rubbed his eyes again. 'Near Coral, during the Pannion War, the body of a Tiste Edur was found. It had come up from deep water.' He shook his head. 'I've a feeling we haven't seen the last of them.'

  'The Shadow Realm,' Kalam said. 'It was theirs, once, and now they want it back.'

  The wizard's gaze narrowed on the assassin. 'Cotillion told you this?'

  Kalam shrugged.

  'It keeps coming back to Shadowthrone, doesn't it? No wonder I'm nervous. That slimy, slippery bastard—'

  'Oh Hood's balls,' Stormy groaned, 'give me that rice piss, if you're gonna go on and on. Shadowthrone ain't scary. Shadowthrone's just Ammanas, and Ammanas is just Kellanved. Just like Cotillion's Dancer. Hood knows, we knew the Emperor well enough. And Dancer. They up to something? No surprise. They were always up to something, from the very start. I tell you both right now,' he paused for a swig of rice wine, made a face, then continued, 'when all the dust's settled, they'll be shining like pearls atop a dung-heap. Gods, Elder Gods, dragons, undead, spirits and the scary empty face of the Abyss itself — they won't none a them stand a chance. You want to worry about Tiste Edur, wizard? Go ahead. Maybe they ruled Shadow once, but Shadowthrone'll take 'em down. Him and Dancer.' He belched. 'An' you know why? I'll tell you why. They never fight fair. That's why.'

  Kalam looked over at the empty chair, and his eyes slowly narrowed.

  ****

  Stumbling, crawling, or dragging themselves along through the bed of white ash, they all came to where
Bottle sat, the sky a swirl of stars overhead. Saying nothing, not one of those soldiers, but each in turn managing one gentle gesture — reaching out and with one finger, touching the head of Y'Ghatan the rat.

  Tender, with great reverence — until she bit that finger, and the hand would be snatched back with a hissed curse.

  One after another, Y'Ghatan bit them all.

  She was hungry, Bottle explained, and pregnant. So he explained. Or tried to, but no-one was really listening. It seemed that they didn't even care, that her bite was part of the ritual, now, a price of blood, the payment of sacrifice.

  He told those who would listen that she had bitten him too.

  But she hadn't. Not her. Not him. Their souls were in­extricably bound, now. And things like that were complicated, profound even. He studied the creature where it was settled in his lap. Profound, yes, that was the word.

  He stroked her head. My dear rat. My sweet— ow! Damn you! Bitch!

  Black, glittering eyes looked up at him, whiskered nose twitching.

  Vile, disgusting creatures.

  He set the creature down and it could wander over a precipice for all he cared. Instead, the rat snuggled up against his right foot and curled into sleep. Bottle looked over at the makeshift camp, at the array of dim faces he could see here and there. No-one had lit a fire. Funny, that, in a sick way.

  They had come through it. Bottle still found it difficult to believe. And Gesler had gone back in, only to return a while later. Followed by Corabb Bhilan Thenu'alas, the warrior dragging Strings into view, then himself collapsing. Bottle could hear the man's snores that had been going on uninterrupted half the night.

  The sergeant was alive. The honey smeared into his wounds seemed to have delivered healing to match High Denul, making it obvious that it had been anything but ordinary honey — as if the strange visions weren't proof enough of that. Still, even that was unable to replace the blood Strings had lost, and that blood loss should have killed him. Yet now the sergeant slept, too weak to manage much else, but alive.

  Bottle wished he was as tired... in that way, at least, the kind that beckoned warm and welcoming. Instead of this spiritual exhaustion that left his nerves frayed, images return­ing again and again of their nightmare journey among the buried bones of Y'Ghatan. And with them, the bitter taste of those moments when all seemed lost, hopeless.

  Captain Faradan Sort and Sinn had stashed away a supply of water-casks and food-packs, which they had since retrieved, but for Bottle no amount of water could wash the taste of smoke and ashes from his mouth. And there was something else that burned still within him. The Adjunct had abandoned them, forcing the captain and Sinn to desert. True enough, it was only reasonable to assume noone had been left alive. He knew his feeling was irrational, yet it gnawed at him nonetheless.

  The captain had talked about the plague, sweeping towards them from the east, and the need to keep the army well ahead of it. The Adjunct had waited as long as she could. Bottle knew all that. Still...

  'We're dead, you know.'

  He looked over at Koryk, who sat cross-legged nearby, a child sleeping beside him. 'If we're dead,' Bottle said, 'why do we feel so awful?'

  'As far as the Adjunct's concerned. We're dead. We can just... leave.'

  'And go where, Koryk? Poliel stalks Seven Cities—'

  'Ain't no plague gonna kill us. Not now.'

  'You think we're immortal or something?' Bottle asked. He shook his head. 'We survived this, sure, but that doesn't mean a damned thing. It sure as Hood doesn't mean that the next thing to come along won't kill us right and quick. Maybe you're feeling immune — to anything and everything the world can throw at us, now. But, believe me, we're not.'

  'Better that than anything else,' Koryk muttered.

  Bottle thought about the soldier's words. 'You think some god decided to use us? Pulled us out for a reason?'

  'Either that, Bottle, or your rat's a genius.'

  'The rat was four legs and a good nose, Koryk. Her soul was bound. By me. I was looking through her eyes, sensing everything she sensed—'

  'And did she dream when you dreamed?'

  'Well, I don't know—'

  'Did she run away, then?'

  'No, but—'

  'So she waited around. For you to wake back up. So you could imprison her soul again.'

  Bottle said nothing.

  'Any god tries to use me,' Koryk said in a low voice, 'it'll regret it.'

  'With all those fetishes you wear,' Bottle noted, 'I'd have thought you'd be delighted at the attention.'

  'You're wrong. What I wear ain't for seeking blessings.'

  'Then what are they?'

  'Wards.'

  'All of them?'

  Koryk nodded. 'They make me invisible. To gods, spirits, demons…'

  Bottle studied the soldier through the gloom. 'Well, maybe they don't work.'

  'Depends,' he replied.

  'On what?'

  'Whether we're dead or not.'

  Smiles laughed from nearby. 'Koryk's lost his mind. No surprise, it being so small, and things being so dark in there...'

  'Not like ghosts and all that,' Koryk said in a sneering tone. 'You think like a ten-year-old, Smiles.'

  Bottle winced.

  Something skittered off a rock close to Koryk and the soldier started. 'What in Hood's name?'

  'That was a knife,' Bottle said, having felt it whip past him. 'Amazing, she saved one for you.'

  'More than one,' Smiles said. 'And Koryk, I wasn't aim­ing for your leg.'

  'I told you you weren't immune,' Bottle said.

  'I'm — never mind.'

  I'm still alive, you were going to say. Then, wisely, decided not to.

  ****

  Gesler crouched down in front of the captain. 'We're a hairless bunch,' he said, 'but otherwise pretty well mending. Captain, I don't know what made you believe in Sinn, enough to run from the army, but I'm damned glad you did.'

  'You were all under my command,' she said. 'Then you got too far ahead of me. I did my best to find you, but the smoke, the flames — all too much.' She looked away. 'I didn't want to leave it at that.'

  'How many did the legion lose?' Gesler asked. She shrugged. 'Maybe two thousand. Soldiers were still dying. We were trapped, Fist Keneb and Baralta and about eight hundred, on the wrong side of the breach — until Sinn pushed the fire back — don't ask me how. They say she's a High Mage of some kind. There was nothing addled about her that night, Sergeant, and I didn't think she was addled when she tried getting back into the city.'

  Nodding, Gesler was silent for a moment, then he rose. 'I wish I could sleep.... and it looks like I'm not alone in that. I wonder why that is...'

  'The stars, Sergeant,' said Faradan Sort. 'They're glitter­ing down.'

  'Aye, might be that and nothing more.'

  'Nothing more? I would think, more than enough.'

  'Aye.' He looked down at the small bite on his right index finger. 'All for a damned rat, too.'

  'All of you fools are probably infected with plague, now.'

  He started, then smiled. 'Let the bitch try.'

  ****

  Balm rubbed the last crusted mud from his face, then scowled over at his corporal. 'You, Deadsmell, you think I didn't hear you praying and gibbering down there? You ain't fooled me about nothing worth fooling about.'

  The man, leaning against a rock, kept his eyes closed as he replied, 'Sergeant, you keep trying, but we know. We all know.'

  'You all know what?'

  'Why you're talking and talking and still talking.'

  'What are you talking about?'

  'You're glad to be alive, Sergeant. And you're glad your squad's made it through in one piece, the only one barring Fid's, and maybe Hellian's, as far as I can tell. We were charmed and that's all there was to it. Damned charmed, and you still can't believe it. Well, neither can we, all right?'

  Balm spat into the dust. 'Listen to you mewling on and on. Sentimen
tal tripe, all of it. I'm wondering who cursed me so that I'm still stuck with all of you. Fiddler I can understand. He's a Bridgeburner. And gods run when they see a Bridgeburner. But you, you ain't nobody, and that's what I don't get. In fact, if I did get it...'

  ****

  Urb. He's as bad as the priest who disappeared. The once-priest, what was his name again? What did he look like? Nothing like Urb, that's for sure. But just as treacherous, treasonous, just as rotten and vile as whatever his name was.

  He ain't my corporal no more, that's for sure. I want to kill him... oh gods, my head aches. My jaw... my teeth all loose.

  Captain says she needs more sergeants. Well, she can have him, and whatever squad he ends up with has my prayers and pity. That's for sure. Said there were spiders and maybe there were and maybe I wasn't conscious so's I couldn't go crazy, which maybe I woulda done, but that don't change one truth, and that's for sure as sure can be that they crawled on me. All over me — I can still feel where their little sticky pointy legs dug into my skin. All over. Everywhere. And he just let 'em do it.

  Maybe captain's got a bottle of something. Maybe if I call her over and talk real sweet, real sane and reasonable, maybe then they'd untie me. I won't kill Urb. I promise. You can have him, Captain. That's what I'll say. And she'll hesitate — I would — but then nod — the idiot — and cut these ropes. And hand me a bottle and I'll finish it. Finish it and everybody'll say, hey, it's all right, then. She's back to normal.

  And that's when I'll go for his throat. With my teeth — no, they're loose, can't use 'em for that. Find a knife, that's what I have to do. Or a sword. I could trade the bottle for a sword. I did it the other way round, didn't I? Half the bottle. I'll drink the other half. Half a bottle, half a sword. A knife. Half a bottle for a knife. Which I'll stick in his throat, then trade back, for the other half of the bottle —if I'm quick that should work fine. I get the knife and the whole bottle.

  But first, she should untie me. That's only fair.

  I'm fine, as everyone can see. Peaceful, thoughtful—

  'Sergeant?'

  'What is it, Urb?'

  'I think you still want to kill me.'

  'What makes you say that?'