The Malazan Empire, page 290
‘Not that I can see,’ Torvald replied after a moment. ‘They look to be in, uh, in pretty bad condition. They’re perched on a small island of logs. Silgar, and Damisk, and one other…Borrug, I think. Gods, Karsa, they’re starved.’
‘Take a harpoon,’ the Teblor growled. ‘That hunger could well drive them to desperation.’
‘A touch shoreward, Karsa, we’re almost there.’
There was a soft crunch from the hull, then a grinding, stuttering motion as the current sought to drag them along the verge. Torvald clambered out, ropes in one hand and harpoon in the other. Beyond him, Karsa saw as he turned about, huddled the three Nathii lowlanders, making no move to help and, if anything, drawing back as far as they could manage on the tangled island. The breach’s roar was a still-distant thundering, though closer at hand were ominous cracks, tearing and shifting noises—the logjam was coming loose.
Torvald made fast the dory with a skein of lines tied to various branches and roots. Karsa stepped ashore, drawing his bloodsword, his eyes levelling on Silgar.
The slavemaster attempted to retreat further.
Near the three emaciated lowlanders lay the remains of a fourth, his bones picked clean.
‘Teblor!’ Silgar implored. ‘You must listen to me!’
Karsa slowly advanced.
‘I can save us!’
Torvald tugged at Karsa’s arm. ‘Wait, friend, let’s hear the bastard.’
‘He will say anything,’ Karsa growled.
‘Even so—’
Damisk Greydog spoke. ‘Karsa Orlong, listen! This island is being torn apart—we all need your boat. Silgar’s a mage—he can open a portal. But not if he’s drowning. Understand? He can take us from this realm!’
‘Karsa,’ Torvald said, weaving as the logs shifted under him, his grip on the Teblor’s arm tightening.
Karsa looked down at the Daru beside him. ‘You trust Silgar?’
‘Of course not. But we’ve no choice—we’d be unlikely to survive plunging through that breach in the dory. We don’t even know this wall’s height—the drop on the other side could be endless. Karsa, we’re armed and they’re not—besides, they’re too weak to cause us trouble, you can see that, can’t you?’
Silgar screamed as a large section of the logjam sank away immediately behind him.
Scowling, Karsa sheathed his sword. ‘Begin untying the boat, Torvald.’ He waved at the lowlanders. ‘Come, then. But know this, Slavemaster, any sign of treachery from you and your friends will be picking your bones next.’
Damisk, Silgar and Borrug scrambled forward.
The entire section of flotsam was pulling away, breaking up along its edges as the current swept it onward. Clearly, the breach was expanding, widening to the pressure of an entire sea.
Silgar climbed in and crouched down beside the dory’s prow. ‘I shall open a portal,’ he announced, his voice a rasp. ‘I can only do so but once—’
‘Then why didn’t you leave a long time ago?’ Torvald demanded, as he slipped the last line loose and clambered back aboard.
‘There was no path before—out on the sea. But now, here—someone has opened a gate. Close. The fabric is…weakened. I’ve not the skill to do such a thing myself. But I can follow.’
The dory scraped free of the crumbling island, swung wildly into the sweeping current. Karsa pushed and pulled with the oars to angle their bow into the torrential flow.
‘Follow?’ Torvald repeated. ‘Where?’
To that Silgar simply shook his head.
Karsa abandoned the oars and made his way to the stern, taking the tiller in both hands.
They rode the tumbling, churning sea of wreckage towards the breach. Where the wall had given way there was an ochre cloud of mist as vast and high as a thunderhead. Beyond it, there seemed to be nothing at all.
Silgar was making gestures with both hands, snapping them out as would a blind man seeking a door latch. Then he jabbed a finger to the right. ‘There!’ he shrieked, swinging a wild look on Karsa. ‘There! Angle us there!’
The place Silgar pointed towards looked no different from anywhere else. Immediately beyond it, the water simply vanished—a wavering line that was the breach itself. Shrugging, Karsa pushed on the tiller. Where they went over mattered little to him. If Silgar failed they would plunge over, falling whatever distance, to crash amidst a foaming maelstrom that would kill them all.
He watched as everyone but Silgar hunkered down, mute with terror.
The Teblor smiled. ‘Urugal!’ he bellowed, half rising as the dory raced for the edge.
Darkness swallowed them.
And then they were falling.
A loud, explosive crack. The tiller’s handle split under Karsa’s hands, then the stern hammered into him from behind, throwing the Teblor forward. He struck water a moment later, the impact making him gasp—taking in a mouthful of salty sea—before plunging into the chill blackness.
He struggled upward until his head broke the surface, but there was no lessening of the darkness, as if they’d fallen down a well, or had appeared within a cave. Nearby, someone was coughing helplessly, whilst a little farther off another survivor was thrashing about.
Wreckage brushed up against Karsa. The dory had shattered, though the Teblor was fairly certain that the fall had not been overly long—they had arrived at a height of perhaps two adult warriors combined. Unless the boat had struck something, it should have survived.
‘Karsa!’
Still coughing, Torvald Nom arrived alongside the Teblor. The Daru had found the shaft of one of the oars, over which he had draped his arms. ‘What in Hood’s name do you think happened?’
‘We passed through that sorcerous gate,’ Karsa explained. ‘That should be obvious, for we are now somewhere else.’
‘Not as simple as that,’ Torvald replied. ‘The blade of this oar—here, look at the end.’
Finding himself comfortably buoyant in this salty water, it took only a moment for Karsa to swim to the end of the shaft. It had been cut through, as if by a single blow from an iron sword such as the lowlanders used. He grunted.
The distant thrashing sounds had drawn closer. From much farther away, Damisk’s voice called out.
‘Here!’ Torvald shouted back.
A shape loomed up beside them. It was Silgar, clinging to one of the water casks.
‘Where are we?’ Karsa asked the slavemaster.
‘How should I know?’ the Nathii snapped. ‘I did not fashion the gate, I simply made use of it—and it had mostly closed, which is why the floor of the boat did not come with us. It was sheared clean off. None the less, I believe we are in a sea, beneath an overcast sky. Were there no ambient light, we’d not be able to see each other right now. Alas, I can hear no coast, though it’s so calm there might be no waves to brush the shoreline.’
‘Meaning we could be within a dozen strokes and not know it.’
‘Yes. Fortunately for us, it is a rather warm sea. We must simply await dawn—’
‘Assuming there is one,’ Torvald said.
‘There is,’ Silgar asserted. ‘Feel the layers in this water. It’s colder down where our feet are. So a sun has looked down upon this sea, I am certain of it.’
Damisk swam into view, struggling with Borrug, who seemed to be unconscious. As he reached out to take hold of the water cask Silgar pushed him back, then kicked himself further away.
‘Slavemaster!’ Damisk gasped.
‘This cask barely holds my weight as it is,’ Silgar hissed. ‘It’s near filled with fresh water—which we’re likely to need. What is the matter with Borrug?’
Torvald moved along to give Damisk a place at the oar shaft. The tattooed guard attempted to drape Borrug’s arms over it as well and Torvald drew closer once more to help.
‘I don’t know what’s wrong with him,’ Damisk said. ‘He may have struck his head, though I can find no wound. He was babbling at first, floundering about, then he simply fell unconscious and nearly slipped under. I was lucky to reach him.’
Borrug’s head kept lolling beneath the surface.
Karsa reached out and collected the man’s wrists. ‘I will take him,’ he snarled, turning about and dragging the man’s arms around his neck.
‘A light!’ Torvald suddenly shouted. ‘I saw a light—there!’
The others swung round.
‘I see nothing,’ Silgar growled.
‘I did,’ Torvald insisted. ‘It was dim. Gone now. But I saw it—’
‘Likely an overwrought imagination,’ Silgar said. ‘Had I the strength, I’d open my warren—’
‘I know what I saw,’ the Daru said.
‘Lead us, then, Torvald Nom,’ Karsa said.
‘It could be in the wrong direction!’ Silgar hissed. ‘We are safer to wait—’
‘Then wait,’ Karsa replied.
‘I have the fresh water, not you—’
‘A good point. I shall have to kill you, then, since you have decided to stay here. We might need that water, after all. You won’t, because you will be dead.’
‘Teblor logic,’ Torvald chuckled, ‘is truly wonderful.’
‘Very well, I will follow,’ Silgar said.
The Daru set off at a slow but steady pace, kicking beneath the surface as he pulled the oar shaft along. Damisk kept one hand on the length of wood, managing a strange motion with his legs that resembled that of a frog.
Gripping Borrug’s wrists in one hand, Karsa moved into their wake. The unconscious lowlander’s head rested on his right shoulder, his knees bumping against the Teblor’s thighs.
Off to one side, feet thrashing, Silgar propelled the water cask along. Karsa could see that the cask was far less filled than the slavemaster had claimed—it could have easily borne them all.
The Teblor himself felt no need. He was not particularly tired, and it seemed that he possessed a natural buoyancy superior to that of the lowlanders. With each indrawn breath, his shoulders, upper arms and the upper half of his chest rose above the water. And apart from Borrug’s knees constantly fouling Karsa’s kicking, the lowlander’s presence was negligible…
There was, he realized, something odd about those knees. He paused, reached down.
Both legs were severed clean just beneath the kneecaps, the water warm in their immediate wakes.
Torvald had glanced back. ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.
‘Do you think there are catfish in these waters?’
‘I doubt it,’ the Daru replied. ‘That was fresh water, after all.’
‘Good,’ Karsa grunted, resuming his swim.
There was no recurrence of the light Torvald had seen. They continued on in the unrelieved darkness, through perfectly calm water.
‘This is foolish,’ Silgar pronounced after a time. ‘We exhaust ourselves for no purpose—’
Torvald called, ‘Karsa, why did you ask about the catfish?’
Something huge and rough-skinned rose up to land on Karsa’s back, its massive weight driving him under. Borrug’s wrists were torn from his grip, the arms whipping back and vanishing. Pushed more than a warrior’s height beneath the surface, Karsa twisted round. One of his kicking feet collided with a solid, unyielding body. He used the contact to propel himself away and back towards the surface.
Even as he reached it—bloodsword in his hands—he saw, less than a body length distant, an enormous grey fish, its jagged-toothed mouth closing about the little that remained visible of Borrug. Lacerated head, shoulders and flopping arms. The fish’s wide head thrashed wildly back and forth, its strange saucer-like eyes flashing as if lit from within.
There was screaming behind Karsa and he turned. Both Damisk and Silgar were kicking wildly in an effort to escape. Torvald was on his back, the oar held tight in his hands, his legs kicking beneath the surface—he alone was making no noise, though his face was twisted with fear.
Karsa faced the fish once more. It seemed to be having trouble swallowing Borrug—one of the man’s arms was lodged crossways. The fish itself was positioned close to vertical in the water, ripping its head back and forth.
Growling, Karsa swam towards it.
Borrug’s arm came free even as the Teblor arrived, the corpse disappearing within the maw. Taking a deep breath and kicking hard, Karsa half rose out of the water, his bloodsword a curving spray as it chopped down into the fish’s snout.
Warm blood spattered Karsa’s forearms.
The fish seemed to fling its entire body backward.
Karsa lunged closer, closing his legs around the creature’s body just beneath the flanking flippers. The fish twisted away at the contact, but could not drag itself free of Karsa’s tightening grip.
The Teblor reversed his sword and plunged it deep into the beast’s belly, ripped it downward.
The water was suddenly hot with blood and bile. The fish’s body became a dead weight, dragging Karsa downward. He sheathed his sword; then, as he and the fish sank beneath the surface, he reached down into the gaping wound. One hand closed on the thigh of Borrug—a shredded mass of flesh—and the fingers dug in to close around bone.
Karsa pulled the lowlander through a cloud of milky, eye-stinging fluid, then, drawing the body with him, returned to the surface.
Torvald was shouting now. Turning, Karsa saw the Daru, standing in waist-deep water, both arms waving. Near him, Silgar and Damisk were wading their way onto some kind of shore.
Dragging Borrug with him, Karsa made his way forward. A half-dozen strokes and his feet thumped and scraped on a sandy bottom. He stood, still holding one of Borrug’s legs. Moments later, he was on the beach.
The others sat or knelt on the pale strip of sand, regaining their breaths.
Dropping the body onto the beach, Karsa remained standing, his head tilted back as he sniffed the warm, sultry air. There was heavy, lush foliage beyond the strand’s shell-cluttered high-tide line. The buzz and whine of insects, a faint rustle as something small moved across dry seaweed.
Torvald crawled close. ‘Karsa, the man’s dead. He was dead when the shark took him—’
‘So that was a shark. The sailors on the Malazan ship spoke of sharks.’
‘Karsa, when a shark swallows someone you don’t go after the poor bastard. He’s finished—’
‘He was in my care,’ Karsa rumbled. ‘The shark had no right to him, whether he was dead or alive.’
Silgar was on his feet a few paces away. At Karsa’s words he laughed, the sound high-pitched, then said, ‘From a shark’s belly to seagulls and crabs! Borrug’s pathetic spirit no doubt thanks you, Teblor!’
‘I have delivered the lowlander,’ Karsa replied, ‘and now return him to your care, Slavemaster. If you wish to leave him for seagulls and crabs, that is for you to decide.’ He faced the dark sea once more, but could see no sign of the dead shark.
‘No-one would believe me,’ Torvald muttered.
‘Believe what, Torvald Nom?’
‘Oh, I was imagining myself as an old man, years from now, sitting in Quip’s Bar in Darujhistan, telling this tale. I saw it with my own eyes, and even I am having trouble believing it. You were halfway out of the water when you swung that sword down—helps having four lungs, I suppose. Even so…’ he shook his head.
Karsa shrugged. ‘The catfish were worse,’ he said. ‘I did not like the catfish.’
‘I suggest,’ Silgar called out, ‘we get some sleep. Come the dawn, we will discover what there is to discover of this place. For now, thank Mael that we are still alive.’
‘Forgive me,’ Torvald said, ‘but I’d rather give thanks to a stubborn Teblor warrior than to any sea god.’
‘Then your faith is sorely misplaced,’ the slavemaster sneered, turning away.
Torvald slowly climbed upright. ‘Karsa,’ he murmured, ‘you should know that Mael’s chosen beast of the sea is the shark. I’ve no doubt at all that Silgar was indeed praying hard while we were out there.’
‘It does not matter,’ Karsa replied. He drew a deep breath of jungle-scented air, slowly released it. ‘I am on land, and I am free, and now I shall walk along this beach, and so taste something of this new land.’
‘I will join you, then, friend, for I believe the light I saw was to our right, slightly above this beach, and I would investigate.’
‘As you like, Torvald Nom.’
They began walking along the strand.
‘Karsa, neither Silgar nor Damisk possesses a shred of decency. I, however, do. A small shred, granted, but one none the less. Thus: thank you.’
‘We have saved each other’s lives, Torvald Nom, and so I am pleased to call you friend, and to think of you as a warrior. Not a Teblor warrior, of course, but a warrior even so.’
The Daru said nothing for a long time. They had moved well out of sight of Silgar and Damisk. The shelf of land to their right was rising in layers of pale stone, the wave-sculpted wall webbed with creepers from the thick growth clinging to the overhang. A break in the clouds overhead cast faint starlight down, reflecting on the virtually motionless water on their left. The sand underfoot was giving way to smooth, undulating stone.
Torvald touched Karsa’s arm and stopped, pointing upslope. ‘There,’ he whispered.
The Teblor softly grunted. A squat, misshapen tower rose above the tangle of brush. Vaguely square and sharply tapering to end at a flat roof, the tower hunched over the beach, a gnarled black mass. Three-quarters of the way up its seaward-facing side was a deeply inset triangular window. Dull yellow light outlined the shutter’s warped slats.
A narrow footpath was visible winding down to the shore, and nearby—five paces beyond the high tide line—lay the collapsed remnants of a fisherboat, the sprung ribs of the hull jutting out to the sides wrapped in seaweed and limned in guano.
‘Shall we pay a visit?’ Torvald asked.
‘Yes,’ Karsa replied, walking towards the footpath.
The Daru quickly moved up beside him. ‘No trophies, though, right?’
Shrugging, the Teblor said, ‘That depends on how we are received.’
‘Strangers on a desolate beach, one of them a giant with a sword almost as tall as me. In the dead of night. Pounding on the door. If we’re met with open arms, Karsa, it will be a miracle. Worse yet, there’s not much likelihood of us sharing a common language—’
