The Malazan Empire, page 399
With renewed energy, Buruk the Pale decided to set about selling his iron, and for this he was required to have an Acquitor accompanying him. Three Nerek trailed them as they walked up towards the forges, each carrying an ingot.
It had been raining steadily since the feast in the Warlock King’s longhouse. Water flowed in turgid streams down the stony streets. Acrid clouds hung low in the vicinity of the forges, coating the wood and stone walls in oily soot. Slaves swathed in heavy rain cloaks moved to and fro along the narrow passages between compound walls.
Seren led Buruk and his servants towards a squat stone building with high, slitted windows, the entranceway three steps from ground level and flanked by Blackwood columns carved to mimic hammered bronze, complete with rivets and dents. The door was Blackwood inlaid with silver and black iron, the patterns an archaic, stylized script that Seren suspected contained shadow-wrought wards.
She turned to Buruk. ‘I have to enter alone to begin with—’
The door was flung open, startling her, and three Edur rushed out, pushing past her. She stared after them, wondering at their tense expressions. A flutter of fear ran through her. ‘Send the Nerek back,’ she said to Buruk. ‘Something’s happened.’
The merchant did not argue. He gestured and the three Nerek hurried away.
Instead of entering the guild house, Seren and Buruk made their way to the centre street, seeing more Edur emerging from buildings and side alleys to line the approach to the noble quarter. No-one spoke.
‘What is going on, Acquitor?’
She shook her head. ‘Here is fine.’ They had a clear enough view up the street, two hundred or more paces, and in the distance a procession had appeared. She counted five Edur warriors, one employing a staff as he limped along. Two others were pulling a pair of sleds across the slick stones of the street. A fourth walked slightly ahead of the others.
‘Isn’t that Binadas Sengar?’ Buruk asked. ‘The one with the stick, I mean.’
Seren nodded. He looked to be in pain, exhausted by successive layers of sorcerous healing. The warrior who walked ahead was clearly kin to Binadas. This, then, was the return of the group Hannan Mosag had sent away.
And now she saw, strapped to one of the sleds, a wrapped form—hides over pieces of ice that wept steadily down the sides. A shape more than ominous. Unmistakable.
‘They carry a body,’ Buruk whispered.
Where did they go? Those bundled furs—north, then. But there’s nothing up there, nothing but ice. What did the Warlock King ask of them?
The memory of Feather Witch’s divinations returned to her suddenly, inexplicably, and the chill in her bones deepened. ‘Come on,’ she said in a quiet tone. ‘To the inner ward. I want to witness this.’ She edged back from the crowd and set off.
‘If they’ll let us,’ Buruk muttered, hurrying to catch up.
‘We stay in the background and say nothing,’ she instructed. ‘It’s likely they’ll all be too preoccupied to pay us much attention.’
‘I don’t like this, Acquitor. Not any of it.’
She shared his dread, but said nothing.
They crossed the bridge well ahead of the procession, although it was evident that word had preceded them. The noble families were all out in the compound, motionless in the rain. Foremost among them were Tomad and Uruth, a respectful space around the two Edur and their slaves.
‘It’s one of the Sengar brothers,’ Seren Pedac said under her breath.
Buruk heard her. ‘Tomad Sengar was once a rival of Hannan Mosag’s for the throne,’ he muttered. ‘How will he take this, I wonder?’
She glanced over at him. ‘How do you know that?’
‘I was briefed, Acquitor. That shouldn’t surprise you, all things considered.’
The procession had reached the bridge.
‘Ah.’ Buruk sighed. ‘The Warlock King and his K’risnan have emerged from the citadel.’
Udinaas stood a pace behind Uruth on her right, the rain running down his face.
Rhulad Sengar was dead.
He was indifferent to that fact. A young Edur eager for violence—there were plenty of those, and one fewer made little difference. That he was a Sengar virtually guaranteed that Udinaas would be tasked with dressing the corpse. He was not looking forward to that.
Three days for the ritual, including the vigil and the staining of the flesh. In his mind, he ran through possibilities in a detached sort of way, as the rain seeped down behind his collar and no doubt gathered in the hood he had not bothered to draw up over his head. If Rhulad had remained unblooded, the coins would be copper, with stone discs to cover the eyes. If blooded and killed in battle, it was probable that gold coins would be used. Letherii coins, mostly. Enough of them to ransom a prince. An extravagant waste that he found strangely delicious to contemplate.
Even so, he could already smell the stench of burning flesh.
He watched the group cross the bridge, Fear pulling the sled on which Rhulad’s wrapped body had been laid. Binadas was limping badly—there must have been considerable damage, to resist the sorcerous healing that must already have been cast upon him. Theradas and Midik Buhn. And Trull Sengar, in the lead. Without the ever-present spear. So, a battle indeed.
‘Udinaas, do you have your supplies?’ Uruth asked in a dull voice.
‘Yes, mistress, I have,’ he replied, settling a hand on the leather pack slung from his left shoulder.
‘Good. We will waste no time in this. You are to dress the body. No other.’
‘Yes, mistress. The coals have been fired.’
‘You are a diligent slave, Udinaas,’ she said. ‘I am pleased you are in my household.’
He barely resisted looking at her at that, confused and alarmed as he was by the admission. And had you found the Wyval blood within me, you would have snapped my neck without a second thought. ‘Thank you, mistress.’
‘He died a blooded warrior,’ Tomad said. ‘I see it in Fear’s pride.’
The Warlock King and his five apprentice sorcerors strode to intercept the party as they arrived on this side of the bridge, and Udinaas heard Uruth’s gasp of outrage.
Tomad reached out to still her with one hand. ‘There must be a reason for this,’ he said. ‘Come, we will join them.’
There was no command to remain behind, and so Udinaas and the other slaves followed Tomad and Uruth as they strode towards their sons.
Hannan Mosag and his K’risnan met the procession first. Quiet words were exchanged between the Warlock King and Fear Sengar. A question, an answer, and Hannan Mosag seemed to stagger. As one, the five sorcerors closed on him, but their eyes were on Rhulad’s swathed form, and Udinaas saw a mixture of consternation, dread and alarm on their young faces.
Fear’s gaze swung from the Warlock King to his father as Tomad’s group arrived. ‘I have failed you, Father,’ he said. ‘Your youngest son is dead.’
‘He holds the gift,’ Hannan Mosag snapped, shockingly accusatory in his tone. ‘I need it, but he holds it. Was I not clear enough in my instructions, Fear Sengar?’
The warrior’s face darkened. ‘We were attacked, Warlock King, by the Jheck. I believe you know who and what they are—’
Tomad growled, ‘I do not.’
Binadas spoke. ‘They are Soletaken, Father. Able to assume the guise of wolves. It was their intention to claim the sword—’
‘What sword?’ Uruth asked. ‘What—’
‘Enough of this!’ Hannan Mosag shouted.
‘Warlock King,’ Tomad Sengar said, stepping closer, ‘Rhulad is dead. You can retrieve this gift of yours—’
‘It is not so simple,’ Fear cut in. ‘Rhulad holds the sword still—I cannot pry his fingers from the grip.’
‘It must be cut off,’ Hannan Mosag said.
Uruth hissed, then shook her head. ‘No, Warlock King. You are forbidden to mutilate our son. Fear, did Rhulad die as a blooded warrior?’
‘He did.’
‘Then the prohibitions are all the greater,’ she said to Hannan Mosag, crossing her arms.
‘I need that sword!’
In the fraught silence that followed that outburst, Trull Sengar spoke for the first time. ‘Warlock King. Rhulad’s body is still frozen. It may be, upon thawing, that his grip on the sword loosens. In any case, it seems clear the matter demands calm, reasoned discussion. It may in the end prove that our conflicting desires can be resolved by some form of compromise.’ He faced his father and mother. ‘It was our task, given us by the Warlock King, to retrieve a gift, and that gift is the sword Rhulad now holds. Mother, we must complete the task demanded of us. The sword must be placed in Hannan Mosag’s hands.’
There was shock and horror in her voice as Uruth replied, ‘You would cut off your dead brother’s hands? Are you my son? I would—’
Her husband stopped her with a fierce gesture. ‘Trull, I understand the difficulty of this situation, and I concur with your counsel that decisions be withheld for the time being. Warlock King, Rhulad’s body must be prepared. This can be conducted without attention being accorded the hands. We have some time, then, do you agree?’
Hannan Mosag answered with a curt nod.
Trull approached Udinaas, and the slave could see the warrior’s exhaustion, the old blood of countless wounds in his tattered armour. ‘Take charge of the body,’ he said in a quiet tone. ‘To the House of the Dead, as you would any other. Do not, however, expect the widows to attend the ritual—we must needs postpone that until certain matters are resolved.’
‘Yes, master,’ Udinaas replied. He swung round and selected Hulad and one more of his fellow slaves. ‘Help me with the sled’s tethers. With solemn accord, as always.’
Both men he addressed were clearly frightened. This kind of open conflict among the Hiroth Edur was unprecedented. They seemed on the verge of panic, although Udinaas’s words calmed them somewhat. There were values in ritual, and self-control was foremost among them.
Stepping past the Edur, Udinaas led his two fellow slaves to the sled.
The waxed canvas sheathing the ice had slowed the melt, although the slabs beneath it were much diminished, the edges softened and milky white.
Fear passed the harness over to Udinaas. The two other slaves helping, they began dragging it towards the large wooden structure where Edur corpses were prepared for burial. No-one stopped them.
Seren Pedac gripped Buruk’s arm and began pulling him back towards the bridge. He swung her a wild look, but wisely said nothing.
They could not manage the passage unseen, and Seren felt sweat prickling on her neck and in the small of her back as she guided the merchant back towards the guest camp. They were not accosted, but their presence had without doubt been marked. The consequences of that would remain undetermined, until such time as the conflict they had witnessed was resolved.
The Nerek had extended a tarp from one of the wagons to shield the hearth they kept continually burning. They scurried from the smoky flames as soon as Buruk and Seren arrived, quickly disappearing into their tents.
‘That looks,’ Buruk muttered as he edged closer to the hearth and held out his hands, ‘to be serious trouble. The Warlock King was badly shaken, and I like not this talk of a gift. A sword? Some kind of sword, yes? A gift from whom? Surely not an alliance with the Jheck—’
‘No,’ agreed Seren, ‘given that it was the Jheck with whom they fought. There’s nothing else out there, Buruk. Nothing at all.’
She thought back to that scene on the other side of the bridge. Fear’s brother, not Binadas, but the other one, who’d counselled reason, he…interested her. Physically attractive, of course. Most Edur were. But there was more. There was…intelligence. And pain. Seren scowled. She was always drawn to the hurting ones.
‘A sword,’ Buruk mused, staring into the flames, ‘of such value that Hannan Mosag contemplates mutilating a blooded warrior’s corpse.’
‘Doesn’t that strike you as odd?’ Seren asked. ‘A corpse, holding on to a sword so tight even Fear Sengar cannot pull it loose?’
‘Perhaps frozen?’
‘From the moment of death?’
He grunted. ‘I suppose not, unless it took his brothers a while to get to him.’
‘A day or longer, at least. Granted, we don’t know the circumstances, but that does seem unlikely, doesn’t it?’
‘It does.’ Buruk shrugged. ‘A damned Edur funeral. That won’t put the Warlock King in a good mood. The delegation will arrive at precisely the wrong time.’
‘I think not,’ Seren said. ‘The Edur have been unbalanced by this. Hannan Mosag especially. Unless there’s quick resolution, we will be among a divided people.’
A quick, bitter smile. ‘We?’
‘Letherii, Buruk. I am not part of the delegation. Nor, strictly speaking, are you.’
‘Nor Hull Beddict,’ he added. ‘Yet something tells me we are irredeemably bound in that net, whether it sees the light of day or sinks to the deep.’
She said nothing, because he was right.
The sled glided easily along the wet straw and Udinaas raised a boot to halt its progress alongside the stone platform. Unspeaking, the three slaves began unclasping the straps, pulling them free from beneath the body. The tarp was then lifted clear. The slabs of ice were resting on a cloth-wrapped shape clearly formed by the body it contained, and all three saw at the same time that Rhulad’s jaw had opened in death, as if voicing a silent, endless scream.
Hulad stepped back. ‘Errant preserve us,’ he hissed.
‘It’s common enough, Hulad,’ Udinaas said. ‘You two can go, but first drag that chest over here, the one resting on the rollers.’
‘Gold coins, then?’
‘I am assuming so,’ Udinaas replied. ‘Rhulad died a blooded warrior. He was noble-born. Thus, it must be gold.’
‘What a waste,’ said Hulad.
The other slave, Irim, grinned and said, ‘When the Edur are conquered, we should form a company, the three of us, to loot the barrows.’ He and Hulad pulled the chest along the runners.
The coals were red, the sheet of iron black with heat.
Udinaas smiled. ‘There are wards in those barrows, Irim. And shadow wraiths guarding them.’
‘Then we hire a mage who can dispel them. The wraiths will be gone, along with every damned Edur. Nothing but rotting bones. I dream of that day.’
Udinaas glanced over at the old man. ‘And how badly Indebted are you, Irim?’
The grin faded. ‘That’s just it. I’d be able to pay it off. For my grandchildren, who are still in Trate. Pay it off, Udinaas. Don’t you dream the same for yourself?’
‘Some debts can’t be paid off with gold, Irim. My dreams are not of wealth.’
‘No.’ Irim’s grin returned. ‘You just want the heart of a lass so far above you, you’ve not the Errant’s hope of owning it. Poor Udinaas, we all shake our heads at the sadness of it.’
‘Less sadness than pity, I suspect,’ Udinaas said, shrugging. ‘Close enough. You can go.’
‘The stench lingers even now,’ Hulad said. ‘How can you stand it, Udinaas?’
‘Inform Uruth that I have begun.’
It was not the time to be alone, yet Trull Sengar found himself just that. The realization was sudden, and he blinked, slowly making sense of his surroundings. He was in the longhouse, the place of his birth, standing before the centre post with its jutting sword-blade. The heat from the hearth seemed incapable of reaching through to his bones. His clothes were sodden.
He’d left the others outside, locked in their quiet clash of wills. The Warlock King and his need against Tomad and Uruth and their insistence on proper observance of a dead blooded warrior, a warrior who was their son. With this conflict, Hannan Mosag could lose his authority among the Tiste Edur.
The Warlock King should have shown constraint. This could have been dealt with quietly, unknown to anyone else. How hard can it be to wrest a sword loose from a dead man’s hands? And if sorcery was involved—and it certainly seemed to be—then Hannan Mosag was in his element. He had his K’risnan as well. They could have done something. And if not…then cut his fingers off. A corpse no longer housed the spirit. Death had severed the binding. Trull could feel nothing for the cold flesh beneath the ice. It was not Rhulad any more, not any longer.
But now there could be no chance of secrecy. The quarrel had been witnessed, and, in accordance with tradition, so too must be the resolution.
And…does any of it matter?
I did not trust Rhulad Sengar. Long before his failure on night watch. That is the truth of it. I knew…doubts.
His thoughts could take him no further. Anguish rose in a flood, burning like acid. As if he had raised his own demon, hulking and hungry, and could only watch as it fed on his soul. Gnawing regret and avid guilt, remorse an unending feast.
We are doomed, now, to give answer to his death, again and again. Countless answers, to crowd the solitary question of his life. Is it our fate, then, to suffer beneath the siege of all that can never be known?
There had been strangers witnessing the scene. The realization was sudden, shocking. A merchant and his Acquitor. Letherii visitors. Advance spies of the treaty delegation.
Hannan Mosag’s confrontation was a dreadful error in so many ways. Trull’s high regard for the Warlock King had been damaged, sullied, and he longed for the world of a month past. Before the revelation of flaws and frailties.
Padding through the forest, mind filled with the urgency of dire news. A spear left in his wake, iron point buried deep in the chest of a Letherii. Leaden legs taking him through shadows, moccasins thudding on the dappled trail. The sense of having just missed something, an omen unwitnessed. Like entering a chamber someone else has just walked from, although in his case the chamber had been a forest cathedral, Hiroth sanctified land, and he had seen no signs of passage to give substance to his suspicion.
And it was this sense that had returned to him. They had passed through fraught events, all unmindful of significance, of hidden truths. The exigencies of survival had forced upon them a kind of carelessness.
