The Malazan Empire, page 649
Yet that did not mesh with Onrack, with how he had been and how he was now. Unless…gods below, unlike everywhere else, this is one fragment of Tellann that lies, somehow, beyond the Ritual. That is why he is flesh and blood here. In this place, there was no Ritual of Tellann, no severing of Imass souls. Suggesting that the Imass living here know nothing about it.
So what would happen if Logros led his thousands here? If Kron—But no, Silverfox wouldn’t permit that. She needed them for something else. For another war.
It’d be nice to know how this fragment related to the one created for the Wolves at the end of the Pannion War. From what Quick Ben had understood, that Beast Hold, or whatever it had been called, had been seeded with the souls of T’lan Imass. Or at least the memories of those souls – could be that’s all a soul really is: the bound, snarled mass of memories from one life. Huh. Might explain why mine is such a mess. Too many lives, too many disparate strands all now tangled together…
Trull Sengar had set off in search of water – springs bubbled up from bedrock almost everywhere, as if even the stone itself was saturated with glacial melt.
Onrack eyed the cats for another moment then turned to Quick Ben. ‘There is a sweep of ice beyond these hills,’ he said. ‘I can smell its rot – an ancient road, once travelled by Jaghut. Fleeing slaughter. This intrusion, wizard, troubles me.’
‘Why? Presumably that battle occurred thousands of years ago and the Jaghut are all dead.’
‘Yes. Still, that road reminds me of…things. Awakens memories…’
Quick Ben slowly nodded. ‘Like shadows, aye.’
‘Just so.’
‘You had to know it couldn’t last.’
The Imass frowned, the expression accentuating his strangely unhuman, robust features. ‘Yes, perhaps I did, deep within me. I had…forgotten.’
‘You’re too damned hard on yourself, Onrack. You don’t need to keep yourself shining so bright all the time.’
Onrack’s smile held sadness. ‘I gift my friend,’ he said quietly, ‘for all the gifts he has given me.’
Quick Ben studied the warrior’s face. ‘The gift loses its value, Onrack, if it goes on too long. It begins to exhaust us, all of us.’
‘Yes, I see that now.’
‘Besides,’ the wizard added, watching the two emlava, their bellies full, now mock-fighting on the blood-smeared grass, ‘showing your fallible side is another kind of gift. The kind that invites empathy instead of just awe. If that makes any sense.’
‘It does.’
‘You’ve been making lots of paints, haven’t you?’
A sudden smile. ‘You are clever. When I find a wall of stone that speaks…yes, a different kind of gift. My forbidden talents.’
‘Forbidden? Why?’
‘It is taboo among my people to render our own forms in likeness to truth. Too much is captured, too much is trapped in time. Hearts can break, and betrayals breed like vermin.’
Quick Ben glanced up at Onrack, then away. Hearts can break. Aye, the soul can haunt, can’t it just.
Trull Sengar returned, waterskins sloshing. ‘By the Sisters,’ he said to Onrack, ‘is that a frown you’re wearing?’
‘It is, friend. Do you wish to know why?’
‘Not at all. It’s just, uh, well, a damned relief, to be honest.’
Onrack reached down and snagged one of the cubs, lifting it by the scruff of its neck. The beast hissed in outrage, writhing as he held it up. ‘Trull Sengar, you may explain to our friend why Imass are forbidden to paint likenesses of themselves. You may also tell him my story, so that he understands, and need not ask again why I am awakened to pain within me, recalling now, as I do, that mortal flesh is only made real when fed by the breath of love.’
Quick Ben studied Onrack with narrowed eyes. I don’t recall asking anything like that. Well, not out loud, anyway.
Trull Sengar’s relieved expression fell away and he sighed, but it was a loose sigh, the kind that marked the unbinding of long-held tensions. ‘I shall. Thank you, Onrack. Some secrets prove a heavy burden. And when I am done revealing to Quick Ben one of the details of your life that has served to forge our friendship, I will then tell you both of my own secret. I will tell you of the Eres’al and what she did to me, long before she appeared to us all in the cavern.’
A moment of long silence.
Then Quick Ben snorted. ‘Fine. And I’ll tell a tale of twelve souls. And a promise I made to a man named Whiskeyjack – a promise that has brought me all this way, with farther still to go. And then, I suppose, we shall all truly know each other.’
‘It is,’ Onrack said, collecting the second cub so he could hold both beasts up side by side, ‘a day for gifts.’
From beyond the hills there came the sound of thunder. That faded, and did not repeat.
The emlava were suddenly quiet.
‘What was that?’ Trull Sengar asked.
Quick Ben could feel his heart pound in his chest. ‘That, friends, was a cusser.’
Fiddler made his way across the dirt floor of the barn to where Bottle slept. He stared down at the young soldier curled up beneath a dark grey blanket. Poor bastard. He nudged with his foot and Bottle groaned. ‘Sun’s set,’ Fiddler said.
‘I know, Sergeant. I watched it going down.’
‘We’ve rigged a stretcher. Just get up and eat something and then you’ve got a mobile bed for the rest of the night.’
‘Unless you need me.’
‘Unless we need you, aye.’
Bottle sat up, rubbed at his face. ‘Thanks, Sergeant. I don’t need the whole night – half will do.’
‘You take what I give you, soldier. Cut it short and we could all end up regretting it.’
‘All right, fine, make me feel guilty, then. See if I care.’
Smiling, Fiddler turned away. The rest of the squad was readying the gear, a few muted words drifting between the soldiers. Gesler and his crew were in the abandoned farmhouse – no point in crowding up all in one place. Poor tactics anyway.
There had been no pursuit. The drum had done its work. But that was four cussers lost, to add to the others they’d already used. Down to two left and that was bad news. If another enemy column found them…we’re dead or worse. Well, marines weren’t supposed to have it easy. Good enough that they were still alive.
Cuttle approached. ‘Tarr says we’re ready, Fid.’ He glanced over at Bottle. ‘I got the sorry end of the stretcher to start, soldier. You better not have gas.’
Bottle, a mouthful of nuts and lard bulging his cheeks, simply stared up at the sapper.
‘Gods below,’ Cuttle said, ‘you’re eating one of those Khundryl cakes, ain’t ya? Well, Fid, if we need us a torch to light the way—’
‘Permission denied, Cuttle.’
‘Aye, probably right. It’d light up half the night sky. Hood’s breath, why do I always get the short twig?’
‘So long as you face off against Corabb on that kind of thing,’ Fiddler said, ‘short’s your middle name.’
Cuttle edged closer to Fiddler and said in a low voice, ‘That big bang yesterday’s gonna draw down a damned army—’
‘Assuming they’ve fielded one. So far, we’re running into companies, battalion elements – as if an army’s dispersed, which is more or less what we expected them to do. No point in maintaining a single force when your enemy’s scattered right across Hood’s pimply backside. If they were smart they’d draw up reserves and saturate the region, leave us not a single deer trail to slink along.’
‘So far,’ Cuttle said, squinting through the gloom at the rest of the squad and massaging his roughly healed shoulder, ‘they ain’t been very smart.’
‘Moranth munitions are new to them,’ Fiddler pointed out. ‘So’s our brand of magic. Whoever’s in command here is probably still reeling, still trying to guess our plans.’
‘My guess is whoever was in command, Fid, is now Rannalled in tree branches.’
Fiddler shrugged, then lifted his pack onto his shoulders and collected his crossbow.
Corporal Tarr checked his gear one last time, then straightened. He drew his left arm through the shield straps, adjusted his sword belt, then tightened the strap of his helm.
‘Most people just carry their shields on their backs,’ Koryk said from where he stood by the barn’s entrance.
‘Not me,’ said Tarr. ‘Get ambushed and there’s no time to ready, is there? So I stay readied.’ He then rolled his shoulders to settle his scaled hauberk, a most familiar, satisfying rustle and clack of iron. He felt unsteady on his feet without that solid, anchoring weight. He had quick-release clasps for his pack of equipment, could drop all that behind him one-handed even as he stepped forward and drew his sword. At least one of them in this squad had to be first to the front, after all, to give them time to bring whatever they had to bear.
This was what he had been trained to do, from the very beginning. Braven Tooth had seen it true enough, seen into Tarr’s stolid, stubborn soul, and he’d said as much, hadn’t he? ‘Your name’s Tarr, soldier. It’s under your feet and you’re stuck fast. When needs be. It’s your job, from now on. You hold back the enemy at that first blink of contact, you make your squad survive that moment, aye? Now, you ain’t solid enough yet. Strap on these extra weights, soldier, then get sparring…’
He liked the idea of being immovable. He liked the idea of being corporal, too, especially the way he hardly ever had to say anything. He had a good squad for that. Fast learners. Even Smiles. Corabb he wasn’t too sure about. Aye, the man had Oponn’s wink true enough. And no shortage of courage. But it seemed he always had to get there first, before Tarr himself. Trying to prove something, of course. No mystery there. As far as the squad was concerned, Corabb was a recruit. More or less. Well, maybe he was a bit past that – nobody called him Recruit, did they? Even if Tarr still thought of him that way.
But Corabb had dragged Fiddler out. All by himself. A damned prisoner, and he’d done that. Saved the sergeant’s life. Almost enough to excuse him being at Leoman’s side as the two of them lured the Bonehunters into Y’Ghatan’s fiery nightmare.
Almost.
Aye, Tarr knew he wasn’t the forgiving kind. Not the forgetting kind, either. And he knew, deep down inside, that he’d stand for every soldier in his squad, stand till he fell. Except, maybe, for Corabb Bhilan Thenu’alas.
Koryk taking far point, they headed out into the night.
Along the edge of the nearest stand of trees, on the path between those boles and the edge of the fallow field, they silently merged with Gesler and his squad. Setting out in darkness beneath burgeoning stars.
Stormy’s heavies were good to have around, Tarr decided. Almost as tough and stubborn as he was. Too bad, though, about Uru Hela. But she’d been careless, hadn’t she? Even if you’re carrying a waterskin, the least you should have at the ready was a shield. Even more appalling, she’d turned and run, exposing her back.
Should’ve sent me to do all that. Demon or no, I’d have stood to meet the bastard. Stood, and held.
‘Remember your name, Tarr. And just to help you remember it, come over here and listen to your Master Sergeant, while I tell you a tale. About another soldier with tar under his feet. His name was Temper, and on the day Dassem Ultor fell, outside Y’Ghatan, well, here then is that tale…’
Tarr had listened, all right. Enough to know that a man like that couldn’t have existed, except in the mind of Master Sergeant Braven Tooth. But it had been inspiring anyway. Temper, a good name, a damned good name. Almost as good as Tarr.
Three paces behind her corporal, Smiles scanned to either side as they moved along the trail, eyes restless with unease, senses awakened to such acuity her skull ached. Bottle was sleeping. Which meant no tiny spying eyes checking out the area, no forest animals tricked into succumbing to Bottle’s puny will, that empathy of similar brain size and intelligence that had so well served them all thus far.
And their damned corporal, all clicking scales and creaking leather, who probably couldn’t put fifteen words together in any reasonable, understandable order. Fine enough jamming a breach, with his ridiculous oversized shield – the only one left after that demon took care of the ones used by the heavies – and his short thick-bladed sword. The kind of soldier who’d hold his ground even when dead. Useful, aye, but as a corporal? She couldn’t figure that.
No, Fid would have been better served with a quick-witted, fast, nasty and hard-to-hit kind of corporal. Well, there was one consolation, and that was anyone could see she was next in line. And it’d been close back there, hadn’t it? Could’ve been Tarr sent out to say hello to that demon, and that would have been that. She’d now be Corporal Smiles, and look sharp there, y’damned fish-sniffers.
But never mind Tarr. It was Koryk who was riding her, uh, mind. A killer, oh yes, a real killer. Sort of like her but without the subtlety, and that made the two of them a good match. Dangerous, scary, the core of the nastiest squad in the Bonehunters. Oh, Balm’s crew might argue that, especially that yelping Throatslitter, but they were lounging round on a damned island right now, weren’t they? Not out here doing what marines were supposed to do, infiltrating, kicking the white squirmy balls outa Edur and Letherii and blowing up the occasional company just to remind Hood who did all the delivering.
She liked this life, yes she did. Better than that squalid existence she’d climbed out of back home. Poor village girl cowering in the ghostly shadow of a dead sister. Wondering when the next vanishing of the shoals would spell her watery demise. Oh, but the boys had wanted her once she’d been the only one left, wanted to fill that shadow with their own, as if that was even possible.
But Koryk here, well, that was different. Felt different, anyway. Because she was older now, she supposed. More experienced, so much so that she now knew what stirred her little winged flutter-bird. Watching Koryk kill people, ah, that had been so sweet, and lucky everyone else was too busy to have heard her moan and nearly squeal and guess what it’d meant.
Revelations were the world’s sharpest spice, and she’d just had a noseful. Making the night somehow clearer, cleaner. Every detail blade-edged, eager to be seen, noted by her glittering eyes. She heard the small creatures moving through the scrub of the fallow field, heard the frogs race up the boles of nearby trees. Mosquito hum and—
A sudden blinding flash to the south, a bloom of fiery light lifting skyward above a distant treeline. A moment later the rumble of twin detonations reached them. Everyone motionless now, crouched down. The small creatures frozen, quivering, terrified.
‘Bad time for an ambush,’ Koryk muttered as he worked his way back, slipping past Tarr.
‘So not one sprung by Malazan marines,’ Fiddler said, moving up to meet Koryk and Tarr. ‘That was a league away, maybe less. Anyone recall which squads were to our right first night?’
Silence.
‘Should we head over, Sergeant?’ Tarr asked. He had drawn his shortsword. ‘Could be they need our help.’
Gesler arrived. ‘Stormy says he heard sharpers after the cussers,’ the sergeant said. ‘Four or five.’
‘Could be the ambush got turned,’ Smiles said, struggling to control her breathing. Oh, take us there, you damned sergeant. Let me see Koryk fight again. It’s this itch, you see…
‘Not in our orders,’ Fiddler said. ‘If they’ve been mauled, the survivors will swing north or south and come looking for friends. We keep going.’
‘They come up to find us and they might have a thousand enemy on their heels,’ Gesler said.
‘Always a possibility,’ Fiddler conceded. ‘All right, Koryk, back on point. We go on, but with extra stealth. We’re not the only ones to see and hear that, so we might run into a troop riding hard across our path. Set us a cautious pace, soldier.’
Nodding, Koryk set out along the trail.
Smiles licked her lips, glowered at Tarr. ‘Put the damned pig-sticker away, Tarr.’
‘That’s “Corporal” to you, Smiles.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘Hood’s breath, it’s gone to his head.’
‘And those aren’t knives in your hands?’
Smiles sheathed them, said nothing.
‘Go on,’ Fiddler ordered them. ‘Koryk’s waiting.’
Corabb picked up his end of the stretcher again and set out after the others. Bottle had slept through that distant succession of explosions. Sign of just how exhausted the poor man was. Still, it was unnerving not having him awake and keeping an eye on things, the way he could leap from animal to animal. Birds, too. And even insects. Although Corabb wondered just how far an insect could see.
He reached up and crushed a mosquito against one eyelid. The stretcher pitched behind him and he heard Cuttle swear under his breath. Corabb quickly regained his hold on the sapling. Damned insects, he needed to stop thinking about them. Because thinking about them led to hearing and feeling them, crawling and biting everywhere and him with both hands used up. This wasn’t like the desert. You could see chigger fleas coming on the wind, could hear a bloodfly from five paces, could pretty much guess that under every rock or stone there was a scorpion or a big hairy spider or a snake all of which wanted to kill you. Simple and straightforward, in other words. None of this devious whispering in the night, this whining at the ear, this winged flit up a man’s nostril. Or crawling into the hair to take nips of flesh that left a swollen, oozing, damnably itching hole.
And then there were the slithery things that sucked blood. Hid under leaves waiting for some poor bastard handless soldier to go past. And ticks. And plants that, when one brushed innocently against them, started up an awful itching rash that then leaked some kind of oil – this was a true underworld, peopled by demon farmers and every life form of the night a raving, rapacious devourer of desert-born men. And never mind the Tiste Edur and the spineless Letherii. Imagine, fighting at the behest of tyrannical masters. Had they no pride? Might be smart to take a prisoner or two, just to get some answers. A Letherii. He might mention the idea to the sergeant. Fiddler was all right with suggestions. In fact, the entire Malazan Army seemed all right with that kind of thing. Sort of a constant warrior gathering, when anyone could speak up, anyone could argue, and thus decisions were forged. Of course, among the tribes, when that gathering was done, argument ended.
