A Hood-damned speech.
From Tavore. Tighter-lipped than a cat at Togg’s teats, but she talked. Not long, not complicated. And there was no brilliance, no genius. It was plain, every word picked up from dusty ground, strung together on a chewed thong, not even spat on to bring out a gleam. Not a precious stone to be found. No pearls, no opals, no sapphires.
Raw garnet at best.
At best.
Tied to Tavore’s sword belt, there had been a finger bone. Yellowed, charred at one end. She stood in silence for a time, her plain features looking drawn, aged, her eyes dull as smudged slate. When at last she spoke, her voice was low, strangely measured, devoid of all emotion.
Blistig could still remember every word.
‘There have been armies. Burdened with names, the legacy of meetings, of battles, of betrayals. The history behind the name is each army’s secret language – one that no-one else can understand, much less share. The First Sword of Dassem Ultor – the Plains of Unta, the Grissian Hills, Li Heng, Y’Ghatan. The Bridgeburners – Raraku, Black Dog, Mott Wood, Pale, Black Coral. Coltaine’s Seventh – Gelor Ridge, Vathar Crossing and the Day of Pure Blood, Sanimon, the Fall.
‘Some of you share a few of those – with comrades now fallen, now dust. They are, for you, the cracked vessels of your grief and your pride. And you cannot stand in one place for long, lest the ground turn to depthless mud around your feet.’ Her eyes fell then, a heartbeat, another, before she looked up once more, scanning the array of sombre faces before her.
‘Among us, among the Bonehunters, our secret language has begun. Cruel in its birth at Aren, sordid in a river of old blood. Coltaine’s blood. You know this. I need tell you none of this. We have our own Raraku. We have our own Y’Ghatan. We have Malaz City.
‘In the civil war on Theft, a warlord who captured a rival’s army then destroyed them – not by slaughter; no, he simply gave the order that each soldier’s weapon hand lose its index finger. The maimed soldiers were then sent back to the warlord’s rival. Twelve thousand useless men and women. To feed, to send home, to swallow the bitter taste of defeat. I was . . . I was reminded of that story, not long ago.’
Yes, Blistig thought then, and I think I know by whom. Gods, we all do.
‘We too are maimed. In our hearts. Each of you knows this.
‘And so we carry, tied to our belts, a piece of bone. Legacy of a severed finger. And yes, we cannot help but know bitterness.’ She paused, held back for a long moment, and it seemed the silence itself grated in his skull.
Tavore resumed. ‘The Bonehunters will speak in our secret language. We sail to add another name to our burden, and it may be it will prove our last. I do not believe so, but there are clouds before the face of the future – we cannot see. We cannot know.
‘The island of Sepik, a protectorate of the Malazan Empire, is now empty of human life. Sentenced to senseless slaughter, every man, child and woman. We know the face of the slayer. We have seen the dark ships. We have seen the harsh magic unveiled.
‘We are Malazan. We remain so, no matter the judgement of the Empress. Is this enough reason to give answer?
‘No, it is not. Compassion is never enough. Nor is the hunger for vengeance. But, for now, for what awaits us, perhaps they will do. We are the Bonehunters, and sail to another name. Beyond Aren, beyond Raraku and beyond Y’Ghatan, we now cross the world to find the first name that will be truly our own. Shared by none other. We sail to give answer.
‘There is more. But I will not speak of that beyond these words: “What awaits you in the dusk of the old world’s passing, shall go . . . unwitnessed.” T’amber’s words.’ Another long spell of pained silence.
‘They are hard and well might they feed spite, if in weakness we permit such. But to those words I say this, as your commander: we shall be our own witness, and that will be enough. It must be enough. It must ever be enough.’
Even now, over a year later, Blistig wondered if she had said what was needed. In truth, he was not quite certain what she had said. The meaning of it. Witnessed, unwitnessed, does it really make a difference? But he knew the answer to that, even if he could not articulate precisely what it was he knew. Something stirred deep in the pit of his soul, as if his thoughts were black waters caressing unseen rocks, bending to shapes that even ignorance could not alter.
Well, how can any of this make sense? I do not have the words.
But damn me, she did. Back then. She did.
Unwitnessed. There was crime in that notion. A profound injustice against which he railed. In silence. Like every other soldier in the Bonehunters. Maybe. No, I am not mistaken – I see something in their eyes. I can see it. We rail against injustice, yes. That what we do will be seen by no-one. Our fate unmeasured.
Tavore, what have you awakened? And, Hood take us, what makes you think we are equal to any of this?
There had been no desertions. He did not understand. He didn’t think he would ever understand. What had happened that night, what had happened in that strange speech.
She told us we would never see our loved ones again. That is what she told us. Isn’t it?
Leaving us with what?
With each other, I suppose.
‘We shall be our own witness.’
And was that enough?
Maybe. So far.
But now we are here. We have arrived. The fleet, the fleet burns – gods, that she would do that. Not a single transport left. Burned, sunk to the bottom off this damned shore. We are . . . cut away.
Welcome, Bonehunters, to the empire of Lether.
Alas, we are not here in festive spirit.
* * *
The treacherous ice was behind them now, the broken mountains that had filled the sea and clambered onto the Fent Reach, crushing everything on it to dust. No ruins to ponder over in some distant future, not a single sign of human existence left on that scraped rock. Ice was annihilation. It did not do what sand did, did not simply bury every trace. It was as the Jaghut had meant it: negation, a scouring down to bare rock.
Lostara Yil drew her fur-lined cloak tighter about herself as she followed the Adjunct to the forecastle deck of the Froth Wolf. The sheltered harbour was before them, a half-dozen ships anchored in the bay, including the Silanda – its heap of Tiste Andii heads hidden beneath thick tarpaulin. Getting the bone whistle from Gesler hadn’t been easy, she recalled; and among the soldiers of the two squads left to command the haunted craft, the only one willing to use it had been that corporal, Deadsmell. Not even Sinn would touch it.
Before the splitting of the fleet there had been a flurry of shifting about among the squads and companies. The strategy for this war demanded certain adjustments, and, as was expected, few had been thrilled with the changes. Soldiers are such conservative bastards.
But at least we pulled Blistig away from real command – worse than a rheumy old dog, that one.
Lostara, still waiting for her commander to speak, turned for a glance back at the Throne of War blockading the mouth of the harbour. The last Perish ship in these waters, for now. She hoped it would be enough for what was to come.
‘Where is Sergeant Cord’s squad now?’ the Adjunct asked.
‘Northwest tip of the island,’ Lostara replied. ‘Sinn is keeping the ice away—’
‘How?’ Tavore demanded, not for the first time.
And Lostara could but give the same answer she had given countless times before. ‘I don’t know, Adjunct.’ She hesitated, then added, ‘Ebron believes that this ice is dying. A Jaghut ritual, crumbling. He notes the water lines on this island’s cliffs – well past any earlier high water mark.’
To this the Adjunct said nothing. She seemed unaffected by the cold, damp wind, barring an absence of colour on her features, as if her blood had withdrawn from the surface of her flesh. Her hair was cut very short, as if to discard every hint of femininity.
‘Grub says the world is drowning,’ Lostara said.
Tavore turn
ed slightly and looked up at the unlit shrouds high overhead. ‘Grub. Another mystery,’ she said.
‘He seems able to communicate with the Nachts, which is, well, remarkable.’
‘Communicate? It’s become hard to tell them apart.’
The Froth Wolf was sidling past the anchored ships, angling towards the stone pier, on which stood two figures. Probably Sergeant Balm and Deadsmell.
Tavore said, ‘Go below, Captain, and inform the others we are about to disembark.’
‘Aye, sir.’
Remain a soldier, Lostara Yil told herself, a statement that whispered through her mind a hundred times a day. Remain a soldier, and all the rest will go away.
With dawn’s first light paling the eastern sky, the mounted troop of Letherii thundered down the narrow coastal track, the berm of the old beach ridge on their left, the impenetrable, tangled forest on their right. The rain had dissolved into a clammy mist, strengthening the night’s last grip of darkness, and the pounding of hoofs was oddly muted, quick to dwindle once the last rider was out of sight.
Puddles in the track settled once more, clouded with mud. The mists swirled, drifted into the trees.
An owl, perched high on a branch of a dead tree, had watched the troop pass. The echoes fading, it remained where it was, not moving, its large unblinking eyes fixed on a chaotic mass of shrubs and brambles amidst thin-boled poplars. Where something was not quite as it seemed. Unease sufficient to confuse its predatory mind.
The scrub blurred then, as if disintegrating in a fierce gale – although no wind stirred – and upon its vanishing, figures rose as if from nowhere.
The owl decided it would have to wait a little longer. While hungry, it nevertheless experienced a strange contentment, followed by a kind of tug on its mind, as of something . . . leaving.
Bottle rolled onto his back. ‘Over thirty riders,’ he said. ‘Lancers, lightly armoured. Odd stirrups. Hood, but my skull aches. I hate Mockra—’
‘Enough bitching,’ Fiddler said as he watched his squad – barring a motionless Bottle – drawing in, with Gesler’s doing the same beneath some trees a few paces away. ‘You sure they didn’t smell nothing?’
‘Those first scouts nearly stepped right on us,’ Bottle said.
‘Something there . . . especially in one of them. As if he was somehow . . . I don’t know, sensitized, I suppose. Him and this damned ugly coast where we don’t belong—’
‘Just answer the questions,’ Fiddler cut in again.
‘We should’ve ambushed the whole lot,’ Koryk muttered, checking the knots on all the fetishes he was wearing, then dragging over his oversized supply pack to examine the straps.
Fiddler shook his head. ‘No fighting until our feet dry. I hate that.’
‘Then why are you a damned marine, Sergeant?’
‘Accident. Besides, those were Letherii. We’re to avoid contact with them, for now.’
‘I’m hungry,’ Bottle said. ‘Well, no. It was the owl, dammit. Anyway, you would not believe what looking through an owl’s eyes at night is like. Bright as noon in the desert.’
‘Desert,’ Tarr said. ‘I miss the desert.’
‘You’d miss a latrine pit if it was the last place you crawled out of,’ Smiles observed. ‘Koryk had his crossbow trained on those riders, Sergeant.’
‘What are you, my little sister?’ Koryk demanded. He then mimed Smiles’s voice. ‘He didn’t shake his babymaker when he’d done peeing, Sergeant! I saw it!’
‘See it?’ Smiles laughed. ‘I’d never get that close to you, half-blood, trust me.’
‘She’s getting better,’ Cuttle said to Koryk, whose only response was a grunt.
‘Quiet everyone,’ Fiddler said. ‘No telling who else lives in these woods – or might be using the road.’
‘We’re alone,’ Bottle pronounced, slowly sitting up, then gripping the sides of his head. ‘Hiding fourteen grunting, farting soldiers ain’t easy. And once we get to more populated areas it’s going to be worse.’
‘Getting one miserable mage to shut his mouth is even harder,’ Fiddler said. ‘Check your gear, everyone. I want us a ways deeper into these woods before we dig in for the day.’ For the past month on the ships the Bonehunters had been shifting over into reversing their sleep cycles. A damned hard thing to do, as it turned out. But now at least pretty much everyone was done turning round. Lost the tans, anyway. Fiddler moved over to where Gesler crouched.
Except this gold-skinned bastard and his hairy corporal. ‘Your people ready?’
Gesler nodded. ‘Heavies are complaining their armour’s gonna rust.’
‘So long as they keep the squeaking to a minimum.’ Fiddler glanced at the huddled soldiers of Gesler’s squad, then back towards his own. ‘Some army,’ he said under his breath.
‘Some invasion, aye,’ Gesler agreed. ‘Ever known anyone to do it this way?’
Fiddler shook his head. ‘It makes a weird kind of sense, though, doesn’t it? The Edur are spread thin, from all reports. The oppressed are legion – all these damned Letherii.’
‘That troop just passed us didn’t look much oppressed to me, Fid.’
‘Well, I suppose we’ll find out one way or the other, won’t we? Now, let’s get this invasion under way.’
‘A moment,’ Gesler said, settling a scarred hand on Fiddler’s shoulder. ‘She burned the fucking transports, Fid.’
The sergeant winced.
‘Hard to miss the point of that, wouldn’t you say?’
‘Which meaning are you referring to, Gesler? The one about patrols on this coast seeing the flames or the one about for us there’s no going back?’
‘Hood take me, I can only chew on one piece of meat at a time, you know? Start with the first one. If I was this damned empire, I’d be flooding this coastline with soldiers before this day’s sun is down. And no matter how much Mockra our squad mages now know, we’re going to mess up. Sooner or later, Fid.’
‘Would that be before or after we start drawing blood?’
‘I ain’t even thinking about once we start killing Hooddamned Tiste Edur. I’m thinking about today.’
‘Someone stumbles onto us and we get nasty and dirty, then we bolt according to the plan.’
‘And try to stay alive, aye. Great. And what if these Letherii ain’t friendly?’
‘We just keep going, and steal what we need.’
‘We should’ve landed en masse, not just marines. With shields locked and see what they can throw at us.’
Fiddler rubbed at the back of his neck. Then sighed and said, ‘You know what they can throw at us, Gesler. Only the next time, there won’t be Quick Ben dancing in the air and matching them horror for horror. This is a night war we’re looking at. Ambushes. Knives in the dark. Cut and bolt.’
‘With no way out.’
‘Aye. So I do wonder if she lit up our transports to tell ‘em we’re here, or to tell us there’s no point in thinking about retreat. Or both.’
Gesler grunted. ‘ “Unwitnessed”, she said. Is that where we are? Already?’
Shrugging, Fiddler half rose. ‘Might be, Gesler. Let’s get moving – the birds are twittering almost as loud as we are.’
But, as they tramped deeper into the wet, rotting forest, Gesler’s last question haunted Fiddler. Is he right, Adjunct? We there already? Invading a damned empire in two-squad units. Running alone, unsupported, living or dying on the shoulders of a single squad mage. What if Bottle gets killed in the first scrap? We’re done for, that’s what. Best keep Corabb nice and close to Bottle, and hope the old rebel’s luck keeps pulling.
At the very least, the waiting was over. Real ground underfoot – they’d all wobbled like drunks coming up from the strand, which might have been amusing in other circumstances. But not when we could have staggered right into a patrol. Things were feeling solid now, though. Thank Hood. Well, as solid as one could be stumping over moss, overgrown sinkholes and twisted roots. Almost as bad as Black Dog. No,
don’t think like that. Look ahead, Fid. Keep looking ahead.
Somewhere above them, through a mad witch’s weave of branches, the sky was lightening.
‘Any more complainin’ from any of you and I’ll cut off my left tit.’
A half-circle of faces ogled her. Good. She was pleased with the way that always worked.
‘Good thing the swim put you out,’ Bowl said.
Sergeant Hellian frowned at the huge soldier. Put out? ‘Heavies are idiots, you know that? Now.’ She looked down and tried counting the number of rum casks she’d managed to drag from the hold before the flames went wild. Six, maybe ten. Nine. She waved at the blurry array. ‘Everybody make room in your packs. For one each.’
Touchy Brethless said, ‘Sergeant, ain’t we supposed to find Urb and his squad? They gotta be close.’ Then her corporal spoke again, this time in a different voice, ‘He’s right. Bowl, where’d you come from again? Up the shore or down it?’
‘I don’t remember. It was dark.’
‘Hold on,’ Hellian said, taking a sidestep to maintain her balance on the pitching deck. No, the pitching ground. ‘You’re not in my squad, Bowl. Go away.’
‘I’d like nothing better,’ he replied, squinting at the wall of trees surrounding them. ‘I ain’t carrying no cask of damned ale. Look at you, Sergeant, you’re scorched all over.’
Hellian straightened. ‘Now hold on, we’re talking ‘ssential victuals. But I’ll tell you what’s a lot worse. I bet that fire was seen by somebody – and I hope the fool that started it is a heap of ash right now, that’s what I hope. Somebody’s seen it, that’s for sure.’
‘Sergeant, they lit up all the transports,’ said another one of her soldiers. Beard, thick chest, solid as a tree trunk and probably not much smarter either. What was his name?
‘Who are you?’
The man rubbed at his eyes. ‘Balgrid.’