Reaper's Gale

  ‘Armour on a ship? No thanks. That’s a guarantee of a fast plunge to the mucky bottom, Sergeant.’

  ‘We won’t be seeing any battle on the waves,’ Cord pronounced.

  ‘Why not? The Letherii got a fleet or three, don’t they?’

  ‘Mostly chewed up by years at sea, Masan Gilani. Besides, they’re not very good at the ship-to-ship kind of fighting – without their magic, that is.’

  ‘Well, without our marines, neither are we.’

  ‘They don’t know that, do they?’

  ‘We haven’t got Quick Ben any more either.’

  Cord leaned on the steering oar and looked across at her. ‘You spent most of your time in the town, didn’t you? Just a few trips back and forth to us up the north side of the island. Masan Gilani, Quick Ben had all the moves, aye, and even the look of an Imperial High Mage. Shifty, mysterious and scary as Hood’s arse-crack. But I’ll tell you this – Sinn, well, she’s the real thing.’

  ‘If you say so.’ All Masan Gilani could think of, when it came to Sinn, was the little mute child curling up in the arms of every woman in sight, suckling on tits like a newborn. Of course, that was outside Y’Ghatan. Long ago, now.

  ‘I do say so,’ Cord insisted. ‘Now, if you ain’t interested in getting unofficial with this sergeant here, best take your swaying hips elsewhere.’

  ‘You men really are all the same.’

  ‘And so are you women. Might interest you,’ he added as she turned to leave, ‘Crump’s no whiskered shrew under those breeches.’

  ‘That’s disgusting.’ But she paused at the steps leading down to the main deck and glanced back at the sergeant. ‘Really?’

  ‘Think I’d lie about something like that?’

  He watched Masan Gilani sashay her way up the main deck to where Balm and the rest were gambling, Crump with all the winnings, thus far. They’d reel him in later, of course. Although idiots had a way of being damnably lucky.

  In any case, the thought of Masan Gilani ending up with Crump, of all people, was simply too hilarious to let pass. If she wasn’t interested in decent men like Sergeant Cord, well, she could have the sapper and so deserve everything that came with him. Aye, he’ll worship you all right. Even what you cough up every morning and that sweet way you clear your nose before going into battle. Oh, wait till I tell Shard about this. And Ebron. And Limp. We’ll set up a book, aye. How long before she runs screaming. With Crump loping desperate after her, knees at his ears.

  Ebron climbed onto the aft deck. ‘What’s got you looking so cheerful, Sergeant?’

  ‘I’ll tell you later. Dropped out of the game?’

  ‘Crump’s still winning.’

  ‘Ain’t turned it yet?’

  ‘We tried, half a bell ago, Sergeant. But the damned fool’s luck’s gone all uncanny.’

  ‘Really? He’s not a mage or something, is he?’

  ‘Gods no, the very opposite. All my magics go awry – the ones I tried on him and on the bones and skull. Those Mott Irregulars, they were mage-hunters, you know. High Marshal this and High Marshal that – if Crump really is a Bole, one of the brothers, well, they were legendary.’

  ‘You saying we’re underestimating the bastard, Ebron?’

  The squad mage looked morose. ‘By about three hundred imperial jakatas and counting, Sergeant.’

  Hood’s balls, maybe Masan Gilani will like being Queen of the Universe.

  ‘What was that you were going to tell me about, Sergeant?’

  ‘Never mind.’

  Shurq Elalle stood on the foredeck of the Froth Wolf and held a steady, gauging eye on the Undying Gratitude five reaches ahead. All sails out, riding high. Skorgen Kaban was captaining her ship and would continue to do so until they reached the mouth of the Lether River. Thus far, he’d not embarrassed himself – or, more important, her.

  She wasn’t very happy about all of this, but these Malazans were paying her well indeed. Good-quality gold, and a chestful of that would come in handy in the days, months and probably years to come.

  Yet another invasion of the Letherii Empire, and in its own way possibly just as nasty as the last one. Were these omens, then, signalling the decline of a once great civilization? Conquered by barbaric Tiste Edur, and now in the midst of a protracted war that might well bleed them out, right down to a lifeless corpse.

  Unless, of course, those hapless abandoned marines – whatever ‘marines’ were; soldiers, anyway – were already jellied and dissolving into the humus. A very real possibility, and Shurq was not privy to any details of the campaign so she had no way of knowing either way.

  So, here she was, returning at last to Letheras . . . maybe just in time to witness its conquest. Witness – now really, darling Shurq, you’ve a bigger role than that. Like leading the damned enemy right up to the docks. And how famous will that make you then? How many more curses on your name?

  ‘There is a ritual,’ said a voice behind her.

  She turned. That odd man, the one in the ratty robes, whose face was so easily forgotten. The priest. ‘Banaschar, is it?’

  He nodded. ‘May I join you, Captain?’

  ‘As you please, but at the moment I am not a captain. I’m a passenger, a guest.’

  ‘As am I,’ he replied. ‘As I mentioned a moment ago, there is a ritual.’

  ‘Meaning what?’

  ‘To find and bind your soul to your body once more – to remove your curse and make you alive again.’

  ‘A little late for that, even if I desired such a thing, Banaschar.’

  His brows rose. ‘You do not dream of living again?’

  ‘Should I?’

  ‘I am probably the last living High Priest of D’rek, the Worm of Autumn. The face of the aged, the dying and the diseased. And of the all-devouring earth that takes flesh and bone, and the fires that transform into ashes—’

  ‘Yes, fine, I grasp the allusions.’

  ‘I, more perhaps than most, do understand the tension between the living and the dead, the bitterness of the season that finds each and every one of us—’

  ‘Do you always go on like this?’

  He looked away. ‘No. I am trying to resurrect my faith—’

  ‘By the Tiles, Banaschar, don’t make me laugh. Please.’

  ‘Laugh? Ah, yes, the play on words. Accidental—’

  ‘Rubbish.’

  That elicited a mocking smile – which was better than the grave misery that had been there a moment earlier. ‘Very well, Shurq Elalle, why do you not wish to live once again?’

  ‘I don’t get old, do I? I stay as I am, suitably attractive—’

  ‘Outwardly, yes.’

  ‘And have you taken the time to look inward, Banaschar?’

  ‘I would not do such a thing without your permission.’

  ‘I give it. Delve deep, High Priest.’

  His gaze fixed on her, but slowly surrendered its focus. A moment passed, then he paled, blinked and stepped back. ‘Gods below, what is that?’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean, good sir.’

  ‘There are . . . roots . . . filling your entire being. Every vein and artery, the thinnest capillaries . . . alive . . .’

  ‘My ootooloo – they said it would take over, eventually. Its appetites are’ – she smiled – ‘boundless. But I have learned to control them, more or less. It possesses its own rigour, yes?’

  ‘You are dead and yet not dead, not any more – but what lives within you, what has claimed your entire body, Shurq Elalle, it is alien. A parasite!’

  ‘Beats fleas.’

  He gaped.

  She grew impatient with his burgeoning alarm. ‘Errant take your rituals. I am content enough as I am, or will be once I get scoured out and some new spices stuffed—’ ‘Stop, please.’

  ‘As you like. Is there something else you wanted to discuss? Truth is, I have little time for high priests. As if piety comes from gaudy robes and self-righteous arrogance. Show me a priest who knows how t
o dance and I might bask in his measure, for a time. Otherwise . . .’

  He bowed. ‘Forgive me, then.’

  ‘Forget trying to resurrect your faith, Banaschar, and try finding for yourself a more worthy ritual of living.’

  He backed away, and very nearly collided with the Adjunct and Tavore’s ever-present bodyguard, Lostara Yil. Another hasty bow, then flight down the steps.

  The Adjunct frowned at Shurq Elalle. ‘It seems you are upsetting my other passengers, Captain.’

  ‘Not my concern, Adjunct. I would be of better service if I was on my own ship.’

  ‘You lack confidence in your first mate?’

  ‘My incomplete specimen of a human? Why would you imagine that?’

  Lostara Yil snorted, then pointedly ignored the Adjunct’s quick warning glance.

  ‘I will have many questions to ask you, Captain,’ Tavore said. ‘Especially the closer we get to Letheras. And I will of course value your answers.’

  ‘You are being too bold,’ Shurq Elalle said, ‘heading straight for the capital.’

  ‘Answers, not advice.’

  Shurq Elalle shrugged. ‘I had an uncle who chose to leave Letheras and live with the Meckros. He wasn’t much for listening to advice either. So off he went, and then, not so long ago, there was a ship, a Meckros ship from one of their floating cities south of Pilott – and they told tales of a sister city being destroyed by ice, then vanishing – almost no wreckage left behind at all – and no survivors. Probably straight down to the deep. That hapless city was the one my uncle lived on.’

  ‘Then you should have learned a most wise lesson,’ Lostara Yil said in a rather dry tone that hinted of self-mockery.

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Yes. People who make up their minds about something never listen to advice – especially when it’s to the contrary.’

  ‘Well said.’ Shurq Elalle smiled at the tattooed woman. ‘Frustrating, isn’t it?’

  ‘If you two are done with your not very subtle complaints,’ the Adjunct said, ‘I wish to ask the captain here about the Letherii secret police, the Patriotists.’

  ‘Ah well,’ Shurq Elalle said, ‘that is not a fun subject.

  Not fun at all.’

  ‘I am not interested in fun,’ Tavore said.

  And one look at her, Shurq Elalle reflected, was proof enough of that.

  With twelve of his most loyal guards from the Eternal Domicile, Sirryn marched up Kravos Hill, the west wall of Letheras two thousand paces behind him. The tents of the Imperial Brigade dominated in the midst of ancillary companies and lesser brigades, although the Tiste Edur encampment, situated slightly apart from the rest, to the north, looked substantial – at least two or three thousand of the damned savages, Sirryn judged.

  Atop Kravos Hill stood half a dozen Letherii officers and a contingent of Tiste Edur, among them Hanradi Khalag. Sirryn withdrew a scroll and said to the once-king, ‘I am here to deliver the Chancellor’s orders.’

  Expressionless, Hanradi reached out for the scroll, then passed it on to one of his aides without looking at it.

  Sirryn scowled. ‘Such orders—’

  ‘I do not read Letherii,’ Hanradi said.

  ‘If you’d like, I can translate—’

  ‘I have my own people for that, Finadd.’ Hanradi Khalag looked across at the officers of the Imperial Brigade. ‘In the future,’ he said, ‘we Edur will patrol the boundaries of our own camp. The parade of Letherii whores is now at an end, so your pimp soldiers will have to make their extra coin elsewhere.’

  The Edur commander led his troop away, down off the summit of the hill. Sirryn stared after them for a moment, until he was certain they would not return. He then withdrew a second scroll and approached the Preda of the Imperial Brigade. ‘These, too,’ he said, ‘are the Chancellor’s orders.’

  The Preda was a veteran, not just of battle, but of the ways of the palace. He simply nodded as he accepted the scroll. ‘Finadd,’ he asked, ‘will the Chancellor be commanding us in person when the time comes?’

  ‘I imagine not, sir.’

  ‘That could make things awkward.’

  ‘In some matters, I will speak for him, sir. As for the rest, you will find, once you have examined that scroll, that you are given considerable freedom for the battle itself.’

  ‘And if I find myself at odds with Hanradi?’

  ‘I doubt that will be a problem,’ Sirryn said.

  He watched the Preda mull that over, and thought he saw a slight widening of the man’s eyes.

  ‘Finadd,’ the Preda said.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘How fares the Chancellor, at the moment?’

  ‘Well indeed, sir.’

  ‘And . . . in the future?’

  ‘He is most optimistic, sir.’

  ‘Very good. Thank you, Finadd.’

  Sirryn saluted. ‘Begging your leave, sir, I wish to oversee the establishment of my camp.’

  ‘Make it close to this hill, Finadd – this is where we will command the battle – and I will want you close.’

  ‘Sir, there is scant room left—’

  ‘You have my leave to move people out at your discretion, Finadd.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  Oh, he would enjoy that. Grubby soldiers with dust on their boots – they always imagined themselves superior to their counterparts in the palace. Well, a few cracked skulls would change that quick enough. By leave of their very own Preda. He saluted again and led his troops back down the hill.

  The man looked familiar. Had he been a student of hers? Son of a neighbour, son of another scholar? These were the questions in Janath’s mind as the troop dragged them from Tehol’s home. Of the journey to the compound of the Patriotists, she now recalled very little. But that man, with the familiar face – a face that stirred oddly intimate feelings within her – would not leave her.

  Chained in her cell, chained in the darkness that crawled with vermin, she had been left alone for some time now. Days, perhaps even a week. A single plate of watery stew slid through the trap at the foot of the door at what seemed irregular intervals – it would not be pushed into her cell if she did not leave the empty plate from the last meal within easy reach of the guard. The ritual had not been explained to her, but she had come to admire its precision, its eloquence. Disobedience meant hunger; or, rather, starvation – hunger was always there, something that she had not experienced in the household of Bugg and Tehol. There had been a time, back then, when she had come to loathe the taste of chicken. Now she dreamed of those damned hens.

  The man, Tanal Yathvanar, had visited but once, apparently to gloat. She’d no idea she had been wanted for sedition, although in truth that did not surprise her much. When thugs were in power, educated people were the first to feel their fists. It was so pathetic, really, how so much violence came from someone feeling small. Small of mind, and it did not matter how big the sword in hand, that essential smallness remained, gnawing with very sharp teeth.

  Both Bugg and Tehol had hinted, occasionally, that things would not go well if the Patriotists found her. Well, them, as it turned out. Tehol Beddict, her most frustrating student, who had only attended her lectures out of adolescent lust, now revealed as the empire’s greatest traitor – so Tanal Yathvanar had said to her, the glee in his voice matched by the lurid reflections in his eyes as he stood with his lantern in one hand and the other touching his private parts whenever he thought she wasn’t looking. She had been sitting with her back to the stone wall, head tilted down chin to chest, with her filthy hair hanging ragged over her face.

  Tehol Beddict, masterminding the empire’s economic ruin – well, that was still a little hard to believe. Oh, he had the talent, yes. And maybe even the inclination. But for such universal collapse as was now occurring, there was a legion of co-conspirators. Unwitting for the most part, of course, barring that niggling in their guts that what they were doing was, ultimately, destructive beyond measure. But greed won out, as i
t always did. So, Tehol Beddict had paved the road, but hundreds – thousands? – had freely chosen to walk it. And now they cried out, indignant and appalled, even as they scurried for cover lest blame spread its crimson pool.

  As things stood at the moment, the entire crime now rested at Tehol’s feet – and Bugg’s, the still elusive manservant.

  ‘But we will find him, Janath,’ Tanal Yathvanar had said. ‘We find everyone, eventually.’

  Everyone but yourselves, she had thought to reply, for that search leads you onto a far too frightening path. Instead, she had said nothing, given him nothing at all. And watched as the sword got ever smaller in his hand – yes, that sword, too.

  ‘Just as we found you. Just as I found you. Oh, it’s well known now. I was the one to arrest Tehol Beddict and Scholar Janath. Me. Not Karos Invictad, who sits day and night drooling over his box and that blessed two-headed insect. It has driven him mad, you know. He does nothing else.’ He then laughed. ‘Did you know he is now the richest man in the empire? At least, he thinks he is. But I did the work for him. I made the transactions. I have copies of everything. But the real glory is this – I am his beneficiary, and he doesn’t even know it!’

  Yes, the two-headed insect. One drooling, the other nattering.

  Tanal Yathvanar. She knew him – that was now a certainty. She knew him, because he had done all this to her before. There had been no dissembling when he had talked about that – it was the source for his gloating over her, after all, so it could not be a lie.

  And now her memories – of the time between the end of the semester at the academy, and her awakening in the care of Tehol and Bugg – memories that had been so fragmented, images blurred beyond all understanding, began to coalesce, began to draw into focus.

  She was wanted, because she had escaped. Which meant that she had been arrested – her first arrest – and her tormentor had been none other than Tanal Yathvanar.

  Logical. Reasonable intuitions from the available facts and her list of observations. Cogent argument and standing before her – some time ago now – the one man who offered the most poignant proof as he babbled on, driven by her lack of reaction. ‘Dear Janath, we must resume where we left off. I don’t know how you got away. I don’t even know how you ended up with Tehol Beddict. But once more you are mine, to do with as I please. And what I will do with you will not, alas, please you, but your pleasure is not what interests me. This time, you will beg me, you will promise anything, you will come to worship me. And that is what I will leave you with, today. To give you things to think about, until my return.’