Fall of Light

FOURTEEN

Yedan Narad stood facing the forest with his back to the grove. The snow upon branches and the ground blackened the boles of the trees, and the crazed scrawl of twigs against the white sky ran like cracks in the face of the world. It was no difficult thing to see the future’s end, looming like the breaking of winter.

Each night his dreams tore apart the shrouds of time. He walked a shoreline in a past he had never lived, into a future that was not his. He spoke with queens who called him brother, yet offered him the rotting, skeletal visage of a young woman in the attire of a bride. He felt sweet breath upon his cheek that assaulted his senses like the stain of gangrene.

During each day, as the hunters of the Shake gathered, as the makeshift army of Glyph of the Shore grew, Narad found himself less able to distinguish the real from the imagined, the moment ahead from the moment just past. At times, he would glance up and see the surrounding forest transformed into walls of raging fire, into a ceaseless cascade of silver, mercurial light. From wounds in the air, he saw the lunging bulk of dragons clawing through, the image rushing towards him as if he was, somehow, flying into the face of horror.

In his dreams, they named him warrior. Of his exploits, they spoke words of awe from crowds too formless to comprehend even as he walked through their midst. Somehow, he led them all, sustained by virtues and qualities of command he knew he did not possess. Everything seemed borrowed, perhaps even stolen. The expectations had begun to bleed into the real world, as increasingly he was looked to for guidance. It was only a matter of time before someone – Glyph, or, now, hate-filled Lahanis – exposed him for what he was.

Narad, lowborn murderer, rapist, who lied to the First Son of Darkness. Why? Because deceit dwells in his heart, and he will duck every hand of justice. Cowardice hides behind his every desire, and just as he fled retribution, so he created for himself false memories, pillaging all he could.

And yet, it was too late to deny the reality of what was coming. He had promised the Shake to the First Son, but the summons, when it came, would see Lord Anomander – not the Shake – dislodged, made to move in order to achieve the meeting. And in that moment, Narad now knew, he would once more betray the man.

That shore is an unwelcome one to every stranger. But that shore is what we will call home. When you find us, you will answer our need. Fail to do so, and death will find you here. But even if you give honourable answer, beware your back, for there I will be standing. I am not who you think I am. For all my avowals, there is a weakness in me, a flaw in the core of my being. It will reveal itself. It is only a matter of time.

‘Yedan Narad.’

He turned to see that Glyph had approached him from the swollen camp now crowding the glade. Two steps behind the hunter stood Lahanis, the killer who had once been a child of the Borderswords. She had shown up a week past and now accompanied Glyph wherever he went. Her small hands rested upon the grips of the two long-knives slipped through her belt. Her eyes, fixed upon Narad, told him of her suspicions.

‘There are Legion soldiers in the forest,’ Glyph said. ‘They track someone.’

Narad shrugged. ‘A criminal. A deserter.’

‘It makes it difficult for us to remain hidden.’

Narad’s gaze flicked to Lahanis. ‘Then kill the trackers.’ At that, he saw her smile.

But Glyph reacted to the suggestion with a troubled frown. ‘Yedan Narad. Has the time then come to begin our war of vengeance? A thousand and more have gathered here, but many more have yet to reach us. Though we now claim to be warriors, few of us know the ways of soldiering. We remain hunters. Our habits are ill suited-’

‘Was this not what you wanted?’ Narad asked him.

He hesitated. ‘Each hunting party elects its own leader. In the forest, they seek isolation from other bands. Nothing can be coordinated.’

Lahanis spoke. ‘It is simple enough, Glyph, as I have already explained. Call the hunting party a squad, make the leader a sergeant.’

‘These are titles and nothing more,’ Glyph replied. ‘Our habits remain. Yedan Narad, you alone among us understand the soldiering ways. Yet you refuse to guide us.’

‘I told you. I never commanded anyone.’ Least of all myself.

‘He’s useless,’ Lahanis said to Glyph. ‘I have said as much. Leave him to his drunken wandering. If you’ve need of a priest, you have found one, but no priest will ever win anyone a war. I alone possess the knowledge you seek. Grant me command, Glyph, and I will make your people into an army.’

‘You, child,’ Glyph said, ‘have yet to walk the Shore. You remain possessed by hate, and it blinds you to the destiny awaiting us.’

Lahanis sneered in answer to that, and then jabbed a finger at Narad. ‘If this man is witness to your destiny, then it has blinded him!’

Already uninterested in this conversation, Narad turned away. ‘Glyph,’ he said wearily, ‘consider your habits when you gathered to hunt the herds. Tell me, did each leader battle the next for command?’

‘No, Yedan. One was chosen.’

‘Upon what basis?’

‘Guile, and prowess.’

‘Take this to your people, then. The Legion is but a herd. Dangerous, yes, but even wild beasts can prove dangerous, so that detail should not alarm you. The enemy will behave just as a herd would, but instead of fleeing the sight of you, they will rush towards you. This is the only difference. Have your chosen leaders apply their guile to that.’

‘Narad Yedan, I will do as you say. Thank you.’

‘You considered that good advice?’ Lahanis demanded.

‘It speaks to our habits, Bordersword. We were not told we must be remade. The Watch gifts us his wisdom. We understand the way of hunting the great herds.’

‘But you will be fighting here, in this forest, not upon a plain!’

‘Bordersword, often a herd will break apart, with smaller groups fleeing into woodland. We know to anticipate such a thing. The forest poses no obstacle to our understanding the words of the Watch.’

With a frustrated snarl, Lahanis marched away.

Still behind Narad, Glyph sighed, and then moved to stand alongside him. ‘She bears too many wounds upon her soul.’

Narad grunted, and said, ‘And you do not?’

‘She is young.’

‘The wounds you speak of are indifferent to that.’

‘Our own children were slain. She reminds us of this-’

‘More than you realize, Glyph. Had your children lived, they would be just like Lahanis. Think on that.’

The Denier was silent for a time, and then he sighed again. ‘Yes. You remind me that there is a difference between the wound survived, and the wound that slays. Only in the first is a new hunger born. We speak of vengeance, but even the loss within us is borrowed. So it is and so it shall remain, for as long as we live.’

‘Indulge Lahanis,’ Narad said, closing his eyes upon his own pain, his own borrowed wounds. ‘Her fire will be needed.’

‘I feared as much.’ Glyph paused, and then said, ‘The Legion soldiers in the forest are thinly scattered. Our hunting bands will know how to deal with them.’

‘The habits of the arrow.’

‘Just so. Yedan Narad, do you fear the night to come?’

Narad snorted. ‘Why should this night be any different?’

‘In your dreams, you walk the Shore.’

‘I have told you this, yes.’

‘Will glory be found there, Yedan?’

Narad knew he should open his eyes, shift his gaze to Glyph, and reveal to the man the raw brutality of an honest reply. Instead, he did not move, barring the sudden trembling of his soul, which he was sure none other could see. ‘Glory. Well, if it needs a name … we can call it such.’

‘What other would you choose?’

The death of innocence? The loss of hope? Betrayal? ‘As I said, it will suffice.’

‘Yedan Narad, upon the day of the war’s end, you must lead us. None other will serve. But this day, as we begin the war, you have already served well enough. We see at last the path we must take, to become slayers of men and women.’

‘The same habit of hunting, Glyph. Only the prey has changed. I said little of worth.’

After a time, the Denier slipped away. Eyes still closed, Narad stared out upon a raging shoreline, argent with furious fire. He felt the weight of his sword in his hand, hearing but otherwise ignoring its muted peals of glee, while beside him a woman spoke.

‘My prince, our spine is bent unto breaking. Will you not return to us? We need your strength.’

Narad grimaced. ‘How is it that you make a virtue of my refusal of your lives, my refusing your right to them? For that is what you now ask of me. Stand fast, I will shout. Bend we shall, but break they will.’

‘Sire, you never shout.’

He waved a hand. ‘You know me as a humourless man, and yet you persist. Why dog a beast that never lived?’

The woman – a soldier, not a queen – was silent for a time, and then she said, ‘I took upon myself a family I never had. A daughter. A son, or was it two? I gave them the delusion they desired. They called me Mother. Until their moments of death, I held to the lie. What compelled me to do such a thing? Even now, while my corpse lies rotting beneath the stones the Andii raised about us, the question haunts me like my own ghost. ‘What compels us, Yedan, to so plunder the truth?’

He shook his head. ‘Nothing less or more than love, I think. Not for the ones you know and have always held close, but for the ones you may never meet. Or for those who, bearing the face of a stranger, stumble into your arms. In that instant, friend, you draw upon the deepest taproot within you. It has no name. It needs no name.’

‘Then, what do you call it?’

He pondered the question for a moment, wondering at her insistence that some things need be named. Then he said, ‘Why, call it glory.’

He opened his eyes and the scene vanished. Once again, before him was the stark contrast of snow and trees, white and black, raised up in front of a fissured sky.

The man he was, in his dreams – the man who was a lover of men – was far wiser than Narad. He spoke with knowledge and forbearance. He spoke like a man at peace with who he was, with who he would ever be. He spoke, too, like a man about to die.

Oh, my queen, see how I will fail you? He and I, we are brothers in failure, bound as lovers to a singular flaw. And when your day comes, Glyph, your final day of the war, he will lead you, not I. Or so I will pray. Better him than Narad, who will, I fear, take the coward’s path.

In this winter, all thoughts of redemption seemed as frozen and hidden as the ground beneath its mantle of snow.

* * *

Glyph watched the other packs slipping away from the camp, and then turned to the four hunters gathered behind him. ‘We must clear the forest of these invaders. Iron not flint for your arrows. Today, I am not interested in seeing them suffer. Quickly done, a return to winter’s silence.’

Lahanis stood among the small group. She alone carried no bow, no quiver of arrows. He would rather she stayed behind, as he had little faith in her woodlore. Borderswords were not trained in forests. Their world had been open land and denuded hills, the tundra of the north. They had often fought from horseback.

But now the Borderswords were no more. Slaughtered in a battle with Houseblades. Lahanis was the only survivor to have joined his people. He would rather she hadn’t. The smooth, round face before him was too young for the ferocity in her eyes. Her weapons invited the kind of death that was delivered with an embrace. Not for her the distance of an arrow or a lance. She would fight and don the blood of those she killed, and this red dress was one she yearned to wear.

She frightened him.

But then, so too did Narad, his first brother since his rebirth. The visions plaguing the Watch, as much as Narad had told him, seemed to promise conflagration and endless slaughter. It was as if Glyph had somehow stumbled into an unexpected destiny, making for his people a role none sought, and it was the Watch who would guide them into it.

But I cannot know. Does he share my love for my people? He would see us used by the First Son. But we owe nothing to the black-skinned Andii, and less to the Liosan, who now wear the guise of bloodless corpses.

A hunter spoke, ‘We are ready, lord.’

And this! Lord! They had given him a title, Lord of the False Dawn. Glyph did not understand it. He saw no significance in any dawn, false or otherwise. Nor could he determine who had first fashioned for him that honorific. It seemed to have sprung up from the frozen ground, or perhaps drifted down with the flakes of snow. He did not like it, but as with Narad, the Watch, there was no fighting this tide. Something now grasped them both, and its hands were cold and unyielding. ‘Very well. Lahanis, we must travel in silence, with not a single misstep. These Legion soldiers are their scouts, their trackers.’

‘I know,’ she replied. ‘We must be as shadows.’

‘You have stained your skin. That is good.’

She frowned. ‘I have done nothing.’ She raised a hand, squinting at it. Her skin was the hue of ash. Blinking, she looked across to Glyph. ‘You are the same. But I saw you smearing ash upon your faces when first I came among you. I considered doing the same, but then forgot. We are stained, but not by our doing.’

Shaken, Glyph glanced over to where Narad stood, still facing out into the forest. ‘I thought him made ill by his visions.’

‘We are Deniers.’ Lahanis claimed the title as if she had been born to it.

The other hunters were muttering, their expressions troubled.

It was startling that no one else had even taken notice. Glyph could think of nothing to say, no answer to give them, or Lahanis.

‘It was on this day,’ said Neerak, the first hunter to have spoken to him. His eyes were wide. ‘By the spring, lord, yesterday, I saw my own reflection, where we keep the ice clear. Pale, but not as pale as the Liosan. Pale, in the way that I have always been. But see my hands now, my forearms – has a plague come among us?’

A plague.

‘We chose neither,’ Lahanis said. ‘We defy the Andii. We defy the Liosan. We have made ourselves apart.’

‘But on this day?’ Neerak demanded, spinning to face her. ‘Why? What has changed?’

Glyph answered. ‘I spoke with the Watch. I asked him, do we begin our war today?’

‘He told us to kill the scouts,’ Lahanis said. ‘The war indeed begins. Glyph, he is a priest. I care not what title you give him, but he walks more than one world. Today, by his blessing, we become an army.’

He stared into her eyes, and saw in their eager light the promise of fire and destruction.

The Last Fish, who now walks, seeking an old enemy. The lake lies almost forgotten, the leagues uncountable between it and where he now stands. The water, he recalls now, was clear. Nothing in it to blind him to his future, a future awash in tears. From water he left, to water he must go. I end where I began. ‘The war claims us now,’ he said. He collected up his bow. ‘By the blessing of the Watch, we are made into slayers of men and women. Come, then. This forest is our home. Time to defend it.’

Pulling up the cloth that masked his face beneath his eyes, he set out, his pack close behind him.

They moved quickly, upon old trails, hunched down beneath tangles of overgrowth canopying the animal tracks. Theirs was a run that devoured leagues. It flowed swiftly but made little sound, the snow taking their footfalls, the shadows of branches and boles scattering their own shadows as they raced onward. The secret of subterfuge was to move as if one belonged, to fight against nothing, bending and dipping, shifting where needed.

It was near dusk when Glyph, still in the lead, caught sight ahead of figures, three in all, drawn together as if in consultation. Their bulks betrayed their presence, along with the glint of iron buckles, an inverted strip of hide, and plumes of breath from unguarded mouths as they spoke in whispers. When one caught the fluid approach of Glyph and his hunters, he cried out and drew out his sword.

Glyph’s arrow sank into his right eye, dropping him instantly.

Two more arrows followed, hissing past Glyph.

Both surviving scouts went down.

The hunters reached the bodies, flowed over them like water, pausing only to cut free arrows. Lahanis pushed close to make certain the scouts no longer lived, but Glyph knew that was unnecessary. All three were dead before they struck the snowy ground. He continued on, shaking the gore from his arrow. The shaft was splintered, the iron point bent where it had struck the inside of the man’s skull. Still padding through the forest, Glyph worked loose the point and slipped it into a pouch at his belt, to be hammered straight later. He then snapped the shaft just below the fletching, and pocketed the end as well, before flinging away what remained.

They rushed on, as the dusk slowly closed around them.

It was as before. My first time, when they sat about a fire and laughed and flirted with the woman in their company. Nothing of them reached the place inside me. Nothing to invite sympathy, nothing to blunt my cold, sharp need for their deaths.

Slayers of children. If the blood not upon their own hands, then upon the uniform. They claimed the standard and wore upon their shoulders the banner that belonged to butchers. I felt nothing killing them. I felt nothing sending a flint arrow into the gut of the last one. I felt nothing chasing him down.

This must be how soldiers think. It could not be otherwise, for what kind of person murders a child? Defenceless elders? Hearth-wives and hearth-husbands?

What kind of person?

Why, the one I am become.

Do I mock myself now, if I say that I will hunt the uniform, slay the uniform? That the uniform is my enemy, mere cuts and hues of cloth and leather, a lifeless thing of belts, buckles and wool? Or is this my only path, my only hope to remain sane?

This, then, must be war. And what begins without must also begin within.

It was well, he reflected as he rushed on into the night, that he was reborn, for surely his old self must be dead by now, fatally wounded by grief and horror.

The lake water was once clear, but now, oh now, now it runs red.

Yedan Narad, I see what haunts you. For you, and all that you see of what awaits us, my chest now aches.

Behind him, close, Lahanis said in a hiss, ‘Wound the next one, lord. My knives thirst.’

And he nodded. For it was best if they all drank.

Like stained water, they flowed dark through the forest, while above them the sky groped towards night. They travelled a shadow world.

It was a night for killing, and kill they did.

* * *

Higher Grace Sheccanto was propped up in her bed, like a corpse bound to the headrest. Pillows were stuffed against her sides to keep her upright, and her head had a habit of dipping, even when she was speaking, until such time as her chin reached her breastbone and her words became incomprehensible. A young acolyte sat upon the bed, close by, ready to help the old woman lift her head once more. Despite this diligence, the words Sheccanto said made little sense.

Warlock Resh sat leaning forward, forearms upon his thighs, in an effort to hear – and understand – the Higher Grace. Finarra Stone stood a few paces back, having already surrendered the task. This, she well understood, would be her last audience with Sheccanto. The Shake might well remain hale in body, but the crown upon the head was broken, if not entirely lost.

None knew what afflicted the old woman. By years alone, she should still be stalwart and sharp of mind, with sufficient power to temper her husband and his increasingly bizarre pronouncements. Have they both spent years hunched over a forge? This is the iron curse, the stealer of memory, sower of confusion. Something has poisoned them both. Am I witness to the cruellest of assassinations?

From the terrible, wretched news that had finally penetrated the monastery, her suspicions needed to shake off few chains in pursuit of imagined conspiracies, ones where civility was the first victim. This could well be Hunn Raal’s work, aspired to genius. Far better than simply murdering Sheccanto and Skelenal, if one could paralyse the Shake with months, if not years, of ineffective rule.

No far reach for the poisoner of an entire legion, the murderer of Lord Ilgast Rend and the slayer of the Wardens of Glimmer Fate. He had been an unprepossessing man, she recalled, arrogant to be sure, but in the way of many soldiers, for whom that arrogance was a brittle façade hiding a wounded soul. She could forgive that bravado. He had also been a drunkard, the kind for whom the pretence of sobriety was a game, eliciting a smile upon his fleshy features – as if the man believed he was fooling everyone around him, when in truth he himself was the only fool, though even then, a knowing fool. Drunkards such as Hunn Raal had a way of eating themselves from the inside out, and alcohol simply served to dull the pain of his endless chewing. She had expected from him a simple continuation of his degradation, his body hollowed out, his skull filled with terrors, a trembling, stumbling descent into death.

Instead, it seemed that evil itself had manifested in the man, lending him preternatural energy even as it scoured him clean of compassion. He was, she now believed, capable of anything.

Did he poison them? Has he agents here among the Shake? Spies? Assassins? Would not their loyalty bleach their skin? Look around – we here are unchanged, although, now that I consider it, the amber hue of our skin seems to have lost its gleam, as if dust now settles upon us all.

Are we transformed here, or simply revealing our sense of loss? What else is surrendered, when faith dies?

‘The sands will burn,’ said Sheccanto, her eyes fixed and staring at a vista none other could see. Those eyes were sunk deep in shadowed sockets, surrounded by withered skin the colour of the winter sky. ‘Someone drags me by an ankle, but my flesh is cold. Lifeless. The pain – the pain comes to those who must witness. Ignominy. The fires of outrage. I wonder … I wonder. Only the dead see the clarity of war. They chose to dishonour me, but my body cares not. Only the Watch understands. But he can do nothing. Nothing.’

Finarra shifted weight. The old woman wandered unknown landscapes in her mind. Every word she uttered took her farther away. By an ankle? You will not live that long, Higher Grace. Already they prepare your crypt, beneath this very floor. None shall drag you from it.

‘By royal blood we were born,’ Sheccanto said. ‘It is well to take the title of queen or king. But the day holds meaning, for what plays across its passage? I will tell you. I will tell you …’ Her head dipped again, and this time her eyes closed, and she began drawing the rattling breaths of sleep.

Slowly, Warlock Resh leaned back in his chair. He raised his scarred hands to his face.

Finarra cleared her throat. ‘I believe Caplo Dreem still awaits us in the compound, warlock. If we are to do this today, it must be soon.’

After a moment, the burly man shook himself and rose to his feet. His attention fixed once more upon the Higher Grace, he said, ‘Captain-’

‘That rank no longer applies,’ Finarra cut in.

‘There will be survivors. Must be survivors. They will need you.’

‘They have Calat Hustain.’

‘And he will not find you a blessing to his grief?’

Bitterness opened within her like a wound. ‘Warlock, the war is lost. Urusander has won. Kharkanas will open its gates to him. We Wardens, well, we were never relevant. We patrolled the Vitr. More to the point,’ she continued, ‘we were the ones who brought T’riss into our realm. Let us judge our demise a just reward for our carelessness.’

He turned from his study of Sheccanto and gazed at her. ‘Will you not return to Calat Hustain?’

‘I see no point,’ Finarra replied. ‘The Vitr remains. It will not subside or cease its assault. Calat will begin again. But I will not.’

‘We do not resent your presence,’ Resh said. ‘But you must understand. Caplo is not as he once was. My friend is now unknown to me. He says he will accompany me to Kharkanas, to the Terondai, and, perhaps, to an audience with Mother Dark.’ He hesitated, and then said, ‘I fear such a meeting.’

‘Then refuse him,’ she replied. ‘The Terondai can wait. You have other concerns.’

‘Skelenal would summon all the brothers and sisters,’ Resh said. ‘He says we must prepare for war. But we have no cause to defend, no reason to fight beyond the pathos of vengeance.’ He shook his head. ‘The children are dead. The forests have burned. If we possessed any authority over the Deniers, it is now abrogated. We did not defend them. Indeed, we did nothing.’

The arguments were old. Finarra had heard them too many times. ‘And this is the way of things, warlock, the means by which evil thrives, and every terrible deed is justified. The dead are already dead, the fires have long since burned out, and the blood now hides beneath rich soil. Each act, if unanswered, unchallenged, breeds the next, and when it is all done, evil stands triumphant.’

‘Can you not see that we are weakened?’ Resh demanded, wringing his hands as he stood before her. ‘Why fight for the Andii, when by Mother Dark’s hand our god was slain? The transformations upon either side now set us apart. We are neither, and yet we are nothing.’

She looked away, vaguely disgusted. Her frustration was growing talons and the urge to strike out grew day by day. ‘Caplo Dreem may well attempt to kill Mother Dark. And this time, the First Son is not there to stand in your friend’s way.’

‘There is Draconus.’

She shot him a searching look. ‘Not for long, I should think.’

‘At the very end, Mother Dark may defy Urusander. She may refuse everything they demand of her. She is a goddess, after all. How do you envisage the power behind that ascension? Is she now stripped of her will? Her independence? Is she helpless, her mind deafened by an endless roar of prayer, beseeching desire, wishes unending?’

Finarra Stone’s eyes narrowed. ‘You believe your faith emasculated your own god, don’t you? You made your god unable to defend itself. Made it helpless.’

‘Faith belongs to the mortal mind,’ said Resh, ‘but one look in the mirror will tell you that it is a lamb in the care of the wolf.’

‘And now you are flayed by guilt, left crushed by your own recriminations? I did not think self-pity could be made sacred, but it seems that you have managed it easily enough, warlock, and would make indulgent weeping its libation. And what is to be your sacrifice? Why, only yourself, of course.’

He snorted. ‘Speaks the woman who tramples upon her own rank. Who tells me that Calat Hustain has no more need for her.’

After a moment, Finarra offered a wry shrug. ‘Then we find comfort in our company.’

Resh looked away. He sighed. ‘I have no leash to bind Caplo Dreem. Must I deliver another crime into the presence of Mother Dark?’

‘He is your friend, not mine.’

‘Was. Now, I am not so sure.’ He met her eyes. ‘Do you seek to guard against his treachery? Will you draw your blade to defend Mother Dark?’

‘Against a dozen beasts? Death will come swiftly.’

‘Then why refuse my desire to send you away?’

‘I will travel to Kharkanas, warlock, in your company or alone.’

‘What do you seek there?’

She said nothing. The truth was, she had no answer to his question, but she felt bound to the fate of the Shake now, like a leaf joining a mass of detritus, impelled by the gathering of its own weight as it swung into the current. But what waited downstream remained unknown. Resh sought a purpose for his brothers and sisters, and believed that he would find knowledge in his study of the Terondai.

And what of Caplo Dreem, blood-tainted and, these days, almost emptied of words? A feral promise glimmered in his eyes. He was now a man quick to bare his teeth. Only a fool would not fear what he had become.

‘The sorcery,’ said Resh, cutting into her thoughts, ‘now pours like blood from a fatal wound. If we are not careful, captain, Kurald Galain will drown in its flood.’

‘Then use it, warlock. Use it up if you can.’

‘A dangerous invitation.’

‘Are you a child, then?’ she snapped. ‘Unmindful of constraint?’

‘A child?’ He seemed to consider the suggestion, indifferent to the challenge in her tone. ‘Yes, I believe. All of us now. Children. Crowded into a small room, and upon the floor in its centre, a chest filled with knives.’

Suddenly chilled, Finarra Stone turned away, gathering up her gloves and cape from the bench near the door. ‘Will you just stand there? Am I to be Caplo’s only escort, then?’

They were startled by a sudden racking cough from Sheccanto. The nurse, sitting almost forgotten beside the bed, lunged forward to catch the old woman before she fell. Rocked by the jostling of the nurse, Sheccanto said, ‘The royal blood is thinned, but I taste it still. The Watch withers in his solitude, a prince dreaming of his sister. She will know the sword in her hand, and she will rise at the day’s end, and so be known as Twilight. Neither monk nor nun, but one of the blood. The Shake must have a queen. Upon the shore … a queen.’ Her eyes widened and she stiffened in the nurse’s arms. ‘Oh bless me! My children do not deserve that!’

She slumped back, head lolling. ‘Let the Vitr take it,’ she mumbled. ‘Silver fire … the flesh from the bones …’

Resh advanced towards her. ‘Higher Grace, do you speak prophecy?’

She lifted her head with sudden strength and met the warlock’s eyes. ‘Prophecy? Fuck prophecy. Immortal shadow, I see the reasons. He is forever restless. You’ll know him by that habit.’ Then her seamed face stretched into a tortured smile. ‘Oh, clever boy. I give him that.’

‘Higher Grace?’

‘When the First Son comes to you, answer his need. Die for the love you have never known, and never will. Die to save what you will never see. Die in the name of children not yet born. Die for the cause not your own. Go, lover of men, go. Nine assassins await you.’ Then she pulled an arm loose from the nurse’s grip and pointed at Finarra Stone. ‘She knows the sword in her hand. Warlock! Kneel to Twilight. Kneel to your queen.’ An instant later, Sheccanto slumped back once more, eyes closing.

Resh leaned closer.

The nurse shook her head. ‘Sleep, warlock, that is all.’

Reeling, Resh pulled away. He faced Finarra with fevered eyes.

‘It means nothing,’ Finarra said. ‘Pay her words no heed. Come, the day is nearing its end. We must set out now, or wait until the morning.’

When she quitted the bedchamber, Resh followed. He said nothing in her wake, but Finarra’s mind was filled with the look he had given her, its raw need, its terrible thirst.

Monks and nuns, witches and warlocks, sisters and brothers. All titles for those who would believe. But I am not one with any such need. Not one to run from shrine to shrine, altar to altar, desperate for communion. Higher Grace, your mind is truly gone if you see anything in me.

Out in the compound, the winter’s chill was fierce as the day died. Seeing them appear, Caplo swung on to his horse. He was swathed in dark furs, as if to mock himself. He fixed his feral gaze upon Finarra, and then Resh. ‘You’ve not forbidden her?’ he asked. ‘This is our journey, warlock. The two of us, in the name of the Shake.’

Reaching his horse, Resh paused to study his old friend for a moment, and then he said, ‘Your words are a comfort, Caplo, if you still count yourself among us.’

Caplo Dreem frowned. ‘Of course. Why would I do otherwise?’

Resh mounted his horse and gathered up the reins. ‘She rides with us now. As you say, Caplo, in the name of the Shake.’

‘Warlock,’ Finarra warned.

But he simply shrugged. ‘Twilight is upon us, I see. All to the good.’ He kicked his horse into motion, swinging the beast round towards the gate.

Cursing under her breath, Finarra mounted up and followed Resh and Caplo. They would ride through the night. She looked with envy upon the dark furs riding Caplo’s back. Already she was cold.

* * *

In the wake of the snowstorm, the air had slowly surrendered its bitter chill. Riding winds from the southeast brought burgeoning warmth, softening the sculpted dunes of snow until the faces they showed to the sunlit sky seemed pocked with rot, and the old track upon which Kagamandra Tulas rode blackened with mud and pools of water.

That he trailed other travellers in this season was clear, and while some rode horses, most were on foot, leading burdened mules. Thus far, he had not yet come across any makeshift graves, and for that he was thankful. Since parting ways with Calat Hustain and his Wardens, Kagamandra had met no one. He had not expected to. Winter was mercurial, like a cat hiding its claws, and this spell of warmth meant little. The season would hold for months yet.

He had been gaining on the refugees – if that was what they were – but without haste or any sense of urgency. He had no reason to welcome company, or take upon himself the burdens or needs of anyone else. In any case, he was himself half starved, his horse little better. His father’s estate, now his own, was a cold inheritance. He could not even be certain it was still occupied. In his absence, his staff, most of whom had served his father, might well have yielded to the vicissitudes of neglect or, perhaps more likely, ennui. It was entirely possible that he rode to an abandoned ruin. No refugee would find succour there.

The way ahead haunted him with its familiarity. As a youth he had often ridden far from the estate, fleeing the shadow of sire and siblings, seeking solitude in denuded hills, dried lake beds and sweeps of withered prairie. These were the half-formed urges of youth, groping in ignorance, not yet comprehending that the solitude he sought already existed, buried deep in his own mind. Every jarring sense of being different, every fear of exclusion, every instant of estrangement from his laughing brothers and their companions, these were the things setting him apart, pushing him into a world solely his own.

If in his imagination he sought to visualize that empty world, which circled round him at a crawling pace, he saw what now surrounded him, as his horse plodded through slush and mud, with the sky overhead a soft white, and the wind smelling of sodden grass. In that respect, he was already home.

For that reason and others, he felt no urgency to end this journey. If he could twist this trail into a vast loop through the wilderness of the south, he would have no cause for complaint.

But necessities posed their own demand. His horse was dying under him, and the hollowness in his gut had given way to a deep lassitude that had spread through his entire body, broken only by the ache in his joints, flaring up like fire whenever he straightened in his saddle.

His father had been right, he now reflected, to have seen so little in him.

Sharenas Ankhadu, why do you appear again and again in my thoughts? What is it you speak, with such expressions of derision? I see your lips move, but no sound finds me. I conjure you before me, to give a proper guise to my messenger – who must attend to me in cruel honesty, in the name of worth – but I remain deaf to your words.

She would, he suspected, mock his self-pity. She would castigate his lethargy. She would, with brittle exasperation, demand his obeisance to his betrothed, and call upon his honour in the name of Faror Hend. Find her! she would say.

But there was no one to find. His betrothed was a promise, nothing more. Such things broke with a single careless word, a lone gesture hinting of dismissal. Standing before Faror Hend, Kagamandra would remain mute, his limbs frozen in place. He would think only of the hurts he could not help but deliver, in the absence of anything one might call love.

The track lifted towards a rise, and upon reaching the top, Kagamandra saw in the shallow valley beyond those he had been following. The party had moved to one side of the trail, clearing a space of snow in which to camp. A roped corral to one side also revealed yellowed grass, where three horses and four mules now cropped the dead stalks.

As Kagamandra drew nearer, he was surprised to see, among those now rising from dung fires to greet him, men and women wearing the uniform of the Wardens.

He continued on until he reached the camp and then reined in as two Wardens, a woman and a man, strode up.

The woman was the first to speak. ‘My name is Savarro. I was once a sergeant. If you track us at Hunn Raal’s bidding, tell him our war with him is done. Tell him,’ she added, ‘it never existed, but for the ambitions of Lord Ilgast Rend. Above all, tell him to leave us alone. The Wardens are no more.’

Kagamandra leaned on the horn of his saddle. ‘Where do you ride, Savarro?’

‘This concerns him? Away. What more does he need?’

‘Upon this track, Savarro, lies an estate. Perhaps it offers – in your mind – a company of Houseblades who might welcome you in its ranks.’

The man shifted at Savarro’s side and then said to her, ‘Does he speak true, sergeant? Do we journey to a highborn’s estate?’

Behind the two, the others were now gathering, intent on the exchange.

Savarro shrugged. ‘I had no thought of us joining the ranks, Ristand. But our food is almost gone. The animals need shelter. The warm spell will not last much longer. The bitterest month of winter is soon upon us.’ She waved a hand. ‘The estate might take us in as guests.’

‘Guests! They’ll see us coming and lock the gates! Look at us, no better than marauders.’ Ristand was a big man, shaggy and broad-faced, and if not for the black hue of his skin he would have revealed a flushed countenance, wind-burned and filled with temper. ‘You said you had for us a destination – but you said nothing about a highborn’s shit-smeared estate! Sweet bung-hole, Savarro!’

‘Will you ever cease your complaints, Ristand?’ She faced Kagamandra again. ‘The lord isn’t even in residence. Lost his wife years ago. No children. We’re as likely to find the place abandoned as anything else, and if so it’ll serve us fine to wait out the season.’

‘What of forage and food?’ Ristand demanded.

Her head snapped round again as she glared at her companion. ‘Maybe they took everything when they left, maybe they didn’t. At the very least, it’s shelter!’

‘And what if there’s Houseblades and all the rest? What then?’

‘Then,’ Savarro said as if speaking to a child, ‘we ask kindly, Ristand. Meaning, a league from the gates, we bind and gag you. Sling your flea-bitten carcass over a saddle. That at least will give us a chance at some hospitality!’ She swung back to Kagamandra. ‘Now, leave us be, will you?’

Kagamandra studied her for a long moment, and then he lifted his gaze past her, to the score or so Wardens now gathered on the track. He saw children among them, and servants, cooks and maids. ‘You have come from the season’s fort, sergeant?’

‘We went there first, yes,’ she replied. ‘To take the news, and bring with us whoever wanted to come.’

‘Yet you and these others – you were at the battle?’

‘Late to it. Too late to make a difference. We were patrolling Glimmer Fate. Meaning we never drew blades against the Legion.’

Kagamandra was silent, but then gathered his reins and said, ‘Make room on the trail. Sergeant, I am not here at Hunn Raal’s bidding. You speak of a battle I know nothing about. You say Ilgast Rend commanded the Wardens? Then this is his problem.’

‘He’s dead.’

‘Dead?’

‘Hunn Raal executed him,’ Savarro said. ‘Why do you know nothing of this? From where have you come?’

‘I spoke to Commander Calat Hustain,’ Kagamandra said, seeing how this now caught their attention. ‘He was riding back to the fort, with news, one presumes, of events at the Vitr. But of that I can only surmise, as he was not forthcoming on the matter. He had wounded and dead in his company. I would think he has already arrived, only to find his base abandoned, and no answer as to why.’

‘Not true,’ Savarro said, confusion now clouding her features. ‘A few chose to remain behind.’

‘Ah. Well, then, lest you desire Calat Hustain to deem you deserters, hadn’t you better return to the fort?’

Voices rose then, arguments erupting. Pushing his mount forward, Kagamandra rode through the press. Once clear, he coaxed his horse into a slow trot, and before too long the shouting began to fade into his wake.

Houseblades. Do I even have Houseblades?

* * *

The winter fort of the Wardens bore a planked walkway along the length of the walls, accommodating patrols that, to Bursa’s mind, had never served much purpose, and even less so now. He stood at his post, feeling a fool, his gaze fixed upon the black wall of the Glimmer Fate’s high grasses, or, rather, upon the battered gap in its otherwise unbroken line, and the dragon that occupied it. Motionless as a massive boulder, with scales that, at this distance, looked no different from iron plates of armour, the creature appeared to be slumbering.

Snow covered its spine. Ice sheathed its folded wings, with long icicles, now dripping in the unseasonal warmth, depending from their ridges. The dragon had preceded the troop’s arrival by four days, according to old Becker Flatt, the retired Bordersword who had elected to remain when the survivors of the battle reached the fort with their terrible news. The man was in the habit of telling everyone that he had nowhere else to go, and the half-dozen others who had stayed no doubt felt the same. In any case, the dragon had been discovered the morning after the storm. Lying in a gap made by its own massive body, its eyes shuttered, conjured up into a sculpted nightmare, waiting like a promise.

Enough reason to flee this cursed place, as far as Bursa was concerned. When he had heard of the desertion of the battle’s survivors, he had not shared the outrage of the others. I would have done the same. I still might.

The Vitr’s slow assault upon the lands of Kurald Galain now held for him all the urgency of death by old age. Nothing could stop it, after all, and its mysteries tasted stale. The Wardens were finished. The world felt bloodless, the future an empty expanse devoid of purpose.

Beside him, Spinnock Durav leaned on the slumped bales that made up the fort’s wall. Like Bursa, he too stared at the dragon upon the edge of the grassline. ‘Seventy paces,’ he said. ‘More or less. Well, there are no caves anywhere nearby, are there? If the beast must hibernate …’

Scowling, Bursa said nothing for a moment. It still astonished him, this new hatred he fostered for the young man at his side. Unreasoning as it was, he relished its intensity. Envy was wasted unless it could do damage. ‘It bears wounds,’ he said. ‘The demon does not hibernate. It simply recovers.’

‘Ah, well. No one has studied it as you have done, sir.’

‘You consider mine an unwise obsession?’ Bursa asked. ‘Do you imagine these flimsy walls of grass can defend us from that beast? It could kill us all, at any moment. Yet you and the rest – still we stay here. Yes, I study the creature, and be thankful that someone does. What we unleashed from the Vitr will haunt the Tiste, and perhaps see Kurald Galain laid to waste.’

Spinnock was studying him in an odd, disquieting manner. ‘We released nothing, sir.’

‘A blunt denial,’ Bursa snapped, ‘soaked through with hope, but the facts will see it wrung dry. Indeed, it was you and Faror Hend and Finarra Stone. All of this, begun by your fumbling.’ After a moment, he shook his head. ‘But you, Durav, you simply followed. In truth, you are innocent enough.’

‘Your words surprise me,’ Spinnock said.

‘She asked me to guard you well, but that was in the world now dead. Where we are now, well, we are mere days from each going our own way. I have no desire to be your escort as you return to your family holdings. I have no desire to fall into your Houseblades, and start saluting you. Your noble blood earns nothing from me. I trust I am understood.’

‘She? Who?’

‘The women all lust after you, Durav. Something you’re used to, I suppose. They all yearn to protect you. When I look upon your future, I see you still a child, forever a child. Such is the fate of men like you.’

Smiling, Spinnock Durav offered up a half-hearted salute, and then moved away, resuming his patrol of the walls.

Those weak of mind hurried into old habits, finding solace in their familiarity. Walk the walls, Warden. Guard the fort. Such is your task. None of it mattered any more, and it took a quicker mind than Spinnock Durav’s to comprehend that everything had changed, that whatever had existed before was now irrelevant.

I must ride from here. Perhaps tonight. Leave Calat Hustain to his grief. Clearly it has broken him. He still speaks of us as a company. All this talk of rebuilding, of rebirth. There is nothing left. See that dragon, Calat Hustain? This is our new future, as meat for its jaws, our flensed skulls to roll and jostle in its gut.

Nine of them.

They hunt me in my dreams, and this whispers to me of my fate. I run, in my arms the wealth of Kurald Galain. The crown, the sceptre, the coins tumbling from between my fingers. Then the shadow sweeps over me-

Growling under his breath, Bursa shook himself to dispel the visions. He would leave tonight. It was not desertion. Like Spinnock Durav, Calat Hustain remained blind to the truths of this new, terrible world. He would find Savarro, Ristand and the others. Old Becker Flatt had said that there had been other survivors, other ragtag groups stumbling in, but they had elected to ride to the Hust Legion. They suffered from the fires of fury, and sought vengeance against Urusander’s Legion. Having fled their first battle, they now saw themselves as soldiers. They vowed that they would meet the enemy again, upon another field, and give answer with sword and lance.

Idiots. No, Savarro had the right of it. Ride out, disappear into the mists. We were misfits. So we began, and into that miserable solitude we now return.

Calat Hustain, you gave command of the Wardens to Lord Ilgast Rend. That was your first crime, and it remains unforgivable. Why you haven’t already taken your own life baffles me. Must someone do it for you?

I would, if I cared. But I don’t. Better, I think, that you live, and so suffer guilt, year upon year, until its rot takes you from the inside out.

A short time later Spinnock Durav returned from his circuit, now approaching Bursa from the other side of the walkway. ‘There will be more snow tonight,’ he said.

Bursa grunted.

Hearing sounds from the compound behind and below, both men turned to see Commander Calat Hustain emerging from the longhouse. Old Becker shambled at his side, struggling as he attempted to shrug into his armour, his sword-belt trailing from one hand.

‘Now what?’ Bursa asked under his breath.

‘Spinnock Durav!’ the commander called. ‘Attend to me. Bursa, remain upon the wall.’

Aye, he’ll take the handsome one. He watched Spinnock clamber down the rope ladder, displaying nauseating agility.

‘Bursa.’

‘Commander?’

‘Observe well, should matters turn awry.’

What new madness now afflicts you, Hustain?

Once Spinnock joined them, they continued on to the gate, and moments later reappeared in the clearing, making directly for the slumbering dragon.

Bursa’s mouth dried. His heart started a fierce hammering in his chest. He thought to cry out, voice his warning. He thought to shriek his sanity down to them – all this, even as he struggled against the impulse to flee. They’re welcome to die. It matters not to me. Finarra, your precious boy followed Calat Hustain. There was nothing I could do to prevent it. The commander ordered me to remain at my post. I could do naught but witness. I wish, oh, captain, how I wish I could say that he died bravely …

The three Tiste had taken no more than a dozen paces when the dragon’s eyes opened and the creature lifted its head, the serpentine neck twisting as the beast fixed lambent eyes upon the intruders.

Impossibly, it then spoke, with a voice that filled Bursa’s skull.

‘We will not return. Refuse us this freedom and we shall set aside our hate. We shall find our frenzy, and so awaken to this world Tiamatha. Upon this dread deed, all manner of dismay and disappointment will follow.’

Commander Calat Hustain said, ‘Eleint. You misconstrue our purpose. We do not challenge your presence, nor your claim to freedom.’

‘This pleases me. What breed of creatures are you?’

‘We are Tiste Andii, of Kurald Galain.’

‘I see some advantage in your form. Less effort to fill your stomach. The bliss of modest shelter. A certain elegance in your crawl upon the ground.’

‘You emerged from the Vitr-’

‘Vitr! What giant ogre throwing stones has been whispering in your ear? Or, perhaps, some meddling Azathanai?’ The dragon lifted its head higher and seemed to sniff the air. ‘The Queen of Dreams haunts one of you. Poor bastard. But then, she failed the first time, yes?’

‘I do not understand,’ Calat Hustain said. ‘What can you tell us about the Vitr? How can we stop its advance?’

‘It advances upon this realm?’

‘It does. Slowly, but yes.’

‘There must be … a leak.’ The creature suddenly blurred, air swirling about it, lifting snow from the ground.

Squinting, Bursa saw the dragon shrink, its form losing its original shape. The spinning snow settled, revealing a naked Tiste woman where the creature had been.

She strode towards Calat, Spinnock and old Becker Flatt.

She spoke out loud now. ‘You wear furs for warmth. Give me some. Also, I hunger. And suffer thirst.’ Then she pointed up to Bursa. ‘The Queen of Dreams sees me through his eyes. I care not. Horrid woman! Vile Azathanai! We threw your sister out. One of my kin then ate you – too bad he couldn’t keep you down!’ Returning her attention to Calat, she said, ‘Take me in. These things’ – she indicated her full breasts – ‘are turning into blocks of ice.’

Gallant as ever, Spinnock removed his cloak and advanced. ‘Milady,’ he said. ‘This will keep you warm until we reach the longhouse.’

Bursa saw her eyeing him, an appraisal he had seen before whenever a woman came face to face with Spinnock Durav.

‘Lovely,’ the woman said, taking the cloak and flinging it over one shoulder. ‘And … lovely.’

Calat Hustain said, ‘Welcome. I am Commander Calat Hustain of the Wardens of Glimmer Fate. Do you have a name?’

‘Of course I have a name. Who doesn’t?’ She was still staring at Spinnock Durav, and then she smiled and stepped close to the young man. ‘My kind greet gallantry with a kiss,’ she said.

‘Indeed?’ Spinnock replied, and though Bursa could not see his face, the sergeant well knew that charming smile with which Durav answered her. ‘Snout to snout as it were?’

‘Never. You surmise truly. I just made that up. Still, do humour me.’

‘At the very least,’ Spinnock said, ‘before I offer up this kiss, tell us your name.’

‘Telorast.’

Spinnock Durav stepped back and bowed to her. ‘Spinnock Durav. Calat you have met, and our companion is a veteran of the Wardens, Becker Flatt. And upon the wall behind us is Bursa.’

Telorast glanced back up at Bursa. ‘Sweet dreams, Bursa?’

He shook his head.

Dragons are not bad enough, it seems. Now they must wield uncanny magic. And tell me I am possessed.

She then took her kiss from Spinnock Durav, pressing her body against him as she did so.

Calat Hustain stood to one side. Bursa delighted in the man’s discomfort. Yes, he does this, commander. You should have known better. After a moment, while Telorast continued to squirm against Spinnock Durav – even as the man now sought to prise her arms from around his neck – Calat swung round and shouted, ‘Open the gate! We’re coming in!’

You forgot to add, ‘The dragon will be joining us for the evening meal.’ Commander, you will rue this gesture. Do I flee tonight? Or remain to satisfy my curiosity? One can hope she loses herself, and devours Durav in a single bite.

Finarra, poor Spinnock Durav. The tale I have to tell you conjures a less than pretty scene …

* * *

The gate was pushed open, stuttering upon ridges of ice, until further movement was blocked by a heap of crusted snow. The opening it made was barely enough to emit the fur-wrapped figure that stumbled out to greet Kagamandra Tulas. Straightening, the figure squinted up at the lord, and then leaned back in through the gap. ‘Trout! Get that shovel – no, the one with the handle, fool. Be quick about it!’ Leaning back, the woman faced Kagamandra again. She dipped her head and said, ‘Milord, welcome home.’

‘Braphen, is that you?’

‘Yes, milord. ’Tis Braphen, acting castellan here at Howls. Milord, your arrival was unexpected. No advance rider reached us, alas, to announce your imminent return. I must confess to a laxity in the upkeep, within the main house, that is. Sealed against the winter, sir, and the like.’ She ducked her head a second time. ‘I submit my resignation, milord, for having failed you.’

‘Braphen,’ said Kagamandra, dismounting, ‘you’ve grown into a woman. You mentioned Trout? He remains, then. Good. I’m not interested in your resignation. There was no advance messenger. Castellan now? That will do.’

While he spoke, Trout appeared with a battered shovel in his cloth-wrapped hands. Seeing Kagamandra, the old veteran nodded, and then turned his head to one side, and spat into the snow. ‘Sir,’ he said, and then he bent to the task of clearing the snow that blocked the gate.

Castellan Braphen met her lord’s gaze, and shrugged. ‘He insisted I make him a captain, milord, or he’d leave. Same for Nassaras, and Igur Lout. Three captains, milord, to command the Houseblades.’

‘That many? Well. How many Houseblades do I have, then?’

Braphen blinked, and then wiped her dripping nose with one forearm. ‘Well, that’s it, milord. Just the captains. The rest left when the orphans arrived. Headed west, I think. Sought to join Lady Hish Tulla’s Houseblades, on account of her being related to you and all.’

‘Hish Tulla is related to me?’

‘She isn’t, milord? The family names being so similar, people thought … well. Oh.’

Trout had managed to work the gate open by now, following a frenzy of flinging wet snow, and Kagamandra led his horse into the compound beyond. The animal shied as it passed beneath the lintel stone and Kagamandra had to fight the beast to bring it in.

‘Abyss below,’ he hissed, startled by his mount’s sudden terror, ‘what ails you?’

Braphen joined him, seeking to calm the animal. ‘It’s the orphans, milord.’

‘What orphans?’

‘Them as were gifted into your care, milord, by Lord Silchas Ruin and Captain Scara Bandaris. Hostages, actually.’

Kagamandra said nothing. Trout arrived to take the reins, and led the frightened horse towards the stables.

‘I know, milord,’ said Braphen, now tugging the gate shut once more. ‘Trout’s gotten even uglier. We’re all agreed on that. Can’t say how, or what’s changed, but I wager your shock finds reason in his sorry visage. Alas, milord, it’s not a shock easily worn off.’

‘Silchas Ruin, you said. And Scara Bandaris? From whence come these hostages? More to the point, why give this estate a new name? And what manner of name is Howls?’

Braphen studied him for a moment, wiping her nose once more. ‘You’ve not returned to take the charge of them, milord?’

‘No. I know nothing about any hostages. Braphen, my patience is – no, lead me inside. I’ve need of a meal. Tell me there are winter stores to suffice.’

‘Oh yes, milord. Plenty. We built us a new cold cellar, back near the old cistern, and it’s stocked full of carcasses.’

‘Near the cistern?’

‘The old one, I said, milord. I mean, the one we found when we started digging. Well, when Trout started digging. So we decided to stop digging. Trout did, rather. The new cellar is beside it, milord, dug into clean dirt. For the carcasses. A big cellar, sir, obviously. It’s not easy fitting fifty carcasses in anywhere.’

‘Fifty carcasses?’

They had begun walking towards the main house. Kagamandra studied it with growing unease, as echoes of his father seemed to remain, ghostly, like stains upon the grey stones. The building looked smaller, ill fitting his memories.

‘For the hostages, mostly, milord.’

‘Excuse me, what is for the hostages, Braphen?’

‘The meat, milord. Goats and steers and mutton.’

They ascended the ice-sheathed steps. Braphen edged ahead to open the door. ‘Milord, welcome back.’

Three strides through, in the cloakroom, a grimy child stood as if awaiting them. He stared up at Kagamandra without expression. He was dressed in a tattered deerskin tunic, his lower legs bare and his feet stained black by ash and the greasy stone tiles.

‘Ah, one of my hostages? Very well.’ Kagamandra approached the child and reached out a hand to rest it upon the thin shoulder.

The boy bared his teeth and growled.

Kagamandra snatched his hand back.

‘Jhelarkan hostages, milord,’ said Braphen. ‘This one is named Gear.’

‘Silchas Ruin and Scara, you said?’

‘Yes, milord.’

‘I imagine neither has visited since delivering the hostages.’

‘No, milord.’

‘How many carcasses remain in that cellar?’

‘About two-thirds, milord.’

‘So there’s room for, say, two more?’

Braphen frowned. ‘Milord?’

‘Never mind. Do we have a cook, or do we all eat raw meat now?’

‘Igur Lout commands the kitchen these days, milord. You will find the hearth in the eating hall well lit, as it’s where he passes the nights, mostly. With the orphans sleeping during the days for the most part, it’s safer that way.’ She drew off her heavier furs now, and the contrast of her comfortable excess with Kagamandra’s own gaunt frame was startling. She interrupted his comparison by wiping her nose again. ‘I will inform Igur to prepare you a meal, milord.’

‘Yes, thank you, Braphen.’

Behind them, as Braphen set off for the kitchen, Trout arrived. Seeing Gear, he pointed a finger and said, ‘That’s the lord’s own horse in the stables, you understand? Keep your claws and fangs off it!’

Gear spun and ran off down a corridor.

Trout glared at Kagamandra. ‘Sir, I’m taking captain’s pay, just like the rest of us still here. Barring the castellan, of course. On account of the hostages.’

‘Understood, Trout. Now, join me in the dining room.’

Trout hesitated, and then nodded. ‘Sir.’ He followed as Kagamandra made his way towards the central chamber.

‘And shed that miserable attitude of yours, will you? We’re old friends, you may recall. We fought side by side. We’ve seen the worst the world can offer.’

‘Shed, sir? Can’t be done. This miserable attitude is all I’ve got. Nothing underneath. Just something naked and ugly, and all the uglier for being naked. I’ve not changed at all, sir. And you, well, you look more like you than you ever did before. So yes, let’s have us a drink or two, sir. We can catch up. Shouldn’t take long. Igur’s not a bad cook, sir.’

‘And where is Nassaras?’

‘Don’t know, don’t care, and don’t dare ask, sir. She’s taken a liking to the hostages, you see.’

‘Ah. Tell me, how many hostages did they send us?’

Reaching the long dining table, Trout edged forward to sweep clutter and old foodstuffs from the surface, and then dragged out a chair for himself and sat.

Kagamandra moved to the high-backed chair at the table’s head. He saw that it was sheathed in dust. He sat and looked expectantly at Trout, until the man cleared his throat and said, ‘There were twenty-five to start, sir. Got maybe twenty left.’

‘What? We’ve lost hostages?’

Trout scowled, reaching up to pull at the folds of wrinkled flesh on his cheeks, plucking them away from the bones underneath as if he sought to peel off his own face. It was an old habit, Kagamandra recalled, and probably responsible for the man’s flaccid mien. ‘Might look like that, but it wasn’t none of our doing. The imps like fighting each other. The weakest ones died first. Those that are left are the nasty ones, and I reckon it’s not over. Nassaras thinks it’s to do with keeping them penned up. They’re wild, you see. Some of them are still known to sleep outside, huddled under furs – sometimes the kind that’re worn, sometimes their own.’

‘They veer into their wolf forms?’

‘They ain’t got much control of that, sir. Not yet. Too young, I wager, and with no elders to teach them anything, who knows what’ll come of this.’ His dark, red-rimmed eyes flicked to Kagamandra. ‘We beat ’em on the field of battle, sir. Demanded terms of surrender and made them kneel with heads bowed. Hostages, we said. Insisted, even.’

Sighing, Kagamandra nodded. ‘No doubt it sounded reasonable in principle.’

Braphen reappeared and behind her walked Igur Lout carrying a battered silver tray on which rested a meal of mostly meat.

‘Milord!’ Igur said. ‘You look awful. I’ve seen stuff spat up by one of the orphans with more life in it. Here. Eat. Braph, get that decanter of wine over there, and some mugs. It’s a puking reunion, by the Abyss! The old company – or what’s left of it. But the captain’s back – the real captain, I mean, not money-grubbing feckers like Trout here.’ The squat, wide man set the tray down in front of Kagamandra and then sat opposite Trout. Eyes on the ugly man, he raised a hand and made a strange corkscrewing motion with his index finger, grinning. ‘Goes in one way and out the other, hey?’

Trout said, ‘If the rest of us didn’t hate cooking, Lout, I’d gut you right here, right now, begging the lord’s pardon.’

‘I see that little has changed,’ Kagamandra said. ‘Igur, that joke was old before I ever made captain in the Legion.’

‘It’s the only one he has,’ Trout said, ‘which ably underscores his pathetic state.’

‘This meat – is it horse?’

Igur nodded. ‘Last one, sir. What we could scavenge off it. Had to beat the orphans back and half of them veered and slathered in gore. That was the day the rest of the Houseblades quit, the shit-smeared cowards. I trust, sir, you’re already planning your revenge on Scara.’

Braphen finished pouring out the wine and turned to depart the room, before Kagamandra gestured and said, ‘Sit down, castellan. Join us.’

‘It’s not fitting, sir. I expect they’ve got complaints about me and the like. In any case, I need to see that your bedroom’s made ready.’

‘Sit down. My room can wait.’

Igur leaned forward. ‘Milord, I told you the first time we rode back in through yon gate, and I’ll tell you now. Your father was a fuckwit. We buried him and shed not a tear, except in relief. Even his own staff spat on his shadow and they’re long gone besides. It’s all yours now, sir, and rightly so. I hear you got a wife coming. Good. Let’s hope she has spirit, enough to break the legs on your bed.’ He reached out and collected a goblet of wine, and added, ‘Your health, milord.’ He drank, and leaned back.

There was a long moment of silence, until Trout pointed a finger at Igur and said, ‘And this is why no one likes you, Lout, excepting when you cook for us. You got all the delicacy of a pig on a place mat.’

Distant thumping drew everyone’s attention. Braphen rose. ‘Someone’s at the gate, milord.’

‘Ah,’ said Kagamandra, ‘that would be Sergeant Savarro and her deserters. Igur, best return to the kitchen and begin preparations to feed our guests. They might number a score or more.’

Cursing under her breath, Braphen made for the gate.

Igur rose, collected up the decanter of wine. ‘Sir,’ he said, ‘they might change their mind.’

At that moment, a chorus of howls erupted from somewhere on the estate grounds.

Kagamandra glanced down at the supper he had but just started, and then he stood. ‘Well, yes. A warning does seem appropriate, under the circumstances. But I doubt they will change their minds, since they have nowhere else to go.’

‘They got horses, sir?’

‘And mules, Igur.’

Trout groaned and climbed upright. ‘I’ll see ’em stabled and all, sir, and I’ll take the first watch, too.’

By the time Kagamandra reached the gate, Savarro, Ristand and a half-dozen other Wardens were already crowding Braphen, who stood blocking their way in with one shoulder leaning against the door. Upon seeing Kagamandra, Sergeant Savarro’s eyes brightened, and then an expression of dread crossed her features.

Braphen glanced back. ‘Milord, they are proving most insistent.’

‘Step back, castellan.’

‘Milord, it’s the discourtesy I am objecting to. They are in no position to insist.’

‘Agreed, Braphen. But we will give them the compound at the very least, and the stable for their animals. Sergeant Savarro, kindly hold your people back, will you? The situation here is not as simple as it seems. On second thoughts, have them gather here, this side of the gate, while the two of us renew our acquaintance.’

Braphen retreated to permit the troop to spill into the compound. Kagamandra saw that there had been no split from the ranks, despite the news of Calat Hustain’s return. Some of the tension in the air had reached the children, and most were bawling. The mules and horses baulked at the threshold and required some effort to bring them inside. Gesturing to Savarro, Kagamandra moved a dozen paces away from the jostling mob.

She and Ristand joined him, the huge man scowling and casting glares at Braphen.

‘Lord, forgive me,’ began Savarro. ‘You didn’t identify yourself earlier-’

‘No need for apologies, sergeant. I was in no position to enlighten you on the condition of this estate. Now, it seems that the argument I left behind has been settled, although not in the way I would have expected.’

‘We voted, milord, and went with the majority. Continue on. The Vitr’s bitter curse on Calat Hustain. We saw too many friends dead on that hillside.’

‘That castellan giving us grief,’ said Ristand, scowling. ‘What kind of welcome is that? It’s cold. The sun is going down. The night is going to be frigid. My feet ache and I’m hungry. I told you, Savarro, it’s a new age, an age where no one cares to help anyone else. Kurald Galain becomes a realm of refugees. That’s no way to live.’

‘Will you shut your mouth for once, Ristand?’

‘Why should I?’ He waved towards Kagamandra. ‘Even this estate’s lord tried talking us out of coming here. Why else tell us about Hustain’s return to the fort? Hunn Raal has the right of it – you fight for kin and the rest can go to the Abyss!’

Kagamandra cleared his throat, and then said, ‘You are welcome to stay, Wardens. But my invitation must be qualified-’

‘What’s that mean?’ Ristand’s head whipped round to his sergeant. ‘What’s he mean by that?’

‘I mean,’ Kagamandra resumed, ‘that we have Jhelarkan hostages here. Children. They are as near to feral as wolves. Your horses and mules are not safe, although we will endeavour to set a guard upon the stables.’

‘Jhelarkan?’ Ristand tugged at his snarled beard. ‘See, Savarro? What did I tell you? Qualified. He invites us into a nest of shapeshifting wolves! More horses to keep ’em fed and not eyeing us with hungry eyes! I should have voted against you.’

‘But you argued the most for coming here, Ristand!’

‘Because this lord here didn’t tell me the truth!’

‘He didn’t know!’

‘He does now!’

‘Ristand, get out of my face before I cut you into little strips! See to the animals, and arrange us a watch for them, two on guard at all times.’

‘They’re hostages, sergeant! We can’t harm them even if they’re chewing off our feet!’

‘Just beat them back. Flat of the blades. Milord, how many Jhelarkan hostages are here?’

‘Twenty.’

‘Twenty?’ Ristand shrieked.

His cry elicited howls from the main house, rising gleefully into the crepuscular air. Hearing them, Ristand swore under his breath and drew his sword. ‘I rescind my vote,’ he snapped. ‘You hear me, sergeant? I vote the other way. That makes it a majority. I’m not getting my feet chewed off.’

‘Ristand! Just go and arrange the guard postings, will you? The vote’s done with. We’re here now. Besides, I was only humouring all of you, about that majority stuff. I’m sergeant, highest rank left among us. It’s my decision.’

‘Cock curdling liar! Tit bag whore! I knew it!’

‘Go, you’re embarrassing us all.’

Ristand snarled and set off back to the others waiting by the gate.

Wiping at her brow, Savarro drew a deep breath and let it out slowly. ‘Apologies, milord. Husbands, what can you do?’

* * *

Four trackers were on her trail, two of them moving up alongside her. Sharenas Ankhadu caught glimpses of them through the crazed lattice of leafless branches and twigs to either side. The remaining pair had drawn up behind her on the track.

She was exhausted, and the day’s light would not fade in time to make any difference in her attempts to evade these hunters. Before dusk’s arrival she knew that blades would clash, shattering the silence of the frozen forest.

It would be an ignominious end, filled with bitter frustration and fraught with pathos. A proper scene, highlighting the sheer indecency of civil war. Soldiers I fought alongside – now we close with murder in our eyes, weapons unsheathed.

Where, in all this, was the life I wanted? The victory of peace whispered so many promises. Kagamandra, we should have fled. Together, into the west, the lands of the Azathanai, or even the Dog-Runners. We should have damned the legacy of peace – you with your promised wife you did not love, me with a future empty of passion. Peace should have won us more. It should have won us a softening of all that was harsh and hard within us, an easing of the ferocity we all saw as necessary weapons in war.

Instead, too many of us turned fierce eyes upon these plain trappings, these quiet chambers. Too many of us still gripped bared iron, even as we walked into realms of peace, filled with the hope of living peaceful lives.

We were contemptuous of such lives, such living. It was beneath us warriors, us harbingers of blood and death. We could see in their eyes – in the eyes of loved ones, estranged friends, husbands and wives – that they knew nothing. Nothing of what truly mattered, what truly counted. They were shallow, ignorant of depravity’s depths. We saw them as fools, and then, as our souls hardened in our self-made isolation, we saw them as victims, no different from enemies upon the field of battle.

To us, they were blind to the ongoing war – the one we still fought, the one that left our souls wounded, bleeding, and then scarred. The one that cried out to us, demanding a lashing out, an eruption of violence. If only to break this brittle illusion of peace, which we knew to distrust.

But I dreamed of being among them, away from the killing and the terror. I dreamed of peace in every instant of war in which I lived.

Why, then, could I not find it? Why did it all seem so weak, so thin, so hopelessly shallow? So … false?

The trackers moving parallel to her had begun converging, while those in her wake had drawn close enough for her to hear their thudding footfalls. Desperate, Sharenas looked for somewhere to make her stand – the bole of an old tree, the root-wall of a toppled giant – but there was nothing like that nearby. She was among young dogwoods, elm thickets and young birch. No fire had rushed through any of this, and the leaf-mould was thick beneath the melting snow.

The soldier on her left voiced a strangled cry. Snapping a glance in that direction, she searched for the man, but could no longer see him.

At that instant, the two behind her rushed forward, even as the third scout swung in to flank her.

Mouth dry, sword-grip feeling greasy in her gloved hand, Sharenas spun round to face her attackers.

Both were women, and known to her, but now hatred twisted their features, and the blood was bright in their eyes.

There was no conversation, no pause in their attack.

Blades lashed out. She caught one, deflecting it, while sidestepping to evade the other. At that moment, the third hunter reached her, lunging with his sword.

The tip pierced the rounded flesh of her right hip, slicing it open to the bone. As the cut muscles and tendons parted, she felt them roll up beneath her skin, and her right leg simply gave way beneath her.

A blade struck her helm, dislodging it. Stunned, Sharenas fell on to her side. A savage blow against her sword knocked the weapon from her hand.

Disbelieving, she looked up into the face of one of the women, who now stood above her, bringing her sword around to push through Sharenas’s throat.

The woman paused, confusion clouding her face.

An arrow’s iron point was protruding from her neck. Blood was rushing down from the ragged tear its passage had made. The life in the woman’s eyes retreated, and then she dropped to her knees atop Sharenas.

Pushing the sagging body off, Sharenas dug in the heel of her one working leg and attempted to scrabble back. The other woman, she saw, was lying a few paces away, her midriff opened wide and its bundle of intestines tumbled out, steaming. Above her body crouched a grey-skinned girl. She held in her red hands long narrow knives, both slick with gore. Twisting round, Sharenas saw the third scout, lying face-down with the shafts of two arrows jutting from his back.

The girl advanced on Sharenas. ‘Plenty hunting you,’ she said. ‘Too many for just a deserter. No matter. You wear the wrong uniform.’

Another voice spoke. ‘No, Lahanis. Leave her.’

The girl scowled. ‘Why?’

‘She is bleeding out anyway, and the cut is too deep to mend. She is already dead. We gave you one.’

‘One is not enough.’

‘Come, we have cleared this part of the forest, but there are others. They will camp. Light fires. We have a night of killing ahead of us, Lahanis, enough to ease your thirst.’

The scene was dulling before Sharenas’s eyes, a grey too flat to be the arrival of dusk. She had one hand pressed against the gash in her hip, and the blood was pumping from the wound in hot waves. Her right leg was lifeless, a weight pinning her to the cold ground. The ache in her skull, and in the muscles and tendons on the left side of her neck, left her gasping, each breath frighteningly shallow.

She heard them move off after recovering their arrows and stripping the bodies.

Some time passed, but it was difficult to know how much. The dimness surrounding her felt disconnected from the sun’s vague departure. It was closer, crawling towards her from all sides, as if promising a warm embrace.

Kagamandra. Look at me now. I hold a hand to the place of my death, seeking to staunch the leak. The blood feels thick now. Thick as clay. It must be the cold.

And I feel an ache in my leg. I imagine I can curl my toes, scuff with the heel. Here, on this edge, I rebuild my broken form, as if preparing for what will come. No longer broken, but whole again. Ready to walk into the darkness.

And yet … Kagamandra. Still I lie here, longing for you with every essence of my being. What holds me to life, if not desire? What vaster power exists? With it, I swear, I feel I can defy the inevitable. Weapon and shield, companion and ally, enough to make the world back away, enough to surmount the highest walls and cross the deepest chasms. Desire, you stand in place of a lover’s arms, and make your embrace such dark comfort.

She heard her own sigh, startling in its clarity, its harsh rattle. Beneath her cold-numbed hand, the gash felt strange, drawn together, the skin puckered and tender. The bunched fists of the rolled-up tendons and muscles no longer burned against her hip bone, as if with her hand she had simply pushed them back into place.

But that is not possible.

Disbelieving, Sharenas found the strength to sit up. Her right leg throbbed with the kind of ache that bespoke deep outrage, and yet it lived. Beneath her the spilled blood had mixed with dirty snow and then leaf-mould and mud. It felt hot to the touch and the steam rising from it did not slacken.

The greyness surrounded her still, palpable like an unseen presence. In her head she heard vague whispers, muttering and, now and then, a faint, distant cry. Blinking, Sharenas looked round. This part of the trail was slightly wider than usual, but otherwise unremarkable. She shared the space with three corpses. The spilled entrails, she saw, were frosted over.

How – how long?

Groaning, she pushed herself to her feet, stood tottering for a moment before she caught the glint of her fallen sword. She hobbled a step, crouched to retrieve the weapon, and straightened once more.

Now what?

The scouts had been stripped of food packs and water flasks, but tightly bound bedrolls and cooking gear remained, all secured to prevent noise when the scouts tracked her. Sharenas realized that she was desperately hungry, and fighting a thirst so fierce she eyed the black spatters of blood on the ground at her feet.

The greyness urged her to feast, revealing its own hunger, bestial and primitive. Sharenas studied the corpse of the woman nearest her, listening to the chorus of faint voices susurrating through her head.

Are you spirits? Did I summon you? Or was it this impossible sorcery – which I never knew I possessed – that drew you into my company? Do you, perhaps, remember what it was to be consumed with desire? Because that alone sustained me. Kagamandra, I have made the memory of you into my lover. Loyal ghost, I feel still your fiery embrace.

But this new hunger, this is a simpler thing. A need both raw and cold. I have lost too much blood. I must restore myself.

The chattering spirits crowded her, and like a soul dispossessed of physical form, she watched her own body, as it dragged the corpse of the woman to one side of the trail, and then set about cutting strips of red meat from one of the thighs.

Once this was done, she set about making a fire.

What now?

Now this.