Ian Esslemont - Blood and Bone

Shimmer scanned the snowdrifts and gleaming wind-bitten ice shelves, seeing nothing. Damn, it was strong! She felt it now: a terrible potency. In fact, she’d not felt anything like it since-

Dust or some sort of wind-lashed dirt spun upwards like a wave from the snow. While they watched it merged, solidifying to reveal a single figure wrapped in ragged furs. It stood on legs of naked bone stained brown. A fleshless face stared at them from beneath the ridge of the bone helmet fashioned from the skull of some prehistoric beast. An Imass.

K’azz stepped forward, raising a hand. ‘Greetings, Elder. We of the Crimson Guard salute you.’

The undead’s jaws worked, the sinew creaking, and a word whispered across the ice, ‘Greetings.’

‘To what do we owe this honour?’

‘Your presence here … drew me.’

‘Are we trespassing? If so, we apologize and will leave at once.’

The great width of its robust shoulders rose and fell. ‘We are all in kind trespassers here.’

‘You mean the Jaghut …’

‘Yes.’

‘Is this why you are here?’

‘No — none remain. I merely pass by. I follow the call to the east. All are gathering. A Summoner has come to us.’

K’azz bowed his head. ‘Yes. I heard. Go with our best wishes. But before you go — may you honour us with your name?’

‘I am Tolb Bell’al, Bonecaster to the Ifayle T’lan Imass. And long have I been absent.’

‘Our thanks, Tolb Bell’al. I am K’azz D’Avore.’

‘We know you, K’azz.’ Tolb inclined his head a fraction. ‘Farewell. Until we meet again.’

Shimmer drew breath to ask what the creature meant but the Imass slumped into a scarf of dust that the wind snatched away. K’azz turned to her and they shared a wondering glance. ‘What did he — or she — mean by that?’

K’azz shrugged. ‘I’ve no idea. Perhaps it meant in the afterlife.’

‘Afterlife?’ Cole growled, coming up. ‘What afterlife? They’re already after life.’

K’azz waved to close the subject. ‘It’s gone now. And with the dawn so too shall we.’

‘Following its call,’ Cole mused.

K’azz frowned at that then signed: ‘ Stand down .’

* * *

The capital of the kingdom of the Thaumaturgs, Anditi Pura, possessed no walls, fortress, or defensive works. At its centre lay the sprawling complex known only as the Inner City. Here could be found the centralized administrative offices, the dormitories, and the training academy of the Thaumaturgs who served both as rulers and bureaucrats of the state.

The generalship of the Army of Righteous Chastisement fell to the next in line to join the Thaumaturg ruling Circle of Nine, Golan Amaway. The Grand Masters of the Mysteries judged the position — correctly — all too demanding in its duties and thus too much of a distraction from the continued pursuit of their one and only obsession: penetrating the secrets of life, and of death.

As the lowest ranked of the Adepts, and thus not sworn into their highest mysteries, Golan had been sanguine in the assignment. He bowed to the assembled Nine Masters, accepted the proffered Rod of Execution, and exited to make ready.

After all, he told himself in solace, it was not as if the Nine Masters would remain behind in idle meditation. They would follow the march at a convenient distance. For as soon as the forces penetrated Ardata’s territory — what the ignorant peasants invoked in superstitious dread as the spirit realm of Himatan — no doubt all would be needed to keep at bay the worst of her attacks.

His bodyguard of ten yakshaka fell unnoticed into step about him. He tapped the heavy rod of blackwood chased in silver in one palm, already considering plans of how best to ensure that their untrustworthy foreign allies, these Isturé, might be manipulated into bearing the brunt of every engagement.

Now, after months of exhausting preparation, they marched east for the mountain highlands, the Gangrek Mounts, that divided the as yet untamed borderlands of Thaumaturg territory from the deep jungle of Ardata’s haunts. A land quite thinly populated where, their own peasants believed, continued existence could only be assured by pacts and deals with elder spirits, demons and monsters of the world’s youth.

A version not too far from the truth should their Isturé traitors’ intelligence be accurate. In any case, they should know soon enough.

Golan travelled in a large covered litter born by four yakshaka. Normally he would travel to war by elephant. However, painful experience gathered through the many — unsuccessful — punitive campaigns against Ardata had demonstrated the limited effectiveness of their war-elephant columns. The dense jungle impeded their progress, they became mired in the deep swamps and they sickened in droves from the raging clouds of insects and thick miasmas. Those few that remained were driven mad by the terrors of the night. And so this army was carried forward by human feet and bent human backs alone.

It was also his habit to travel far closer to the front lines than his predecessors judged prudent. Yet he felt himself to be at no risk. Not only did he enjoy the protection of his bolstered bodyguard of twenty yakshaka soldiers, he also stood at the centre of an encircling crowd of his staff of regular army officers, messengers and ordinary soldiers. Not to mention yet a further army of clerks and scribes travelling with their own logistical support of reams upon reams of records listing everything carried and worn by the army entire. He would not even be surprised if there lay within the clerks’ long train of paperwork a sheet reading General of the Army: one .

His second in command, U-Pre, edged close to the open side of the rocking litter, bowed for permission to speak. ‘Yes?’ Golan said, and waved a switch to brush away the plaguing flies.

‘The leader of the foreign mercenaries wishes to speak, Master.’

‘Very well, U-Pre.’

The man bowed again and jogged off.

Golan rocked with the motion of the raised platform. A light rain, no more than a mist, masked the distant green line that was the highlands where they appeared now and again through gaps in the surrounding forest canopy. The swaying helped Golan maintain a meditative calm despite the horrors that, as earlier campaigns reported, awaited beyond that ragged mountain range.

Heavy armoured boots thumping into the dirt of the track next to his litter announced the presence of this Skinner, commander of the Isturé. ‘You wish to speak?’ Golan asked without turning to look.

‘Yes.’

‘The slow progress of our advance still troubles you, yes?’

The long silence following that observation told Golan that he was correct in his prediction. After marching for a time the foreign mercenary, once an aristocrat within Ardata’s demesnes, and, it was rumoured, so much more than that, cleared his throat to speak again.

Golan slid his gaze sideways to the man: tall helm under an arm, long coat of armour glittering darkly like a curtain of night, wide brutal face so unlike the properly symmetrical rounded features of those of Jacuruku. And, unusually, a long mass of pale hair the colour of sun-dried grass. Was this the feature that had caught the eye of Ardata herself?

‘Yes,’ the man admitted, ‘the slow pace remains an irritation. Allow my command to travel ahead to scout the way and to evaluate the character of the resistance.’

Golan edged his gaze away. ‘No, Isturé. We shall all stay together. Present a strong united front, yes? Like any good artisan I wish to keep all my tools with me so that I may respond appropriately to whatever situation may arise. As a skilled craftsman yourself, you understand this, yes?’