Steven Erikson - Forge of Darkness

Gripp stepped towards her, his face wretched. ‘My love-’

But both Anomander and Hish held up a staying hand.

‘Lady Hish,’ said the First Son, ‘Gripp Galas made no such request of me.’

Hish swung on Gripp. ‘Is this true? Did you fail in this one request of your master?’

‘Forgive me,’ the man said, bowing his head. ‘My lord said that his need for me was pressing.’

‘I did,’ Anomander said. ‘But I see now they were careless words. Lady Hish, your pardon. That you are brought to this, by my insensitivity, shames me. You ask for dispensation, but I ask that you withdraw your request.’

Hish stared, struck speechless.

Then Anomander turned to Gripp Galas. ‘Old friend, long have you served me, with valour and with honour. As my most trusted servant I have set my weight upon you, and not once heard from you a word of complaint. You have dressed my wounds on the field of battle. You have mended the damage of my clumsy youth. Did you truly believe that now, on this fraught day, I would once more draw tight this leash? We are all weakened by distress, and indeed it seems every tender emotion lies exposed and trembling to a forest of knives. Gripp Galas, old friend, your service to me ends here and it ends now. You have won the heart of a woman who in all things is nothing less than breathtaking. If love needs permission, I give it. If your future with Lady Hish can be served by any sacrifice within my ability, I give it.’ He set his gaze upon Hish Tulla. ‘Nothing need be asked and nothing need be surrendered by you, my lady. On this, of all days, I will see love made right.’ He swung into the saddle. ‘Go well, my friends. We are done here.’

As he rode out through the gate, Gripp Galas stared after his ex-master. He reached out one hand to his side, groping.

Hish stepped close and clasped that hand, and then felt some of his weight as he seemed to sag.

‘You damned fool,’ she said in a low voice. ‘I thought you knew him.’

The forest had broken down in this place. It left skeletal trees rising from marsh grasses, and rotting logs blanketed in moss. Black water surrounded every hummock and the smaller islands were made from tufts of grass and reeds. The air smelled of decay and insects swarmed. They were camped upon the verge of this sunken land, brought up in their flight from the south. A dozen fires smouldered, green grasses fed into the flames to fill the air with smoke and so drive back the biting insects. Narad sat near one of them, eyes watering.

They had been criminals marching in file, and he was the last of that line, the last to despoil this miserable congress of civility. The proclamation of his ugliness was smoke-stained, fly-bitten and filthy, and he felt at home in this place, barring the company he kept.

Others had joined them. From the west had come a company commanded by Captain Hallyd Bahann, and with him was a beautiful woman named Tathe Lorat and her daughter, Sheltatha Lore. Their soldiers brought tales of slaughter at a monastery and the pillaging of Abara Delack. And now, riding up from the south, another troop approached and with their sighting the squads around Narad stirred, collecting their weapons and donning their helms. At last, he heard, their captain had arrived.

There were many kinds of curiosity, Narad realized as he stood with the others and fixed his gaze on the riders. To see a face behind a name, if that name was wreathed in tales of heroism, was a clean kind of curiosity. But the face of a monster invited its own fascination, perhaps in the shock of recognition, since every face could be seen in one; or, more to the point, from that one face, it took little imagination to find one’s own. Narad did not know which lure made him strain to see Captain Scara Bandaris, but he knew that a transformation awaited the man.

Since their flight from the slaughter at the wedding site, Narad had begun, with quick glances, to set upon the features of the soldiers around him the semblance of corpses. In his mind he looked upon his companions as if they were lying on the ground, all life gone, with faces frozen in death. Perhaps it was only a game, or perhaps it was a promise, or even a prayer. He wanted them all dead. He wanted to gaze down on the once-laughing eyes and see the look of men and women who no longer had anything to laugh about. He wanted to see the jest of fate, and would show each face he saw a smile they would never answer, and could never challenge.

At the head of his troop, Captain Scara Bandaris rode up, harshly reining in his lathered horse. Narad squinted up at the man’s face, eager to set that lifeless mask upon it.

Instead, he saw nothing but blinding rage.

‘ By whose command? ’

The soldiers who had begun gathering close to greet their captain suddenly recoiled.

Something bright, like a fire, ignited in Narad.

Scara Bandaris dismounted. He strode directly towards Sergeant Radas. ‘Who is your commanding officer, sergeant? Tell me!’

‘You are, sir.’

‘And what orders did I leave you with?’

‘We were to await you in the forest. But sir, Lieutenant Infayen Menand brought us orders from Captain Hunn Raal.’

Scara’s face displayed incredulity. ‘Hunn Raal ordered the Legion to murder Lord Jaen and his daughter? To take the lives of highborn gathered to celebrate a wedding? Hunn Raal ordered you to unleash your soldiers on Enesdia? To rape her and leave her to die on the hearthstone? The hearthstone that was a gift from Lord Anomander to his brother? May I see these orders, sergeant? May I see for myself the sigil of Hunn Raal?’

Radas had gone white. ‘Sir, Lieutenant Infayen, who bore the word of Captain Hunn Raal, assumed command. I am a soldier of Urusander’s Legion. I follow the orders of my superiors.’

‘Where is Infayen now?’

‘East, sir, to join Commander Urusander.’

Captain Hallyd Bahann approached, Tathe Lorat at his side and trailing behind them an old man with but one leg, who struggled as the sodden ground made uncertain purchase for his crutch. Narad had looked upon Hallyd before, and had found it easy to imagine his visage made lifeless, all arrogance stripped away. It had been a delicious vision. Hallyd Bahann was a bully and the proof of that was in his bearing and his swollen features. He was a man who would look his best when dead.

‘Scara, old friend, welcome,’ said Hallyd. ‘There have been miscalculations, I think. We are agreed on that, you and me. The challenge before us now is to mitigate the damage to our cause.’

Scara was studying the man with level eyes. ‘Our cause indeed, Hallyd,’ he said in a suddenly calm voice. ‘Do remind us, Hallyd, of that cause. I find myself in need of this noble list uttered aloud. Be logical in your assembly, and lift us all once more into the realms of virtue. But pray, old friend, begin at the bottom, there in the blood between a dead woman’s legs.’

Hallyd’s smile vanished.

Without awaiting a reply, Scara continued. ‘Will you not carry us higher then, ignoring the stains as best you can, to a hostage slain defending that woman, cut down not in honourable contest, but as a wild dog staked to the ground? Then to an old man, a father and hero of the wars against the Forulkan, who died on the threshold of his son-in-law’s house?’ He spoke loudly, with weight, and that voice carried through the camp, pushed harsh against the silent soldiers. ‘But wait. Let us add a new rung in this righteous climb to our cause. A maid, one arm severed and then cut down. A maid, venal benefactor of the inequity we so despise. And the Houseblades, barely armed, who laid for our cause a carpet of split flesh and matted grasses.’ He raised his arms, like an orator set aflame with outrage. ‘But here anew we see more signs of Hunn Raal’s certain path to justice! The burnt corpses of Deniers in the forest! Why, those old wax witches grew fat at our expense, did they not? And the children showed improper pomp in the cut of their rags. Do speak to us, Hallyd Bahann, of our pure purpose. Tell me how a choice of faiths divides the realm we have sworn to defend, and do name your reasons for the side you set us on. Write your list in the columns of smoke behind me and stretch it across the heavens-’