Steven Erikson - Dust of Dreams

Only we never got out, never got wise, did we? We found ourselves in a cesspool and then spent the next twenty years telling each other the smell ain’t so bad. Sweet as rain, in fact.

The K’Chain Che’Malle were going to die. They were going to pour their blood into him, souls crowding for his embrace, whatever that meant. The Matron who wanted all this was dead, but then… ain’t dying the first and most obvious path into ascendancy, into godhood?

Though eating the front of her skull, that’s just sick. She’ll make ’em pay for that, now that she’s a goddess or whatever.

Well, he’d keep the door barred until the last moment-he had an army to order around, after all. A mob of heavies who’d wheel on a horse-hair with an instant’s thought. Imagine what Coltaine could’ve done with these legions. If he’d had ’em, Korbolo Dom wouldn’t be wiggling his finger up Laseen’s backside right now. In fact-

‘Hood’s breath, Stormy, you’re leaking the sickest things.’

‘So get outa my head!’

‘I said “leaking,” you oaf. I ain’t in your head. Listen, stop thinking we’re all vulture shit, all right? I don’t know if these things got anything like morale, but if they do you’ve just beaten it into a pulpy mess.’

‘Those were my thoughts!’

‘So figure out a way of keeping them inside. Just picture your thick skull-it’s got holes, right. Out the eyes, the nose, whatever. So, picture blocking ’em all up. Now you’re safe. Now you can think all the stupid things you like to think about.’

‘Is that why I ain’t getting anything from you?’

‘No. Right now, I’m too witless to think. Sky’s lightening-look at that cloud to the south. It’s not a cloud. It’s a hole in the sky. It’s a warren ripped wide open. Just looking at it makes my skin crawl like a leech under a rock.’

‘Ges, these legions-’

‘Furies.’

‘They ain’t presented for battle, unless you plan on us just marching right up to ’em. Like the Quon used to do.’

‘You’re right. The Quon had badly trained troops, but they had a lot of them. Who needs tactics?’

‘We do.’

‘Right. So, see if we can get ’em sawtooth-’ He stopped suddenly.

In the same instant something rushed through Stormy and he grunted, twisting round.

The massive baggage train had halted. Drones-smaller creatures, not much taller than a human-swarmed the beds, unshipping rectangular slabs of iron. ‘Gesler-are those shields?’

Gesler had halted and wheeled his mount. ‘Aye, I think so. I was wondering at those hand-and-a-half axes the Ve’Gath carried. So, these really are heavies-’

‘I couldn’t pick up one of those shields, let alone hang it from one arm. The Nah’ruk got missile weapons?’

‘Unplug your skull,’ said Gesler, ‘and you’ll get your answer. Another innovation from the Matron. She must have been something, I think.’

‘She was a big fat lizard.’

‘She also broke ten thousand years of changing nothing-and the Che’Malle claim they never had a religion.’

Grunting-and not quite understanding what Gesler had meant-Stormy cast about to find the Destriant.

Twenty paces to the west, Kalyth was astride the back of Sag’Churok, but she was not watching the smooth distribution of the huge shields through the Ve’Gath ranks. Instead, she was squinting south. Stormy followed her gaze.

‘Ges, I see ’em. A line of legions-’

‘Furies,’ said Gesler.

‘Five across making the facing. And what, three deep? Hood’s breath, they look to outnumber us badly. I’m thinking three teeth each legion, ranks no more than thirty deep. We can reach that high ground just ahead, shield-lock there.’

‘You’ll screen my K’ell, then, Stormy. Show your teeth and let the Nah’ruk close jaws on ’em. How long you think you can hold that ridge?’

‘How long do you need?’

‘I want most of the enemy Furies committed to pushing you off that ridge. I want you to savage them, enough to get them ducking their heads and thinking about nothing but the next step forward. I don’t want ’em looking right or left.’

‘What’s Ampelas Uprooted going to be doing during all this?’ Stormy demanded.

‘Unplug your skull.’

‘No, this is better.’

Kalyth had ridden closer. ‘There is sorcery-defences, weapons.’

Stormy wasn’t understanding something. He knew he would if he knocked down the walls he’d raised around his thoughts, but he didn’t want to do that. Ampelas Uprooted-Gesler wasn’t factoring it into his tactics at all. Why not? No matter. ‘Ges, when holding isn’t what we need to do any more, what do you want from us?’

‘Single wedge, advance at the walk. Cut the bastards in half, Stormy. One wing will be healthier than the other. That one needs blocking-we annihilate the weaker wing. Then we can wheel and take down the other half.’

‘Ges, these Ve’Gath never fought this way before. The K’Chain Che’Malle had no tactics at all, from what I can see in my head.’

‘That’s why they need us humans,’ Kalyth said. ‘She understood. You two-’ she shook her head. ‘The Che’Malle-they drink down your confidence. They are sated. They hear you, discussing the battle to come, and they are awestruck with wonder. And… faith.’

Stormy scowled. Woman, if you could read me right now, you’d run screaming. Of course we say we’re doing this and then that and then this other thing and it’s all so perfect and so logical. We know it’s all a joke. We know that once the battle is engaged, it all turns into Hood’s hoary picnic basket.

Me and Ges, we’re just amateurs. Dujek was damned good at this, but Dassem Ultor, ah, he was the best of them all. He could stand there in front of ten thousand soldiers, and he’d take ’em all through every sword-stroke in the battle to come. By the end of all that wheeling here, driving there, breaking through there, we’d all be nodding half bored and ready to get on with it. It was a done deal to us, and the First Sword, why, he’d just take us all in with his eyes and give back one single nod.

Then the day went out and mayhem was a field of flowers and by dusk the enemy was dead or on the run.

Aye, Gesler, I hear you echoing him. I see you taking on his matter-of-fact tone and that face of sun-warmed iron that we all knew would turn to ice when the time came. I’ll give you this, friend, you’re stealing from the best of ’em all, and doing good.

He clawed through his beard. ‘Anyone got a cask of ale? I can’t remember the last time I went into a battle not belching sour brew.’ He studied Kalyth for a moment, and then sighed. ‘Never mind. Go on, Ges, go hide your K’ell, I got it here.’

‘See you when it’s done, Shield Anvil.’

‘Aye, Mortal Sword.’

Heat was building beneath Kalyth. Sag’Churok was flooded with flavours of violence. But she sat hunched, chilled, her very bones feeling like sticks trapped in lakeshore ice. These two soldiers appalled her. Their confidence was insane. The ease with which they took command-and the mockery with which they exchanged their titles moments before separating-left her reeling.

Her people had met with traders from Kolanse. She had seen armoured caravan guards, looking bored as the merchants haggled with the Elan elders. Children had drawn close to them, eyes shining, but none drew close enough to touch, as much as they might have wanted to. Killers were lodestones. Their silence and their flat eyes fed something in the young boys and girls, and Kalyth could see their childlike longing, the whispering romance of the horizons these warriors had seen. Such scenes had frightened her, and she had prayed to the spirits for the strangers to leave, to take their dangerous temptations with them.