Steven Erikson - Dust of Dreams

‘You think so? You’re dead wrong. He knows because she told him. Him and no one else. Now, you can try to twist Fiddler for details all you like-it won’t work. The truth as much as cut out his tongue.’

‘So what’s made you the Magus of Dark? What miserable piss-sour secret you holding back on now, Quick?’

The wizard turned away once more, stared out over the city, and then stiffened. ‘Shit, what now?’

The sorcery erupted from an alley mouth, striking Brys Beddict from his left side. The impact sent him sprawling, grey tendrils writhing like serpents about his body. In the span of a single heartbeat, the magic had bound him tight, arms trapped. The coils began constricting.

Lying on his back, staring up at the night sky-that had at last begun to pale-Brys heard footsteps and a moment later the Errant stepped into the range of his vision. The god’s single eye gleamed like a star burning through mist.

‘I warned you, Brys Beddict. This time, there will be no mistakes. Yes, it was me who nudged you to take that mouthful of poisoned wine-oh, the Chancellor had not anticipated such a thing, but he can be forgiven that. After all, how could I have imagined that you’d found a guardian among Mael’s minions?’ He paused, and then said, ‘No matter. I am done with subtlety-this is much better. I can look into your eyes and watch you die, and what could be more satisfying than that?’

The sorcery tautened, forcing Brys’s breath from his lungs. Darkness closed in round his vision until all he could see was the Errant’s face, a visage that had lost all grace as avid hunger twisted the features. He watched as the god lifted one hand and slowly clenched the fingers-and the pressure around Brys’s chest built until his ribs creaked.

The new fist that arrived hammered like a maul against the side of the Errant’s head, snapping it far over. The gleaming eye seemed to wink out and the god crumpled, vanishing from Brys’s dwindling vision.

All at once the coils weakened, and then frayed into dissolving threads.

Brys drew a ragged, delicious breath of chill night air.

He heard horse hoofs, a half dozen beasts, maybe more, approaching at a canter from up the street. Blinking sweat from his eyes, Brys rolled on to his stomach and then forced himself to his knees.

A hand closed on his harness and lifted him to his feet.

He found himself staring up at a Tarthenal-a familiar face, the heavy, robust features knotted absurdly into a fierce frown.

‘I got a question for you. It was for your brother and I was on my way but then I saw you.’

The riders arrived, horses skidding on the dew-slick cobbles-a Malazan troop, Brys saw, weapons unsheathed. One of them, a dark-skinned woman, pointed with a sword. ‘He crawled into that alley-come on, let’s chop the bastard into stewing meat!’ She made to dismount and then seemed to sag and an instant later she collapsed on to the street, weapon clattering.

Other soldiers dropped down from their mounts. Three of them converged on the unconscious woman, while the others fanned out and advanced into the alley.

Brys was still having difficulty staying upright. He found himself leaning with one forearm against the Tarthenal. ‘Ublala Pung,’ he sighed, ‘thank you.’

‘I got a question.’

Brys nodded. ‘All right, let’s hear it.’

‘But that’s the problem. I forgot what it was.’

One of the Malazans crowded round the woman now straightened and faced them. ‘Sinter said there was trouble,’ he said in heavily accented trader tongue. ‘Said we needed to hurry-to here, to save someone.’

‘I believe,’ Brys said, ‘the danger has passed. Is she all right, sir?’

‘I’m a sergeant-people don’t “sir” me… sir. She’s just done in. Both her and her sister.’ He scowled. ‘But we’ll escort you just the same, sir-she’d never forgive us if something happened to you now. So, wherever you’re going…’

The other soldiers emerged from the alley, and one said something in Malazan, although Brys needed no translation to understand that they’d found no one-the Errant’s survival instincts were ever strong, even when he’d been knocked silly by a Tarthenal’s fist.

‘It seems,’ Brys said, ‘I shall have an escort after all.’

‘It is not an offer you can refuse, sir,’ said the sergeant.

Nor will I. Lesson learned, Adjunct.

The soldiers were attempting to heave the woman named Sinter back into her saddle. Ublala Pung stepped up to them. ‘I will carry her,’ he said. ‘She’s pretty.’

‘Do as the Toblakai says,’ said the sergeant.

‘She’s pretty,’ Ublala Pung said again, as he took her limp form in his arms. ‘Pretty smelly, too, but that’s okay.’

‘Perimeter escort,’ snapped the sergeant, ‘crossbows cocked. Anybody steps out, nail ’em.’

Brys prayed there would be no early risers between here and the palace. ‘Best we hurry,’ he ventured.

On a rooftop not far away, Quick Ben sighed and then relaxed.

‘What was all that about?’ Hedge asked beside him.

‘Damned Toblakai… but that’s not the interesting bit, though, is it? No, it’s that Dal Honese woman. Well, that can all wait.’

‘You’re babbling, wizard.’

Magus of Dark. Gods below.

Alone in the cellar beneath the dormitories, Fiddler stared down at the card in his hand. The lacquered wood glistened, dripped as if slick with sweat. The smell rising from it was of humus, rich and dark, a scent of the raw earth.

‘Tartheno Toblakai,’ he whispered.

Herald of Life.

Well, just so.

He set it down and then squinted at the second card he had withdrawn to close this dread night. Unaligned. Chain. Aye, we all know about those, my dear. Fret naught, it’s the price of living.

Now, if only you weren’t so… strong. If only you were weaker. If only your chains didn’t reach right into the heart of the Bonehunters-if only I knew who was dragging who, why, I might have reason to hope.

But he didn’t, and so there wasn’t.

To journey into the other worlds, a shaman or witch of the Elan would ride the Spotted Horse. Seven herbs, softened with beeswax and rolled into a ball and then flattened into an oblong disc that was taken into the mouth and held between lip and gum. Coolness slowly numbing and saliva rising as if the throat was the mouth of a spring, a tingling sensation lifting to gather behind the eyes in coalescing colours and then, in a blinding flash, the veil between worlds vanished. Patterns swirled in the air; complex geometries played across the landscape-a landscape that could be the limitless wall of a hide tent, or the rolling plains of a cave wall where ran the beasts-until the heart-stains emerged, pulsing, blotting the scene in undulating rows, sweet as waves and tasting of mother’s milk.