‘That temple. It couldn’t have held all those souls. All that grief. It was broken and that’s why it fell over. That was what you were supposed to see. So you’d understand when everything happens. And not be sad. And be able to do what he wants you to do, just not in the way he thought it would be. That’s all.’
‘Good. Now crawl back to your own dreams, Kettle.’
‘Okay. Just remember, don’t cry too soon. You have to wait.’
‘Really. How long before I do this crying?’
But she was gone.
He’d caught some damn fever from the rotting ice. Shivering and hallucinating for three-maybe four-nights now. Bizarre dreams inside dreams and on and on. Delusions of warmth, the comfort of furs not sodden with sweat, the balm of mysterious conversations where meaning wasn’t an issue. I like this life. It’s predictable. Mostly. And when it isn’t, it feels no different. 1 take whatever comes at me. As if each night 1 receive lessons in… in taking control.
Now it was time for the huge table heaped with all his favourite foods.
They said he was gaunt as a wraith.
But every night he ate his fill.
With the dawn light pushing the shadows into the clefts and valleys and transforming the snow-clad peaks into molten gold, Seren Pedac rose from her furs and stood, feeling grimy and dishevelled. The high altitude left her throat sore and her eyes dry, and her allergies only exasperated those conditions. Shivering in the cutting wind, she watched Fear Sengar struggling to relight the fire. Long-frozen wood was reluctant to burn. Kettle had been gathering grasses and she now squatted down beside the Tiste Edur with her offerings.
A ragged cough from where Udinaas lay still buried in furs. After a moment, he slowly sat up. Face flushed with fever, sweat on his brow, his eyes dull. He hacked out a noise Seren belatedly realized was laughter.
Fear’s head snapped round as if wasp-stung. ‘This amuses you? You’d rather another cold meal to start the day?’
Udinaas blinked over at the Tiste Edur, then shrugged and looked away.
Seren cleared her throat. ‘Whatever amused him, Fear, had nothing to do with you.’
‘Speaking for me now?’ Udinaas asked her. He tottered weakly to his feet, still wrapped in the furs. ‘This might be another dream,’ he said. ‘At any moment that white-skinned warrior perched over there might transform into a dragon. And the child Kettle will open her mouth like a door, into which Fear Sengar will plunge, devoured by his own hunger to betray.’ The flat, murky eyes fixed on Seren Pedac. ‘And you will conjure lost ages, Acquitor, as if the follies of history had any relevance, any at all.’
The whirl and snap of a chain punctuated the bizarre pronouncements.
Udinaas glanced over at Clip, and smiled. ‘And you’re dreaming of sinking your hands into a pool of blood, but not any old blood. The question is, can you manipulate events to achieve that red torrent?’
‘Your fever has boiled your brain,’ the Tiste Andii warrior said with an answering smile. He faced Silchas Ruin. ‘Kill him or leave him behind.’
Seren Pedac sighed, then said, ‘Clip, when will we begin our descent? Lower down, there will be herbs to defeat his fever.’
‘Not for days,’ he replied, spinning the chain in his right hand. And even then… well, I doubt you’ll find what you’re looking for. Besides,’ he added, ‘what ails him isn’t entirely natural.’
Silchas Ruin, facing the trail they would climb this day, said, ‘He speaks true. Old sorcery fills this fetid air.’
‘What kind?’ Seren asked.
‘It is fragmented. Perhaps… K’Chain Che’Malle-they rarely used their magic in ways easily understood. Never in battle. I do recall something… necromantic’
And is that what this is?’
‘I cannot say, Acquitor.’
‘So why is Udinaas the one afflicted? What about the rest of us?’
No-one ventured a response, barring another broken laugh from Udinaas.
Rings clacked. ‘I have made my suggestion,’ Clip said.
Again, the conversation seemed to die. Kettle walked over to stand close to Udinaas, as if conferring protection.
The small campfire was finally alight, if feebly so. Seren collected a tin pot and set out to find some clean snow, which should have been a simple enough task. But the rotted patches were foul with detritus. Smears of decaying vegetation, speckled layers of charcoal and ash, the carcasses of some kind of ice-dwelling worm or beetle, wood and pieces of countless animals. Hardly palatable. She was surprised they weren’t all sick.
She halted before a long, narrow stretch of ice-crusted snow that filled a crack or fold in the rock. She drew her knife, knelt down and began pecking at it. Chunks broke away. She examined each one, discarding those too dis-coloured with filth, setting the others into the pot. Not much like normal glaciers-those few she had seen up close. After all, they were made of successive snowfalls as much as creeping ice. Those snowfalls normally produced relatively pristine strata. But here, it was as if the air through which the snow fell had been thick with drifting refuse, clogging every descending flake. Air thick with smoke, ash, pieces of once living things. What could have done that? If just ash then she could interpret it as the result of some volcanic eruption. But not damned fragments of skin and meat. What secret hides in these mountains?
She managed to dig the knife-point deep into the ice, j then settled her weight on it. The entire remaining slab of ice lifted suddenly, prised away from the crack. And there, lying beneath it, a spear.
The shaft, long as Seren was tall, was not wood. Polished, mottled amber and brown, it looked almost… scaled. The broad head was of one piece, blade and stem, ground jade, milky smooth and leaf-shaped. No obvious glue or binding held the socket onto the shaft.
She pulled the weapon loose. The scaled texture, she saw, was created by successive, intricate layering of horn, which explained the mottled appearance. Again, she could discern no indication of how the layers were fixed. The spear was surprisingly heavy, as if the shaft had mineralized.
A voice spoke behind her. ‘Now that is an interesting find.’
She turned, studied Clip’s mocking expression, and felt a flash of irritation. ‘In the habit of following people around, Clip?’
‘No, mostly I lead them. I know, that task serves to push you to one side. Leaves you feeling useless.’
‘Any other bright observations you want to make?’
He shrugged, spinning the damned chain back and forth. ‘That spear you found. It’s T’lan Imass.’
‘Is that supposed to mean something to me?’
‘It will.’
‘It’s not a weapon you fight with, is it?’
‘No. And I don’t hide in trees and throw fruit either.’
She frowned.
He laughed, turning away. ‘I was born in Darkness, Acquitor.’
And?’
He paused, glanced back at her. ‘Why do you think I am rhe Mortal Sword of the Black-Winged Lord? My good looks? My charming personality? My skill with these blades here?’
‘Well,’ she replied, ‘you’ve just exhausted my list of reasons.’
‘Ha ha. Hear me. Born in Darkness. Blessed by our Mother. The first in thousands of years-she turned away, you know. From her chosen sons. Thousands of years? More like tens of thousands. But not from me. I can walk the Darkness, Acquitor.’ He waved his chain-spinning hand back towards the others. ‘Not even Silchas Ruin can make that claim.’
‘Does he know?’
‘No. This is our secret for as long as you choose.’
And why would I choose to not tell him this, Clip?’
‘Because I am the only one here who can keep him from killing you. You and Udinaas-the two he considers most useless. Indeed, potential enemies.’
‘Enemies? Why would he think that?’ She shook her head in disbelief. ‘We’re just bugs he can crush underfoot any time he likes. An enemy is one who poses a threat. We don’t.’