Baaljagg tore loose its grip on her crushed shoulder and closed its fangs about her skull. It then whipped her into the air.
Olar Ethil’s left hand was suddenly stabbing into the ay’s throat, punching through withered hide and closing on its spinal column. Even as the wolf flung her upward, she caught hold. The momentum from Baaljagg’s surge added force to her grip. A sudden, terrible ripping sound erupted from the ay, and like a serpent a length of the beast’s spinal column tore free of its throat, still clutched in the witch’s bony hand.
The Bonecaster spun away from the ay, landing hard in a clatter of bones.
Baaljagg collapsed, head lolling like a stone in a sack.
Absi wailed.
As Olar Ethil was picking herself up, Gruntle marched towards her, his two weapons readied. Seeing him, she flung the spinal column to one side.
And began to veer.
When he reached her, she was nothing but a blur, moments from expanding into something huge. He punched where her head had been a moment earlier, and the bell hilt of the cutlass cracked hard against something. The veering abruptly vanished. Reeling back, her face crushed, Olar Ethil sprawled on her back.
‘Spit on the tiger god,’ Gruntle said, standing directly over her. ‘Hood take your stupid veering, and mine!’ Clashing his blades together, he brought them down in an X pattern beneath her jaw. ‘Now, Bonecaster, I happen to know that if you hit even T’lan Imass bones hard enough, they shatter.’
‘No mortal—’
‘Piss on that. I will leave you in pieces, do you understand me? Pieces. How’s it done again? Head in a niche? On a pole? The crook of a tree? No trees here, witch, but a hole in the ground, that’s easy.’
‘The child is mine.’
‘He won’t have you.’
‘Why not?’
‘You just killed his dog.’
Precious Thimble hurried forward, feeling half fevered, her knees wobbly beneath her. ‘Bonecaster—’
‘I am considering withdrawing my offers,’ Olar Ethil said. ‘All of them. Now, Mortal Sword, will you remove your weapons and let me rise?’
‘I haven’t decided.’
‘What must I promise? To leave Absi in your care? Will you guard his life, Mortal Sword?’
Precious saw Gruntle hesitate.
‘I came to bargain with you all,’ Olar Ethil continued. ‘In faith. The undead ay was a slave to ancient memories, ancient betrayals. I will not hold it against any of you. Mortal Sword, look upon your friends – who among them is capable of protecting the children? You will not. The Trell waits only to hear my words whispering through his mind, and then he will quit your company. The Awl warrior is a pup, and a disrespectful one at that. The Jhag Bolead spawn is broken inside. I mean to bring to Onos Toolan his children—’
‘He’s a T’lan Imass, isn’t he?’
The Bonecaster was silent.
‘It’s the only way he would still serve you,’ Gruntle said. ‘He died, just as his daughters believed, and you resurrected him. Will you do the same to the boy? The gift of your deathly touch?’
‘Of course not. He must live.’
‘Why?’
She hesitated, and then said, ‘Because he is the hope of my people, Mortal Sword. I need him – for my army and for the First Sword who commands them. The child, Absi, shall be their cause, their reason to fight.’
Gruntle, Precious saw, was suddenly pale. ‘A child? Their cause?’
‘Their banner, yes. You do not understand – I cannot hold on to his anger … the First Sword’s. It is dark, a beast unchained, a leviathan – he must not be unleashed, not this way. Burn’s dream, Mortal Sword, let me rise!’
Gruntle withdrew his weapons, stumbled back a step. He was muttering something under his breath. Precious Thimble caught only a few words. In the Daru tongue. ‘The banner … child’s tunic, was that it? The colour … began red, ended … black.’
Olar Ethil struggled to her feet. Her face was barely recognizable, a crushed, splintered knot of bone and torn hide. The gouges from Baaljagg’s canines had scored deep, white grooves on her temples and the base of her mandible on both sides. The ruined shoulder slumped, its arm hanging useless.
As Gruntle backed still further, an anguished cry came from Setoc. ‘Has she won you all then? Will no one protect him? Please! Please!’
The twins were weeping. Absi was kneeling beside Baaljagg’s desiccated body, moaning in a strange cadence.
Cartographer clattered closer to the boy, one foot blackened and smouldering. ‘Make him stop that. Someone. Make him stop that.’
Precious frowned, but the others ignored the undead man’s pleas. What does he mean by that? She turned to Olar Ethil. ‘Bonecaster—’
‘East, woman. That is where you will find all you need. I have touched your soul. I have made it into a Mahybe, a vessel that waits. East.’
Precious Thimble crossed her arms, eyes closing for a moment. She wanted to look at Faint and Sweetest, to see the satisfaction, the relief, in their eyes. She wanted to, but knew she would see nothing of the sort, not from those two. They were women, after all, and three children were being surrendered. Thrown into undead arms. They will thank me in the end. When the memory of this moment fades, when we are all safe and home again.
Well … not all of us. But what can we do?
Setoc, with Torrent at her side, was all that stood between Olar Ethil and the three children. Tears streamed down Setoc’s cheeks, and in the Awl warrior’s stance Precious Thimble saw a man facing his execution. He’d drawn his sabre, but the look in his eyes was bleak. Yet he did not waver. Among them all, this young warrior was the only one not to turn away. Damn you, Setoc, will you see this brave boy die?
‘We can’t stop her,’ Precious said to Setoc. ‘You must see that. Torrent – tell her.’
‘I gave up the last of the Awl children to the Barghast,’ said Torrent. ‘And now they are all dead. Gone.’ He shook his head.
‘Can you protect these ones any better?’ Precious demanded.
It was as if he’d been slapped. He looked away. ‘Giving up children is the one thing I seem to do well.’ He sheathed his weapon and grasped Setoc’s upper arm. ‘Come with me. We will talk where no one else can hear us.’
Setoc shot the warrior a wild look, started to struggle, and then abruptly sagged in his grip.
Precious watched him drag her away. He broke like a frail twig. Are you proud of yourself now, Precious?
But the path is finally clear.
Olar Ethil walked with a hitching gait she’d not shown before, joints grinding and snapping, up to where the boy knelt. She reached down with her good arm and scooped him up by the collar of his Barghast tunic. Held him out to study his face, and he in turn looked steadily back at her, dry-eyed, flat. The Bonecaster grunted. ‘Your father’s son all right, by the Abyss.’
She turned round and set off, northward, the boy hanging from her grip. After a moment, the twins followed, neither one looking back. There’s no end to losing everything, is there? It just goes on and on. Their mother, their father, their people. No, they won’t be looking back.
And why should they? We failed them. She came, she cut us apart, bought us like an empress scattering a handful of coins. And they were what she bought. Them, and our turning away. And it was easy, because this is what we are.
Mahybe? What in Hood’s name is that?
With horror in his heart, Mappo set out from the camp, leaving the others, leaving behind this terrible dawn. He struggled to keep from breaking into a run, as if that would help. Besides, if they all watched him, they did so with consciences as stained as his own. Was there comfort in that? Should there be? We are nothing but our own needs. She but showed each of us the face we hide from ourselves and everyone else. She shamed us by exposing our truths.