‘And these you would gather close about you, that we might form a core. Of resistance, of stubborn will.’
‘So I have thought.’
‘To win through to the other side? Is there an other side, Draconus?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You don’t know,’ she repeated, making the words a snarl. ‘All my life,’ she said, ‘I have chosen to be alone. In my struggles, in my victories and my failings. Draconus, I will face oblivion in the same way. I must — we all must. It does nothing to stand together, for we each fall alone.’
‘I understand. I am sorry, then, Apsal’ara, for all this.’
‘There is no other side, Draconus.’
‘No, probably not.’
She drew up more of her chain, settled its crushing weight on to her shoulders, and then pulled away from the man, back towards the wagon. No, she could not give him anything, not when hope itself was impossible. He was wrong to admire her. To struggle was her own madness, resisting something that could not be resisted, fighting what could not be defeated.
This foe would take her mind, her self, tearing it away piece by piece — and she might sense something of those losses, at least to begin with, like vast blanks in her memory, perhaps, or an array of simple questions she could no longer answer. But before long, such knowledge would itself vanish, and each floating fragment would swirl about, untethered, alone, unaware that it had once been part of something greater, something whole. Her life, all her awareness, scattered into frightened orphans, whimpering at every strange sound, every unseen tug from the surrounding darkness. From woman to child, to helpless babe.
She knew what was coming. She knew, too, that in the end there was a kind of mercy to that blind ignorance, to the innocence of pieces. Unknowing, the orhpans would dissolve away, leaving nothing.
What mind could not fear such a fate?
‘Draconus,’ she whispered, although she was far from his side now, closing in on the wagon once more, ‘there is no other side of chaos. Look at us. Each chained. Together, and yet alone. See us pass the time as we will, until the end. You made this sword, but the sword is only a shape given to something far beyond you, far beyond any single creature, any single mind. You just made it momentarily manageable.’
She slipped into the gloom behind the lead wheel. Into the thick, slimy rain.
‘Anomander Rake understands,’ she hissed. ‘He understands, Draconus. More than you ever did. Than you ever will. The world within Dragnipur must die. That is the greatest act of mercy imaginable. The greatest sacrifice. Tell me, Draconus, would you relinquish your power? Would you crush down your selfishness, to choose this. . this emasculation? This sword, your cold, iron grin of vengeance — would you see it become lifeless in your hands? As dead as any other hammered bar of iron?’
She ducked beneath the lead axle and heaved the chain on her shoulders up and on to the wooden beam. Then climbed up after it. ‘No, Draconus, you could not do that, could you?’
There had been pity in Rake’s eyes when he killed her. There had been sorrow. But she had seen, even then, in that last moment of locked gazes, how such sentiments were tempered.
By a future fast closing in. Only now, here, did she comprehend that.
You give us chaos. You give us an end to this.
And she knew, were she in Anomander Rake’s place, were she the one possessing Dragnipur, she would fail in this sacrifice. The power of the weapon would seduce her utterly, irrevocably.
None other. None other but you, Anomander Rake.
Thank the gods.
He awoke to the sting of a needle at the corner of one eye. Flinching back, gasping, scrabbling away over the warm bodies. In his wake, that blind artist, the mad Tiste Andii, Kadaspala, face twisted in dismay, the bone stylus drawing back.
‘Wait! Come back! Wait and wait, stay and stay, I am almost done! I am almost done and I must be done before it’s too late, before it’s too late!’
Ditch saw that half his mangled body now bore tattoos, all down one side — wherever skin had been exposed whilst he was lying unconscious atop the heap of the fallen. How long had he been lying there, insensate, whilst the insane creature stitched him full of holes? ‘I told you,’ he said, ‘not me. Not me!’
‘Necessary. The apex and the crux and the fulcrum and the heart. He chose you. I chose you. Necessary! Else we are all lost, we are all lost, we are all lost. Come back. Where you were and where you were, lying just so, your arm over, the wrist — the very twitch of your eye-’
‘I said no! Come at me again, Kadaspala, and I will choke the life from you, I swear it. I will crush your neck to pulp. Or snap your fingers, every damned one of them!’
Lying on his stomach, gaping sockets seeming to glare, Kadaspala snatched his hands back, hiding them beneath his chest. ‘You must not do that and you must not do that. I was almost finished with you. I saw your mind went away, leaving me your flesh — to do what was needed and what was needed is still needed, can’t you understand that?’
Ditch crawled further away, well beyond the Tiste Andii’s reach, rolling and then sinking down between two demonic forms, both of which shifted sicken shy;ingly beneath his weight. ‘Don’t come any closer,’ he hissed.
‘I must convince you. I have summoned Draconus. He is summoned. There will be threats, they come with Draconus, they always come with Draconus. I have summoned him.’
Ditch slowly lowered himself down on to his back. There would be no end to this, he knew. Each time his mind fell away, fled to whatever oblivion it found, this mad artist would crawl to his side, and, blind or not, he would resume bis work. What of it? Why should I really care? This body is mostly destroyed now, anyway. If Kadaspala wants it — no, damn him, it is all I have left.
‘So many are pleased,’ the Tiste Andii murmured, ‘to think that they have become something greater than they once were. It is a question of sacrifices, of which I know all there is to know, yes, I know all there is to know. And,’ he added, somewhat breathlessly, ‘there is of course more to it, more to it. Salvation-’
‘You cannot be serious.’
‘It is not quite a lie, not quite a lie, my friend. Not quite a lie. And truth, well, truth is never as true as you think it is, or if it is, then not for long not for long not long for long.’
Ditch stared up at the sickly sky overhead, the flashes of reflected argent spilling through what seemed to be roiling clouds of grey dust. Everything felt imminent, something hovering at the edge of his vision. There was a strangeness in his mind, as if he was but moments from hearing some devastating news, a fatal illness no healer could solve; he knew it was coming, knew it to be inevitable, but the details were unknown and all he could do was wait. Live on in endless anticipation of that cruel, senseless pronouncement.
If there were so many sides to existing, why did grief and pain overwhelm all else? Why were such grim forces so much more powerful than joy, or love, or even compassion? And, in the face of that, did dignity really provide a worthy response? It was but a lifted shield, a display to others, whilst the soul cowered be shy;hind it, in no way ready to stand unmoved by catastrophe, especially the personal kind.
He felt a sudden hatred for the futility of things.
Kadaspala was crawling closer, his slithering stalking betrayed in minute gasps of effort, the attempts at stealth pathetic, almost comical.
Blood and ink, ink and blood, right, Kadaspala? The physical and the spiritual, each painting the truth of the other.
I will wring your neck, I swear it.
He felt motion, heard soft groans, and all at once a figure was crouching down beside him. Ditch opened his eyes. ‘Yes,’ he said, sneering, ‘you were summoned.’