Toll the Hounds Part 49

Her breaths came fast, shallow. Oh, this was a most unantic.i.p.ated tactic of his. Give me nothing, woman. No, give it to yourself instead. Make use of me. As proof. Of your freedom. Tonight you can make yourself free again. The way it felt when you were younger, when there was no husband weighing down your arm. Before the solemn shackles were slipped on. Give me nothing, woman. No, give it to yourself instead. Make use of me. As proof. Of your freedom. Tonight you can make yourself free again. The way it felt when you were younger, when there was no husband weighing down your arm. Before the solemn shackles were slipped on. A most extraordinary invitation indeed. 'Where are my servants?' A most extraordinary invitation indeed. 'Where are my servants?'

'Away for the rest of the night, Lady Vidikas.'

'Just like Hanut Orr. Does he sit in some tavern right now, telling everyone-'

'I arranged nothing with that b.a.s.t.a.r.d. And you must realize, he will talk whether anything happens or not. To wound you. Your reputation.'

'My husband will then hear of it, even though nothing has happened.'

'And should you stand before Gorlas and deny the rumours, will he believe you, Challice?'

No. He wouldn't want to. 'He will not accept being cuckolded.' 'He will not accept being cuckolded.'

'He will smile because he doesn't care. Until it serves him to challenge one of us, me or Hanut, to a duel. On a point of honour. He is a fine duellist. A cruel one at that. He disregards all rules, all propriety. Victory is all that matters and if that means flinging sand into his opponent's eyes he will do just that. A very dangerous man, Challice. I would not want to face him with rapiers bared. But I will if I have to.' Then he shook his head. 'But it won't be me.'

'No?'

'It will be Hanut Orr. That is the man he wants for you. He's given you to Hanut Orr another reason he stormed off, since he finally understood that I would not permit it.'

'So in Gorlas's stead this night you have defended my honour.'

'And failed, because Hanut is skewering your reputation even as we speak. When I said you can make use of me, Challice, I meant it. Even now, here, you can tell me to seek out Hanut yes, I can guess where he is right now and call him out. I can kill him for you.'

'My reputation . . .'

'Is already ruined, Lady Vidikas, and I am truly sorry for that. Tell me what you would have me do. Please.'

She was silent. It was getting difficult to think clearly. Consequences were crashing down like an avalanche and she was buried, all air driven from her lungs. Buried, yes, in what had not even happened.

Yet.

'I will try this freedom of yours, Shardan Lim.'

He rose, one hand settling on the grip of his rapier. 'Milady.'

Oh, how n.o.ble. Snorting, she rose. 'You've taken hold of the wrong weapon.' Snorting, she rose. 'You've taken hold of the wrong weapon.'

His eyes widened. Was the surprise real or feigned? Was there a glimmer of triumph in those blue, blue eyes? She couldn't find it at all.

And that frightened her.

'Shardan . . .'

'Milady?'

'Make no wishes for a future. Do you understand me?'

'I do.'

'I will not free my heart only to chain it anew.'

'Of course you won't. That would be madness.'

She studied him a moment longer, and received nothing new for that effort. 'I am glad I am not drunk,' she said.

And he bowed.

Making, in that one gesture, this night of adultery so very . . . n.o.ble.

Night seeps into Darujhistan, a thick blinding fog in which people stumble or hide as they walk the alleys and streets. Some are drawn like moths to the lit areas and the welcoming eternal hiss of gas from the wrought iron poles. Others seek to move as one with the darkness, at least until some d.a.m.ned piece of crockery snaps underfoot, or a pebble is sent skittering. And everywhere can be seen the small glitter of rodent eyes, or heard the slither of tails.

Light glows through shutters and bubbled gla.s.s windows, but never mind the light and all peaceful slumber and discourse and all the rest such illumination might reveal! Dull and witless the expectations so quickly and predictably surrendered!

A woman in whose soul burned freedom black and blazing arches her back as only the second man in her life slides deep into her and something ignites in her mind Gorlas ever used his fingers in this place, after all, and fingers cannot match G.o.ds below! G.o.ds below!

But leave that now truly, imagination suffices to make eloquent all the clumsy shifting about and strange sounds and the fumbling for this and that, and then that no more! Out into the true darkness, yes, to the fingerless man stalking his next victim.

To a new estate and Captain Torvald Nom of the House Guard, moments from leaving for the night with all security in the so-capable hands of Scorch and Leff (yes, he worked hard on that), who pauses to watch a black two-person carriage trundle into the courtyard, and whose eyes thin to very-most slits of suspicion and curiosity and a niggling feeling of . . . something, as a cloaked, hooded figure steps into view and slides like a bad thought up the stairs and into the main house. Who . . . Who . . . ponder no longer, Torvald Nom! On your way, yes, back home to your loving and suitably impressed wife. Think of nothing but that and that alone and be on your way! ponder no longer, Torvald Nom! On your way, yes, back home to your loving and suitably impressed wife. Think of nothing but that and that alone and be on your way!

A guard with occasional chest pains is questioning patrons of a bar, seeking witnesses who might have seen someone set out to follow that local man into the alley in order to beat him to death and would no one step forward on behalf of that hapless victim? Might do, aye, if'n any of us liked him, y'see . . .

In a crypt (irrationally well lit, of course) sits a man plotting the downfall of the city, starting with a handful of Malazans, and he sits most contented in the absence of shadows or any other ambivalence imposed upon reality.

Out in Chuffs, as moles sleep in their tiny cots, Bainisk sits down beside Harllo's bed to hear more stories about Darujhistan, for Bainisk was born in Chuffs and has never left it, you see, and his eyes glow as Harllo whispers about riches and all sorts of wonderful foods and great monuments and statues and blue fire everywhere and before long both are asleep, Harllo in his lumpy bed and Bainisk on the floor beside it, and across the way Venaz sees this and sneers to display his hatred of both Bainisk and Bainisk's new favourite when Venaz used to be his best, but Bainisk was a betrayer, a liar and worse and someday Harllo would pay for that- Because Harllo was right. He was a boy who drew bullies like a lodestone and this was a cruel fact and his kind were legion and it was a G.o.dly blessing how so many survived and grew up to wreak vengeance upon all those people not as smart as they were, but even that is a bitter reward and never quite as satisfying as it might be.

Back to Darujhistan, with relief, as a Great Raven launches herself skyward from the tower of Baruk's estate, watched with evil satisfaction by a squat, overweight demon staring out from a spark-spitting chimney mouth.

And this was a night like any other, a skein of expectations and antic.i.p.ations, revelations and perturbations. Look around. Look around! On all sides, day and night, light and dark! Every step taken with the firm resolve to believe in the solid ground awaiting it. Every step, one after another, again and again, and no perilous ledge yawns ahead, oh no.

Step and step, now, step and step-

CHAPTER TEN.

Will you come and tell me when the music ends When the musicians are swallowed in flames Every instrument blackening and crumbling to ash When the dancers stumble and sprawl their diseased limbs rotting off and twitching the skin sloughing away

Will you come and tell me when the music ends When the stars we pushed into the sky loose their roars And the clouds we built into visible rage do now explode When the bright princes of privilege march past with dead smiles falling from their faces a host of deceiving masks

Will you come and tell me when the music ends When reason sinks into the mora.s.s of superst.i.tion Waging a war of ten thousand armies stung to the lash When we stop looking up even as we begin our mad running into stupidity's nothingness with heavenly choirs screaming

Will you come and tell me when the music ends When the musicians are no more than black grinning sticks Every instrument wailing its frantic death cry down the road When the ones left standing have had their mouths cut off leaving holes from which a charnel wind eternally blows Will you come and tell me when the music ends The fire is eating my breath and agony fills this song When my fingers crack on the strings and fall from my hands And this dance twists every muscle like burning rope while your laughter follows down my crumpling corpse

Won't you come and tell me when the music ends When I can leap away and face one G.o.d or a thousand Or nothing at all into this blessed bliss of oblivion When I can prise open this box and release cruel and bitter fury at all the mad fools crowding the door in panicked flight

Watch me and watch me with eyes wide and shocked With disbelief with horror with indignant umbrage to upbraid And the shouted Nays are like drumbeats announcing a truth The music ends my friends, my vile, despicable friends, and see me see me slam the door slam it hard in all your faces!

The Music Ends Fisher kel Tath

His boots crunched on water-worn stones slick with mist as he made his way to the water's edge. The steep slopes of the surrounding mountainsides were verdant, thick rainforest, crimson-barked trees towering high, beards of moss hanging from toppled trunks.

Endest Silann leaned on his stolid walking stick, the muscles of his legs trembling. He looked round as he slowly regained his breath. It was chilly, the sun's arc just slipping past the western peaks, and shadow swallowed the river valley.

Black water rushed by and he felt its cold no need to squat down, no need to slide a hand into the tugging current. This dark river was, he could see now, nothing like Dorssan Ryl. How could he have expected otherwise? The new is ever but a mangled echo of the old and whatever whispers of similarity one imagined do naught but sting with pain, leaving one blistered with loss. Oh, he had been a fool, to have journeyed all this way. Seeking what? Even that he could not answer.

No, perhaps he could. Escape. Brief, yes, but escape none the less. Escape. Brief, yes, but escape none the less. The coward flees, knowing he must return, wishing that the return journey might kill him, take his life as it did the old everywhere. The coward flees, knowing he must return, wishing that the return journey might kill him, take his life as it did the old everywhere. But listen! You can shape your soul make it a bucket, a leaking one that you carry about. Or your soul can be a rope, thick and twisted, refusing to break even as it buckles to one knot after another. Choose your image, Endest Silann. You are here, you've made it this far, haven't you? And as he told you . . . not much farther to go. Not much farther at all. But listen! You can shape your soul make it a bucket, a leaking one that you carry about. Or your soul can be a rope, thick and twisted, refusing to break even as it buckles to one knot after another. Choose your image, Endest Silann. You are here, you've made it this far, haven't you? And as he told you . . . not much farther to go. Not much farther at all.

He smelled woodsmoke.

Startled, alarmed, he turned away from the rush of the river. Faced upstream whence came the late afternoon breeze. There, in distant gloom, the muted glow of a campfire.

Ah, no escape after all. He'd wanted solitude, face to face with intractable, indifferent nature. He'd wanted to feel . . . He'd wanted solitude, face to face with intractable, indifferent nature. He'd wanted to feel . . .

irrelevant. He'd wanted the wildness to punch him senseless, leave him humiliated, reduced to a wretch. Oh, he had wanted plenty, hadn't he?

With a sour grunt, Endest Silann began walking upstream. At the very least, the fire would warm his hands.

Thirty paces away, he could see the lone figure facing the smoky flames. Huge, round-shouldered, seated on a fallen log. And Endest Silann smiled in recognition.

Two trout speared on skewers cooked above the fire. A pot of simmering tea sat with one blackened shoulder banked in coals. Two tin cups warmed on the flat rock making up one side of the hearth.

Another log waited opposite the one on which sat the warlord, Caladan Brood, who slowly twisted round to watch Endest Silann approach. The broad, oddly b.e.s.t.i.a.l face split into a wry smile. 'Of all the guests I imagined this night, old friend, you did not come to mind. Forgive me. You took your time since beginning your descent into this valley, but for that I will happily make allowances but do not complain if the fish is overcooked.'

'Complaints are far away and will remain so, Caladan. You have awakened my appet.i.te for food, drink and, most of all, company.'

'Then sit, make yourself comfortable.'

'So you did indeed disband your army after the siege,' said Endest Silann, making his way over to settle himself down. 'There were rumours. Of course, my master said nothing.'

'See me now,' said the warlord, 'commanding an army of wet stones, and yes, it proves far less troublesome than the last one. Finally, I can sleep soundly at night.

Although, matching wits with these trout has challenged me mightily. There, take one of those plates, and here beware the bones, though,' he added as he set a fish on the plate.

'Alone here, Caladan Brood it makes me wonder if you are hiding.'

'It may be that I am, Endest Silann. Unfortunately, hiding never works.'

'No, it never does.'

Neither spoke for a time as they ate their supper. The trout was indeed overdone but Endest Silann said nothing, for it was delicious none the less.

If Anomander Rake was a mystery shrouded in darkness, then Caladan Brood was one clothed in geniality. Spare with words, he nevertheless could make virtually anyone feel welcome and, indeed, appreciated. Or rather, he could when the pressures of command weren't crouched on his shoulders like a d.a.m.ned mountain. This night, then, Endest Silann well understood, was a gift, all the more precious in that it was wholly unexpected.

When the meal was done, night's arrival closed out the world beyond the fire's light. The rush of the river was a voice, a presence. Water flowed indifferent to the heave and plunge of the sun, the shrouded moon and the slow spin of the stars. The sound reached them in a song without words, and all effort to grasp its meaning was hopeless, for, like the water itself, one could not grasp hold of sound. The flow was ceaseless and immeasurable and just as stillness did not in fact exist, so neither did true, absolute silence.

'Why are you here?' Endest Silann asked after a time.

'I wish I could answer you, old friend, and Burn knows the desire to ease the burden is almost overwhelming.'

'You are a.s.suming, Caladan, that I am ignorant of what awaits us.'

'No, I do not do that after all, you have sought a pilgrimage, out to this river and among the Tiste Andii, this place has proved a mysterious lure. Yet you ask why I am here, and so your knowledge must be . . . incomplete. Endest Silann, I cannot say more. I cannot help you.'

The old Tiste Andii looked away, off into the dark where the river sang to the night. So, others had come here, then. Some instinctive need drawing them, yes, to the ghost of Dorssan Ryl. He wondered if they had felt the same disappointment as he had upon seeing these black (but not black enough) waters. It is not the same. Nothing ever is, beginning It is not the same. Nothing ever is, beginning with ourselves. with ourselves. 'I do not,' he said, 'believe much in forgiveness.' 'I do not,' he said, 'believe much in forgiveness.'

'What of rest.i.tution?'

The question stunned him, stole his breath. The river rushed with the sound of ten thousand voices and those cries filled his head, spread into his chest to grip his heart. Cold pooled in his gut. By the Abyss . . . such . . . ambition. By the Abyss . . . such . . . ambition. He felt the icy trickle of tears on his fire-warmed cheeks. 'I will do all I can.' He felt the icy trickle of tears on his fire-warmed cheeks. 'I will do all I can.'

'He knows that,' Caladan Brood said with such compa.s.sion that Endest Silann almost cried out. 'You might not believe this now,' the huge warrior continued, 'but you will find this pilgrimage worthwhile. A remembrance to give strength when you need it most.'

No, he did not believe that now, and could not imagine ever believing it. Even so . . . the ambition ambition. So appalling, so breathtaking.

Caladan Brood poured the tea and set a cup into Endest's hands. The tin shot heat into his chilled fingers. The warlord was standing beside him now.

'Listen to the river, Endest Silann. Such a peaceful sound . . .'

But in the ancient Tiste Andii's mind that sound was a wailing chorus, an overwhelming flood of loss and despair. The ghost of Dorssan Ryl? No, this was where that long dead river emptied out, feeding the midnight madness of its history into a torrent where it swirled with a thousand other currents. Endless variations on the same bitter flavour.