Deadhouse Gates

by Steven Erikson

  Moby led the way, revealing a return of nerve, and something like possessive pride. Just beyond the intersection, in the left-hand passage, there was an alcove set in the wall, on which hung resplendent scale armour suited to a wearer over ten foot tall and of massive girth. Two double-bladed axes leaned against the niche walls, one to either side. Moby paused there to play a tiny, loving hand over one iron-sheathed boot, before wistfully moving on. Crokus stumbled in passing as it momentarily gripped his full attention.

  Upon opening the door, they entered the tower's ground floor. A stone staircase spiralled up from its centre. At the foot of the saddlebacked steps lay another body, a young, dark-skinned woman who looked as if she had been placed there but an hour before. She was dressed in what were clearly underclothes, though the armour that had once covered them was nowhere to be seen. Vicious wounds crisscrossed her slight form.

  Apsalar approached, crouched down and rested a hand on the girl's shoulder. 'I know her,' she whispered.

  'Eh?' Rellock growled.

  'The memory of the one who possessed me, Father,' she said. 'His mortal memory—'

  'Dancer,' Fiddler said.

  She nodded. 'This is Dassem Ultor's daughter. The First Sword recovered her after Hood was done using her, and brought her here, it seems.'

  'Before breaking his vow to Hood—'

  'Aye, before Dassem cursed the god he once served.'

  'That was years ago, Apsalar,' Fiddler said.

  'I know.'

  They were silent, all studying the frail young woman lying at the foot of the stairs. Mappo shifted Icarium's weight in his arms, as if uneasy with the echo he knew he had become, even though it was understood that he would not do with his burden what Dassem Ultor had done.

  Apsalar straightened and cast her eyes up the staircase. 'If Dancer's memory serves, the portal awaits.'

  Fiddler swung to the others. 'Mappo? You will join us?'

  'Aye, though perhaps not all the way—assuming there's a means to leave that warren when one so chooses—

  'Quite an assumption,' the sapper said.

  The Trell simply shrugged.

  'Iskaral Pust?'

  'Oh, aye. Of course, of course! Why not, why ever not? To walk the maze back out? Insanity! Iskaral Pust is anything but insane, as you all well know. Aye, I shall accompany you… and silently add to naught but myself: perhaps an opportunity for betrayal will yet arise! Betray what? Betray whom? Does it matter? It is not the goal that brings pleasure, but the journey taken to achieve it!'

  Fiddler met Crokus's sharp gaze. 'Watch him,' he said.

  'I shall.'

  The sapper then glanced down to Moby. The familiar squatted by the doorway, quietly playing with its own tail. 'How does one say goodbye to a bhok'aral?'

  'With a boot in the backside, how else?' Pust offered.

  'Care to try that with this one?' Fiddler asked.

  The High Priest scowled, made no move.

  'He was out there when we travelled the storms, wasn't he?' Crokus said, approaching the tiny wizened creature. 'Recall those battles we could not see? He was protecting us… all along."

  'Aye,' the sapper said.

  'Ulterior motives!' Pust hissed.

  'Nonetheless.'

  'Gods, he'll be lonely!' Crokus gathered the bhok'aral into his arms. There was no shame to the tears in the lad's eyes.

  Blinking, Fiddler turned away, grimacing as he studied the staircase. 'It'll do you no good to draw it out, Crokus,' he said.

  'I'll find a way to visit,' the Daru whispered.

  'Think on what you see, Crokus,' Apsalar said. 'He looks content enough. As for being alone, how do you know that will be the case? There are other Houses, other guardians…'

  The lad nodded. Slowly he released his grip on the familiar and set it down. 'With luck, there won't be any crockery lying around.'

  'What?'

  Crokus smiled. 'Moby always had bad luck around crockery, or should I say it the other way around?' He rested a hand on the creature's blunt, hairless head, then rose. 'Let's go.'

  The bhok'aral watched the group ascend the stairs. A moment later there was a midnight flash from above, and they were gone. The creature listened carefully, cocking its tiny head, but there was no more sound from the chamber above.

  It sat unmoving for a few more minutes, idly plucking at its own tail, then swung about and scampered into the hallway, coming to a stop before the suit of armour.

  The massive, closed great helm tilted with a soft creak, and a ragged voice came from it. 'I am pleased my solitude is at an end, little one. Tremorlor welcomes you with all its heart… even if you have made a mess on the hallway floor.'

  Dust and gravel sprayed, rapping against Duiker's shield, as the Wickan horsewarrior struck the ground and rolled, coming to a stop at the historian's feet. No more than a lad, the Crow looked almost peaceful, eyes closed as if in gentle sleep. But for him, all dreams had ended.

  Duiker stepped over the body and stood for a moment in the dust it had raised. The short sword in his right hand was glued there by blood, announcing every shift of his grip with a thick, sobbing sound.

  Riders wheeled across the hoof-churned space before the historian. Arrows sped out from the gaps between them, hummed like tigerflies through the air. He jerked his shield around to catch one darting for his face, and grunted at the solid whack that drove the hide-covered rim against mouth and chin, splitting both.

  Tarxian cavalry had broken through and was only moments away from severing the dozen remaining squads from the rest of the company. The Crow counterattack had been savage and furious, but costly. Worst of all, Duiker saw as he moved warily forward, it might well have failed.

  The infantry squads had been broken apart and had reformed into four groups—only one of them substantial—which now struggled to re-knit. Less than a score of Crow horsewarriors remained upright, each one surrounded by Tarxians hacking at them with their broad-bladed tulwars. Everywhere horses writhed and screamed on the ground, kicking out in their pain.

  The back end of a cavalry horse nearly knocked him over. Stepping around, Duiker closed in and thrust the point of his sword into a Tarxian's leather-clad thigh. The light armour resisted a moment, until the historian threw all his weight behind the stab, feeling the point pierce flesh, sink deep and grate against bone. He twisted the blade.

  A tulwar slashed down, biting solidly into Duiker's shield. He bent low, pulling the snagged weapon with him. Fresh blood drenched his sword hand as he yanked his blade free. The historian hacked and chopped at the man's hip until the horse sidestepped, carrying the rider beyond his reach.

  He pushed his helm rim clear of his eyes, blinked away grit and sweat, then moved forward again, towards the largest knot of infantry.

  Three days since Sanimon Valley and the bloody reprieve granted them by the Khundryl tribe. Their unexpected allies had closed that battle pursuing the remnants of their rival tribes into the hours of dusk, before slipping off to return, presumably, to their own lands. They had not been seen since.

  The mauling had driven Korbolo Dom into a rage—that much was patently clear—for the attacks were now incessant, a running battle over forty hours long and with no sign that it would relent any time soon.

  The beleaguered Chain of Dogs was struck again and again, from the flanks, from behind, at times from two or three directions at once. What vengeful blades, lances and arrows did not achieve, exhaustion was completing. Soldiers were simply falling to the ground, their armour in tatters, countless minor wounds slowly draining the last of their reserves. Hearts failed, major blood vessels burst beneath skin to blossom into bruises that were deep black, as if some dreadful plague now ran amok through the troops.

  The scenes Duiker had witnessed were beyond horror, beyond his ability to comprehend.

  He reached the infantry even as the other groups managed to close and link up, wheeling into a bladed wheel formation that no horse—no matter how well trai
ned—would challenge.

  Within the ring, a swordsman began beating sword on shield, bellowing to add his voice to the rhythm of blows. The wheel spun, each soldier stepping in time, spun, crossing the ground, spun, slowly returning to where the remaining company still held the line on this, the west flank of the Chain.

  Duiker moved with them, part of the outer ring, delivering killing blows to whatever wounded enemy soldier the wheel trampled. Five Crow riders kept pace. They were the last survivors of the counterattack and, of those, two would not fight again.

  A few moments later the wheel reached the line, broke apart and melted into it. The Wickans dug spurs into their lathered horses to race southward. Duiker pushed his way through the ranks until he stumbled into the clear. He lowered his quivering arms, spat blood onto the ground, then slowly raised his head.

  The mass of refugees marched before him, a procession grinding past the spot where he stood. Wreathed in dust, hundreds of faces were turned in his direction, watching that thin cordon of infantry behind him—all that lay between them and slaughter—as it surged, buckled and grew ever thinner with each minute that passed. The faces were expressionless, driven to a place beyond thought and beyond emotion. They were part of a tidal flow where no ebb was possible, where to drop back too far was fatal, and so they stumbled on, clutching the last and most precious of their possessions: their children.

  Two figures approached Duiker, coming down alongside the stream of refugees from the vanguard position. The historian stared at them blankly, sensing that he should recognize the two—but every face had become a stranger's face.

  'Historian!'

  The voice jarred him out of his fugue. His split lip stung as he said, 'Captain Lull.'

  A webbed jug was thrust at him. Duiker forced his short sword back into its scabbard and accepted the jug. The cool water filled his mouth with pain but he ignored it, drinking deep.

  'We've reached Geleen Plain,' Lull said.

  The other person was Duiker's nameless marine. She wavered where she stood, and the historian saw a vicious puncture wound in her left shoulder, where a lance-point had slipped over her shield. Broken rings from her armour glittered in the gaping hole.

  Their eyes met. Duiker saw nothing still alive in those once beautiful light-grey eyes, yet the alarm he felt within him came not from what he saw, but from his own lack of shock, the frightening absence of all feeling—even dismay.

  'Coltaine wants you,' Lull said.

  'He's still breathing, is he?'

  'Aye.'

  'I imagine he wants this.' Duiker pulled free the small glass bottle on its silver chain. 'Here—'

  'No,' Lull said, frowning. 'Wants you, Historian. We've run into a tribe of the Sanith Odhan—so far they're just watching.'

  'Seems the rebellion's a less certain thing down here,' Duiker muttered.

  Sounds of battle along the flanking line diminished. Another pause, a few heartbeats in which to recover, to repair armour, quench bleeding.

  The captain gestured and they began walking alongside the refugees.

  'What tribe, then?' the historian asked after a moment. 'And, more importantly, what's it got to do with me?'

  'The Fist has reached a decision,' Lull said.

  Something in those words chilled Duiker. He thought to probe for more, yet dismissed the notion. The details of that decision belonged to Coltaine. The man leads an army that refuses to die. We've not lost a refugee to enemy action in thirty hours. Five thousand soldiers… spitting in the face of every god …

  'What do you know of the tribes this close to the city?' Lull asked as they continued on.

  'They've no love of Aren,' Duiker said.

  'Worse for them under the Empire?'

  The historian grunted, seeing the direction the captain pursued in his questions. 'No, better. The Malazan Empire understands borderlands, the different needs of those living in the countryside—vast territories in the Empire, after all, remain nomadic, and the tribute demanded is never exorbitant. More, payment for passage across tribal lands is always generous and prompt. Coltaine should know this well enough, Captain.'

  'I imagine he does—I'm the one that needs convincing.'

  Duiker glanced at the refugees on their left, scanning the row upon row of faces, young and old, within the ever-present shroud of dust. Thoughts pushed past weariness, and Duiker felt himself tottering on an edge, beyond which—he could now clearly see—waited Coltaine's desperate gamble.

  The Fist has reached a decision.

  And his officers balk, flinch back overwhelmed with uncertainty. Has Coltaine succumbed to despair? Or does he see all too well?

  Five thousand soldiers…

  'What can I say to you, Lull?' Duiker asked.

  'That there's no choice left.'

  'You can answer that yourself.'

  'I dare not.' The man grimaced, his scarred face twisting, his lone eye narrowing amidst a nest of wrinkles. 'It's the children, you see. It's what they have left—the last thing they have left. Duiker—'

  The historian's abrupt nod cut out the need to say anything more—a swiftly granted mercy. He'd seen those faces, had come close to studying them—as if, he'd thought at the time, seeking to find the youth that belonged there, the freedom and innocence—but that was not what he sought, nor what he found. Lull had led him to the word itself. Simple, immutable, thus far still sacrosanct.

  Five thousand soldiers will give their lives for it. But is this some kind of romantic foolishness—do I yearn for recognition among these simple soldiers? Is any soldier truly simple—simple in the sense of having a spare, pragmatic way of seeing the world and his place in it? And does such a view preclude the profound awareness I now believe exists in these battered, footsore men and women?

  Duiker swung his gaze to his nameless marine, and found himself meeting those remarkable eyes, as if she had but waited for him—his thoughts, doubts and fears—to come around, to seek her.

  She shrugged. 'Are we so blind that we cannot see it, Duiker? We defend their dignity. There, simple as that. More, it is our strength. Is this what you wished to hear?'

  I'll accept that minor castigation. Never underestimate a soldier.

  Sanimon itself was a massive tel, a flat-topped hill half a mile across and over thirty arm-spans high, its jumbled plateau barren and windswept. In the Sanith Odhan immediately south of it, where the Chain now struggled, two ancient raised roads remained from the time when the tel had been a thriving city. Both roads ran straight as spears on solid cut-stone foundations; the one to the west—now unused as it led to another tel in hills bone dry and nowhere else—was called Painesan'm. The other, Sanijhe'm, stretched southwest and still provided an overland route to the inland sea called Clatar. At a height of fifteen arm-spans, the roads had become causeways.

  Coltaine's Crow Clan commanded Sanijhe'm near the tel, manning it as if it was a wall. The southern third of Sanimon itself was now a Wickan strongpoint, with warriors and archers of the Foolish Dog and Weasel clans. As the refugees were led along the east edge of Sanimon, the tel's high cliff wall obviated the need for a flanking guard on that side. Troops moved to support the rearguard and the eastern flank. Korbolo Dom's forces, which had been engaged in a running battle with both elements, had their noses bloodied once again. The Seventh was still something to behold, despite its diminished numbers, soldiers among it pitching dead to the ground without a visible wound on them, others wailing and weeping even as they slayed their foes. The arrival of mounted Wickan archers completed the rout, and the time had come once more for rest.

  Fist Coltaine stood waiting, alone, facing the odhan to the south. His feather cloak fluttered in the wind, its ragged edges shivering in the air's breath. Lining a ridge of hills in that direction, two thousand paces distant, another tribe sat their horses, barbaric war standards motionless against the pale-blue sky.

  Duiker's gaze held on the man as they approached. He tried to put himself inside Coltain
e's skin, to find the place where the Fist now lived—and flinched back in his mind. No, not a failure of imagination on my part. An unwillingness. I can carry no-one else's burden—not even for a moment. We are all pulled inside ourselves now, each alone…

  Coltaine spoke without turning. 'The Kherahn Dhobri—or so they are named on the map.'

  'Aren's reluctant neighbours,' Duiker said.

  The Fist turned at that, his eyes sharp. 'We have ever held to our treaties,' he said.

  'Aye, Fist, we have—to the outrage of many Aren natives.'

  Coltaine faced the distant tribe again, silent for a long minute.

  The historian glanced at his nameless marine. 'You should seek out a cutter,' he said.

  'I can still hold a shield—'

  'No doubt, but it's the risk of infection…'

  Her eyes widened and Duiker was felled mute, a rush of sorrow flooding him. He broke the gaze. You're a fool, old man.

  Coltaine spoke. 'Captain Lull.'

  'Fist.'

  'Are the wagons ready?'

  'Aye, sir. Coming up now.'

  Coltaine nodded. 'Historian.'

  'Fist?'

  The Wickan slowly turned round to face Duiker. 'I give you Nil and Nether, a troop from the three clans. Captain, has Commander Bult informed the wounded?'

  'Aye, sir, and they have refused you.'

  The skin tightened around Coltaine's eyes, but then he slowly nodded.

  'As has,' Lull continued, looking at Duiker, 'Corporal List.'

  'I admit,' the Fist sighed, 'those I selected from my own people are none too pleased—yet they will not disobey their warleader. Historian, you shall command as you see fit. Your responsibility, however, is singular. Deliver the refugees to Aren.'

  And so we come to this. 'Fist—'

  'You are Malazan,' Coltaine cut in. 'Follow the prescribed procedures—'

  'And if we are betrayed?'

  The Wickan smiled. 'Then we all join Hood, here in one place. If there must be an end to this, let it be fitting.'

  'Hold on as long as you can,' Duiker whispered. 'I'll skin Pormqual's face and give the order through his lips if I have to.'