House of Chains

by Steven Erikson

  The warleader was standing outside the flap, drinking deep from a waterskin. He was out of his armour, wearing only a thin, sweat-stained linen shirt.

  Corabb halted before him. ‘There is much to tell you, Leoman of the Flails.’

  ‘Out with it, then,’ Leoman replied when he’d finished drinking.

  ‘I was your only messenger to survive to reach Sha’ik. She has had a change of heart—she now commands that you lead the Army of the Apocalpyse come the morrow. She would have you, not Korbolo Dom, leading us to victory.’

  ‘Would she now,’ he drawled, then squinted and looked away. ‘The Napan has his assassins between us and Sha’ik?’

  ‘Aye, but they will not challenge our entire force—they would be mad to attempt such a thing.’

  ‘True. And Korbolo Dom knows this—’

  ‘He has not yet been informed of the change of command—at least he hadn’t when I left. Although Sha’ik had issued a demand for his presence—’

  ‘Which he will ignore. As for the rest, the Napan knows. Tell me, Corabb, do you think his Dogslayers will follow any other commander?’

  ‘They shall have no choice! The Chosen One has so ordered!’

  Leoman slowly nodded. Then he turned back to his tent. ‘Break camp. We ride to Sha’ik.’

  Exultation filled Corabb’s chest. Tomorrow would belong to Leoman of the Flails. ‘As it should be,’ he whispered.

  Kalam stepped outside. His clothes were in tatters, but he was whole. Though decidedly shaken. He had always considered himself one of the ablest of assassins, and he had drawn a blade against a veritable host of inimical, deadly foes over the years. But Cotillion had put him to shame.

  No wonder the bastard’s a god. Hood’s breath, I’ve never before seen such skill. And that damned rope!

  Kalam drew a deep breath. He had done as the Patron of Assassins had asked. He had found the source of the threat to the Realm of Shadow. Or at least confirmed a host of suspicions. This fragment of Kurald Emurlahn will be the path to usurpation . . . by none other than the Crippled God. The House of Chains had come into play, and the world had grown very fraught indeed.

  He shook himself. Leave that to Cotillion and Ammanas. He had other, more immediate tasks to attend to this night. And the Patron of Assassins had been kind enough to deliver a pair of Kalam’s favourite weapons . . .

  His eyes lit upon the leprous corpse lying a half-dozen paces away, then narrowed. Kalam moved closer. Gods below, that is some wound. If I didn’t know better, I’d say from the sword of a T’lan Imass. The blood was thickening, soaking up dust from the flagstones.

  Kalam paused to think. Korbolo Dom would not establish his army’s camp among the ruins of this city. Nor in the stone forest to the west. The Napan would want an area both clear and level, with sufficient room for banking and trenches, and open lines of sight.

  East, then, what had once been irrigated fields for the city, long ago.

  He swung in that direction and set out.

  From one pool of darkness to the next, along strangely empty streets and alleys. Heavy layers of sorcery had settled upon this oasis, seeming to flow in streams—some of them so thick that Kalam found himself leaning forward in order to push his way through. A miasma of currents, mixed beyond recognition, and none of them palatable. His bones ached, his head hurt, and his eyes felt as if someone was stirring hot sand behind them.

  He found a well-trod track heading due east and followed it, staying to one side where the shadows were deep. Then saw, two hundred paces ahead, a fortified embankment.

  Malazan layout. That, Napan, was a mistake.

  He was about to draw closer when he saw the vanguard to a company emerge through the gate. Soldiers on foot followed, flanked by lancers.

  Kalam ducked into an alley.

  The troop marched past at half-pace, weapons muffled, the horses’ hoofs leather-socked. Curious, but the fewer soldiers in the camp the better, as far as he was concerned. It was likely that all but the reserve companies would have been ensconced in their positions overlooking the field of battle. Of course, Korbolo Dom would not be careless when it came to protecting himself.

  He calls himself master of the Talon, after all. Not that Cotillion, who was Dancer, knows a damned thing about them. Sparing the revelation only a sneer.

  The last of the soldiers filed past. Kalam waited another fifty heartbeats, then he set out towards the Dogslayer encampment.

  The embankment was preceded by a steep-sided trench. Sufficient encumbrance to a charging army, but only a minor inconvenience to a lone assassin. He clambered down, across, then up the far side, halting just beneath the crest-line.

  There would be pickets. The gate was thirty paces on his left, lantern-lit. He moved to just beyond the light’s range, then edged up onto the bank. A guard patrolled within sight on his right, not close enough to spot the assassin as he squirmed across the hard-packed, sun-baked earth to the far edge.

  Another trench, this one shallower, and beyond lay the ordered ranks of tents, the very centre of the grid dominated by a larger command tent.

  Kalam made his way into the camp.

  As he had suspected, most of the tents were empty, and before long he was crouched opposite the wide street encircling the command tent.

  Guards lined every side, five paces apart, assault crossbows cocked and cradled in arms. Torches burned on poles every ten paces, bathing the street in flickering light. Three additional figures blocked the doorway, grey-clad and bearing no visible weapons.

  Flesh and blood cordon . . . then sorcerous wards. Well, one thing at a time.

  He drew out his pair of ribless crossbows. A Claw’s weapons, screw-torqued, the metal blackened. He set the quarrels in their grooves and carefully cocked both weapons. Then settled back to give the situation some thought.

  Even as he watched he saw the air swirl before the command tent’s entrance, and a portal opened. Blinding white light, the flare of fire, then Kamist Reloe emerged. The portal contracted behind him, then winked out.

  The mage looked exhausted but strangely triumphant. He gestured at the guards then strode into the tent. The three grey-clothed assassins followed the mage inside.

  A hand light as a leaf settled on Kalam’s shoulder, and a voice rasped, ‘Eyes forward, soldier.’

  He knew that voice, from more years back than he’d like to think. But that bastard’s dead. Dead before Surly took the throne.

  ‘Granted,’ the voice continued, and Kalam knew that acid-spattered face was grinning, ‘no love’s lost between me and the company I’m sharing . . . again. Figured I’d seen the last of every damn one of them . . . and you. Well, never mind that. Need a way in there, right? Best we mount a diversion, then. Give us fifty heartbeats . . . at least you can count those, Corporal.’ The hand lifted away.

  Kalam Mekhar drew a deep, shaky breath. What in Hood’s name is going on here? That damned captain went renegade. They found his body in Malaz City the morning after the assassinations . . . or something closely approximating his body . . .

  He focused his gaze once more upon the command tent. From beyond it a scream broke the night, then the unmistakable flash and earth-shaking thump of Moranth munitions. Suddenly the guards were running.

  Tucking one of the crossbows into his belt, Kalam drew out the otataral long-knife. He waited until only two Dogslayers were visible, both to the right of the entrance, facing the direction of the attack—where screams ripped the air, as much born of horror as from the pain of wounds—then surged forward.

  Raising the crossbow in his left hand. The recoil thrumming the bones of his arm. The quarrel burying itself in the back of the further guard. Long-knife thrusting into the nearer man, point punching through leather between plates of bronze, piercing flesh then sliding between ribs to stab the heart.

  Blood sprayed as he tugged the weapon free and darted into the tent’s doorway.

  Wards collapsed around him.

  W
ithin the threshold he reloaded the crossbow and affixed it in the brace on his wrist—beneath the voluminous sleeves. Then did the same with the other one on his left wrist.

  The main chamber before him held but a lone occupant, a grey-robed assassin who spun at Kalam’s arrival, a pair of hooked Kethra knives flashing into guard position. The face within the hood was expressionless, a narrow, sun-darkened visage tattooed in the Pardu style, the swirling artistry broken by a far heavier sigil branded into the man’s forehead—a talon.

  The grey-clad assassin suddenly smiled. ‘Kalam Mekhar. I suppose you don’t remember me.’

  In answer Kalam drew out his second long-knife and attacked.

  Sparks bit the air as the blades clashed and whispered, the Pardu driven back two steps until, with a sweeping backslash, he leapt to the right and sidestepped round to give himself more space. Kalam maintained the pressure, weapons flashing as they darted out, keeping the Talon on the defensive.

  He had skill with those heavy Kethra knives, and both quickness and strength. Kalam’s blades took blocking blows that reverberated up the bones of his arms. Clearly, the Pardu was seeking to break the thinner weapons, and, well made as they were, nicks and notches were being driven into the edges.

  Further, Kalam knew he was running out of time. The diversion continued, but now, along with the crack of sharpers ripping the air, waves of sorcery had begun rolling in deafening counterpoint. Whatever the nature of the squads attacking the Dogslayers, mages were giving answer.

  Worse yet, this Talon didn’t enter here alone.

  Kalam suddenly shifted stance, extending the knife in his left hand and drawing his right hand back to take guard position. He led with the point, evading the parries, and, in increments, slowly retracted his left arm, beginning at the shoulder. The faintest pivoting of hips, drawing the lead leg back—

  And the Pardu closed the distance with a single step.

  Kalam’s right hand shot across, beating aside both Kethra blades, simultaneously lunging high with his left hand.

  The Pardu flung both weapons up to parry and trap the thrust.

  And Kalam stepped in still closer, stabbing crossways with the long-knife in his right hand. Punching the tip into the man’s lower belly.

  A gush of fluids, the edge gouging along the spine, the point then plunging out the other side.

  The parry and trap had torn the long-knife in his left hand from its grasp, flinging it to one side.

  But the Talon was already sagging, folding over the belly wound and the weapon impaling him.

  Kalam leaned closer. ‘No,’ he growled. ‘I don’t.’

  He tugged his knife free and let the dying man fall to the layered rugs of the tent floor.

  ‘A damned shame,’ mused a voice near the back wall.

  Kalam slowly turned. ‘Kamist Reloe. I’ve been looking for you.’

  The High Mage smiled. He was flanked by the other two Talons, one of whom held Kalam’s second long-knife and was examining it curiously. ‘We’ve been expecting a strike by the Claws,’ Kamist Reloe said. ‘Although an attack by long-dead ghosts was, I admit, not among our expectations. It is Raraku, you understand. This damned land is . . . awakening. Well, never mind that. Soon, there will be . . . silence.’

  ‘He holds an otataral weapon,’ the assassin on Kamist’s right said.

  Kalam glanced down at the blood-smeared long-knife in his right hand. ‘Ah, well, that.’

  ‘Then,’ the High Mage sighed, ‘you two shall have to take him in the, uh, mundane way. Will you suffice?’

  The one holding the long-knife flung it behind him and nodded. ‘We’ve watched. He has patterns . . . and skill. Against either one of us singly we’d be in trouble. But against both of us?’

  Kalam had to agree with the man’s assessment. He stepped back, and sheathed his weapon. ‘He’s probably right,’ he rumbled. With his other hand he drew out the acorn and tossed it on the floor. All three men flinched back as it bounced then rolled towards them. The innocuous object came to a halt.

  One of the Talons snorted. Kicked it to one side.

  Then the two assassins stepped forward, knives flickering.

  Kalam raised both arms, twisted his wrists outward, then flexed them hard.

  Both Talons grunted, then staggered backward, each impaled by a quarrel.

  ‘Careless of you,’ Kalam muttered.

  Kamist shrieked, unveiling his warren.

  The wave of sorcery that struck the High Mage caught him entirely unawares, coming from one side. Death-magic closed around him in a sizzling, raging web of black fire.

  His shriek escalated. Then Kamist Reloe sprawled, the sorcery still flickering over his twitching, burned body.

  A figure slowly emerged from where the Talon had kicked the acorn moments earlier, and crouched down beside Kamist Reloe. ‘It’s disloyalty that bothers us the most,’ he said to the dying High Mage. ‘We always answer it. Always have. Always will.’

  Kalam recovered his second long-knife, eyes on the closed flaps on the chamber’s back wall. ‘He’s through there,’ he said, then paused and grinned. ‘Good to see you, Quick.’

  Quick Ben glanced over and nodded.

  The wizard was, Kalam saw, looking older. Worn down. Scars not written on his skin, but on his heart. He will, I suspect, have nothing good to tell me when all this is done. ‘Did you,’ he asked Quick Ben, ‘have anything to do with the diversion?’

  ‘No. Nor did Hood, although the hoary bastard’s arrived. This is all Raraku.’

  ‘So Kamist said, not that I understand either of you.’

  ‘I’ll explain later, friend,’ Quick Ben said, rising. He faced the back flap. ‘He has that witch Henaras with him, I think. She’s behind some fierce wards that Kamist Reloe raised.’

  Kalam approached the doorway. ‘Leave those to me,’ he growled, unsheathing his otataral long-knife.

  The room immediately beyond was small, dominated by a map table, on which was sprawled the corpse of Henaras. Blood was still flowing in streams down the table’s sides.

  Kalam glanced back at Quick Ben and raised his brows.

  The wizard shook his head.

  The assassin gingerly approached, and his eyes caught something glimmering silver-white on the woman’s chest.

  A pearl.

  ‘Seems the way is clear,’ Kalam whispered.

  Another flap slashed the wall opposite.

  Using the points of his knives, Kalam prised it open.

  A large high-backed chair filled the next chamber, on which was seated Korbolo Dom.

  His blue skin was a ghastly grey, and his hands shook where they rested on the chair’s ornate arms. When he spoke his voice was high and tight, jittery with fear. ‘I sent an emissary to the Adjunct. An invitation. I am prepared to attack Sha’ik and her tribes—with my Dogslayers.’

  Kalam grunted. ‘If you think we’ve come with her answer, you’d be wrong, Korbolo.’

  The Napan’s eyes darted to Quick Ben. ‘We assumed you were either dead with the rest of the Bridgeburners, or still on Genabackis.’

  The wizard shrugged. ‘Tayschrenn sent me ahead. Even so, he’s brought the fleet across on mage-driven winds. Dujek Onearm and his legions reached Ehrlitan a week past—’

  ‘What’s left of those legions, you mean—’

  ‘More than enough to complement the Adjunct’s forces, I should think.’

  Kalam stared between the two men. The Bridgeburners . . . dead? Whiskeyjack? Onearm’s Host—gods below, what happened over there?

  ‘We can salvage this,’ Korbolo Dom said, leaning forward. ‘All of Seven Cities, returned to the Empire. Sha’ik brought in chains before the Empress—’

  ‘And for you and your soldiers a pardon?’ Quick Ben asked. ‘Korbolo Dom, you have truly lost your mind—’

  ‘Then die!’ the Napan shrieked, leaping forward, hands reaching for the wizard’s throat.

  Kalam stepped in and, knife reversed, struck
Korbolo Dom hard against the side of the head.

  The Napan staggered.

  A second fist shattered his nose and sent him sprawling.

  Quick Ben stared down at the man. ‘Truss him up, Kalam. That diversion’s over, from the silence outside—I’ll find us a way out.’

  Kalam began tying the unconscious man’s hands. ‘Where are we taking him?’

  ‘I’ve a thought to that.’

  The assassin glanced up at his friend. ‘Quick? The Bridgeburners? Whiskeyjack?’

  The hard, dark eyes softened. ‘Dead. Barring Picker and a handful of others. There’s a tale there, and I promise I will tell it in full . . . later.’

  Kalam stared down at Korbolo Dom. ‘I feel like cutting throats,’ he rasped.

  ‘Not him. Not now.’

  Hold back on the feelings, Kalam Mekhar. Hold back on everything. Quick’s right. In time. In time . . .

  Oh, Whiskeyjack . . .

  There was time for . . . everything. This night and for the day to come, Bidithal needed Sha’ik. And the Whirlwind Goddess. And perhaps, if all went well, there would be the opportunity for bargaining. Once the goddess’s rage has cooled, annealed into beauty by victory—we can still achieve this.

  But I know now what Febryl has done. I know what Korbolo Dom and Kamist Reloe plan for the dawn.

  They could be stopped. The knives could be turned.

  He hobbled as quickly as he could towards Sha’ik’s palace. Ghosts flitted about on the edges of his vision, but his shadows protected him. In the distance he heard screams, detonations and sorcery—coming, he realized, from the Dogslayers’ camp. Ah, so that Claw’s made it that far, has he? Both good and . . . troubling. Well, at the very least he’ll keep Kamist occupied.

  Of course, the danger posed by the roving assassins still existed, though that was diminishing the closer he got to Sha’ik’s abode.

  Still, the streets and alleys were disturbingly deserted.

  He came within sight of the sprawling palace, and saw with relief the pools of torchlight surrounding it.

  Counter the Napan’s gambit—awaken the goddess to the threat awaiting her. Then hunt down that gnarled bhok’aral Febryl and see his skin stripped from his writhing flesh. Even the goddess—yes, even the goddess will have to recognize me. My power. When flanked by my new pets—