Dust of Dreams

by Erikson, Steven

  ‘Bottle,’ cut in Fiddler. ‘Just how much do you really want to know? I told you to keep your head down, didn’t I? Now here you are, and here comes the Adjunct and Yil. I sent you back to the squad for a reason, soldier. You should’ve listened. Now it’s too late.’

  Keneb sent Bulge off to finish striking his command tent and rode through the breaking camps of the Ninth Company. Soldiers stopped talking to watch him ride past. There was none of the usual banter, suggesting to Keneb that the tale of the ‘incident’ at Gesler’s camp had bled out among the ranks. Whatever had happened, it looked bad.

  It’d be nice to get some good news. For a change. ‘The High Mage has opened us a warren that’ll take us right to wherever it is the Adjunct wants us. A lovely warren, rolling fields of flowers and gambolling deer that fall dead at our feet whenever we get hungry. Water? No, the rivers are rivers of wine. Ground’s soft as pillows every night, too. It’s great! Oh, and when we get there, the enemy take one look at us and drop their weapons and send for wagons loaded with the booty of a king’s vault. And the women! Why—’

  ‘Keneb!’

  He turned in his saddle to see Blistig riding up from a side avenue. The man fell in alongside him.

  ‘The morning’s turned into Hood’s hole, Keneb. What else did you hear?’

  ‘About what? Got called to the Ninth, Fifth Squad. That’s all I know.’

  ‘Gesler and Stormy have deserted.’ There was a glint in Blistig’s eyes.

  ‘Ridiculous.’

  ‘The word’s gone out, right out—the whole damned army knows it now. She’s losing it, Keneb, and none too soon as far as I’m concerned. We ain’t gonna hold for this march across the Wastelands. She’ll have to disband us. I liked the look of Letheras—how about you?’

  ‘Gesler and Stormy have not deserted, Blistig.’

  ‘You said you knew nothing—’

  ‘I don’t have to. I know those two. They’re solid as mountains.’

  ‘They’re gone, Keneb. Simple as that—’

  ‘You were summoned to this meeting?’

  ‘Not officially. But it sounds to be army’s business.’

  ‘It concerns a squad in one of my companies, Blistig. Do me a favour, ride the fuck back to your Legion and get them in order. If new commands are going to come down, leave it to the Adjunct’s staff. If she wanted you she’d have invited you.’

  The man’s face darkened. ‘You’ve turned into a real shit, Keneb. Don’t settle in Letheras—the city ain’t big enough for both of us.’

  ‘Go away, Blistig.’

  ‘Once we’re disbanded, I’m coming looking for you, Keneb.’

  ‘The day that happens, Blistig, you won’t make it out of your Legion’s camp. They’ll cut you down not two steps from your tent.’

  ‘Shows what you know. I got rapport. They’ll be at my back when I go for you.’

  Keneb glanced over, brows lifting. ‘Rapport? You’re a joke, Blistig. You’re their joke. Now get out of my face—’

  ‘Not a chance. I’m off to talk with the Adjunct.’

  ‘Talk? About what?’

  ‘My business.’

  They drew closer to a cordon of soldiers. That ring parted as they rode in. Within the circle waited an ominous gathering. Keneb saw Tavore and Yil along with Quick Ben, Fiddler and Bottle. His gaze then found the destroyed tent. That doesn’t look good. He reined in, dismounted. A soldier from the Eighteenth Squad came forward and took the reins. ‘Thank you, Corporal Rib.’ Keneb paused. ‘Think we still need this cordon?’

  ‘Only the inner ring’s doing that, Fist,’ Rib replied. ‘The rest are just gawking.’

  ‘Get me your sergeant,’ Keneb said.

  ‘Aye, sir.’

  Smirking, Blistig moved past, heading for the Adjunct.

  The Eighteenth’s sergeant pushed through. ‘Fist. Bad news, this.’

  ‘So I hear, Gaunt-Eye. Now, round up the other sergeants all these soldiers belong to. I want them out of here. I want them all getting ready for the day’s march. Tell them if I look up in a hundred heartbeats and still see this mob, Hood’s heel is coming down. Am I understood, Sergeant?’

  The Genabackan blinked. ‘Aye, Fist.’ He saluted and then plunged back into the crowd. Almost at once, he started barking orders.

  Corporal Rib grinned. ‘He don’t need the other sergeants, Fist. I ain’t never known a meaner sergeant.’

  ‘Carry on, Corporal.’

  ‘Aye, Fist.’

  Keneb walked over to the motley gathering—these damned all-too-familiar faces, the miserable expressions, the Adjunct’s flat eyes and thin, straight mouth as she stood listening to whatever Blistig was saying. As Keneb reached them Tavore lifted a gauntleted hand, cutting Blistig off.

  ‘Fist Blistig,’ she said, ‘is this the time to petition for an increase in the rum ration?’

  ‘Adjunct, the Eighth Legion may be about to crumble. I’m just wanting to make sure my own legion—’

  ‘That will be enough, Blistig. Return to your legion immediately.’

  ‘Very well, Adjunct. Still, who’d have thought those two would desert.’ He saluted and was forced to hold it while Tavore stood motionless, her regard level and lifeless. As the moment grew uncomfortable, the Adjunct returned the salute, converting it into a dismissive gesture—as if brushing lint from her cloak.

  Face paling, Blistig wheeled and marched back to his horse, only to find that the animal had wandered off—no one had taken the reins from him.

  As he hesitated, Keneb grunted and said, ‘Rapport, aye.’

  ‘Not my legion,’ he snapped. ‘You might want a word or two about courtesy with your soldiers, Keneb.’

  ‘The Malazan military demands courtesy first and expects respect to follow. Lose respect and the courtesy usually goes with it.’

  ‘Remember, I’ll be looking for you.’

  ‘Best find your horse first, Blistig.’

  The Adjunct gestured Keneb over.

  ‘Fist. Our camp security seems to have been breached.’

  ‘They are truly missing, Adjunct?’

  She nodded.

  ‘I cannot see how anyone managed to penetrate this deep into our camp,’ Keneb said. ‘Unless they were our own—but then, where are the bodies? I don’t understand this, Adjunct.’

  ‘The High Mage suggests the attacker was a Shi’gal K’Chain Che’Malle.’

  ‘A what?’

  ‘Sometimes,’ Quick Ben said, ‘those ones grow wings. They’re the Matron’s own assassins, Fist. And one dropped down out of the night and stole them both.’

  ‘To do what with them? Eat them? Why did neither man make a sound?’

  ‘They were selected,’ said the High Mage, ‘and no, I have no idea why.’

  Keneb struggled to make sense of all this. He glanced at Fiddler. The sergeant looked miserable. Well, nothing new there. ‘Gesler and Stormy,’ he slowly ventured, ‘were anything but average marines.’

  ‘As close to ascendants,’ said Quick Ben, ‘as anyone in this army.’

  ‘Will this winged assassin come back for more of us?’ Keneb asked, offering the question to any one of the five soldiers standing opposite him.

  Fiddler grunted. ‘Damn, that’s the first time the question’s come up—you got a point. Why stop with just them?’

  ‘The problem is,’ said Quick Ben, ‘we have no idea what the Che’Malle want with Gesler and Stormy.’

  ‘And no real way to find out,’ added Bottle.

  ‘I see,’ said Keneb. ‘Well, how can we defend against such future attacks? High Mage?’

  ‘I’ll see what I can think up, Fist.’

  ‘One squad member with a crossbow stays awake at all times at night,’ said Keneb. ‘Maybe that won’t help, but it’s a start. Adjunct, if the soldiers begin thinking people can go missing at any time and we can do nothing about it, we’ll end up facing a mutiny.’

  ‘You are correct, Fist. I will see to it that the order
goes out.’ She turned. ‘Captain Yil, ride to the Letherii camp and report our losses—you need hold nothing back from Commander Brys Beddict. Include in your report our conjectures.’

  As Lostara made to leave, Quick Ben said, ‘Captain, be sure that Atri-Ceda Aranict is present.’

  She nodded and then departed.

  The Adjunct stepped close to Keneb. ‘Fist. We have suffered a wound here. It may prove deeper and more serious than any of us presently believe. You may be assured that I will do all that is in my power to find and retrieve Gesler and Stormy—but understand, we must continue the march. We must hold this army together.’

  ‘Aye, Adjunct. To that end, we have another problem. He was just here, in fact.’

  She held his gaze. ‘I am aware of that, Fist. I am also aware of the additional burdens you have been forced to carry as a consequence. I will deal with this matter shortly. In the meantime, we need to make certain that the rumour of Gesler and Stormy deserting is laid to rest. The truth is unpleasant enough in its own right that none will think us dissembling. Summon your officers, Fist.’ She then turned to her High Mage. ‘Do what you can to protect us.’

  ‘I will, Adjunct.’

  ‘And find them, Quick Ben.’

  ‘Again, whatever I can do, I will do it.’

  ‘We cannot lose any more veterans.’

  She did not need to add that without them the chains of this army would snap at the first moment of trouble. Even now, one more gust of ill wind could do us all in.

  Gesler and Stormy, you damned idiots. Probably tossing dice in that rank tent you shared—or stitching a solid wall down the middle to close another spat. As bad as brothers, you two were. And now you’re gone and there’s a huge hole in my company of marines, one I can’t hope to see filled.

  The Adjunct and the High Mage had left. Fiddler and Bottle drew close to their Fist.

  ‘Fire, sir.’

  Keneb frowned at Fiddler. ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘It’s the fire. The one they went through. Thinking on it, I doubt that winged lizard will be back. I can’t be sure, but my feeling is we’ve seen the last of it. And the last of them.’

  ‘You said this to the Adjunct?’

  ‘Just a feeling, sir. I’m sending Bottle out tonight, to see what he can find.’

  Bottle looked thrilled at the prospect.

  ‘Let me know what he discovers, Sergeant. Immediately—don’t wait until morning. I’m not sleeping anyway.’

  ‘I know the feeling, sir. As soon as we get something, then.’

  ‘Good. Go on, now. I’ll see to dispersing Gesler’s squad—hold on, why not take one now? Take your pick, Fid.’

  ‘Shortnose will do. He’s hiding a brain behind all that gnarly bone and whatnot.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ Keneb asked.

  ‘I sent him to collect four people in a specific sequence. I didn’t need to repeat myself, sir.’

  ‘And he’s a heavy?’

  ‘Aye, sometimes things ain’t what they seem, you know?’

  ‘I’ll have to think about that, Fiddler. All right, take him and get going.’

  Outrider Henar Vygulf walked up the main avenue between the ordered rows of the Letherii camp. Though a horseman, the ground trembled slightly with each step he took, and there was little debate as to who was the tallest, biggest soldier in Brys’s army. He drew curious stares as he made his way to HQ. He wasn’t astride his huge horse, after all, and not riding at a torrid pitch making people scatter as was his habit; thus, seeing him on foot was shocking in itself, quite apart from the fact that he was striding into the heart of the encampment. Henar Vygulf hated crowds. He probably hated people. Could be he hated the world.

  Trailing two steps behind him was Lance Corporal Odenid, who was attached to the commander’s staff as a message-bearer. This was his sole task these days: finding soldiers and dragging them back to Brys Beddict. The commander was conducting intensive and extensive interviews, right through the whole army. Odenid had heard that for the most part Brys was asking about the Wastelands, collecting rumours, old tales, wispy legends. The most extraordinary thing of all, when it came to these interviews, was Brys Beddict’s uncanny ability to remember names and faces. At day’s end he would call in a scribe and recount for her a complete and detailed list of those soldiers and support staff he’d spoken with that day. He would give ages, places of birth, military history, even family details such as he had gleaned, and he would add notes on whatever each soldier knew or thought they knew about the Wastelands.

  The Beddict brothers, Odenid concluded, were probably not even human. Probably both god-touched. Hadn’t Brys returned from the dead? And hadn’t he been the only one—until that Tarthenal—to have defeated the Emperor of a Thousand Deaths?

  Henar Vygulf had been summoned for an interview, but this time there was more to it, or so Odenid suspected. An officer from the Bonehunters had ridden into camp early this morning. Something had happened. Odenid didn’t rank high enough to be able to lounge around in the HQ tent, and the commander’s inner circle were a close-mouthed lot one and all. Whatever the news had been, it had stalled the march, probably until noon. And the Malazan was still there, in a private meeting with Brys and his Ceda—Odenid had seen them himself when he’d been summoned in and told to head to the outriders and bring back Henar Vygulf. ‘Or,’ had said Brys, ‘I think he is so named. The tall one, the one with Bluerose ancestry. Has in his train about ten specially bred horses strong enough to carry him—a family of horse-breeders, I seem to recall …’

  And the man slept on his right and pissed standing on one leg, yes, that’s him all right.

  The added thought made Odenid smile. God-touched. Brys hadn’t even interviewed Henar yet.

  They reached the front entrance to the command tent. Henar halted, ignoring the lone guard standing beside the flap as he turned to Odenid. ‘Do you announce me?’

  ‘No. Just go in, Outrider.’

  Henar had to duck, something that never put him in a good mood. There were reasons for living out in the open, good ones, and even these flimsy walls of canvas and now silk seemed to push in on him. He was forced to deepen his breathing, struggling to beat down the panic rising within him.

  Two other aides waved him through to the inner chambers. He tried not to see them once the gestures were made. Walls were miserable enough; people crowded inside the tight spaces they made, with Henar trapped in there with them, was even worse. They were breathing his air. It was all he could do not to snap both their necks.

  That was the problem with armies. Too many people. Even the relatively open camp with its berms and corner fortlets and widely spaced tent rows could instil in him a wild desperation. When he delivered dispatches into such camps, he rode like a madman, just to push through and deliver the message and then get the damned out as quickly as possible.

  He made his way down a too-narrow passage and stepped through a cloying slit in the silks to find himself in a larger room, the ceiling peaked and morning sunlight making the air glow. Commander Brys sat in a folding chair, the Atri-Ceda Aranict standing on his left. Seated in another chair was the Malazan officer, her legs folded showing him a solid, muscled thigh—his eyes followed the sweeping curve of its underside and all at once his breathing steadied. A moment later his gaze lifted to her face.

  Brys waited for the huge man’s attention to return to him. It didn’t. Henar Vygulf was staring at Lostara Yil as if he’d never before seen a woman—granted, a beautiful woman in this instance. Even so … he cleared his throat. ‘Outrider Henar Vygulf, thank you for coming.’

  The man’s eyes flicked to Brys and then back again. ‘As ordered, sir.’

  ‘If I could have your attention? Good. You were attached to the Drene Garrison during the Awl Campaign, correct?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Liaising with the Bluerose Lancers, the company to which you once belonged.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Brys frown
ed. ‘Well, this isn’t working. Outrider, may I introduce to you Captain Lostara Yil, adjutant to the Adjunct Tavore of the Bonehunters. Captain, this is Outrider Henar Vygulf.’

  In the manner of Bluerose court etiquette, Henar lowered himself on to one knee and bowed his head. ‘Captain, it is a pleasure.’

  Yil glanced over at Brys with raised brows.

  He shook his head, equally baffled. As far as he knew, the captain wasn’t nobleborn, and certainly not royalty.

  She hesitated, clearly uncomfortable, and then said, ‘Please rise, Henar. Next time, a salute will suffice.’

  He straightened. ‘As you command, sir.’

  ‘Now,’ said Brys, ‘might we resume?’

  Henar pulled his eyes from Lostara with obvious effort and then nodded. ‘Of course, sir.’

  ‘During the most recent campaign, a renegade Awl named Redmask infiltrated Drene. Blood was shed, and in the pursuit that followed, garrison soldiers were ambushed. Is this accurate so far?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘There followed reports of two demonic creatures serving as bodyguards to this Redmask.’

  ‘Yes, sir. Lizards, running on two legs, fast as a horse, sir. They were sighted and reported on in the campaign itself. The Atri-Preda included descriptions in her dispatches up to and including the first major battle. Thereafter, no messengers managed to make it back.’

  ‘Do you happen to know a soldier named Pride?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘An Awl by birth, but raised by a family in Drene. He was old enough when taken to still remember a number of Awl legends regarding an ancient war for the land with an army of demons of similar description. The Awl were not victorious, but the war ended when the demons migrated east into the Wastelands. Once enemies, then allies? It is possible. Do we know what happened to Redmask? Does he still live?’

  ‘Sir, it’s assumed he’s dead, since the Awl are no more.’

  ‘But no direct proof.’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Thank you, Henar Vygulf. You are dismissed.’