The Malazan Empire Series: (Night of Knives, Return of the Crimson Guard, Stonewielder, Orb Sceptre Throne, Blood and Bone, Assail) (Novels of the Malazan Empire)

by Ian C. Esslemont

  His old companion bowed silently, though wonder and hurt warred upon his face. Jatal kneed Ash onward.

  The Elites were indeed gathering. Princess Andanii was already in attendance. An even stronger bodyguard of Vehajarwi captains surrounded her. Jatal bowed a greeting. ‘Princess.’

  She too eyed him uncertainly, as if detecting something odd in his tone or manner. Jatal thought she looked flushed and wary. For an instant hope flared in his chest as he imagined that it was shame that brought such colour to her cheeks. Shame and regret. Then another voice sneered upon such hopes: She only now is touched by a true awareness of the enormity of what she attempts.

  Yet to his admiring gaze she appeared an inspiringly warlike figure in her white robes, with her wind-whipped headscarf hanging dazzlingly bright over her bands of enamelled green and silver armour. Her great longbow stood tall at her back. Her peaked helmet sported its Vehajarwi crest of a stylized leaping horse.

  ‘Prince,’ she responded. ‘This day we may realize our ambitions.’

  ‘Indeed.’ But which ambitions might those be?

  She reared tall in her saddle to peer back over the assembled Elites. A new fervour glowed in her brown eyes and she thrust up an arm, shouting: ‘Glory to the Adwami!’

  A great roar answered her as two thousand throats echoed the shout. Jatal bowed his answer. Indeed, may this day bring glory to the Adwami. If only that. Andanii brought her arm down chopping forward and they surged ahead, charging for the road to the capital.

  It was not yet dawn. A golden pink light suffused the flat eastern horizon. Behind, the night was purple and dark ocean-green with the clinging sullen glow of the Visitor. The air was crisp and cool. It dried Jatal’s sweaty face and neck. His hands upon the reins became numb. The road was empty – either word of their presence had spread, or traffic was always rather light. From what Jatal had seen so far of the lack of commerce for such a large population, he suspected the latter.

  They did pass field after field, some fallow, most crowded with tall stands of rice. The food production at least was impressive. One could give the Thaumaturgs that: they were organized. What was lacking, however, was anything beyond a mere agrarian society. They rode past clutches of farmers’ hamlets, granaries, even corrals for livestock, but where were the merchant houses, the inns, the manufacturers or traders? These magus-scholar overlords seemed to encourage none of those. They were no doubt quite happy to keep their populace chained to the countryside.

  As they drew nearer the capital, this populace revealed itself in greater numbers. Figures worked hunched in the fields, bent wretches in rags bowed to them from the sides of the road as they stormed past. No doubt they were required by law to move aside for anyone riding by – under the logic that anyone not busy working the land must be an official.

  This lack of reliance on mechanisms and domesticated animals struck Jatal as further serving to subjugate the populace. The work they must do was simply all that much greater. They passed more of those Thaumaturg-altered oxen-like labourers: some toiled in the fields pulling simple wooden implements; others were strapped to irrigation water-wheels or pulling carts.

  So far the Warleader’s predictions appeared borne out: this populace constituted no threat. So beaten down were they that anything beyond the limited horizons of their daily grinding round was as alien as travel to another land. Yet this very seeming lack of humanity profoundly disturbed Jatal. They seemed incapable of anything, yet at the same time chillingly capable of everything imaginable.

  The outskirts of the capital hove into view. Like Isana Pura in the south, this urban centre lay as a huge rambling conglomeration of low, single- or double-storey brick and clay box-like buildings. Laundry hung drying from flat ceilings or on stands. Striped awnings stretched out over the narrow streets.

  Crowds of pedestrians fled from them down side streets or into doorways. They encountered a few pathetic efforts to raise barricades. At their approach the city-dwellers manning these simply ran, abandoning the overturned carts and heaped barrels and wooden chests. These the Adwami jumped or quickly demolished. Their mounted scouts kept reappearing to urge the main column onward.

  They reached the Inner City complex. A massive wall of rust-hued brick surrounded it and its main gate, a good two rods in height and sheathed in iron-studded bronze, remained sealed. A broad open marshalling field – or killing ground – surrounded the walls, complete with narrow stone ditches.

  The scouts milled here, far back from the main gate. A scattering of dead men and horses littered the paved ground. Tall spears, or javelins, stood from their bodies. ‘What is this?’ Jatal demanded of the nearest rider. ‘Who is defending?’

  ‘Yakshaka on the walls,’ the Awamir rider answered.

  ‘Why is the way yet sealed?’

  ‘We are to await the Warleader’s mercenaries,’ Andanii called. ‘They will open the way.’

  What was this? More secrets between them? Here was further evidence of their intimacy. And of his irrelevance. He did not know which writhed in his chest the worse. What more details might they have arranged behind his back? Perhaps this attack was intended to rid her and the Warleader of more than one obstacle to their supremacy. Perhaps he was riding to his death.

  Well … she has slain me already. This flesh is but a hollow shell. But my people, what of them? Pinal will protect them. He will withdraw.

  The clatter of hooves marked the arrival of the Warleader’s van. He rode at the fore. The giant Scarza loped alongside his horse, a monstrous two-bladed axe over one shoulder. His warhound, Jatal sneered. And yet the man had seemed quite friendly earlier – all the more to quell your suspicions!

  Jatal acknowledged the Warleader’s arrival with an impatient wave. ‘Our advance is halted already!’

  ‘A small matter,’ the Warleader answered. ‘My men will take it.’ Dismounting, he motioned to the half-Trell. ‘Scarza, you will lead the assault.’

  The giant grinned, further revealing his great yellowed tusks. ‘We will be within in moments.’ He passed Jatal and gave a conspiratorial wink. ‘Now you will see the professionals at work, yes?’

  Jatal found he could no longer answer the man’s jesting banter in kind. The Trell turned away, frowning as if uneasy, and clapped his enormous hands together. ‘Come, lads! Form up!’

  From his vantage point mounted on Ash’s back, it appeared to Jatal like an all-out assault. Troops formed to a wide front. He saw teams of shieldmen and crossbowmen gathering, and what one might call sappers, or siegeworkers, who carried coiled rope and large iron grapnels. Behind this attack force rallied ranks of archers who would presumably provide covering fire.

  Still mounted on his heavy warhorse, the Warleader walked it to the fore. Turning, he regarded the ranks. More than ever he now struck Jatal as a figure of war and rapine. His battered and ragged mail coat hung iron-grey down the sides of his mount. His equally ashen beard seemed to meld with the neck of his camail. His flat smoky eyes seemed forged from iron. The Grey Man, he sometimes overheard the mercenaries calling him. Or the Grey Ghost.

  Behind him, tall gleaming figures now moved slowly at the crenellations of the walls – the yakshaka forming into position. ‘Soldiers,’ the Warleader began, his voice strong, ‘you follow me as a proven war leader. Today you will have your reward! Take this position and this city and all it contains will be yours to choose from. Enough riches to buy estates in any country of your choice. Or you may choose to remain here and share in the rulership of these lands. Victory here could win you everything. Defeat will bring you nothing. From this point onward, the choice is yours.’ And he bowed his head to them, briefly, as if to reinforce: this day is yours.

  The mercenaries howled their answer like bloodthirsty wolves. They shook their weapons. Scarza goaded them on, bellowing and roaring. The sound froze Jatal’s blood. He’d never heard the like. This must be how they conduct war in other lands. It struck him as barbaric.

  The trained schol
ar within, however, coolly observed, They are working themselves into a frenzy to do what they must: a direct assault on the gate. Many will die and only chance will decide which.

  Desperate men and women making an all or nothing throw against long odds. It was a wager Jatal wouldn’t take.

  His gaze found Andanii’s pale and sweat-sheathed face. She watched the mercenaries and their preparations as if mesmerized. The realization came to him then: You fool! You are in the midst of such a throw now. And you may very well have already lost …

  Still roaring, the mercenaries charged. Teams spread out to tackle as wide a front as possible. They clambered down the sloping sides of the slit ditches then scrabbled up the far sides. The ranks of archers followed more slowly, stopping to fire salvos that arched for the walls.

  And where are these vaunted Thaumaturgs? Duelling the shaduwam within, I hope.

  At the walls yakshaka appeared with what looked like javelins. These they heaved in mighty throws far outstripping anything a common man might manage. The missiles landed with earsplitting clanging and ringing. They slammed into the stone-flagged grounds to stand erect. Where they stuck mercenaries, shieldmen or no, they passed straight through, pinning the unfortunate to the spot.

  Those are solid bronze rods, Jatal realized, awed. Now he knew why the horses had fallen: they had been completely run through as well.

  The assault wave reached the walls. Grapnels flew, trailing knotted ropes. The yakshaka moved to respond. Men and women climbed with desperate speed. Here and there yakshaka took hold of the grapnels, and, despite the astounding weight of several attackers, heaved the line free to send them falling in a screaming heap.

  Arrows stood from the armoured giants like forests of quills; they seemed to pay them no attention. They dropped their bronze spears straight down. The missiles wrought a horrific price among the clumped besiegers. Yet it looked to Jatal as though there were far more lines than defenders. Mercenaries now made the battlements atop the walls. Here they met the yakshaka, who cut them down as they came.

  With attackers on the walls, the archers eased off. The Warleader barked a command and they roared their own growling throaty answer. They charged, adding their numbers to the assault.

  Had this been an attack on any other wall in any other place with the attackers so outnumbering the defenders, Jatal imagined that the outcome would not have been in doubt. But these were armoured yakshaka guards. They swept the mercenaries from the walls. Cut them down with great blows of their two-handed blades. The attack appeared to be stalling.

  Jatal spotted Scarza climbing a rope at one of the uncontrolled sections of wall. He rose hand over hand, his axe swinging at his back. Making the battlements, he charged for the front line. Jatal glimpsed him between crenellations, dodging and ducking as he made his way closer to the line of defenders. Then a yakshaka came tottering from the battlement, overbalanced, then fell in utter silence. It crashed to the ground, shattering upon the stone flags in an explosion like an enormous pot breaking.

  An answering cheer arose from the mercenaries waiting their turn on the ropes.

  Jatal again glimpsed the broad form of the Trell as he shouldered aside another of the defenders and straight-armed it over a low section of the crenellations. This one also fell in complete silence to burst like a dropped pot.

  Do those things not even know fear? Jatal wondered. Why no scream or roar of protest?

  Scarza charged the gatehouse tower. ‘He might just make it,’ Jatal murmured to the Warleader.

  The mercenary was stroking his grizzled beard. ‘Scarza has never failed me,’ he answered, in the smug tone one might use when discussing a prized dog or horse.

  That tone drove Jatal to flinch in distaste, only to realize: I am no better. He returned to studying the battle. Have I wronged you, foreigner?

  The Warleader nodded to Andanii, who pulled her rapt gaze from the wall and jerked a curt answer. She turned on her mount to the marshalled Elites, yelled: ‘Ready to advance!’

  Jatal thought her voice a touch too choked and shrill. Perhaps she had lost her taste for adventure and daring, now that the price to pay was so bitter. It occurred to him that their positions had seemingly reversed: he, once reluctant and fearful, was now completely open to whatever the day might bring.

  They waited. Horses nickered their tension. Fittings jangled and rang. Jatal was surprised to find his breathing even. He glanced to Andanii and found her eyes on him; she quickly looked away. Checking my resolve? Searching for signs of fear? Today you’ll find none. Today we shall see who is truly weak.

  I swear to that.

  The foreign mercenaries kept climbing; by now most of the archers had gained the wall. Sounds of fighting echoed from within. Then the crash of cavalry reached them: it was distant, from elsewhere about the city. The Adwami tribes invading from all quarters. Jatal glimpsed pillars of smoke climbing into the sky over the low roofs.

  The tall twin leaves of the gate shook as if from a great blow. Dust sifted down their iron-studded faces. They creaked and groaned, moving. Then slowly swung apart revealing Scarza and the cheering mercenaries.

  The Warleader raised his arm. Andanii too thrust her arm high. He brought his swinging down like a scythe. She echoed the gesture. Jatal bellowed a war cry and heeled Ash into a gallop. He drew his sword and bent forward over Ash’s neck aiming the curved blade ahead.

  The crash and reverberation of a storm of hooves marked the column following. He passed the narrow ditches, the litter of fallen men and horses. Ash jumped one dead Saar mount. Ahead, Scarza beckoned from the wide gate. Jatal’s heart hammered even louder than Ash’s hooves. What awaited them? The Warleader had said to make for the central complex.

  A wide main approach faced Jatal. It was flanked by long buildings looking like dormitories or housing of some sort. As before at Isana Pura, the architecture offered almost no hint as to which buildings were more important than any other: all were low and uniform. A glimpse into the Thaumaturg mind and philosophy, of course. Following plain logic, Jatal urged Ash onward, making for the centre.

  The approach ended at a wide set of stone stairs leading up to a broad columned building – a reception hall perhaps. Jatal yanked Ash to a halt and dismounted. Here, the first sign of violence within the gates offered itself. Corpses in dark robes lay sprawled on the stairs, black fluids dribbling like treacle. Ash flinched away, rearing and sounding his unease. The horrific stench raised Jatal’s gorge, yet despite this, or because of it, he climbed the stairs. His boots slipped and slid on the thick flowing mush. The corpses consisted of dead Thaumaturgs plus a few attacking shaduwam – the first he’d seen since Isana Pura. Like their brethren, these were mostly naked, filthy and unwashed. By their bent shattered bones and burst flesh, it looked as if their deaths had been as grotesque as they seemed to hope for. The Thaumaturgs, on the other hand, appeared to have succumbed to some sort of rotting curse: their bones lay still articulated by ligaments and sinew within their robes, yet mostly sloughed of all soft flesh. That flesh – skin, fat, muscle and organs – ran as a melted slush to spread from under the lips of their robes and sleeves and come seeping down the stairs in a broad red carpet.

  Jatal pressed the back of his hand to his mouth and turned away. By all the gods of the world! He was leading Andanii into this? He glimpsed his bared sword and nearly laughed at the ridiculousness of the gesture. The Warleader had come up behind him. He surveyed the ghastly scene without a flicker of expression, though he did nod as if satisfied. ‘Good,’ he murmured. Then, advancing, gestured, this way.

  The column fell in behind the Warleader. Jatal peered sidelong to Andanii. The Vehajarwi princess had paled to snow. She swallowed nervously and wiped her gleaming sweaty brow, her gaze darting everywhere.

  Good, Jatal thought. Her conscience plagues her. She knows doubts – yet it is too late. Far too late.

  More corpses littered the hall in smeared fluids. The warm humid air stank of excrement. Jata
l stepped over the sprawled, obscenely flattened bodies. ‘The shaduwam appear to have won through,’ the Warleader observed.

  Ahead, stairs descended into an interior sunken court surrounded by smaller, separate buildings. Statues bordered the court on all sides. These were the first depictions of the human form Jatal had seen from the Thaumaturgs: they were uniform, a figure bent in reflection, hands clasped, yet mouth open as if about to speak. The Warleader led the way down the stairs and across the court. Here were the bodies of several shaduwam. They lay contorted, hands at throats, their faces sculptures of agony. They had actually gouged bloody wounds at their necks with their own dirty broken nails. The sight made Jatal unbearably uneasy. Was this some sort of Thaumaturg curse?

  As the leading element of the column reached the top of the opposite stairs, stones shifted behind in a loud grinding and Jatal spun. A mist gusted from the mouths of the surrounding statues in one long loud exhalation. The troopers caught in the sunken court, some thirty of them, clutched at their throats. Weapons clattered to the stones. Andanii lurched down the stairs as if she would rescue the nearest, but Jatal thrust an arm across her chest, stopping her. ‘They are dead already,’ he told her.

  Across the court the rest of the column halted, glaring left and right, their eyes wide. ‘Go round!’ Jatal called. The leading ranks acknowledged this, saluting. They led the way to the sides, searching for a way through. Somehow, Jatal did not think this would be easy; they had entered a labyrinth of traps or dead ends. All prepared by the Thaumaturgs for unwary invaders long ago.

  ‘What now?’ Andanii asked the Warleader.

  The man’s perpetual expression of impatient disapproval twisted even further as he peered ahead. He motioned aside. ‘This way, I believe.’ He strode on without waiting.

  Jatal moved to follow but Andanii stilled him with a hand on his arm. ‘We need to talk,’ she whispered, low.

  Her voice, so husky and close, raised an answering thrill in his blood. Yet he clamped down on the sensation and kept his expression indifferent. A final confession, my princess?