The Second Collected Tales of Bauchelain & Korbal Broach: Three Short Novels of the Malazan Empire

by Steven Erikson

  Are we the children of gods? If so, then what god would so countenance such ignoble spawn? Why is the proper and good path so narrow, so disused, while the cruel and wanton ones proliferate in endless swarm? Why is the choice of integrity the thinnest branch within reach? While the dark wild tree is a mad web across half the sky?

  Oh, yes, I know. You poets will sing to me of value gauged in the strain of the challenge, as if sheer difficulty is the meaning of worth. If righteousness was easy, you say, it would not shine like gold. And do not beggars dream of gold, just as the fallen dream of salvation, and the coward dreams of courage? But you do not understand anything. Do the gods exult in the temptations they fling before us? Why? Are they insane? Are they, in fact, eager to see us fall? Give us the clear and true path, and in the act of seeing the darkness falls away, the lures vanish, the way home beckons us all.

  If you would awaken our souls, dear gods, be so good as to then sweep the shadows from the road ahead.

  No, the gods have all the moral rectitude of children. They created nothing and are no different from us, knuckled to the world.

  Listen! I have no faith in any of you. And naught in me either. Do none of you see how this pilgrimage has already failed? Oh, easy enough for the poets to comprehend that hoary truth – seeking fame we step into their path and cut them down, and then gnaw on their bones. And what of you, Sardic Thew? And you, Lady Snippet? And the Dantoc and her footman? You have eaten of the flesh and it was the easiest road of all, wasn’t it? And who stood tallest with armoured excuses? Why, none other than Tulgord Vise, Champion of Purity, and indeed the Well Knight Arpo Relent, paladin of virtue.

  One day I shall stand before the Nehemoth, before Bauchelain and Korbal Broach. I shall look upon true evil. And they will see in my eyes all the evil that I have done, and they will smile and call me friend. Companion. Cohort in the League of Venality. Could I deny them?

  Faith? Look upon Nifty Gum, this broken thing here. An artist beloved, so beloved his retinue of worshippers would bare fangs against the envy of the gods themselves.

  I found their trail, even as the shadows of dusk closed in. A rampant, rabid thing, skittering this way and that, a small herd led by a blind bull. Rocks overturned, plants torn loose – yes, they hungered. They thirsted. And suffered. Two women, the man they honoured with their loyalty.

  In darkness I came upon their first camp, and from the scuffs and signs I was able to reconstruct the dreadful events with nary a test to my woodsmanship. See me claw my face yet again? The youngest was set upon, the other two in cahoots, a pact forged in a demon’s hole, that one. The innocent child, strangled, all the soft parts of her sweet form torn away by savage teeth. Teeth. Ah, Midge, do I see you pause in your breaking fast? Well you should. You see, when those eager mouths drank and fed, poor Oggle Gush was not yet dead.

  They ate themselves sick, did Pampera and Nifty. And they left the body in their wake, spoiled, rotting. I see your shock, Brash Phluster, and I do mock it. If you had but one adoring fan in your wake, and starvation loomed, you would not hesitate – deny it not! See Nifty Gum, huddled there. No hesitation stuttered his hands.

  When I renewed my tracking, I admit my thoughts were black as a pauper’s pit. Now, I did hunt. I believed I could forge this distinction, you see, between what they had done to that child, and all that we have done on this here trail. Is not the soul a thing of sweet conceit?

  So now, consider this. He had but one worshipper left, and she was close in that she shared his crime, a murderess, a belly-bloated beauty he could touch with familiarity so absolute no mortal could step between them. You might think. And you might fold tight your arms and whisper easing words to yourself. She but followed his lead – what else could she do, after all?

  Was it guilt, then, that launched her upon his back? That sank teeth into his shoulder, striving towards his throat? The mouthfuls of spurting flesh she gobbled down, even as he shrieked and thrashed? And what of Nifty Gum? That he should twist round and bite her in turn, fatally as it transpired, snipping through her jugular, whereupon he bathed and did drink deep. Even as she died, she gnawed upon his right calf, and so was left in a pose of blessed defiance.

  I caught him twenty paces down from this final atrocity, limping and streaming crimson. Oh yes, all of you set eyes upon him now. This poet of appetites. Study him in your arrayed expressions of horror and disgust. Hypocrites one and all. You. Me. The wretched gods, too. Aye, I should have killed him then and there. A quarrel through the back of his head. I should have. But no. Why should the blood stain my hands alone? I give him to you, pilgrims. He is the end of this path, the one we have all chosen. I give him to you all. My gift.

  As his last words drifted and sank into earth and flesh, Brash Phluster licked his lips and said, ‘But, where is she? Can’t we still—’

  ‘No,’ growled Mister Must, in a tone that stirred awake his soldier days, ‘we cannot, Phluster.’

  ‘But I don’t want to die!’

  And at that, Steck Marynd did weep.

  For myself, I admit to a certain satisfaction. Oh, don’t look at me like that! Given the chance, what artist wouldn’t eat his fans? Think of the satisfaction! Far preferable than the opposite, I fervently assert. But let us skip and dance from such admissions, lest they unveil things even more unsightly.

  Sellup crawled from the ditch, her split lips stretched back in a ghastly smile, her eyes fixing upon Nifty Gum. ‘All for me!’ she cackled, dragging herself closer. ‘I won’t eat you, darling! I’m not even hungry!’

  The wretched poet, thrice named Artist of the Century, lifted his bedraggled head. The modest balance of his features was gone, each detail inexpertly reassembled into a pastiche of Gumdom. Old blood stained his chin, flaked the edges of his tunnelled mouth. Flanking the ill-ruddered nose, each eye struggled with the other, fighting over proper alignment, which neither could quite manage. And if a lockbox waited behind those orbs, it was kicked over, contents strewn in tangled heaps. From the weep of his crusted nostrils to the coagulated clumps in his stringy hair, he was indeed a man bereft of his Entourage, barring one dead hag avowing undying servitude.

  ‘It was the eggs,’ he whispered.

  At this even Sellup paused.

  ‘I was so hungry. All I could think of was … was eggs! Sunny side up, scrambled, poached.’ Trembling fingertips touched his mouth and he flinched, as if those fingers did not belong to him at all. ‘Those tales. A dragon spawn trapped in a giant egg – that’s just stupid. I— I don’t even like meat! Not real meat. But eggs, that’s different. Like an idea not yet born, I could eat those. I so want to! It was the maiden he stole. The Egg Demon, I mean. Stole – stole away in the night! I tried to warn them, you see, I really did. But they wouldn’t listen!’ He stabbed a finger at Sellup. ‘You! You wouldn’t listen! I’m out of ideas, don’t you see that!? Why do you think I plundered every fairy tale I could find? It’s – it’s – all gone!’

  ‘I’ll be your egg, sweetie!’ She picked up a rock and rapped it against the side of her head, eliciting a strange muted thump. ‘Crack me open, darling! See? It’s easy!’

  As one might imagine, we stared in morbid fascination at this tableau and all its bizarre logic, and I was reminded of that cabal of poets from Aren a few centuries back, the ones who imbibed all manner of hallucinogens in a misplaced search for enlightenment, only to get lost in the private weirdness that is the artist’s mortal brain when it can discern nothing but its own navel (and who needs hallucinogens for that?).

  ‘Get away from me.’

  ‘Sweetie!’ Thump-thump. ‘Here, take my rock!’ Thump! ‘You can do it too!’ Thump! ‘It’s easy!’

  As it turned out, even Nifty Gum was of no mind to discover what hid inside the skull of one of his fans. Instead, he whispered, ‘Someone end it. Please. Someone. Plea—’

  I would hazard the notion that this heartfelt utterance referred to a wholly natural desire to see Sellup expunged from his (and
everyone else’s) sight, and in that regard Nifty won my sympathies entire. For reasons unknown, however (oh how I lie, don’t I?), Tulgord Vise misinterpreted the Great Artist and in answer he thrust his sword between the poet’s shoulder blades. The point burst from Nifty’s chest in a welter of blood and splintered bone.

  Nifty’s eyes gave up the struggle, and he sagged, leaning heavily on the sword blade before, with a grunt, Tulgord heaved the weapon free. The poet fell back in a puff of dust.

  Sellup moaned. ‘Thumbsy?’

  Seeing the man’s lips moving, I edged closer – after a wary glance Tulgord’s way, but he was already cleaning his blade in the sand beside the trail – and then I leaned close. ‘Nifty? It is me, Flicker.’

  Sudden horror lit up Nifty’s eyes. ‘The eggs,’ he breathed. ‘The eggs!’

  Whereupon, with a strange, blissful smile, he died.

  Is this the fate for all artists who wantonly steal inspiration? Certainly not, and shame on you for even suggesting it.

  Our family was indeed in tatters. But this morning was yet to give up the last of its shocking revelations, for at that moment Well Knight Arpo Relent sat up, blinking the gobs of mucus from his eyes. The crack in his head dripped pink tears, but he seemed unmindful of that.

  ‘Who dressed me?’ he demanded in an odd voice.

  Apto Canavalian lifted his gaze, and a most forlorn and dejected gaze it was. ‘Your mother?’

  Arpo stood, somewhat unsteadily, and tugged clumsily at the straps of his armour. ‘I don’t need this.’

  Poor Sellup had resumed her crawling and was now curled up on Nifty’s sundered chest, tentatively licking at the blood. ‘Look at this,’ she muttered, ‘I have no taste at all.’

  ‘Well Knight,’ said Tulgord Vise, ‘do you recall what happened to you?’

  At that Apto Canavalian started, and then stared up at the Mortal Sword in horror commingled with blistering hatred.

  ‘The blood dried up,’ Arpo answered. ‘Miserable shits, after all I did for them. Open the flood gates! Who pissed on that altar? Was that a demon did that? I hate demons. Death to all demons!’ He succeeded in shucking off his coat of mail and it fell to one side with a golden rustle. ‘All dogs must hereafter walk backwards. That’s my decree and make of it what you will. Pluck one eye from every cat, bring them in buckets – of course I’m serious! No, not the cats, the eyes. It’s tragic the dogs can’t see where they’re going. So, we take those eyes and we—’

  ‘Well Knight!’

  Arpo glared at Tulgord Vise. ‘Who in Farl’s name are you?’

  ‘Wrong question!’ the Mortal Sword snapped. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Well now, what’s this?’

  We all stared at what Relent now gripped in one hand.

  ‘That’s your penis,’ said Apto Canavalian. ‘And I say that advisedly.’

  Arpo stared down at it. ‘Kind of explains everything, doesn’t it?’

  Personally, I see no humour in that statement whatsoever. In any case, Arpo Relent (or whoever happened to be inhabiting his body at that time) now focused his entire attention upon his discovery, and moments later made a mess of things. His brows lifted, and then he smiled and started over again. ‘I could do this all day. In fact, I think I will.’

  With a disgusted grunt Tulgord Vise turned to saddle his horse.

  Sardic Thew clapped his hands. ‘Well! I think today’s the day!’

  Tiny Chanter belched. ‘Better not be. Flicker’s got stories to finish and he ain’t getting away with not finishing them.’

  ‘Dear sir,’ said I, ‘we have the breadth of the sun’s passage, if our host’s assessment is correct and why would we doubt it? Fear not, resolutions abound.’

  ‘If I don’t like what I hear you’re a dead man.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Fl— oh, never mind.

  Studiously, I avoided Purse Snippet’s piercing regard, only to be speared by Relish’s. The maddening expectations of women!

  As if chilled, Apto Canavalian drew tighter his cloak. He rose to stand close to me. ‘Flicker, a word if you please.’

  ‘You need fear nothing from Brash Phluster, sir.’ I raised my voice. ‘Is that not true, Brash?’

  The young poet’s face twisted. ‘I just want things to be fair, Flicker. Tell him that. Fair. I deserve that. We both do, you and me. Tell him that.’

  ‘Brash, he is standing right here.’

  ‘I’m not talking to him.’

  Apto was gesturing, clearly wanting the two of us to walk off a short distance. I glanced around. Mister Must had reappeared with his teapot. Sardic Thew held out his cup with shaky hands, whilst Purse Snippet offered the old man a frail smile as he went to her first. Our host’s visage flashed dark for a moment. Relish was now braiding a whole string of nooses together, reminding me of the winter solstice ritual of an obscure Ehrlii tribe, something to do with hanging charms upon a tree in symbolic remembrance of when they used to hang bigger things from trees. Her brothers were throwing small rocks at Sellup’s head, laughing when one struck. The deathless fan, however, gave no indication of noticing, busy as she was eating Nifty’s heart out. Steck Marynd sat staring at the ashes of the campfire, and all the knuckle bones that glowed like infernal coals.

  Arpo Relent had worked his penis into exhaustion and was now slapping the limp tip back and forth with all the hopeless optimism of an unsated woman on a wedding night.

  ‘We have a few moments yet, it seems,’ I conceded. ‘Lead on, sir.’

  ‘I never wanted to be a judge,’ Apto said once we’d gone about twenty paces up the trail. ‘I shouldn’t be here at all. Do you have any idea how hard it is being a critic?’

  ‘Why, no. Is it?’

  The man shivered in the wretched heat, leading me to wonder if he was fevered. ‘It’s what eats at us all, you see.’

  ‘No, I am afraid I don’t.’

  His eyes flicked at mine. ‘If we could do what you do, don’t you think we would?’

  ‘Ah.’

  ‘It’s like the difference between a fumbling adolescent and a master lover. We’re brilliant in squirts, while you can enslave a woman across the span of an entire night. The truth is, we hate you. In the unlit crevices of our cracked soul, we seethe with resentment and envy—’

  ‘I would not see it that way, Apto. There are many kinds of talent. A sharp eye and a keen intellect, why, they are rare enough to value in themselves, and their regard set upon us is our reward.’

  ‘When you happen to like what we say.’

  ‘Indeed. Otherwise, why, you’re an idiot and it gives us no small amount of pleasure to say so. As far as relationships go,’ I added, ‘there is little that is unique or even at all unusual here.’

  ‘All right, it’s like this, this here, this very conversation we’re having.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘“Entirely lacking profundity, touching on philosophical issues with the subtlety of a warhammer. Reiterations of the obvious” – see my brow lifting to show just how unimpressed I am? So, what do you think I’m really saying when I make such pronouncements?’

  ‘Well, I suppose you’re saying that in fact you are smarter than me—’

  ‘Sharper than your dull efforts to be sure. Wiser, cooler of regard, loftier, far too worldly to observe your clumsy maunderings with anything but amused condescension.’

  ‘Surely it is your right to think so.’

  ‘Don’t you feel a stab of hate, though?’

  ‘Ah, but the wise artist – and indeed, some of us are wise – possesses a most perfect riposte, one that pays no regard to whatever murky motives lie behind such attacks.’

  ‘Really? What is it?’

  ‘Well, before I answer let me assure you that this in no way refers to you, for whom I feel affection and growing respect. That said, why, we forge a likeness in our tale and then proceed to excoriate and torture the hapless arse-hole with unmitigated and relentless contempt.’

  ‘The ego’
s defence—’

  ‘Perhaps, but I am content enough to call it spite.’

  And Apto, being a critic whom as I said I found both amiable and admirable (shock!), was grinning. ‘I look forward to the conclusion of your tales this day, Avas Didion Flicker, and you can be assured that I will consider them most carefully as I ponder the adjudication of the Century’s Greatest Artist.’

  ‘Ah, yes, rewards. Apto Canavalian, do you believe that art possesses relevance in the real world?’

  ‘Now, that is indeed a difficult question. After all, whose art?’

  To that I shrugged. ‘Pray, don’t ask me.’

  All chill had abandoned Apto upon our return to the others. Light his step and fair combed his hair. Brash Phluster bared his teeth upon seeing the transformation, and stewed to a boil of suspicion was his glare in my direction. Mister Must was already perched and waiting atop the carriage, small clouds of smoke rising from his pipe. Steck Marynd sat astride his horse, crossbow resting across one forearm. He wore his soldier’s mask once again, angled sharp with a strew of discipline and stern determination. Indeed, backlit by the morning sun, the exudation surrounding this grim figure was an aura of singular purpose, a penumbra ominous as a jilted woman’s upon the doorstep of a rival’s house.

  Tulgord Vise was in turn swinging himself onto his mount in a jangle of chain and deadly weapons. Stalwart in pose, vigorous in defence of propriety, the Mortal Sword of the Sisters cast grating eyes upon the much-reduced party, and allowed himself a satisfied nod.

  ‘Is this my horse?’ Arpo Relent asked, glaring at the beast that still stood barebacked and hobbled.

  ‘Gods below,’ growled Tulgord. ‘You, Flicker, saddle the thing, else we linger here all day. And you, Phluster, give us a song.’

  ‘Nobody has to die anymore!’

  ‘That’s what you think,’ retorted Tiny Chanter. ‘The Reaver himself is your audience, poet, as it should be. A blade hovers over your head. A sneer announces your death sentence, a yawn spells your doom. A modest drift of attention from any one of us and your empty skull rolls and bounces on the road. Hah, this is how performance should be! Life in the balance!’