Toll the Hounds

by Steven Erikson

  Seerdomin lifted his head and glared over at the decapitated corpse. ‘Can you understand any of that, Harak? Can you grasp, now, finally, how the very existence of people like you gives me reason to stay alive? Because you give my rage a face, and my sword, well, it’s hungry for faces.’ It was either that, or the fury within him would devour his own soul. No, better to keep the face he slashed open someone else’s, rather than his own. Keep finding them, one after another. Justice was so weak. The corrupt won, the pure of heart failed and fell to the wayside. Graft and greed crowed triumphant over responsibility and compassion. He could fight that, and that fight need not even be in his own name. He could fight for Black Coral, for the Tiste Andii, for humanity itself.

  Even for the Redeemer – no, that cannot be. What I do here can never be healed – there can be no redemption for me. Ever. You must see that. All of you must see that.

  He realized he was pleading – but to whom? He did not know. We were put in an impossible situation, and, at least for us, the tyrant responsible is dead – has been punished. It could have been worse – he could have escaped retribution, escaped justice.

  There was trauma in war. Some people survived it; others were for ever trapped in it. For many of those, this circumstance was not a failing on their part. Not some form of sickness, or insanity. It was, in truth, the consequence of a profoundly moral person’s inability to reconcile the conflicts in his or her soul. No healer could heal that, because there was nothing to heal. No elixir swept the malady away. No salve erased the scars. The only reconciliation possible was to make those responsible accountable, to see them face justice. And more often than not, history showed that such an accounting rarely ever took place. And so the veteran’s wounds never mend, the scars never fade, the rage never subsides.

  So Seerdomin had come to believe, and he well knew that what he was doing here, with weapon in hand, solved nothing of the conflict within him. For he was as flawed as anyone, and no matter how incandescent his rage, his righteous fury, he could not deliver pure, unsullied justice – for such a thing was collective, integral to a people’s identity. Such a thing must be an act of society, of civilization. Not Tiste Andii society – they clearly will not accept that burden, will not accede to meting out justice on behalf of us humans, nor should they be expected to. And so . . . here I am, and I hear the Redeemer weep.

  One cannot murder in the name of justice.

  Irreconcilable. What he had been, what he was now.

  The things he did then, and all he was doing here, at this moment.

  The would-be usurper knelt beside him, headless in sour symbolism. But it was a complicated, messy symbol. And he could find for himself but one truth in all of this.

  Heads roll downhill.

  It may be that in the belief of the possibility of redemption, people willingly do wrong. Redemption waits, like a side door, there in whatever court of judgement we eventually find ourselves. Not even the payment of a fine is demanded, simply the empty negotiation that absolves responsibility. A shaking of hands and off one goes, through that side door, with the judge benignly watching on. Culpability and consequences neatly evaded.

  Oh, Salind was in a crisis indeed. Arguments reduced until the very notion of redemption was open to challenge. The Redeemer embraced, taking all within himself. Unquestioning, delivering absolution as if it was without value, worthless, whilst the reward to those embraced was a gift greater than a tyrant’s hoard.

  Where was justice in all of this? Where was the punishment for crimes committed, retribution for wrongs enacted? There is, in this, no moral compass. No need for one, for every path leads to the same place, where blessing is passed out, no questions asked.

  The cult of the Redeemer . . . it is an abomination.

  She had begun to understand how priesthoods were born, the necessity of sanctioned forms, rules and prohibitions, the moral filter defined by accepted notions of justice. And yet, she could also see how profoundly dangerous such an institution could become, as arbiters of morality, as dispensers of that justice. Faces like hooded vultures, guarding the door to the court, choosing who gets inside and who doesn’t. How soon before the first bag of silver changes hands? How soon before the first reprehensible criminal buys passage into the arms of the blind, unquestioning Redeemer?

  She could fashion such a church, could formalize the cult into a religion, and she could impose a harsh, unwavering sense of justice. But what of the next generation of priests and priestesses? And the one after that, and the next one? How long before the hard rules make that church a self-righteous, power-mongering tyranny? How long before corruption arrives, when the hidden heart of the religion is the simple fact that the Redeemer embraces everyone who comes before him? A fact virtually guaranteed to breed cynicism in the priesthood, and from such cynicism secular acquisitiveness would be inevitable.

  This loss was not just a loss of faith in the Redeemer. It was a loss of faith in religion itself.

  Her prayers touched a presence, were warmed by the nearby breath of an immortal. And she pleaded with that force. She railed. Made demands. Insisted on explanations, answers.

  And he took all her anger into his embrace, as he did everything else. And that was wrong.

  There were two meanings to the word ‘benighted’. The first was pejorative, a form of dour ignorance. The second was an honour conferred in service to a king or queen. It was this latter meaning that had been applied to Seerdomin, a title of respect.

  There was a third definition, one specific to Black Coral and to Seerdomin himself. He dwelt in Night, after all, where Darkness was not ignorance, but profound wisdom, ancient knowledge, symbolic of the very beginning of existence, the first womb from which all else was born. He dwelt in Night, then, and for a time had made daily pilgrimages out to the barrow with its forbidden riches, a one-man procession of rebirth that Salind only now comprehended.

  Seerdomin was, in truth, the least ignorant of them all. Had he known Itkovian in his life? She thought not. Indeed, it would have been impossible. And so whatever had drawn Seerdomin to the cult arrived later, after Itkovian’s death, after his ascension. Thus, a personal crisis, a need that he sought to appease with daily prayers.

  But . . . why bother? The Redeemer turned no one away. Blessing and forgiveness was a certainty. The bargaining was a sham. Seerdomin need only have made that procession once, and been done with it.

  Had no one confronted him, he would still be making his daily pilgrimage, like an animal pounding its head against the bars of a cage – and, disregarded to one side, the door hanging wide open.

  Was that significant? Seerdomin did not want the Redeemer’s embrace. No, the redemption he sought was of a different nature.

  Need drove her from the bed in the temple, out into Night. She felt weak, light-headed, and every step seemed to drain appalling amounts of energy into the hard cobbles underfoot. Wrapped in a blanket, unmindful of those she passed, she walked through the city.

  There was meaning in the barrow itself, in the treasure that none could touch. There was meaning in Seerdomin’s refusal of the easy path. In his prayers that asked either something the Redeemer could not grant, or nothing at all. There was, perhaps, a secret in the Redeemer’s very embrace, something hidden, possibly even deceitful. He took in crimes and flaws and held it all in abeyance . . . until when? The redeemed’s death? What then? Did some hidden accounting await each soul?

  How much desperation hid within each and every prayer uttered? The hope for blessing, for peace, for the sense that something greater than oneself might acknowledge that hapless self, and might indeed alter all of reality to suit the self’s desires. Were prayers nothing more than attempted bargains? A pathetic assertion of some kind of reciprocity?

  Well, she would not bargain. No, she had questions, and she wanted answers. She demanded answers. If the faith that was given to a god came from nothing more than selfish desires, then it was no less sordid than base greed. If to
hand over one’s soul to a god was in fact a surrendering of will, then that soul was worthless, a willing slave for whom freedom – and all the responsibility that entailed – was anathema.

  She found herself reeling through the gate, on to the road that Seerdomin once walked day after day. It had begun raining, the drops light, cool on her fevered forehead, sweet as tears in her eyes. Not much grew to either side of the road, not even the strange Andiian plants that could be found in the walled and rooftop gardens. The dying moon had showered this place in salt water, a downpour the remnants of which remained as white crust like a cracked skin on the barren earth.

  She could smell the sea rising around her as she staggered on.

  And then, suddenly, she stumbled into daylight, the sun’s shafts slanting in from the east whilst a single grey cloud hung directly overhead, the rain a glittering tracery of angled streaks.

  Bare feet slipping on the road’s cobbles, Salind continued on. She could see the barrow ahead, glistening and freshly washed, with the mud thick and churned up round its base. There were no pilgrims to be seen – perhaps it was too early. Perhaps they have all left. But no, she could see smoke rising from cookfires in the encampment. Have they lost their way, then? Is that surprising? Have I not suffered my own crisis of faith?

  She drew closer, gaze fixed now on the barrow.

  Redeemer! You will hear me. You must hear me!

  She fell on to her knees in the mud and its chill rippled up through her. The rain was past and steam now rose on all sides. Water ran in trickles everywhere on the barrow, a hundred thousand tears threading through all the offerings.

  Redeemer—

  A fist closed in the short hair at the back of her neck. She was savagely pulled upright, head yanked round. She stared up into Gradithan’s grinning face.

  ‘You should never have come back,’ the man said. His breath stank of kelyk, and she saw the brown stains on his lips and mouth. His eyes looked strangely slick, like stones washed by waves. ‘I am tempted, Priestess, to give you to my Urdomen – not that they’d have you.’

  Urdomen. He was an Urdo, a commander of the fanatic élites. Now I begin to underst—

  ‘But Monkrat might.’

  She frowned. What had he been saying? ‘Leave me,’ she said, and was shocked at how thin and weak her voice sounded. ‘I want to pray.’

  He twisted his grip, forcing her round to face him, close enough to be lovers. ‘Monkrat!’ Someone came up beside them.

  ‘Get some saemankelyk. I’d like to see how well she dances.’

  She could feel his hard knuckles pressing the back of her neck, twisting and ripping hair from its roots, pushing into the bruises he’d already made.

  ‘I can give you nothing,’ she said.

  ‘Oh, but you will,’ he replied. ‘You’ll give us a path,’ and he turned her back to face the barrow, ‘straight to him.’

  She did not understand, and yet fear gripped her, and as she heard someone hurrying up, bottle swishing, her fear burgeoned into terror.

  Gradithan tugged her head further back. ‘You are going to drink, woman. Waste a drop and you’ll pay.’

  Monkrat came close, lifting the bottle with its stained mouth to her lips.

  She sought to twist her face away but the Urdo’s grip denied that. He reached up with his other hand and closed her nostrils.

  ‘Drink, and then you can breathe again.’

  Salind drank.

  Finding her gone from her room, Spinnock Durav stood for a long moment, staring down at the rumpled mattress of the cot, noting the missing blanket, seeing that she’d left most of her clothes behind, including her moccasins. He told himself he should not be surprised. She had not much welcomed his attentions.

  Still, he felt as if some cold, grinning bastard had carved a gaping hole in his chest. It was absurd, that he should have been careless enough, complacent enough, to find himself this vulnerable. A human woman of so few years – he was worse than some old man sitting on the temple steps and drooling at every young thing sauntering past. Love could be such a squalid emotion: burning bright in the midst of pathos, the subject of pity and contempt, it blazed with brilliant stupidity all the same.

  Furious with himself, he wheeled about and strode from the room.

  In a city of unending Night, no bell was too early for a drink. He left the temple and the keep, made his way down ghostly streets to the Scour.

  Inside, Resto was behind the bar, red-eyed and scratching at his beard and saying nothing as Spinnock walked to the table at the back. Tavern-keepers knew well the myriad faces of misery, and unbidden he drew a tall tankard of ale, bringing it over with gaze averted.

  Glaring at the other tables – all empty; he was the only customer – Spinnock collected the tankard and swallowed down half its foamy contents.

  Moments after Resto delivered the third such tankard the door opened and in walked Seerdomin.

  Spinnock felt a sudden apprehension. Even from there the man smelled of blood, and his face was a ravaged thing, aged and pallid, the eyes so haunted that the Tiste Andii had to look away.

  As if unaware of his reaction, Seerdomin came to Spinnock’s table and sat down opposite him. Resto arrived with a jug and a second tankard.

  ‘She doesn’t want my help,’ Spinnock said.

  Seerdomin said nothing as he poured ale into his tankard, setting the jug back down with a thump. ‘What are you talking about?’

  Spinnock looked away. ‘I couldn’t find you. I searched everywhere.’

  ‘That desperate for a game?’

  A game? Oh. Kef Tanar. ‘You are looking at a pathetic old man, Seerdomin. I feel I must sacrifice the last of my dignity, here and now, and tell you everything.’

  ‘I don’t know if I’m ready for that,’ the man replied. ‘Your dignity is important to me.’

  Spinnock flinched, and still would not meet Seerdomin’s eyes. ‘I have surrendered my heart.’

  ‘Well. You can’t marry her, though, can you?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The High Priestess – although it’s about time you realized that she loves you in return, probably always has. You damned Andii – you live so long it’s as if you’re incapable of grasping on to things in the here and now. If I had your endless years . . . no, scratch out the eyes of that thought. I don’t want them. I’ve lived too long as it is.’

  Spinnock’s mind was spinning. The High Priestess? ‘No, she doesn’t. Love me, I mean. I didn’t mean her, anyway.’

  ‘Gods below, Spinnock Durav, you’re a damned fool.’

  ‘I know that. I’ve as much as confessed it, for Hood’s sake.’

  ‘So you’re not interested in making the High Priestess happier than she’s been in a thousand years. Fine. That’s your business. Some other woman, then. Careful, someone might up and murder her. Jealousy is deadly.’

  This was too off-hand for Seerdomin, too loose, too careless. It had the sound of a man who had surrendered to despair, no longer caring – about anything. Loosing every arrow in his quiver, eager to see it suddenly, fatally empty. This Seerdomin frightened Spinnock. ‘What have you been up to?’ he asked.

  ‘I have been murdering people.’ He poured another round, then settled back in his chair. ‘Eleven so far. They saw themselves as liberators. Scheming the downfall of their Tiste Andii oppressors. I answered their prayers and liberated every one of them. This is my penance, Spinnock Durav. My singular apology for the madness of humanity. Forgive them, please, because I cannot.’

  Spinnock found a tightness in his throat that started tears in his eyes. He could not so much as look at this man, dared not, lest he see all that should never be revealed, never be exposed. Not in his closest friend. Not in anyone. ‘That,’ he said, hating his own words, ‘was not necessary.’

  ‘Strictly speaking, you are right, friend. They would have failed – I lack no faith in your efficacy, especially that of your Lord. Understand, I did this out of a desire to prove
that, on occasion, we are capable of policing our own. Checks and balances. This way the blood stains my hands, not yours. Giving no one else cause for hating you.’

  ‘Those who hate need little cause, Seerdomin.’

  The man nodded – Spinnock caught the motion peripherally.

  There was a silence. The tale had been told, Spinnock recalled, more than once. How the Bridgeburner named Whiskeyjack – a man Anomander Rake called friend – had intervened in the slaughter of the Pannion witches, the mad mothers of Children of the Dead Seed. Whiskeyjack, a human, had sought to grant the Son of Darkness a gift, taking away the burden of the act. A gesture that had shaken his Lord to the core. It is not in our nature to permit others to share our burden.

  Yet we will, unhesitatingly, take on theirs.

  ‘I wonder if we blazed his trail.’

  ‘What?’

  Spinnock rubbed at his face, feeling slightly drunk.

  ‘Itkovian’s.’

  ‘Of course you didn’t. The Grey Swords—’ ‘Possessed a Shield Anvil, yes, but they were not unique in that. It’s an ancient title. Are we the dark mirror to such people?’ Then he shook his head. ‘Probably not. That would be a grand conceit.’

  ‘I agree,’ Seerdomin said in a slurred growl.

  ‘I love her.’

  ‘So you claimed. And presumably she will not have you.’

  ‘Very true.’

  ‘So here you sit, getting drunk.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Once I myself am drunk enough, Spinnock Durav, I will do what’s needed.’

  ‘What’s needed?’

  ‘Why, I will go and tell her she’s a damned fool.’

  ‘You’d fail.’

  ‘I would?’

  Spinnock nodded. ‘She’s faced you down before. Unflinchingly.’

  Another stretch of silence. That stretched on, and on.

  He was drunk enough now to finally shift his gaze, to fix his attention on Seerdomin’s face.

  It was a death mask, white as dust. ‘Where is she?’ the man asked in a raw, strained voice.

  ‘On her way back out to the barrow, I should think. Seerdomin, I am sorry. I did not lie when I said I was a fool—’