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gave the ghost of a nod in response and looked away - straight into Trenech's
eyes. The hulking fellow stared at him, or rather through him. Sweat beaded
his brow. His right hand clenched the table in a white-knuckled grip.
Temper had spoken with the fellow only a few times. He thought him
slow-witted, like an infant in a giant's body. Was he terrified by all this,
or mindlessly enraged? Temper imagined he ought to say something reassuring
but didn't know what.
Turning his head slightly, he studied the men. The majority, some thirty or
so, sat gathered towards the door, voices low as they whispered among
themselves. Closer, in the flickering light of the fireplace, Ash, Corinn, and
a dozen others sat together at two tables. Of these, Temper guessed the
average age to be around the mid-thirties. They adjusted the straps of their
armour and weapon belts. Some smoked short clay pipes. None spoke. Temper
identified three Wickan tribesmen, moustached, wearing studded boiled-leather
hauberks with mailed sleeves; two dark Dal Honese, one with the raised cuts of
facial scarification on his cheeks, the other's right eye a pale milky orb;
one Napan, short and thick-set like a stump, his bluish-toned skin faded to a
silty green; two dusky men from Seven Cities in mail shirts under long
surcoats that they adjusted and belted snug; and the rest probably Quon
Talian, in army-standard Malazan hauberks, one with rows of blued steel
lozenges riveted over the leather. Every one of them possessed a crossbow,
either at his back, on the table, or at the bench beside him. Short swords
hung sheathed at belts and shoulder harness. Veterans, and probably all
Bridgeburners as well.
The others were the street-sweepings and thugs Temper had identified earlier.
Many carried curved short swords sheathed pommel-forward, Jakatan style, while
on others Temper identified plain Talian long knives, curved Dal Honese
daggers, and on two, long double-edged Untan duelling swords. They wore a
mishmash of armour, the heaviest of which amounted to nothing more than
boiled-leather vests or padded long shirtings.
Some pulled at their leathers, obviously uncomfortable in them. Temper looked
away in disgust: city toughs, not a veteran among them. What could Ash hope to
accomplish with these? And Corinn? Head down, she spoke with the sergeant.
Temper eyed her hard, hoping to raise her head by the heat of his gaze. He
knew she was a mage, but was she really a Bridgeburner cadre mage? He thought
they'd all died during the campaigns of Seven Cities and Genabackis.
He sighed, rubbed his eyes. All the gods above and below. Seven Cities.
Y'Ghatan. He could almost smell the desert's faint cinnamon scent, feel the
punishing heat. That day, that betrayal - returned like a stab to the chest,
and he shuddered. He remembered how the dust had risen in choking clouds that
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scoured his throat and blinded vision; the hordes of robed Seven City
defenders. He saw Dassem, unbelievably thrust through, supported by Hilt. He
recalled the glimpses he'd caught of Dassem stumbling, holding his chest. He'd
said something to Temper, some joke or farewell lost amid the screams and
clash of battle.
Temper unclenched his jaws and eased his tension in a long slow exhalation. So
now both he and Corinn knew of each other. What was it she wanted from him?
Perhaps nothing. Perhaps this was just a warning that he should keep his head
down and not interfere or she'd reveal who he was. Like she said, maybe she
was just trying to save his sorry ass. Leaning forward, he tried to catch her
eye across the room.
A dog's howl cut through the stone walls like the concussion of Moranth
munitions. It rose and fell, deep, resounding, the most savage and lustful
call Temper had ever heard. Corinn flinched as if bitten, snapped a panicked
glance to Temper, then turned away. The young toughs peered about, their eyes
wide. The veterans' hands twitched towards their crossbows.
From the corner of his eye, Temper caught a sly, disturbingly cretinous smile
grow on Trenech's fat lips. Temper swallowed to wet his own suddenly dry
mouth. Here he sat, prisoner to a gang of ruthless criminals or deserters -
betrayed by a woman, beside a fool, a mindless drooling wreck, and a moron the
size of a bhederin - on the most locally dreaded night of this generation.
Could things possibly get any worse?
Faro Balkat's eyelids flickered open, revealing orbs rolled back to whites. As
calmly as if ordering another drink he announced into the silence: 'The Shadow
Moon is risen.'
Kiska wondered if she was hallucinating, for she suddenly found herself lying
at the narrow bottom of a deep defile. Streamers of cloud threaded across a
ribbon of sky high above. Wind tossed hot dust in her face, soughing down the
curves of the canyon. She rubbed her eyes. What had happened? Barked laughter
jerked her to her feet.
A man slid down the side of the canyon using his hands and feet, digging his
elbows to slow his descent. At the bottom he fell, tumbling, robes flapping
around pale shins. It was the dead old man. He lurched to his feet, closed on
her. Kiska ran. He yelled a word and she stopped, legs numb. He came around to
stand before her, grinning like one of the Nacht statues in the gardens and
alleys of Malaz. Kiska could still move her arms so she punched him across the
mouth and he fell back in surprise. With that she was free and she ran on
around the curve of the canyon.
Two sinuous turns later the channel ended in a cul-de-sac of stone layered
like folded cloth. Snarling, Kiska threw herself at it. She scrabbled and
grabbed for hand and footholds. After she had climbed only an arm's length the
rotten layers crumbled beneath her like brittle old leather, and she slid
down, scraping her side and chin. She lay gasping in the dust.
'Nothing's as easy as it seems, is it? Would that I had kept that in mind.'
Kiska yelped and lunged to her feet, drawing her knife.
The old man sneered, brushed dirt from his robes. 'I'm dead. Remember?'
Kiska didn't allow the point of her blade to waver. 'Where are we? What's
going on?'
The man's wide crazed grin returned. He opened his arms, looked about.
'Magnificent, isn't it? This place?'
'What have you done to me?'
'A place,' the old man continued, 'whose existence has been theorized for the
last millennia. A place whose characteristics I deduced from ancient sources.
A place - a Realm - that, should it belong to anyone, belongs to me. My realm
which I should rule, suzerain. The Path of Shadow.' [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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