At that moment, the other paw hammered what remained from the other side. When it had completed its passage, all that was left was a section of occipital plate attached to a flopping patch of scalp, dangling from the back of the neck.
Sukul Ankhadu’s knees buckled. Her left hand exited the wound in the second beast’s throat with a sobbing sound.
She might have remained on her knees, balanced by the sudden absence of any weight above her shoulders, but then the creature that had finally killed her lurched forward, its enormous weight crushing her down as the Soletaken, who had once been Til’aras Benok, collapsed, slowly suffocating from a crushed windpipe.
Moments later, the only sound from this modest clearing was the dripping of blood.
Trull Sengar could hear the faint echoes of sorcery and he feared for his friends. Something was seeking to reach this place, and if it-or they-got past Hedge and Quick Ben, then once more Trull would find himself standing before unlikely odds. Even with Onrack at his side…
Yet he held his gaze on the gates. The silent flames rose and ebbed within the portals, each to its own rhythm, each tinted in a different hue. The air felt charged. Static sparks crackled in the dust that had begun swirling up from the stone floor.
He heard a sound behind him and turned. Relief flooded through him. ‘Onrack-’
‘They seek Ulshun Pral,’ his friend replied, emerging from the tunnel mouth, two paces, three, then he halted. ‘You are too close to those gates, my friend. Come-’
He got no further.
The fires within one of the gates winked out, and from within the suddenly dark portal figures emerged.
Two strides behind Silchas Ruin, Seren Pedac was the next in their group to cross the threshold. She did not know what prompted her to push past Fear Sengar-and attributed no special significance to Clip’s hanging back. A strange tug took hold of her soul, a sudden, excruciating yearning that overwhelmed her growing dread. All at once, the stone spear she held in her hands felt light as a reed.
Darkness, a momentary flicker, as of distant light, then she was stepping onto gritty stone.
A cavern. To either side, the raging maws of more gates, flooding all with light.
Before her, Silchas Ruin halted and his swords hissed from their scabbards. Someone was standing before him, but in that moment Seren Pedac’s view was blocked by the White Crow.
She saw a barbaric warrior standing further back, and behind him, a lone silhouette standing in the mouth of a tunnel.
To her left Fear Sengar appeared.
She took another step, to bring her round Silchas Ruin, to see the one who had made the albino Tiste Andii pause.
And all at once, the terror began.
On Fear Sengar’s face, an expression of profound horror-even as he surged past Seren Pedac. A knife in his raised hand. The blade flashing down towards Silchas Ruin’s back.
Then all of Fear’s forward motion ceased. The out-thrust arm with its knife flailed, slashed the air even as Silchas Ruin-as if entirely unaware of the attack-took a single step forward.
A terrible gurgling sound from Fear Sengar.
Spinning round, Seren Pedac saw Clip standing immediately behind Fear. Saw the chain between Clip’s hands slide almost effortlessly through Fear Sengar’s throat. Blood lashed out.
Beyond Clip, Udinaas, with Kettle now held tight in his arms, sought to lunge away, even as a shadow erupted beneath him, writhed about his lower limbs, and dragged the Letherii down to the stone floor, where Wither then swarmed over Udinaas. ‘
Clip released one end of his chain and whipped the length free of Fear Sengar’s throat. Eyes staring, the expression of fierce intent fixed upon his face, the Tiste Edur’s head sagged back, revealing a slash reaching all the way back to his spine. As Fear Sengar fell, Clip slid in a deadly blur towards Udinaas.
Frozen in shock, Seren Pedac stood rooted. Disbelieving, as a scream of raw denial tore from her throat.
Silchas Ruin’s swords were singing as he closed in deadly battle with whomever stood before him. Staccato impacts as those blades were parried with impossible speed.
Wither had wrapped shadow hands around Udinaas’s neck. Was choking the life from the ex-slave.
Kettle pulled herself free, then twisted round to pound tiny hands against the wraith.
All at once, a ferocious will burgeoned within Seren Pedac. The will to kill. Launched like a javelin towards Wither.
The wraith exploded in shreds-
– as Clip arrived, standing over Udinaas and reaching down one hand to grasp Kettle’s tunic between the girl’s shoulder blades.
Clip threw the child across the floor. She struck, skidded then rolled like a bundle of rags.
With focused punches of Mockra, Seren Pedac hammered at Clip, sending him staggering. Blood sprayed from his nose, mouth and ears. Then he whipped round, a hand lashing out.
Something pounded Seren Pedac high on her left shoulder. Sudden agony radiated out from the point of impact and all her concentration vanished beneath those overwhelming waves. She looked down and saw a dagger buried to the hilt-stared down at it in disbelief.
There had been no time to think. Trull Sengar was left with naught but recognition. One, then another, arriving in shocks that left him stunned.
From the gate emerged an apparition-and Trull Sengar had stood before this one before, long ago, during a night’s vigil over fallen kin. Ghost of darkness. The Betrayer. No longer weaponless, as he had been the first time. No longer half rotted, yet the coals of those terrifying eyes remained, fixed now upon him in bright familiarity.
And, in a low voice, almost a whisper, the Betrayer said, ‘Of course it is you. But this battle, it is not-’
At that moment, Trull Sengar saw his brother. Fear, the god of his childhood, the stranger of his last days among the Tiste Edur. Fear, meeting Trull’s wide eyes. Seeing the battle about to begin. Comprehending-and then there was a knife in his hand, and, as he surged forward to stab the Betrayer in the back, Trull saw in his brother’s face-in an instant-the full measure of Fear’s sudden self-awareness, the bitter irony, the truth of generations past returned once more, one last time. Silchas Ruin, an Edur knife seeking his back.
When Fear was tugged backward, when his throat opened wide, Trull Sengar felt his mind, his soul, obliterated, inundated by incandescent fury, and he was moving forward, the tip of his spear seeking the slayer of his brother-
And the Betrayer was in his way.
A slash opened up the Betrayer’s skin at the base of his throat, the tip skittering away across one clavicle; then a thrust, punching into the apparition’s left shoulder muscle.
And all at once the Betrayer’s swords wove a skein of singing iron, parrying the spear’s every lightning thrust and sweep. And suddenly Trull Sengar’s advance stalled, and then he was being driven back, as those swords, hammering the shaft of his spear, tore away bronze sheathing, began splintering the wood.
And Trull Sengar recognized, before him, his own death.
Onrack the Broken saw his friend’s attack fail, saw the fight turn, and saw that Trull Sengar was doomed to fall.
Yet he did not move. Could not.
He felt his own heart tearing itself to pieces, for the man behind him-the Imass, Ulshun Pral-was, Onrack knew at once, of his own blood. A revelation, the summation of a thousand mysterious sensations, instincts, the echoing of gestures-Ulshun Pral’s very stance, his manner of walking, and the talent of eyes and hand-he was, oh he was…
Trull Sengar’s spear exploded in the warrior’s hands. A sword lashed out-
The blow to her shoulder had driven Seren Pedac down to her knees, then pitched her sideways-and she saw, there before Silchas Ruin, Trull Sengar.
Clip, blood streaming down his face, had turned back to pursue Udinaas, who was, crawling, scrabbling towards Kettle.
And before her rose a choice.