Kyle laughed. Pledged!
That's just unfortunate. That's all. Why, us soldiers, we're used to that. Half the men I've killed were sworn to Togg, same as myself. Doesn't mean nothing, lad.’
Kyle shook his head. ‘You don't understand.’ How could anyone not of his people see that that being must have been a Wind Spirit itself. And they killed it. Yet how could Cowl, a mere mortal, kill a spirit? Surely that was impossible.
‘Well, maybe we don't understand. We're just passing through Bael lands after all.’ Struth. But I know there is one thing we understand and you don't.’ Stoop pointed to the west. ‘The Guard is locked in a duel to the death with a great power, lad. A force that would lay waste to these entire lands to get to us.’
‘The Malazans.’
‘You've the right of it. Good to see that you've been paying attention. Now, power is power. We knew this warlock, Shen, was no way potent enough to whip up this sort of storm. Why, the entire weather of this subcontinent is affected. Your own plains are dry because of all the rains that are drawn here to run off to the eastern coast. We'd hoped it was something we could use in our war against the damned Malazans. But, as you saw, it was some blasted dreaming magus.’
‘Dreaming?’
‘Yes. Cowl says that all this — the storm — was summoned up and sustained just by his dreaming. Imagine that, hey?’
Kyle almost threw himself upon Stoop. You fools! You've slain a God of my people! But blinding pain hammered within his skull and he rubbed furiously with his one good hand at his forehead.
‘You OK, lad?’
Kyle jerked a nod. ‘Could use some fresh air.’
Stoop took his arm to help him up the corridor. Outside, beyond the colonnaded walk, Guardsmen were lounging on the benches and planters, talking, resting and oiling weapons and armour. Stoop sat Kyle on the top ledge of a broad set of stairs that led down to a sunken patio, now a fetid pool of rotting leaves and branches. Clouds still enshrouded the Spur's top and would remain for some time yet, Kyle imagined. But the edge was off the storm. Thunder no longer burst overhead or rumbled out over the plains spread out below. High sheet lightning flickered and raced far above, leaping and flashing soundlessly.
It could not be. How could it? It was impossible. Nothing after this, he decided, could ever touch him again. Yet something had happened. He studied his wrapped hand. It was numb of any feeling but for a constant nagging ache. They must've put some kind of salve on it. His tulwar, he noted, had been sheathed by some considerate soul. Odd-handed, he drew it. The leather of the grip came away like dry bark in his hand. He brushed away the burnt material leaving the scorch-marked tang naked. The blade, however, remained clean and unmarred. The swirls and curls of Wind seemed to dance down its gleaming length. Turning it over, Kyle paused: the design now ran down both sides of the curved blade. He didn't remember Smoky engraving both sides.
He touched the cold blade to his forehead and invoked a prayer to Wind. He'd have to get it re-gripped. And he'd name it Tcharka. Gift of Wind. And he'd never forget what happened here this day.
‘Have a rest,’ Stoop advised. ‘It'll be a while yet.’
Kyle let his head fall back to the stone wall. Through slitted eyes he spotted Stalker crouched against a pillar next to two Guardsmen he didn't know; one extraordinarily hairy and ferociously scarred; the other an older man whose beard was braided and tied off in small tails. Both were nut brown, as burly as bears, and reminded Kyle of the men of the Stone Mountains to the far west of his lands. The scout watched him with his startling bright hazel eyes while murmuring aside to the men. Exhausted, Kyle drowsed in the fitful weak wind.
Near dawn came Kyle's turn in the basket. He and four others stepped in while the wicker, hemp and wood construction hung extended out over empty yawning space. Eight Guardsmen manned the iron arms of the winch. A gusting wind pulled and tossed Kyle's hair as he now carried his helmet under an arm.
‘How will they get down?’ he asked a man with him in the basket as the crew started edging the winch on its first revolution.
The Guardsman swung a lazy glance up to the men at the winch. A smile of cruellest humour touched his lips. ‘Poor bastards. Better them than us. They'll have to come down the ropes.’
The wind rose as the basket descended close to the naked cliffs. It batted at the frail construction and pulled at Kyle's Crimson Guard surcoat. Us, the Guardsman had said. Kyle knew now he was one of them yet could never be one with them. He was part of the brotherhood but that same brotherhood had killed something like his God: one of his people's ancestors, progenitors, guides or protectors — perhaps even an avatar of the one great Father Wind himself. He knew now it would be easier for him to use the weapon at his side. To turn flat, unresponsive eyes upon death and killing. To do what must be done. He studied the men suspended with him over what could be their own deaths. Two watched the clouds above, perhaps searching for hints of the coming weather. Another peered down, curious perhaps as to where they might disembark. The last stared ahead at nothing. Their eyes, surrounded by a hatching of wrinkles, appeared flat and empty. These were the ones who could not be touched. Kyle felt drawn to them, sensed now that he shared something of the dead world they inhabited. He watched their sweaty, scarred, boiled-leather faces and felt his own hardening into that mask. He could stare at them now, at anyone dead or alive, and not see them.
CHAPTER II
For generations the poles of the Quon Talian continent stood as the province of Unta in the east and the province of Quon Tali (which gave the land its name) in the west. Each in turn dominated mercantile trade and strove to crush its distant rival while the lesser states, Itko Kan, Cawn, Gris and Dal Hon, danced in a myriad of alliances, trade combines and Troikas marshalled against one or both of these poles. Who could have predicted that these two major capitals would fall to the invader while poorer states would resist for years?
South Kan Hermitages
Under a blazing noon sun the crowd jostling its way up Unta's street of Opals thickened to an immovable clamouring mass. Ahead, the thoroughfare debouched into Reacher's Square where the animal roar of tens of thousands of voices buffeted those straining for entrance. Second-storey balconies facing the street sagged with the weight of more paying spectators than good sense should allow.
For the frustrated citizens caught in the street, advance was impossible. Possum, however, easily slipped his way forward, edging from slim gap to slim gap, passing with a brush here or a well-placed elbow there. Those of his profession were trained to use crowds and this was one reason why he enjoyed them so much. Anonymity, it seemed to him, was assured as one among so many. But it was also his opinion of human nature that with so many people gathered together no one could possibly organize anything.
He stepped out on to the littered bricks of Reacher's Square to find it a heaving sea of citizens of the Empire; for today was execution day. The Empress was dispatching her enemies in as messy and public a manner as possible. All to serve as salutary warnings to those contemplating any such crimes. And of course to entertain her loyal masses. Edging his way around the perimeter of the huge square, Possum kept close to one enclosing wall. He estimated the crowd at some fifty thousand, all peering and straining their attention to the central platform where various minor criminals had already met their ends in beheadings, evisceratings and impalings.