The Bonehunters

Mostly what she found were the remnants of villagers – all worried by dogs. Two squat storage buildings flanked the avenue that ran inward from the jetty, and these were both locked. With Barathol's help, both buildings were broken into, and in these structures they found more supplies than they could ever use.



Cutter swam out to examine the carracks, returning after a time to report that both remained sound and neither was particularly more seaworthy than the other. Of matching length and beam, the craft were like twins.



'Made by the same hands,' Cutter said. 'I think. You could judge that better than me, Barathol, if you're at all interested.'



'I will take your word for it, Cutter. So, we can choose either one, then.'



'Yes. Of course, maybe they belong to the traders we met.'



'No, they're not Jelban. What are their names?'



'Dhenrabi's Tail is the one on the left. The other's called Sanal's Grief. I wonder who Sanal was?'



'We'll take Grief,' Barathol said, 'and before you ask, don't.'



Scillara laughed.



Cutter waded alongside one of the swamped sculls beside the jetty. 'We should bail one of these, to move our supplies out to her.'



Barathol rose. 'I'll start bringing those supplies down from the warehouse.'



Scillara watched the huge man make his way up the avenue, then turned her attention to the Daru, who had found a half-gourd bailer and was scooping water from one of the sculls. 'Want me to help?' she asked.



'It's all right. Finally, I've got something to do.'



'Day and night now.'



The glance he threw her was shy. 'I've never tasted milk before.'



Laughing, she repacked her pipe. 'Yes you have. You just don't remember it.'



'Ah. I suppose you're right.'



'Anyway, you're a lot gentler than that little sweet-faced bloodfly was.'



'You've not given her a name?'



'No. Leave that to her new mothers to fight over.'



'Not even in your own mind? I mean, apart from blood-fly and leech and horse tick.'



'Cutter,' she said, 'you don't understand. I give her a real name I'll end up having to turn round and head back. I'll have to take her, then.'



'Oh. I am sorry, Scillara. You're right. There's not much I understand about anything.'



'You need to trust yourself more.'



'No.' He paused, eyes on the sea to the east. 'There's nothing I've done to make that… possible. Look at what happened when Felisin Younger trusted me – to protect her. Even Heboric – he said I was showing leadership, he said that was good. So, he too trusted me.'



'You damned idiot. We were ambushed by T'lan Imass. What do you think you could have done?'



'I don't know, and that's my point.'



'Heboric was the Destriant of Treach. They killed him as if he was nothing more than a lame dog. They lopped limbs off Greyfrog like they were getting ready to cook a feast. Cutter, people like you and me, we can't stop creatures like that. They cut us down then step over us and that's that as far as they're concerned. Yes, it's a hard thing to take, for anyone. The fact that we're insignificant, irrelevant.



Nothing is expected of us, so better we just hunch down and stay out of sight, stay beneath the notice of things like T'lan Imass, things like gods and goddesses. You and me, Cutter, and Barathol there. And Chaur. We're the ones who, if we're lucky, stay alive long enough to clean up the mess, put things back together. To reassert the normal world. That's what we do, when we can – look at you, you've just resurrected a dead boat – you gave it its function again – look at it, Cutter, it finally looks the way it should, and that's satisfying, isn't it?'



'For Hood's sake,' Cutter said, shaking his head, 'Scillara, we're not just worker termites clearing a tunnel after a god's careless footfall. That's not enough.'



'I'm not suggesting it's enough,' she said. 'I'm telling you it's what we have to start with, when we're rebuilding – rebuilding villages and rebuilding our lives.'



Barathol had been trudging back and forth during this conversation, and now Chaur had come down, timidly, closer to the water. The mute had unpacked the supplies from the horses, including Heboric's wrapped corpse, and the beasts – unsaddled, their bits removed – now wandered along the grassy fringe beyond the tideline, tails swishing.



Cutter began loading the scull.