The Crippled God

‘Did I make any bold claims to courage?’



‘You make plenty of claims,’ he said wearily, ‘but none of them come close to courage.’



‘Go then,’ she hissed. ‘I am done with you.’



He studied her, and then nodded.



Walked from the throne room.



Sandalath Drukorlat leaned back on the throne, closed her eyes. ‘Now,’ she muttered, ‘I have my very own ghost.’ The life that was, the one she had just killed. ‘There’s courage in doing that. And if it felt easy, well, we know that’s a lie. But a gentle one. Gentle as a kiss never taken, a moment … slipping past, not touched, not even once.’



The soldier who walked in then, why, she knew him well. She could see through his armour right through to his beating heart, and such a large, strong heart. She could see, too, all his bones, scarred with healed breaks, and beyond that the floor of the chamber. Because this soldier’s arrival had been a long, long time ago, and the one seated on this throne, before whom he now knelt, was not Sandalath Drukorlat.



The soldier was looking down, and then he was laughing. The sound was warm with love, softened by some unknown regret.



‘Gods below,’ said a voice from the throne, seeming to come from the dark wood behind her head. ‘How is it I cannot even remember your name?’



The soldier was grinning when he looked up. ‘Lord, when was the last time a Warden of the Outer Reach visited the throne room of Kharkanas? Even I cannot answer that.’



But Anomander was not yet prepared to excuse himself this failing. ‘Have I not seen you before? Did not your commander at the Reach speak to me of you?’



‘Perhaps, Lord, the praise was faint, if it existed at all. Shall I ease your dismay, Lord?’



Sandalath saw a hand rise from where one of her own rested on the arm of the chair. His hand. Pointing – no, just a gesture, just that . ‘No need. Warden Spinnock Durav.’



The soldier smiled and nodded. ‘Upon word of your summons, Lord, I have come, as at that time I was the ranking officer in the Reach.’



‘Where then is Calat Hustain?’



‘An event at the gate, Lord.’



‘Starvald Demelain? I have heard nothing of this.’



‘It has been only a week, Lord, since he set out for it.’



‘What manner of event was this – do you know?’



‘The word that came to us from the Watchers did not suggest urgency, or dire threat, Lord. An awakening of foreign energies. Modest, but worth closer examination.’



‘Very well. Then, Spinnock Durav, it shall be you.’



‘I am ever at your call, Lord. What is it that you wish me to do?’



Anomander’s answer stole all humour from the soldier’s face. And, she recalled, it was never to return.



The peace of the forest belied the horror waiting ahead. Water dripped from moss, ran like tears down channels in the lichen covering the boles of the trees. Somewhere, above the canopy, heavy clouds had settled, leaking rain. Withal would have welcomed the cool drops, the sweet kisses from heaven. He needed to be reminded of things beyond all this – the throne room and the woman he had left behind, and before him the First Shore with its heaps of corpses and pools of thickening blood. But this forest was too narrow to hold all that he wanted, and to pass from one misery to the next took little effort, and it was not long before he could hear the battle ahead, and between the towering trunks of the ancient trees he now caught flashes of shimmering light – where the world ends .



For all of us .



He was done with her haunting his dreams, done with all the demands that he make his love for Sandalath into some kind of weapon, a thing with which to threaten and cajole. And Sand had been right in rejecting him. No, she was Mother Dark’s problem now.



The chewed-up trail dipped before climbing to the ridge overlooking the First Shore, and as he scrabbled his way up the slope the sounds of fighting built into a roar. Two more steps, a thick root for a handhold, and then he was on the ridge, and before him was a scene that stole the strength from his legs, that closed a cold hand about his heart.



Who then has seen such a thing? Before him, seven thousand bodies. Letherii. Shake. And there, along the base of Lightfall – to either side of that breach – how many dead and dying Liosan? Ten thousand? Fifteen? The numbers seemed incomprehensible. The numbers gave him nothing. In his mind he could repeat them, as if voicing a mantra, as his gaze moved from one horror to the next, and then down to where the knot of defenders fought at the very mouth of the wound – fought to deny the Liosan a single foothold upon the Shore – and still, none of it made sense. Even when it did.