Toll the Hounds

He looked about his makeshift camp, saw that the modest hearth with its fistful of coals still smouldered from the previous night’s fire. ‘I am hungry, and thirsty,’ he said. ‘You can leave whenever it pleases you.’



The dragon’s sibilant voice spoke in Kallor’s skull. ‘You cannot know my pain.’



He grunted. ‘You cannot feel pain. You’re dead, and you have the look of having been buried. For a long time.’



‘The soul writhes. There is anguish. I am broken.’



He fed a few clumps of dried bhederin dung on to the coals, and then glanced over. ‘I can do nothing about that.’



‘I have dreamt of a throne.’



Kallor’s attention sharpened with speculation. ‘You would choose a master? That is unlike your kind.’ He shook his head. ‘I scarcely believe it.’



‘Because you do not understand. None of you understand. So much is beyond you. You think to make yourself the King in Chains. Do not mock my seeking a master, High King Kallor.’



‘The Crippled God’s days are numbered, Eleint,’ said Kallor. ‘Yet the throne shall remain, long after the chains have rusted to dust.’



There was silence between them then, for a time. The morning sky was clear, tinted faintly red with the pollen and dust that seemed to seethe up from this land. Kallor watched the hearth finally lick into flames, arid he reached for the small, battered, blackened pot. Poured the last of his water into it and set the pot on the tripod perched above the fire. Swarms of suicidal insects darted into the flames, igniting in sparks, and Kallor wondered at this penchant for seeking death, as if the lure for an end was irresistible. Not a trait he shared, however.



I remember my death,’ the dragon said.



‘And that’s worth remembering?’



‘The Jaghut were a stubborn people. So many saw naught but the coldness in their hearts-’



‘Misunderstood, were they?’”They mocked your empire, High King. They answered you with scorn. It seems the wounds have not healed.’



‘A recent reminder, that’s all,’ Kallor replied, watching the water slowly awaken. He tossed in a handful of herbs. ‘Very well, tell me your tale. I welcome the amusement.’



The dragon lifted its head and seemed to study the eastern horizon.



‘Never wise to stare into the sun,’ Kallor observed. ‘You might burn your eyes.’



‘It was brighter then-do you recall!’



‘Perturbations of orbit, or so believed the K’Chain Che’Malle.’



‘So too the Jaghut, who were most diligent in their observations of the world. Tell me, High King, did you know they broke peace only once! In all their existence-no, not the T’lan Imass-that war belonged to those savages and the Jaghut were a most reluctant foe.’



‘They should have turned on the Imass,’ Kallor said. ‘They should have annihilated the vermin.’



‘Perhaps, but I was speaking of an earlier war-the war that destroyed the Jaghut long before the coming of the T’lan Imass. The war that shattered their unity, that made of their lives a moribund flight from an implacable enemy-yes, long before and long after the T’lan Imass.’



Kallor considered that for a moment, and then he grunted and said, ‘I am not well versed in Jaghut history. What war was this? The K’Chain Che’Malle? The Forkrul Assail?’ He squinted at the dragon. ‘Or, perhaps, you Eleint?’



There was sorrow in its tone as the dragon replied, ‘No. There were some among us who chose to join in this war, to fight alongside the Jaghut armies-’



‘Armies? Jaghut armies?’



‘Yes, an entire people gathered, a host of singular will. Legions uncountable. Their standard was rage, their clarion call injustice. When they marched, swords beating on shields, time itself found measure, a hundred million hearts of edged iron. Not even you, High King, could imagine such a sight-your empire was less than a squall to that terrible storm.’



For once, Kallor had nothing to say. No snide comment to voice, no scoffing refutation. In his mind he saw the scene the dragon had described, and was struck mute. To have witnessed such a thing!



The dragon seemed to comprehend his awe. ‘Yes again, High King. When you forged your empire, it was on the dust of that time, that grand contest, that most bold assault. We fought. We refused to retreat. We failed. We fell. So many of us fell-should we have believed otherwise! Should we have held to our faith in the righteousness of our cause, even as we came to believe that we were doomed?’