‘Tell me of redemption.’

‘There is little that I can say, Segda Travos.’

Seerdomin snorted. ‘The god known as the Redeemer can say nothing of re-demption.’ He gestured to that distant quiescent figure kneeling in the basin. ‘She gathers power-I can smell it. Like the rot of ten thousand souls. What manner of god does she now serve? Is this the Fallen One? The Crippled God?’

‘No, although certain themes are intertwined. For followers of the Crippled God, the flaw is the virtue. Salvation arrives with death, and it is purchased through mortal suffering. There is no perfection of the spirit to strive towards, no true blessing to be gained as a reward for faith.’

‘And this one?’

‘As murky as the kelyk itself. The blessing is surrender, the casting away of all thought. The self vanishes within the dance. The dream is shared by all who par-take of pain’s nectar, but it is a dream of oblivion. In a sense, the faith is antilife. Not in the manner of death, however. If one views life as a struggle doomed to fail, then it is the failing that becomes the essence of worship. He is the Dying God, after all.’

‘They celebrate the act of dying?’

‘In a manner, yes, assuming you can call it celebration. More like enslavement. Worship as self-destruction, perhaps, in which all choice is lost.’

‘And how can such a thing salve the mortal soul, Redeemer?’

‘That I cannot answer. But it may be that we shall soon find out.’

‘You do not believe I can protect you-at least in that we’re in agreement. So, when I fall-when I fail-the Dying God shall embrace me as it will you.’ He shook his head. ‘I am not unduly worried about me. I fear more the notion of what eternal dying can do to redemption-that seems a most unholy union.’

The Redeemer simply nodded and it occurred to Seerdomin that the god had probably been thinking of little else. A future that seemed sealed into fate, an end to what was, and nothing glorious in what would follow.

He rubbed at his face, vaguely dismayed at the weariness he felt. Here, discon-nected from his body, from any real flesh and bone, it was his spirit that was ex-hausted, battered down. And yet… and yet, I will stand. And do all I can. To defend a god I have chosen not to worship, against a woman who dreamt once of his embrace, and dreams of the same now-with far deadlier intent. He squinted down at her, a form almost shapeless in the gathering gloom beneath gravid, leaden clouds.

After a moment raindrops splashed against his helm, stained his forearms and his hands. He lifted one hand, and saw that the rain was black, thick, wending like slime.

The sky was raining kelyk.

She raised her head, and the distance between them seemed to vanish. Her eyes shone with fire, a slow, terrible pulse.

Gods below… .

Like the worn ridge of a toothless jaw, the Gadrobi Hills rose into view, spanning the north horizon. Kallor halted to study them. An end to this damned plain, to this pointless sweep of grasses. And there, to the northwest, where the hills sank back down, there was a city.

He could not yet see it. Soon.

The temple would be nondescript, the throne within it a paltry thing, poorly made, an icon of insipid flaws. A broken fool once named Munug would writhe before it, in obeisance, the High Priest of Pathos, the Prophet of Failure-enough thematic unity, in fact, to give any king pause. Kallor allowed himself a faint Smirk. Yes, he was worthy of such worship, and if in the end he wrested it body and soul from the Crippled God, so be it.

The temple his domain, the score of bent and maimed priests and priestesses his court, the milling mob outside, sharing nothing but chronic ill luck, his subjects. This, he decided, had the makings of an immortal empire.

Patience-it would not do, he realized, to seek to steal the Fallen One’s wor-shippers. There was no real need. The gods were already assembling to crush the Crippled fool once and for all. Kallor did not think they would fail this time.’ Though no doubt the Fallen One had a few more tricks up his rotted sleeve, not least the inherent power of the cult itself, feeding as it did on misery and suffering-two conditions of humanity that would persist for as long as humans existed.

Kallor grunted. ‘Ah, fuck patience. The High King will take this throne. Then we can begin the… negotiations.’

He was no diplomat and had no interest in acquiring a diplomat’s skills, not even when facing a god. There would be conditions, some of them unpalatable, enough to make the hoary bastard choke on his smoke. Well, too bad.

One more throne. The last he’d ever need.

He resumed walking. Boots worn through. Dust wind-driven into every crease of his face, the pores of his nose and brow, his eyes thinned to slits. The world clawed at him, but he pushed through. Always did. Always would.