Toll the Hounds

Well, Barathol’s solid presence could answer her need. For a time, anyway.



Emerging on to the main deck, she found herself in the midst of a growing storm. The bhokarala crowded the dockside rail and scampered back and forth along its length, while at the other end of the gangplank stood an agent of the harbour master along with a half-dozen city guards even now drawing their batons, readying to assault the ship.



Barathol and Chaur had just climbed up from the hold and the blacksmith began pushing his way through the screeching, spitting apes.



She well understood his desire to prevent an escalation of the situation. Spite was not the most evenly tempered woman Scillara had known. An argument gone awry could well result in an enraged dragon’s devastating the quayside and half the city beyond. All for a misunderstanding on moorage fees.



So much for a quiet arrival.



Scillara hurried forward, kicking aside bhokarala and pulling loose her coin-pouch.



A blow to the side of his head and he rolled, suddenly awake, both knives coming Into his hands and blades scraping across the gritty flagstoned floor beneath him. His shoulder struck a wall and he blinked in the gloom.



A tall figure stood over him, black leather and banded iron in tatters, the dull gleam of snapped ribs showing through torn, green skin. A face in shadows, pitted eye-sockets, a broad slash of mouth hinting at up-thrust tusks.



Rallick Nom studied the apparition, the knives feeling useless in his gloved hands. The side of his head still rang. His gaze dropped to the stiffened leather toes of the demon’s half-rotted moccasins. ‘You kicked me.’



‘Yes,’ came the rasping reply.



‘Why?’



The demon hesitated, then said, ‘It seemed the thing to do.’



They were in a narrow corridor. A solid door of black wood and bronze fittings was to Rallick’s left. To his right, just beyond the demon, there was a T-intersection and double doors facing on to the conjunction. The light cast by the lantern the creature held in one withered, long-fingered hand seemed both pale and cold, casting diffused, indifferent shadows against the stone walls. Overhead, the ceiling was roughly arched, the stones thinner and smaller towards the peak, seemingly fitted without mortar. The air smelled of dust and decay, lifeless and dry.



‘It seems… I remember nothing,’ Rallick said.



‘In time.’



Every joint was stiff; even sitting up with his back against the wall left Rallick’s muscles trembling. His head ached with more than just the echoes of that damned kick. ‘I’m thirsty-if you’re not going to beat me to death, demon, then find me something to drink.’



‘I am not a demon.’



‘Such things are never easy to tell,’ Rallick replied in a growl.



‘I am Jaghut. Raest, once a tyrant, now a prisoner. “He who rises shall fall. He who falls shall be forgotten.” So said Gothos, although, alas, it seems we must all wait for ever before his name fades into oblivion.’



Some strength was returning to his limbs. ‘I recall something… a night of blood, the Gedderone Fete. Malazans in the city…’



‘Portentous events as bereft of meaning now as they were then. You have slept, assassin, for some time. Even the poison on your weapons has lost all potency. Although the otataral within your veins courses unabated by time-few would have done as you did, which is, I suppose, just as well.’



Rallick sheathed his knives and slowly pushed himself upright. The scene spun sickeningly and he closed his eyes until the vertigo passed.



Raest continued, ‘I wander in this house… rarely. Perhaps some time had passed before I realized that she was missing.’



Rallick squinted at the tall, hunched Jaghut. ‘She? Who?’



‘A demon in truth. Vorcan is her name now, I believe. You lay beside her, immune to the passage of time. But now she has awakened. She has, indeed, escaped. One might consider this… perturbing. If one cared, that is.’



Vorcan, Mistress of the Assassins’ Guild, yes, now he remembered. She was wounded, dying, and he struggled to carry her, not knowing why, not knowing what he sought. To the house, the house that had grown from the very earth. The house the Malazans called an Azath. Born of the tyrant’s Finnest-Rallick frowned at Raest. ‘The house,’ he said, ’it is your prison, too.’



A desiccated shrug that made bones squeak. ‘The stresses of owning property.’



‘So you have been here since then. Alone, not even wandering about. With two near-corpses cluttering your hallway. How long, Raest?’



‘I am not the one to ask. Does the sun lift into the sky outside then collapse once more? Do bells sound to proclaim a control where none truly exists? Do mortal fools still measure the increments leading to their deaths, wagering pleas¬ures against costs, persisting in the delusion that deeds have value, that the world and all the gods sit in judgement over every decision made or not made? Do-’