Toll the Hounds

And a rider lunged into view directly before her, sawing the reins-and this man and his mount were real, solid. Sparks spat out from skidding hoofs, the horse’s eyeless head lifting. Picker staggered back in alarm.



Damned corpses! She stared up at the rider, and then swore. ‘I know you!’



The one-eyed man, enwreathed in the stench of death, settled his horse and looked down upon her, And then he sad, ‘I am Hood’s Herald now, Corporal Picker,’



‘Oh. ls that a promotion?’



‘No, a damned sentence, and you’re not the only one I need to visit, so enough of the sardonic shit and listen to me-’



She bridled. ‘Why? What am I doing here? What’s Hood want with me that he ain’t already got? Hey, take a message back to him! I want to-’



‘I cannot, Picker. Hood is dead.’



‘He’s what?



‘The Lord of Death no longer exists. Gone. For ever more. Listen, I ride to the gods of war. Do you understand, tore-bearer? I ride to all the gods of war.’



Tore-bearer? She sagged. ‘Ah, shit.’



Toc the Younger spoke then, and told her all she needed to know.



When he was done, she stared, the blood drained from her face, and watched as he gathered the reins once more and prepared to leave.



‘Wait!’ she demanded. ‘I need to get out of here! How do I do that, Toc?’



The dead eye fixed upon her one last time. He pointed at the gourds resting on the stone floor to either side of Picker. ‘Drink. Live up to your name. Pick one, Picker.’



‘Are you mad? You just told me where that blood’s come from!’



‘Drink, and remember all that I have told you.’



And then he was gone.



Remember, yes, she would do that. ‘Find the Toblakai. Find the killer and re-mind him… remind him, do you understand me? Then, tore-bearer, lead him to war.



‘Lead him to war



There had been more, much more. None of it anything she could hope to forget. ‘All I wanted to do was retire.’



Cursing under her breath, she walked over to the nearest gourd, crouched down before it. Drink. It’s blood, dammit!



Drink.



To stand in the heart of Dragnipur, to stand above the very Gate of Darkness, this was, for Anomander Rake, a most final act. Perhaps it was desperation. Or a sac-rifice beyond all mortal measure.



A weapon named Vengeance, or a weapon named Grief-either way, where he had been delivered by that sword was a world of his own making. And all the choices that might have been were as dust on the bleak trail of his life.



He was the Son of Darkness. His people were lost. There was, for him, room to grieve, here at the end of things, and he could finally turn away, as his mother had done so long ago. Turn away from his children. As every father must one day do, in that final moment that was death. The notion of forgiveness did not even occur to him, as he stood on the mound of moaning, tattooed bodies.



He was, after all, not the begging sort.



The one exception was Draconus. Ah, but those circumstances were unique, the crime so faceted, so intricately complicated, that it did no good to seek to prise loose any single detail. In any case, the forgiveness he asked for did not demand an answer. All that mattered was that Draconus be given those words. He could do with them as he pleased.



Anomander Rake stood, eyes fixed heavenward, facing that seething conflagra-tion, the descending annihilation, and he did not blink, did not flinch. For he felt its answer deep within him, in the blood of T’iam, the blood of chaos.



He would stand, then, for all those he had chained here. He would stand for all the others as well. And for these poor, broken souls underfoot. He would stand, and face that ferocious chaos.



Until the very last moment. The very last moment.



Like a mass of serpents, the tattoos swarmed beneath him.



Kadaspala had waited for so long. For this one chance. Vengeance against the slayer of a beloved sister, the betrayer of Andarist, noble Andarist, husband and brother. Oh, he had come to suspect what Anomander Rake intended. Sufficient reparation? All but one Tiste Andii would answer ‘yes’ to that question. All but one.



Not Kadaspala! No, not me! Not me not me! Not me not me not me!



I will make yon fail. In this, your last gesture, your pathetic attempt at reconciliation-I will make you fail!



See this god I made? See it? See it see it!



No, you did not expect that expect that expect that, did you now? Did you now?



Nor the knife in its hand. Nor the knife in its hand!



Teeth bared, blind Kadaspala twisted on to his back, the better to see the Son of Darkness, yes, the better to see him. Eyes were not necessary and eyes were not necessary. To see the bastard.