Memories of Ice

'The Jaghut remember Moon's Spawn. I alone am in possession of the relevant scrolls from Gothos's Folly that whisper of the K'Chain Nah'rhuk — the Short-Tails, misbegotten children of the Matrons — who fashioned mechanisms that bound sorcery in ways long lost, who built vast, floating fortresses from which they launched devastating attacks upon their long-tailed kin.



'Oh, they lost in the end. Were destroyed. And but one floating fortress remained, damaged, abandoned to the winds. Gothos believed it had drifted north, to collide with the ice of a Jaghut winter, and was so frozen, trapped for millennia. Until found by the Tiste Andii Lord.



'Do you comprehend, Toc the Younger? Anomander Rake knows nothing of Moon's Spawn's fullest powers — powers he has no means of accessing even were he to know of them. Dear Mother remembers, or at least some part of her does. Of course, she has nothing to fear. Moon's Spawn is not within two hundred leagues of here — my Winged Ones have searched for it, high overhead, through the warrens, everywhere. The only conclusion is that Moon's Spawn has fled, or failed at last — was it not almost destroyed over Pale? So you've told me.



'So you see, Toc the Younger, your Malazan army holds no terror for any of us, including dear Mother. Onearm's Host will be crushed in the assault on Coral. As will Brood and his Rhivi. Moreover, the White Faces will be shattered — they've not the discipline for this kind of war. I will have them all. And I will feed you bits of Dujek Onearm's flesh — you'd like some meat again, wouldn't you? Something that hasn't been … regurgitated. Yes?'



He said nothing, even as his stomach clenched in visceral greed.



The Seer crouched lower and touched a fingertip to Toc's temple. 'It's so easy breaking you. All your faiths. One by one. Almost too easy. The only salvation you can hope for is mine, Toc the Younger. You understand that now, don't you?'



'Yes,' he replied.



'Very good. Pray, then, that there is mercy in my soul. True, I've yet to find any myself, though I admit I've little searched. But perhaps it exists. Hold to that, my friend.'



'Yes.'



The Seer straightened. 'I hear my mother's cries. Take him back, Seerdomin.'



'As you command, Holy One.'



Strong arms gathered Toc the Younger, lifted him with ease from the cold floor.



He was carried from the room. In the hallway, the Seerdomin paused.



'Toc, listen to me, please. She's chained down below, and the reach does not encompass the entire room. Listen. I will set you down beyond her grasp. I will bring food, water, blankets — the Seer will pay little heed to her cries, for she is always crying these days. Nor will he probe towards her mind — there are matters of far greater import consuming him.'



'He will have you devoured, Seerdomin.'



'I was devoured long ago, Malazan.'



'I–I am sorry for that.'



The man holding him said nothing for a long moment, and when he spoke at last, his voice cracked. 'You … you offer compassion. Abyss take me, Toc, I am ever surpassed. Allow to me, please, my small efforts-'



'With gratitude, Seerdomin.'



'Thank you.'



He set off once more.



Toc spoke. 'Tell me, Seerdomin, does the ice still grip the sea?'



'Not for at least a league, Toc. Some unexpected twist of the currents has cleared the harbour. But the storms still rage over the bay, and the ice out there still thunders and churns like ten thousand demons at war. Can you not hear it?'



'No.'



'Aye, I'll grant you it's faint from here. From the keep's causeway, it is a veritable assault.'



'I–I remember the wind …'



'It no longer reaches us. Yet another wayward vagary, for which I am thankful.'



'In the Matron's cave,' Toc said, 'there is no wind.'



Wood splintered, a sickening sound that trembled through the entire Meckros fragment. Lady Envy paused in her climb towards the street's ragged, torn end. The slope had grown suddenly steeper, the frost slick on the cobbles underfoot. She hissed in frustration, then drew on a warren and floated to where Lanas Tog stood on the very edge.



The T'lan Imass did not so much as sway on her perilous perch. Wind ripped at her tattered skins and bone-white hair. The swords still impaling her glistened with rime.



Reaching her side, Lady Envy saw more clearly the source of the terrible, snapping sounds. A vast section of ice had collided with them, was grinding its way along the base in a foaming sluice of jetting water and spraying ice.