‘And by this, the Nerek justify their strange patriarchy.’

‘Perhaps,’ Hull conceded, ‘although it is the female line that is taken as purest.’

‘And does this first mother’s mother have a name?’

‘Ah, you noted the confused blending of the two, as if they were roles rather than distinct individuals. Maiden, mother and grandmother, a progression through time-’

‘Discounting the drudgery spent as wife. Wisdom unfurls like a flower in a pile of dung.’

His gaze sharpened on her. ‘In any case, she is known by a number of related names, also suggesting variations of a single person. Eres, N’eres, Eres’al.’

‘And this is what lies at the heart of the Nerek ancestor worship?’

‘Was, Seren Pedac. You forget, their culture is destroyed.’

‘Cultures can die, Hull, but the people live on, and what they carry within them are the seeds of rebirth-’

‘A delusion, Seren Pedac,’ he replied. ‘Whatever might be born of that is twisted, weak, a self-mockery.’

‘Even stone changes. Nothing can stand still-’

‘Yet we would. Wouldn’t we? Oh, we talk of progress, but what we really desire is the perpetuation of the present. With its seemingly endless excesses, its ravenous appetites. Ever the same rules, ever the same game.’

Seren Pedac shrugged. ‘We were discussing the Nerek. A noble-born woman of the Hiroth Tiste Edur has blessed them-’

‘Before even our own formal welcome has been voiced.’

Her brows rose. ‘You think this is yet another veiled insult to the Letherii? Instigated by Hannan Mosag himself? Hull, I think your imagination has the better of you this time.’

‘Think what you like.’

She turned away. ‘I’m going for a walk.’

Uruth had intercepted Mayen at the bridge. Whatever was exchanged between them was brief and without drama, at least none that Udinaas could determine from where he sat in front of the longhouse. Feather Witch had trailed Uruth after delivering the message from her mistress, and waited a half-dozen paces distant from the two Edur women, though not so far as to be out of earshot. Uruth and Mayen then approached side by side, the slaves trailing.

Hearing low laughter, Udinaas stiffened and hunched lower on the stool. ‘Be quiet, Wither!’ he hissed.

‘ There are realms, dead slave ,’ the wraith whispered, ‘ where memories shape oblivion, and so make of ages long past a world as real as this one. In this way, time is defeated. Death is defied. And sometimes, Udinaas the Indebted, such a realm drifts close. Very close .’

‘No more, I beg you. I’m not interested in your stupid riddles-’

‘Would you see what I see? Right now? Shall I send Shadow’s veil to slip over your eyes and so reveal to you unseen pasts?’

‘Not now-’

‘Too late.’

Layers unfolded before the slave’s eyes, cobweb-thin, and the surrounding village seemed to shrink back, blurred and colourless, beneath the onslaught. Udinaas struggled to focus. The clearing had vanished, replaced by towering trees and a forest floor of rumpled moss, where the rain fell in sheets. The sea to his left was much closer, fiercely toppling grey, foaming waves against the shoreline’s jagged black rock, spume exploding skyward.

Udinaas flinched away from the violence of those waves – and all at once they faded into darkness, and another scene rose before the slave’s eyes. The sea had retreated, beyond the western horizon, leaving behind trench-scarred bedrock ringed in sheer ice cliffs. The chill air carried the stench of decay.

Figures scurried past Udinaas, wearing furs or perhaps bearing their own thick coat, mottled brown, tan and black. They were surprisingly tall, their bodies disproportionately large below small-skulled, heavy-jawed heads. One sported a reed-woven belt from which dead otters hung, and all carried coils of rope made from twisted grasses.

They were silent, yet Udinaas sensed their terror as they stared at something in the northern sky.

The slave squinted, then saw what had captured their attention.

A mountain of black stone, hanging suspended in the air above low slopes crowded with shattered ice. It was drifting closer, and Udinaas sensed a malevolence emanating from the enormous, impossible conjuration – an emotion the tall, pelted creatures clearly sensed as well.

They stared for a moment longer, then broke. Fled past Udinaas-

– and the scene changed.

Battered bedrock, pulverized stone, roiling mists. Two tall figures appeared, dragging between them a third one – a woman, unconscious or dead, long dark brown hair unbound and trailing on the ground. Udinaas flinched upon recognizing one of the walking figures – that blinding armour, the iron-clad boots and silver cloak, the helmed face. Menandore. Sister Dawn . He sought to flee – she could not avoid seeing him – but found himself frozen in place.