The Complete Malazan Book of the Fallen (78 page)

She frowned at him, then shook her head. “I know Kalam,” she said. “He’s an old friend, I think.”

The assassin choked on something, then coughed loudly, wagging his head.

The woman pointed at the wooden block. “See? It’s growing again.”

Both men looked. A haze blurred the block’s edges, swelling and shifting, then vanished, yet it was clear to Paran that the thing was now bigger.

“It has roots,” the woman added.

Paran shook himself. “Corporal? Remain here with the girl. I won’t be long.” He sheathed his sword and left the glade. After winding through the undergrowth for a minute, he came to its edge and looked out on a terrace crowded with guests. A low-walled fountain rose from the paving stones to his left, encircled by marble pillars spaced about a yard apart.

The captain saw that Whiskeyjack and the squad had arrayed themselves in a rough line a dozen feet from the garden’s edge, facing the terrace. They looked tense. Paran found a dead branch and snapped it in half.

At the sound all six men turned. The captain pointed at Whiskeyjack and Mallet, then stepped back between the trees. The sergeant whispered something to Quick Ben. Then he collected the healer and they came over.

Paran pulled Whiskeyjack close. “Kalam’s found Sorry, and something else besides,” he said. “The girl’s not all there, Sergeant, and I don’t think it’s an act. One minute she remembers killing me, the next she doesn’t. And she’s got it into her head right now that Kalam’s an old friend.”

Mallet grunted.

After a brief glance back at the party, Whiskeyjack asked, “So what’s this ‘something else?’ ”

“I’m not sure, but it’s ugly.”

“All right.” The sergeant sighed. “Go with the captain, Mallet. Take a look at Sorry. Any contact from the Assassins’ Guild yet?” he asked Paran.

“No.”

“Then we move soon,” Whiskeyjack said. “We let Fiddler and Hedge loose. Bring Kalam when you come back, Mallet. We need to talk.”

Rallick found his path unobstructed as he moved across the central chamber toward the front doors. Faces turned to him and conversations fell away, rising again as he passed. A bone-deep weariness gripped the assassin, more than could
be accounted for by the blood lost to a wound already healed. The malaise gripping him was emotional.

He paused at seeing Kruppe rising from a chair, mask dangling from one plump hand. The man’s face was sheathed in sweat and there was fear in his eyes.

“You’ve a right to be terrified,” Rallick said, approaching him. “If I’d known you’d be here—”

“Silence!” Kruppe snapped. “Kruppe must think!”

The assassin scowled but said nothing. He’d never before seen Kruppe without his usual affable façade, and the sight of him so perturbed made Rallick profoundly uneasy.

“Be on your way, friend,” Kruppe said then, his voice sounding strange. “Your destiny awaits you. More, it seems this new world is well prepared for one such as Raest, no matter what flesh he wears.”

Rallick’s scowl deepened.
The man sounds drunk
. He sighed, then turned away, his mind returning once again to what had been achieved this night. He continued on his way, leaving Kruppe behind. What now? he wondered. So much had gone into reaching this moment. The sharp focus of his thoughts seemed dulled now by success. Never the crusader, Rallick’s obsession to right the wrong had been, in a sense, no more than the assassin assuming the role Coll himself should have taken. He’d played the instrument of Coll’s will, relying on a faith that the man’s own will would return.

And if it didn’t?
His scowl deepening, Rallick crushed that question before it could lead his thought in search of an answer. As Baruk had said, the time had come to go home.

As he passed a silver-masked woman touched his arm. Startled by the contact, he turned to look at her. Long brown hair surrounded the featureless mask, its eyehole slits revealing nothing of what lay behind it. The woman stepped close. “I’ve been curious,” she said quietly, “for some time. However, I see now I should have observed you personally, Rallick Nom. Ocelot’s death could have been avoided.”

The assassin’s gaze darkened. “Vorcan.”

Her head tilted in a fraction of a nod.

“Ocelot was a fool,” Rallick snapped. “If Orr’s contract was sanctioned by the Guild, I await punishment.”

She did not reply.

Rallick waited calmly.

“You’re a man of few words, Rallick Nom.”

His answer was silence.

Vorcan laughed softly. “You say you await punishment, as if already resigned to your own death.” Her gaze shifted from him toward the crowded terrace. “Councilman Turban Orr possessed protective magic, yet it availed him naught. Curious.” She seemed to be considering something, then she nodded. “Your skills are required, Rallick Nom. Accompany me.”

He blinked, then, as she strode toward the garden at the rear of the house, he followed.

Crokus held one hand over Challice’s mouth as he lay atop her. With his other he removed his thief’s mask. Her eyes widened in recognition. “If you scream,” Crokus warned in a harsh voice, “you’ll regret it.”

He’d managed to drag her perhaps ten yards into the undergrowth before she tripped him. They’d thrashed about, but he’d won the battle.

“I just want to talk to you,” Crokus said. “I won’t hurt you, Challice, I swear it. Unless you try something, of course. Now, I’m going to remove my hand. Please don’t scream.” He tried to read the expression in her eyes, but all he saw was fear. Ashamed, he raised his hand.

She didn’t scream, and a moment later Crokus found himself wishing she had. “Damn you, thief! When my father catches you he’ll have you skinned alive! That’s if Gorlas doesn’t find you first. You try anything with me and he’ll have you boiled, slowly—”

Crokus jammed his hand over her mouth again. Skinned? Boiled? “Who’s Gorlas?” he demanded, glaring. “Some amateur chef? So you did betray me!”

She stared up at him.

He lifted his hand again.

“I didn’t betray you,” she said. “What are you talking about?”

“That murdered house guard. I never did it, but—”

“Of course you didn’t. Father hired a Seer. A woman killed that guard, a servant of the Rope’s. The Seer was terrified and didn’t even stay to be paid! Now get off me, thief.”

He let her go and sat back on the ground. He stared into the trees. “You didn’t betray me? What about Meese? The guards at Uncle Mammot’s? The big hunt?”

Challice climbed to her feet and brushed dead leaves from her hide cloak. “What are you babbling about? I have to get back. Gorlas will be looking for me. He’s the first son of House Tholius, in training to be a master duelist. If he sees you with me, there’ll be real trouble.”

He looked up at her blankly. “Wait!” He sprang to his feet. “Listen, Challice! Forget this Gorlas idiot. Within the year my uncle will introduce us formally. Mammot is a famous writer.”

Challice rolled her eyes. “Get your feet back on the ground. A writer? Some old man with ink-stained hands who walks into walls—has his house power? Influence? House Tholius has power, influence, everything required. Besides, Gorlas loves me.”

“But I—” He stopped, looking away. Did he? No. Did that matter, though? What did he want from her, anyway?

“What do you want from me, anyway?” Challice demanded.

He studied his feet. Then he met her eyes. “Company?” he asked diffidently. “Friendship? What am I saying? I’m a thief! I rob women like you!”

“That’s right,” she snapped. “So why pretend otherwise?” Her expression softened. “Crokus, I won’t betray you. It will be our secret.”

For the briefest of moments he felt like a child being stroked and consoled by a kindly matron, and he found himself enjoying it.

“Before you,” she added, smiling, “I’d never met a real thief from the streets.”

His enjoyment ended in a surge of anger. “Hood’s Breath, no,” he sneered.

“Real? You don’t know what’s real, Challice. You’ve never had blood on your hands. You’ve never seen a man die. But that’s the way it should be, isn’t it? Leave the dirt to us, we’re used to it.”

“I saw a man die tonight,” Challice said quietly. “I never want to again. If that’s what ‘real’ means, then I don’t want it. It’s all yours, Crokus. Good-bye.” She turned and walked away.

Crokus stared at her back, her braided hair, as her words rang in his head.

Suddenly exhausted, he turned to the garden. He hoped Apsalar had remained where he’d left her. The last thing he wanted now was to have to track her down. He slipped into the shadows.

Mallet recoiled with his first step into the glade. Paran gripped his arm. Their eyes met.

The healer shook his head. “I’ll not approach any closer, sir. Whatever lives there is anathema to my Denul Warren. And it . . . it senses me . . . with hunger.” He wiped sweat from his brow, drew a shaky breath. “Best bring the girl to me here.”

Paran released his arm and darted into the clearing. The block of wood was now the size of a table, veined in thick, twisting roots and pocked on its sides with rough squared holes. The earth around it looked soaked in blood. “Corporal,” he whispered, chilled. “Send the girl over to Mallet.”

Kalam laid a hand on her shoulder. “It’s all right, lass,” he said, in the tone of a kindly uncle, “you go on, now. We’ll join you shortly.”

“Yes,” she smiled, and moved to where the healer stood at the glade’s edge. Kalam rubbed his bristly jaw, eyes following her. “Never seen Sorry smile before,” he said, as Paran arrived. “And that’s a shame.”

They stood and watched as Mallet spoke quietly to the girl, then stepped forward and laid a hand on her forehead.

Paran cocked his head. “The storm’s stopped,” he said.

“Yeah. Hope it means what we’d like it to mean.”

“Someone’s stopped it. I share your hope, Corporal.” For the captain however, it was a small hope. Something was building. He sighed. “It’s not even the twelfth bell yet. Hard to believe.”

“Long night ahead of us,” the assassin said, making it clear that he, too, found himself sorely lacking in optimism. He grunted. Mallet had voiced an amazed cry that reached them. The healer drew back his hand and waved at Paran and Kalam. “You go,” the assassin said.

The captain frowned at the black man, confused. Then he went over to where the healer and Sorry waited. The girl’s eyes were closed, and she seemed in a trance.

Mallet was direct. “The possession’s gone,” he said.

“Guessed as much,” Paran replied, eyeing the girl.

“There’s more to it, though,” the healer continued. “She’s got someone else inside her, sir.”

Paran’s brows rose.

“Someone who was there all along. How it survived the Rope’s presence is beyond me. And now I’ve got a choice.”

“Explain.”

Mallet crouched, found a twig and began to scratch aimless patterns in the dirt. “That someone’s been protecting the girl’s mind, acting like an alchemist’s filter. In the last two years, Sorry’s done things that would drive her insane if she’d remembered any of it. That presence is fighting those memories right now, but it needs help, because it isn’t as strong as it once was. It’s dying.”

Paran squatted beside the man. “You’re thinking of offering that help, then?”

“Not sure. You see, sir, I don’t know its plans. Don’t know what it’s up to, can’t read the pattern it’s trying to make. So let’s say I help it, only what it wants is absolute control? Then the girl’s possessed all over again.”

“So you think the presence was protecting Sorry from the Rope, only so it could now jump in and take over?”

“Put it that way,” Mallet said, “and it doesn’t make sense. What gets me, though, is why else would that presence commit itself so thoroughly? Its body, its flesh is gone. If it lets go of the girl it’s got nowhere to go, sir. Now, maybe it’s a loved one, a relative or something like that. A person who was willing to sacrifice herself absolutely. That’s a possibility.”

“Herself? It’s a woman?”

“It was. Damned if I know what it is now. All I get from it is sadness.” The healer met Paran’s eyes. “It’s the saddest thing I’ve ever known, sir.”

Paran studied the man’s face briefly, then he rose. “I’m not going to give you an order on what to do, Healer.”

“But?”

“But, for what it’s worth, I say do it. Give it what it needs so it can do what it wants to do.”

Mallet puffed out his cheeks, then tossed down the twig and straightened. “My instinct, too, sir. Thanks.”

Kalam spoke loudly from the glade. “Far enough. Show yourselves.”

The two men spun around to see Kalam looking into the woods to their left. Paran grasped Mallet’s arm and pulled him into the shadows. The healer dragged Sorry with them.

Two figures entered the glade, a woman and a man.

Crokus snaked closer through the vines and mulch of the forest floor. For an off-limits garden, this was a busy tangle of wood. The voices he’d heard in his search for Apsalar now revealed themselves as two men and one silver-masked
woman. All three were looking at an odd, blurry tree stump in the center of the glade. Slowly Crokus let out a breath. One of the men was Rallick Nom.

“There is ill in this,” the woman said, stepping back. “A hunger.”

The large black-skinned man at her side grunted. “Wouldn’t argue with you on that, Guild Master. Whatever it is, it ain’t Malazan.”

The thief’s eyes widened.
Malazan spies? Guild Master? Vorcan!
Seemingly impervious to the strangeness around her, the woman now turned to Rallick. “How does it affect you, Rallick?”

“It doesn’t,” he said.

“Approach it, then.”

The assassin shrugged and walked up to the writhing, knotted block. Its blurred movement stopped.

Vorcan relaxed. “You seem to damage its efforts, Rallick. Curious.”

The man grunted. “Otataral dust.”

“What?”

“I rubbed it into my skin.”

Vorcan stared.

The other man’s eyes narrowed on Rallick. “I remember you, Assassin. Our quarry when we first sought to make contact. The night of the ambush from above.”

Rallick nodded.

“Well,” the Malazan continued, “I’m surprised you survived.”