«Trotts!» the sergeant bellowed.
The Barghast's face, woad tattoos stretched into illegibility, turned to Whiskeyjack with wide eyes.
«Let go of the rope, soldier.»
Kalam released an amused snort behind Whiskeyjack, who glared at the others. «Now,» he said, his voice harsh, «since one of you idiots convinced everyone else that loading all the equipment into the boat when it's still on shore was a good idea, you can all man the rope and drag it into the lake-not you, Trotts. You get inside, get comfortable, there at the stern.» Whiskeyjack paused. He studied Sorry's expressionless face.
«From Fiddler and Hedge I expect this, but I thought I put you in charge of setting things up.»
Sorry shrugged.
Whiskeyjack sighed. «Can you rig us a sail?»
«There's no wind.»
«Well, maybe there will be.» Whiskeyjack said, exasperated.
«Yes,» Sorry answered. «We have some canvas. We'll need a mast.»
«Take Fiddler and make one. Now, the rest of you, get this boat into the water.»
Trotts climbed inside and sat down at the stern. He stretched out his long legs and draped an arm over the splashboard. He bared his filed teeth in what might have been a smile.
Whiskeyjack turned to a grinning Kalam and Quick Ben. «Well?» he demanded. «What're you waiting for?»
The grins died.
CHAPTER NINE
Have you seen the one who stands apart cursed in a ritual sealing his kind beyond death the host amassed and whirling like a plague of pollen-
he stands apart the First among all ever veiled in time yet outcast and alone a T'lan Imass wandering like a seed unfallen
Lay of Onos T'oolan Toc the Younger
Toc the younger leaned forward in his saddle and spat. It was his third day out from Pale, and he longed for the city's high wall around him. The Rhivi Plain stretched out on all sides, cloaked in yellow grass that rippled in the afternoon wind, but otherwise featureless He scratched the edges of the wound that had taken his left eye, and muttered under his breath. Something was wrong. He should have met her two days past. Nothing was going as planned these days. What with Captain Paran vanishing before even meeting Whiskeyjack and the story making the rounds about a Hound attacking the 2nd's last-surviving mage and leaving fourteen dead marines in its wake, he supposed he shouldn't be surprised that this rendezvous had gone awry as well.
Chaos seemed a sign of the times. Toc straightened and rose in his saddle. Though there was no true road as such on the Plain, merchant caravans had mapped a rough track running north- south along the western edge. Trade had since died out, but the passing of generations of wagons and horse trains had left its mark. The centre of the Plain was home to the Rhivi, those small brown-skinned people who moved with the herds in a seasonal cycle. Though not warlike, the Malazan Empire had forced their hand, and now they fought and scouted alongside Caladan Brood's Tiste And? legions against the Empire.
Moranth reports placed the Rhivi far to the north and east, and Toc was thankful for that. He was feeling very alone out in this wasteland, yet loneliness was a lesser evil, all things considered.
Toc's single eye widened. It seemed he wasn't so alone, after all.
Perhaps a league ahead ravens wheeled. The man cursed and loosened the scimitar sheathed at his hip. He fought the urge to push his horse into a gallop and settled for a quick trot.
As he neared he saw trampled grass off to one side of the trader's track. The cackling laughter of the ravens was the only sound to break the stillness. They had already begun feeding. Toc reined in his horse and sat unmoving in his saddle, hunched forward. None of the bodies he saw looked as if they were apt to start moving, and the ravens» preoccupied squabbling was good evidence that any survivors had long gone. Still, he a bad feeling about this. Something hung in the air, something between a smell and a taste.
He waited, for what he wasn't certain, but a reluctance to move gripped him. All at once he identified the strangeness he felt: magic. It had been unleashed here. «I hate this,» he muttered, then dismounted.
The ravens gave him room, but not much. Ignoring their outraged shrieks he approached the bodies. They numbered twelve in all. Eight wore the uniforms of Malazan Marines-but these weren't average soldiers. His gaze narrowed on the silver sigils on their helmets.
«Jakatakan,» he said. tlites. They'd been cut to pieces.
He turned his attention to the remaining bodies and felt a tremor of fear run through him. No wonder the Jakatakan had taken such a beating. Toc strode to one of the bodies and crouched beside it. He knew something of the clan markings among the Barghast, how each hunter group was identified through their woad tattooing. The breath hissed between his teeth and he reached out to turn the savage's face towards him, then he nodded. These were Ilgres Clan. Before the Crimson Guard had enlisted them, their home territory had been fifteen hundred leagues to the east, among the mountains just south of the Porule. Slowly Toc rose. The Ilgres numbered among the strongest of those who had joined the Crimson Guard at Blackdog Forest, but, that was four hundred leagues north. So what had brought them here?
The stench of spilled magic wafted across his face and he turned, his eye fixing on a body he hadn't noticed before. It lay beside scorched grass. «So,» he said, «my question's answered.» This band had been led by a Barghast shaman. Somehow, they'd stumbled on to a trail and this shaman had recognized it for what it was. Toc studied the shaman's body. Killed by a sword wound in the throat. The unleashing of sorcery had been the shaman's, but no magic had opposed him. And that was odd, particularly since it was the shaman who had died, rather than whomever he'd attacked.
Toc grunted. «Well, she's said to be hell on mages.» He walked a slow circle around the kill site, and found the trail with little difficulty. Some of the Jakatakan had survived, and from the smaller set of boot-prints, so had their charge. And overlaying these tracks were half a dozen moccasin prints. The trail veered westerly from the trader's track, yet still led south.
Returning to his horse, Toc mounted and swung the animal around.
He removed the short bow from its saddle holster and strung it, then nocked an arrow. There was no hope of coming up on the Barghast undetected. Out on this plain he'd be visible a long time before entering arrow-range-and that range had become much closer now that he'd lost an eye. So they'd be waiting for him, with those damn lances. But he knew he had no choice; he hoped only to take down one or two of them before they skewered him.
Toc spat again, then wrapped the reins around his left forearm and adjusted his grip on the bow. He gave the wide red scar crossing his face a vigorous, painful scratch, realizing that the maddening itch would return in moments anyway. «Oh well,» he said, then drove his heels into the horse's flanks.
The lone hill that rose up before Adjunct Lorn was not a natural one. The tops of mostly buried stones encircled its base. She wondered what might be entombed within it, then dismissed her misgivings. If those standing stones were of the size she'd seen rising around the mysterious barrows outside Genabaris, this mound dated back millennia. She turned to the two exhausted marines stumbling in her wake. «We'll make our stand here. You with the crossbow, I want you lying up top.»
The man ducked his head in answer and staggered to the mound's grassy summit. Both he and his comrade seemed almost relieved,tha she'd called a halt, though they knew their death was but minutes away.
Lorn eyed the other soldier. He'd taken a lance barb in his left shoulder and the blood still flowed profusely down the front of his breastplate. How he had stayed on his feet in the last hour was beyond Lorn's understanding. He looked upon her with eyes dulled by resignation, showing nothing of the pain he must be feeling.
«I'll hold your left,» he said, shifting his grip on the curved tulwar in his right hand.
Lorn unsheathed her own longsword and fixed her attention northwards. Only four of the six Barghast were visible, approaching slowly.
«We're being flanked,» she called out to her crossbowman. «Take the one on your left.»
The soldier beside her grunted. «My life need not be sheltered,» he said.
«We were charged with your protection, Adjunct-»
«Quiet,» Lorn commanded. «The longer you stand the better protected I'll be,» she said.
The soldier grunted again.
The four Barghast were lingering now, just out of bowshot range. Two still carried their lances; the other two gripped short axes. Then a voice cried out far to Lorn's right and she whirled to see a lance speeding towards her, and behind it a charging Barghast.
Lorn brought her blade across her body and dropped into a crouch as she raised the weapon over her head. Her sword caught the lance's shaft and even as it did so she was turning, pulling her weapon to one side.
The deflected lance sped past and cracked into the hillside off to her right.
Behind her she heard the crossbowman release a quarrel. As she spun back to the four charging Barghast there came a scream of pain from the other side of the mound. The soldier beside her seemed to have forgotten his wound, as he gripped his tulwar with both hands and planted his feet wide.
«Attend, Adjunct,» he said.
The Barghast off to the right cried out and she turned to see him spinning with the impact of a quarrel.
The four warriors before them were no more than thirty feet away.
The two with lances now launched them. Lorn made no move, realizing almost immediately that the one aimed at her would fly wide. The soldier beside her dropped away to his left, but not enough to avoid the lance as it thudded into his right thigh. It struck with such force as to drive right through his leg and embed itself in the earth. The soldier was pinned, but his only response was a soft gasp, and he raised his sword to parry an axe swinging at his head.
In this time Lorn had already closed with the Barghast rushing at her.
His axe was a shorter weapon, and she took advantage of this with a thrust before he came into his own range. He brought the coppersheathed haft up to parry, but Lorn had already flicked her wrist, completing the feint and dipping under the axe. Her lunge buried the sword point in the Barghast's chest, slicing the leather armour as if were cloth.
Her attack had committed her, and her sword was nearly wrenched from her hand as the savage toppled backwards. Off-balance, she staggered a step, expecting the crushing blow of an axe. But it didn't, arrive. Regaining her balance she spun round, to find her crossbowman now wielding his tulwar, engaging the other Barghast. Lorn snapped her attention to see how her other guard fared.
Somehow, he still lived, though he faced two Barghast. He'd managed to drag the lance out of the earth, but the weapon's shaft remained in his leg. That he was able to move at all, much less defend himself, spoke eloquently of Jakatakan discipline and training.
Lorn rushed to engage the Barghast on the man's right, nearest her. Even as she did so, an axe slipped past the soldier's guard and struck him across the chest. Scale snapped as the heavy
