Night of Knives

The brittle flesh of the being’s neck creaked as it cocked its head to regard her through empty sockets. ‘The Hounds and I are akin. Slaves to Shadow in our own ways. But I thank you for your concern. Now you must go.’

The creature raised a clawed hand in farewell and at that the world darkened. All around shadows writhed like black wings. For an instant she thought she heard a chorus of whispers in a confusing multitude of languages. Then the shadows whipped away, and she recognized where she stood: Riverwalk, south of Malaz River.

Immediately, a howl tore through the night so loud that Kiska jumped as if the Hound was beside her, ready to close its jaws. She took off at a run, not daring to glance behind. Ahead, a mere few blocks, the jagged top of Obo’s ruined tower thrust into the clouds like a broken dagger. Another bellow, loud as a thunderclap, and she stumbled. Screams rose around her, torn from the throats of terrified citizens locked in their houses. She raced around a corner and over an open square, then dived the low stone wall of the tower grounds. Amongst the leaves and tossed garbage of the abandoned yard she lay trembling, straining to listen.

But she heard nothing, only the surf, strangely distant, and the rush of wind. Slowly, she brought her breath under control, stilled her pulse. Something kicked through the fallen branches and she suppressed a yelp. She raised her head a fraction: a thin foot in leather sandals. She looked up. An old man in tattered brown woollen robes, hefting a tree limb as a staff. He was bald but for strands of long wild white hair in a fringe over his ears.

He glowered down the length of a long hooked nose. ‘What’s this?’ he muttered, as if he’d stepped on a cow turd.

Kiska blinked up at him. Who was this doddering oldster? Surely not Obo, the malevolent ogre of legend. ‘Who in the Queen’s wisdom are you?’ she asked warily, and climbed to her feet, watching the man all the while.

‘Who am I?’ the fellow squawked. ‘Who am I? Some guttersnipe invades my home and questions me?’

‘’Your home?’

‘Yes, my home.’ The old man swept his staff up at the tower and Kiska saw that it now rose massive and undamaged into a night sky gleaming with stars but free of any moon. She peered around — the familiar hillsides ran down to the sea while to the north the cliffs rose like a wall — yet no city surrounded them. Not one building marred a field of wind-swept marsh grasses and nodding cattails.

‘Where are we?’

The old man jabbed her arm with the staff. ‘Are you dense? My tower.’

‘You’re Obo?’

The old man screwed up his mouth in anger and raised his staff.

Kiska snatched it from his hands and threw it to one side.

The old man gaped at her. ‘Why you…! That was my stick!’

Kiska tensed, waiting for a blast of magery or a flesh-rotting curse. Instead, the old man turned sharply around and marched up the stone steps to the tower’s only door.

‘Wait! Hey you — wait!’

The door slammed. Kiska ran up the stairs and beat her fists on the wood. ‘Open up. What am I to do?’

A slit no larger than the palm of a hand opened. ‘You can go away.’

‘But there’s a hound out here! You can’t leave me outside…’

One watery eye squinted past her. ‘It’s gone away. Now you go away.’

Kiska waved one hand to the marsh. ‘Go where? There’s nothing out there!’

The old man — Kiska couldn’t bring herself to identify him as the Obo — a legendary name of dread as a sorcerer from ages past. Another favourite of the blood-splashed stories her mother used to tell. He snarled his exasperation. ‘Not here. You don’t belong here. You go back to where you came from.’

She nodded. ‘Good. Yes. That’s what I want.’

‘Then go away and stop bothering me.’ The portal slammed shut.

She backed down the stairs. ‘Okay. I will!’ she shouted, ‘No thanks to you.’

At the low wall she paused and listened. For what, she wasn’t certain. A hound’s call, she supposed. But there was only the wind hissing through the tall grass and the churning of the surf. Lights caught her eye and she turned, staring to the far southern sky. Blue-green flashes played like banners painted in the night. Kiska shivered, remembering legends that the lights were reflections of the Stormriders, rising to drag ships down into their icy sunken realm. Tales she used to laugh at. But now… now she didn’t know what to think. She wiped her hands at the thighs of her sodden pants and blew on them. What had the old man meant, ’go back to where you came frond How? What was she to do?

In the gloom she could make out slabs of standing stones, a structure of some sort surrounded by a copse of stunted trees and low mounds. It appeared to stand right on the spot where, in Malaz City… Kiska’s breath caught and she backed away. Burn preserve my soul. It stood right where the Deadhouse would stand, or had stood. Only now it was a tomb.

She hugged herself as she shuddered. It wasn’t so much the cold as the shock of recognition. This really was her home, or would be. She felt suddenly very insignificant, even foolish. All her life she’d been so sure things never changed here. She wondered whether she could trust what this fellow hinted — that she would somehow return to the city. But then, what choice did she have?

If she did succeed in returning, Kiska vowed she would head straight to Agayla’s. If anyone knew what was going on — and what to do — it would be her. Never mind all this insane mumbling of the Return, the Deadhouse, and Shadow. What a tale she had for her aunt!

She took a deep steadying breath, stepped over the wall, and immediately lost her balance. The stars wheeled overhead until clouds like dark cloths flew across her vision, blotting them out. Now the moon glowed behind the clouds like the eye of giants from long ago. Ribbons of fog drifted over her. Wincing, she stood, rubbed at a bruised elbow. Turning, she glanced up to the shattered walls of Obo’s tower: a ruin once more. She was back in Malaz — the Malaz she knew. He’d done it; or perhaps he’d done nothing and simply walking out of the Tower’s grounds had returned her. Who knew how any of this worked? Perhaps Agayla could explain. In any case, she was back and had to get to her aunt’s as quickly as possible. That meant braving the streets again. She automatically slipped into the cover of a nearby wall.

Yet, she glanced back to Obo’s shattered tower. Maybe she could hide in the grounds till dawn. After all, who was she kidding? She now knew she was outclassed. Who would blame her? Kiska almost growled her frustration. Agayla must know what was going on. She had to talk to her.

A bellow erupted from the distance. Kiska flinched-Gods below! — and bolted from the shelter of the wall and down the narrow street.

The night’s second bell rang out tonelessly as Kiska reached Agayla’s rooms. Her aunt lived alone behind her shop on Reach Lane, a street so narrow its second-storey balconies butted each other overhead and occulted the moonlight.

Kiska leaned her weight onto the door and hammered her fist on its solid timbers: planks from a shipwreck, Agayla once told her. Kiska’s blows hardly raised a quiver. She stepped back, rain-sodden and exhausted. Woven garlands of ivy and twists of herbs hung over the lintel and down both jambs. When had that been done? Under its small gable, the door’s panels had been washed in dark tarry swathes as if a handful of leaves had been ground over them. She caught a sharp peppery scent. Too tired to wonder, she pressed herself to the wood. She whispered, ‘Auntie? It’s me. Open up. Please open. Please.’

‘Hello? Who’s there begging and scratching at my door? What lost soul?’

‘It’s me! Open up.’

‘Me? Oho! Any shade will have to do better than that to cross my threshold. Go and pester someone else.’

‘Auntie! Please! There are things out here! Let me in!’

With a rattle, the door swung inward. Agayla stood at the narrow threshold, a candle in one hand that cast her sharp features into stark shadow and light. ‘I know there are, dear. That’s why you shouldn’t be out.’

Kiska stumbled in, slammed the door. Panting, chilled to the bone, she pressed her back to it, threw home the bolt.

Agayla shook her head as if Kiska had been out playing in the mud.

Still breathless, Kiska pointed to the door. ‘Don’t just stand there! There are monsters out there. Ghosts!