Orb Sceptre Throne

Sergeant Hektar grunted as he reached the front line. The ground was soft and wet beneath Bendan’s sandals. The noise was nowhere near what it had been in any of his earlier battles. Just clattering shields, hissed breaths and the fierce outraged screams of the wounded. Something slashed his shield yet was hardly a blow at all. More like a snake slithering across the surface hunting for a gap. He poked his head up for a look and something flashed across his vision and his helmet flew off over the lines. He ducked, thrusting. Wet warmth soaked his neck and front. Cut me — the bastard! And he thrust again, pushing with his shield. Bastard! The bright tongue licked around the lip of his shield, grating against the bone of his arm, and he snarled. His neck and side were now cold and numb.

Hands grasped him, pulling him back. Fuck! No! I’ll have that bastard. I swear!

‘Easy, lad,’ someone soothed, urging him backwards. ‘You’re a right mess.’

‘What?’ Bendan glanced to his side. Bright wet blood soaked his armour down to his legs. ‘Damn!’ He touched the side of his head and barked a yell at the pain. His shield arm hung numb, blood dripping from his fingertips. ‘Damn.’

He reached the rear and slumped down in the grass with the other wounded waiting for one of the bonesetters. When the cutter came alongside him she shook her head as if disgusted. ‘Sliced half your scalp right off. Ear’s gone, too. All I can do is stop the bleeding and wrap you up.’

‘Good enough. I want back in there.’

‘If there’s time.’ The young squad healer’s gaze skittered aside as she unwound a rag.

A short while later Bendan felt the reverberation of many hooves through the ground and calls went up: ‘Rhivi! Cav!’

He staggered upright and did his best to see over the heads of the shifting jostling lines. Rhivi cavalry were sweeping across the fields behind the Seguleh. Some lowered lances, others fired their short-bows. The Seguleh responded by doubling up to face both ways. The slaughter was appalling: horses’ necks and stomachs slit, riders spilling right and left.

Bendan spotted Hektar standing to one side and hobbled over. ‘Sarge.’

‘What’s going on?’ the big man asked.

‘You got a better view than I.’

‘No, I don’t.’

Bendan looked up: blood and gore crossed the man’s face in a slit where the bridge of his nose and his eyes once lay. His front was smeared in blood as well where it had been roughly wiped. Bendan quickly turned away, his gorge rising. Ye gods!

‘Healers stopped the bleeding,’ Hektar said. ‘Other than this nick I’m fit.’

Bendan swallowed to steady his stomach and to ease a burning that was tightening across his chest. ‘Yeah. Me too.’ Shouting pulled his attention to the lines. The Seguleh had broken contact and were now chasing the Rhivi from the field. ‘They’re after the Rhivi,’ he told Hektar. He saw a mounted lad hardly no more than a boy charge a Seguleh and the warrior sidestep the lance and swing and the lad topple from his saddle, his leg hanging from a few ligaments as he tumbled limp. Bendan flinched and winced his own pain at the sheer cold exactness of it.

*

The quorl carrying Torvald and the Silver Galene set down just behind a sharp mountain ridge. What Torvald had glimpsed in the next valley over drove him to immediately scramble the last few feet up the slope to peer down. Watching the slaughter below, he felt as if he would vomit. ‘Do something — now!’ he begged Galene, behind him. ‘They’re being torn to pieces … can’t you see?’

‘Not yet,’ she answered. ‘They’re too close together.’

‘Too close together? What do you mean? Well, I’m not waiting.’ He lurched forward to descend. An armoured hand yanked him back.

‘Do not alert them.’

He pointed back to the ranks of landed quorl and the waiting Black and Red among the rocks. ‘Join them! Together you can-’

‘Together we would likewise be cut down by the Seguleh,’ she interrupted, harsh. ‘As we were before. But that was long ago. We are not the people we once were. Now we have much less … patience for all this. Ah — look.’ She raised her helmed head to the valley. ‘Good. Yes.’

*

Aragan kicked his lathered mount right up to the Malazan shield wall then threw himself from the saddle. He slapped the horse to send it off and pushed his way through the troopers. He realized he had no idea who was in charge, and grabbed a trooper, shouting, ‘Who’s ranking officer here?’

‘You, sir,’ the man drawled.

‘Other than fucking me!’

The regular smiled as he wrapped bloodied rags over a hand that was no more than a fingerless stump. ‘You must be that Aragan fellow. It’s Fist K’ess.’ He inclined his head to indicate further along the lines.

Aragan nodded. ‘Oponn favour you, man.’ He waved Captain Dreshen to follow.

When he found K’ess, the Fist stared his disbelief before belatedly saluting. ‘Ambassador — you shouldn’t be here. I suggest you withdraw-’

‘None of us should be here, Fist. What’s the butcher’s bill?’

The Fist exchanged bleak glances with the aides and staff surrounding him. ‘First estimate is forty per cent incapacitated,’ he reported, his voice hoarse. ‘Wounded or otherwise.’

Aragan’s chest constricted like an iron band. He couldn’t draw breath. Burn deliver them! Forty per cent! This was … unimaginable. What were these Seguleh? The noise of the nearby fighting faded to a dull roar. He blinked away the darkness that seemed to be clawing at him from the edges of his vision and forced in a deep steadying breath. ‘Fist. The Rhivi have bought us time. We no longer have the troops to hold this line. I suggest we withdraw to the head of the valley, among the rocks.’

Fist K’ess saluted. The man’s face was a lifeless mask, shocked beyond expression, beyond feeling. ‘Yes, Ambassador.’

*

Then a bellowed call came: ‘Retreat! Move out! Up valley!’

‘Damn,’ Hektar murmured, stricken. ‘I can’t see nothing.’

Though feeling strangely weak and a touch dizzy Bendan took the man’s elbow with his one good hand. ‘I’ll guide you, Sarge. Don’t you worry. C’mon, this way.’

After the scramble higher up the slope, Bendan found himself and Hektar among the front ranks. Not believing his terrible luck, he glanced to the slashed limping and crippled troopers on his left and right and swallowed his outrage. A gimp and a blind man — best the Empire can muster! What a Twins-cursed joke. ‘Get back, Sarge. You’re no use.’

‘I can still fill a slot. Hold the line.’

‘You can’t see a thing!’

The beaming smile returned. ‘We’re all just hidin’ behind our shields anyways, ain’t we?’

Bendan squinted down the valley to where the Seguleh had assembled. What in the name of the Queen of Mysteries were they waiting for?

‘Still not comin’?’ Hektar asked.

‘Yeah. They’re just … standin’ there. Like they was waitin’ for us to run away or somethin’.’

Someone came scrambling among the rocks. It was Bone, the old saboteur. ‘Hey, Sarge! I …’ His voice trailed away when Hektar turned to the sound of his voice. ‘Damn! I’m sorry, Sarge.’

‘I’m still standing. Seen Little?’

‘Yeah … up the lines.’

‘Good.’

‘What’re they waitin’ for?’ Bendan complained yet again.

‘They do not pursue,’ K’ess muttered where he stood with Aragan at the centre of the Malazan lines.

‘No,’ Aragan answered, distracted. ‘They may be giving us time to have a good think about this. And frankly, the troops deserve that … In fact, they deserve better than that …’

Bracing himself, he stepped out among the rocks before the lines and turned to face the troops. He raised his