commander would stand.
Tavore’s head had turned in startlement, and words were exchanged-too low for Blistig’s ears-followed by a salute from the newcomer.
The Adjunct is alone. So too is another woman, seemingly as bound up in grief as Tavore herself, yet this one possesses an edge, an anger tempered like Aren steel. Short on patience, which might be precisely what’s needed here.
Was it you, Keneb?
Of course, Lostara Yil, once a captain in the Red Blades, now just one more outlawed soldier, had revealed no inclinations to take a woman to her bed. Not anyone, in fact. Yet she was no torture to look at, if one had a taste for broken glass made pretty. That and Pardu tattoos. But it was just as likely that the Adjunct wasn’t thinking in those terms. Too soon. Wrong woman.
Throughout the fleet, officers had been reporting talk of mutiny among the soldiers-excepting, oddly enough, the marines, who never seemed capable of thinking past the next meal or game of Troughs. A succession of reports, delivered in increasingly nervous tones, and it had seemed the Adjunct was unwilling or unable to even so much as care.
You can heal wounds of the flesh well enough, but it’s the other ones that can bleed out a soul.
After that night, Lostara Yil clung to a resentful Tavore like a damned tick. Commander’s aide. She understood the role. In the absence of actual direction from her commander, Lostara Yil assumed the task of managing nearly eight thousand miserable soldiers. The first necessity was clearing up the matter of pay. The fleet was making sail for Theft, a paltry kingdom torn to tatters by Malazan incursions and civil war. Supplies needed to be purchased, but more than that, the soldiers needed leave and for that there must be not only coin but the promise of more to come, lest the entire army disappear into the back streets of the first port of call.
The army’s chests could not feed what was owed.
So Lostara hunted down Banaschar, the once-priest of D’rek. Hunted him down and cornered him. And all at once, those treasury chests were overflowing.
Now, why Banaschar? How did Lostara know?
Grub, of course. That scrawny runt climbing the rigging with those not-quite-right bhok’aral-I ain’t once seen him come down, no matter how brutal the weather. Yet Grub somehow knew about Banaschar’s hidden purse, and somehow got the word to Lostara Yil.
The Fourteenth Army was suddenly rich. Too much handed out all at once would have been disastrous, but Lostara knew that. Enough that it be seen, that the rumours were let loose to scamper like stoats through every ship in the fleet.
Soldiers being what they were, it wasn’t long before they were griping about something else, and this time the Adjunct’s aide could do nothing to give answer.
Where in Hood’s name are we going?
Are we still an army and if we are, who are we fighting for? The notion of becoming mercenaries did not sit well, it turned out.
The story went that Lostara Yil had it out with Tavore one night in the Adjunct’s cabin. A night of screams, curses and, maybe, tears. Or something else happened. Something as simple as Lostara wearing her commander down, like D’rek’s own soldier worms gnawing the ankles of the earth, snap snick right through. Whatever the details, the Adjunct was… awakened. The entire Fourteenth was days from falling to pieces.
A call was issued for the Fists and officers ranking captain and higher to assemble on the Froth Wolf. And, to the astonishment of everyone, Tavore Paran appeared on deck and delivered a speech. Sinn and Banaschar were present, and through sorcery the Adjunct’s words were heard by everyone, even crew high in the riggings and crow’s nests.
A Hood-damned speech.
From Tavore. Tighter-lipped than a cat at Togg’s teats, but she talked. Not long, not complicated. And there was no brilliance, no genius. It was plain, every word picked up from dusty ground, strung together on a chewed thong, not even spat on to bring out a gleam. Not a precious stone to be found. No pearls, no opals, no sapphires.
Raw garnet at best.
At best.
Tied to Tavore’s sword belt, there had been a finger bone. Yellowed, charred at one end. She stood in silence for a time, her plain features looking drawn, aged, her eyes dull as smudged slate. When at last she spoke, her voice was low, strangely measured, devoid of all emotion.
Blistig could still remember every word.
‘There have been armies. Burdened with names, the legacy of meetings, of battles, of betrayals. The history behind the name is each army’s secret language-one that no-one else can understand, much less share. The First Sword of Dassem Ultor-the Plains of Unta, the Grissian Hills, Li Heng, Y’Ghatan. The Bridgeburners-Raraku, Black Dog, Mott Wood, Pale, Black Coral. Coltaine’s Seventh-Gelor Ridge, Vathar Crossing and the Day of Pure Blood, Sanimon, the Fall.
‘Some of you share a few of those-with comrades now fallen, now dust. They are, for you, the cracked vessels of your grief and your pride. And you cannot stand in one place for long, lest the ground turn to depthless mud around your feet.’ Her eyes fell then, a heartbeat, another, before she looked up once more, scanning the array of sombre faces before her.
‘Among us, among the Bonehunters, our secret language has begun. Cruel in its birth at Aren, sordid in a river of old blood. Coltaine’s blood. You know this. I need tell you none of this. We have our own Raraku. We have our own Y’Ghatan. We have Malaz City.
‘In the civil war on Theft, a warlord who captured a rival’s army then destroyed them-not by slaughter; no, he simply gave the order that each soldier’s weapon hand lose its index finger. The maimed soldiers were then sent back to the warlord’s rival. Twelve thousand useless men and women. To feed, to send home, to swallow the bitter taste of defeat. I was… I was reminded of that story, not long ago.’
Yes, Blistig thought then, and 1 think I know by whom. Gods, we all do.
‘We too are maimed. In our hearts. Each of you knows this.
‘And so we carry, tied to our belts, a piece of bone. Legacy of a severed finger. And yes, we cannot help but know bitterness.’ She paused, held back for a long moment, and it seemed the silence itself grated in his skull.
Tavore resumed. ‘The Bonehunters will speak in our secret language. We sail to add another name to our burden, and it may be it will prove our last. I do not believe so, but there are clouds before the face of the future-we cannot see. We cannot know.
‘The island of Sepik, a protectorate of the Malazan Empire, is now empty of human life. Sentenced to senseless slaughter, every man, child and woman. We know the face of the slayer. We have seen the dark ships. We have seen the harsh magic unveiled.
‘We are Malazan. We remain so, no matter the judgement of the Empress. Is this enough reason to give answer?
‘No, it is not. Compassion is never enough. Nor is the hunger for vengeance. But, for now, for what awaits us, perhaps they will do. We are the Bonehunters, and sail to another name. Beyond Aren, beyond Raraku and beyond Y’Ghatan, we now cross the world to find the first name that will be truly our own. Shared by none other. We sail to give answer.
‘There is more. But I will not speak of that beyond these words: “What awaits you in the dusk of the old world’s passing, shall go… unwitnessed.” T’amber’s words.’ Another long spell of pained silence.
‘They are hard and well might they feed spite, if in weakness we permit such. But to those words I say this, as your commander: we shall be our own witness, and that will be enough. It must be enough. It must ever be enough.’
Even now, over a year later, Blistig wondered if she had said what was needed. In truth, he was not quite certain what she had said. The meaning of it. Witnessed, unwitnessed, does it really make a difference? But he knew the answer to that, even if he could not articulate precisely what it was he knew. Something stirred deep in the pit of his soul, as if his thoughts were black waters caressing unseen rocks, bending to shapes that even ignorance could not alter.
Well, how can any of this make sense? I do not have the words.
