The Crippled God

‘What priestesses?’

‘The Liosan won’t stop. Nothing can make them stop. The Watch knows — all the Shake do. They have accepted it. They are going to die for us. Every last one of them. We cannot permit that. Where is Gallan? Where is Silchas? Where is my brother-’

Then Withal’s arms were about her, lifting her from the throne, holding her tight. She felt weak as a child, but he was strong — stronger than she’d ever imagined was possible for a human. She felt something crumble within her and let out a soft gasp.

‘I went looking for ghosts,’ she said. ‘I–I found them, I think. Mother help me. Save me — it’s too much-’

‘Sand.’ The word was a sob.

‘We need to run,’ she said. ‘That’s all we need to do, my love. Run. Tell Twilight — raise a flag of truce — I will yield Kharkanas to the Liosan. They can have it, and I hope they burn it to the fucking ground!’

‘Sand — this is Yedan’s battle now, and he will not parley with the Liosan. He is a Shake prince. He wields a Hust blade — it was the witches who explained to me what that meant-’

‘Hust? A Hust sword?’ Did I know that? I must have. Did I?

‘Forged to slay Eleint — without them the Andii could never have killed all those dragons at the Sundering. They could never have fought back. Yedan’s sword knows what’s coming-’

‘Stop it!’

‘It’s too late-’

‘Yedan-’

‘He knows, Sand. Of course he knows. The witches are desperate — Yan Tovis accepts none of this-’

‘Because she’s not a fool!’ Sandalath pushed Withal back. ‘We need to run!’

He shook his head.

She glared round. Guards looked away. Servants ducked their heads. She bared her teeth. ‘You must think me mad. Do you? But I’m not. I see now, as clearly as Yan Tovis does. Is this all the Shake are to be to us? Wretched fodder doomed to fail? How dare we ask them to fight?’ She spun, glared at the domed ceiling. ‘Mother Dark! How dare you?’

The shout echoed, her only reply.

‘The Shake will fight,’ said Withal into the silence that followed. ‘Not for you, Sand. Not for the Queen of High House Dark. Not even for Kharkanas. They will fight for their right to live. This once, after generations of retreating, of kneeling to masters. Sand — this is their fight.’

‘Their deaths, you mean. Don’t you? Their deaths!’

‘And they will choose where it is to be, Sand. Not me. Not you.’

What makes us do this? What makes us set aside the comforts of peace?

‘Sand,’ Withal said in a quiet voice, ‘this is their freedom. This one thing. Their freedom.’

‘Go back to them, then,’ she croaked, turning away. ‘Be their witness, Withal. They’ve earned that much at least. Remember all that you see, for as long as there’s life left to you.’

‘My love-’

‘No.’ She shook her head, walking from the throne room.

Hostages. We are all hostages.

Yedan Derryg leaned the blade of his sword against his shoulder, his jaws bunching rhythmically, his eyes narrowing as he studied the breach. ‘Signal the front lines. They’re coming.’

The blurred shapes of the dragons skittered like wind-torn clouds behind the veil of Lightfall. He counted five in all, but suspected there were more. ‘It will be in strength this time,’ he said. ‘They will seek to advance ten paces to start, and then form a crescent as the ranks behind them spill out, spread out. Our flanks need to deny that. Push in along the Lightfall itself, sever the vanguard.’

‘That’s asking a lot,’ muttered Brevity beside him.

Yedan nodded.

‘Maybe too much,’ she continued. ‘We’re none of us trained as soldiers. We don’t know what we’re doing.’

‘Captain, the Liosan are no different. Helmed and armed doesn’t make an army. They are conscripts — I could see as much the first time.’ He chewed on the thought and then added, ‘Soft.’

‘You saying they don’t want any of this?’

‘Like us,’ he replied, ‘they have no choice. We’re in a war that began long ago, and it has never ended, Captain.’

‘Pithy says they look no different from the Tiste Andii, barring their snowy skin.’

He shrugged. ‘Why should that matter? It’s all down to disagreeing about how things should be.’

‘We can’t win, can we?’

He glanced at her. ‘Among mortals, every victory is temporary. In the end, we all lose.’

She spat on to the white sand. ‘You ain’t cheering me at all, sir. If we ain’t got no hope of winning against ’em, what’s the point?’

‘Ever won a scrap, Captain? Ever stood over the corpses of your enemy? No? When you do, come find me. Come tell me how sweet victory tastes.’ He lifted the sword and pointed down to the breach. ‘You can win even when you lose. Because, even in losing, you might still succeed in making your point. In saying that you refuse the way they want it.’

‘Well now, that makes me feel better.’

‘I can’t do the rousing speeches, Captain.’

‘I noticed.’

‘Those words sound hollow, all of them. In fact, I do not believe that I have ever heard a commander or ruler say anything to straighten me up. Or make me want to do for them what they wanted done. So,’ he said amiably, ‘if I won’t die for someone else, how can I ask anyone else to do so?’

‘Then what’re we gonna die for here?’

‘For yourselves, Captain. Each and every one of you. What could be more honest than that?’

After a time, she grunted. ‘I thought it was all about fighting for the soldier beside you. And all that. Not wanting to let them down, I mean.’

‘What you seek not to let down, Captain, is your sense of yourself. How you see yourself, even when you see yourself through the eyes of the people around you.’ He shook his head. ‘I won’t argue against that. So much comes down to pride, after all.’

‘So, we’re to hold against the Liosan — we’re to hold the First Shore — out of some kind of feeling of pride?’

‘I would like to hear a truly rousing speech, one day,’ Yedan mused. ‘Just once.’ Then he sighed. ‘No matter. One can’t have everything, can one?’

‘I see ’em — coming through!’

Yedan started walking down the slope. ‘Hold back the Letherii until I need them, Captain.’

‘Yes sir!’

The Liosan vanguard burst through the breach with a roar.

Seeing the shadows wheeling above the Liosan, Brevity flinched. Dragons. That ain’t fair. Just ain’t. She turned and made her way down to the Letherii legion.

They were like Pithy now. They had that thing in their eyes — Brevity could not find words to describe it. They’d fought for their lives, but not in that daily struggle to put food on the table, not in those quiet moments when the body surrendered to some illness. This was a sudden thing, a savage thing. That look she saw now, she didn’t know what it was.

But she wanted some of it.

Errant’s nudge, I must be mad.

Sharl had always been the older sister, the capable one. When her mother had wandered off in the way drunks did, leaving them on their own, Sharl had reached out to take in her two younger brothers.

The Shake understood the two sides of the Shore. The drawing close, the falling apart. Those sides lived in their blood, and in all the ghettos where dwelt the remnants of her people the fates washed back and forth, and