Through the screen of whizzing flies he saw something in the sky ahead. A darker cloud, a towering, swirling thing. Dust storm? There was no dust. A whirlwind? Maybe. But the air was still. It was in his path, although still some distance away. He watched it, to track its path.
The cloud remained directly ahead.
The insects surrounding him were suddenly frenzied — and he caught something in their manic buzzing.
He could hear that cloud now, a deeper, more frightening drone quickly overwhelming the swarming flies.
All of this felt wrong. Mappo slowed his run, halted. The flies spun round him a moment longer, and then fled. He stood, breathing deep, eyes on the vast spinning pillar of locusts.
And then, all at once, he understood. ‘
Something that looked like white foam was spreading from the base of the locust cloud, surging in tumultuous waves.
The butterflies reached him, whipped round him — so many he could no longer see the ground at his feet. The frantic breaths of their wings stole the sweat from his skin, until he began shivering. ‘D’ivers! I would speak to you! Semble! Show yourself to me!’
The locusts blighted half the sky, devouring the sun. Spinning overhead, and then, in a wave of rage, descending.
Mappo dropped to his knees, buried his face beneath his arms, hunched down.
They struck his back like a deluge of darts.
As more poured down, he grunted at their weight. Bones creaked. He struggled for breath, clenched his jaws against the pain.
The locusts stabbed again and again with their jaws, driven mad by the feel and scent of living flesh.
But he was Trell, and his kind had skin like leather.
The locusts could not draw blood. But the weight grew vast, seeking to crush him. In the gap his arms made for his face he stared at inky darkness, and his gasps snatched up dust from the ground. Deafened by the futile clack of bladed jaws, buried in riotous darkness, he held on.
He could feel the mind of the d’ivers now. Its fury was not for him alone.
The being was ancient. It had not sembled in a long time — thousands of years, perhaps more. Lost now to the primitive instincts of the insects.
With a deafening roar the vast weight on Mappo’s back burst apart, exploded outward.
He sat up, tilted back his head. ‘Shards opals diamonds gems leaves drinkers — go away. Go away. Go!’
The cloud heaved upward, twisted, and then churned past him. Another seething wave of butterflies, and then they too were gone.
Stunned, Mappo looked round. He was alone.
He was covered in bruises. Every bone ached.
‘Child, be careful. This d’ivers was once a god. Someone tore it apart, into so many pieces it can never heal. It can’t even find itself. All it knows now is hunger — not for you or me. For something else. Life itself, perhaps. Child, your song has power. Be careful. What you banish you can also summon.’
He heard her voice again, fainter now, drifting away. ‘
Grunting, he climbed to his feet. Drew his sack round and loosened the drawstrings, reached in and lifted out a waterskin. He drank deep, sighed, drank a second time and then stuffed the skin back into the sack. Tightening the shoulder straps again, he faced east, and resumed running.
For the edge of the world.
‘Nice sword.’
‘Alas, this one I must use. I will give my two Letherii swords to you.’
Ryadd Eleis leaned back against the knobby stone of the cave wall. ‘How did they get the dragons on that blade?’
Silchas Ruin continued studying the weapon he had unsheathed. The flames of the hearth danced up and down its length. ‘There is something wrong with this,’ he said. ‘The House of Hust burned to the ground with everything else — not Kharkanas itself, of course, that city didn’t burn. Not precisely. But Hust, well, those forges were a prize, you see. And what could not be held had to be destroyed.’
Ryadd glanced away, at the pearl sky beyond the cave mouth. Another dawn had arrived. He’d been alone for some time. Awakened to find that the Tiste Andii had returned sometime in the night, blown in like a drift of snow. ‘I don’t understand what you’re saying.’
The white face took on an almost human hue, bathed as it was in the firelight. But those red eyes were as unnerving as ever. ‘I thought I knew all the weapons forged by the Hust. Even the obscure ones.’
‘That one does not look obscure, Silchas,’ said Ryadd. ‘It looks like a hero’s weapon. A famous weapon. One with a name.’
‘As you say,’ Silchas agreed. ‘And I am not so old as to forget the ancient warning about trusting shadows. No, the one who gave me this sword is playing a game.’
‘Someone gave it to you? In return for what?’
‘I wish I knew.’
Ryadd smiled. ‘Never bargain knowing only the value of one side of the deal. Onrack said that to me once. Or maybe it was Ulshun Pral.’
Silchas shot him a look.
Ryadd shrugged, lifting himself to his feet. ‘Do we now resume our journey?’
Sheathing the sword, Silchas straightened as well. ‘We have gone far enough, I think.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I needed to take you away from Starvald Demelain, and now I have done so.’ He faced Ryadd. ‘This is what you must learn. The Eleint blood within you is a poison. I share it, of course. My brother and I chose it for ourselves — we perceived a necessity, but that is the fatal lure of power, isn’t it? With the blood of T’iam within our veins, we could bring peace to Kurald Galain. Of course, that meant crushing every House opposing us. Regrettable, but that sentiment was as far as the poison would permit us to go in our thoughts. The thousands who died could not make us hesitate, could not stop us from continuing. Killing thousands more.’
‘I am not you, Silchas Ruin.’
‘Nor will you ever be, if I can help it.’
Ryadd walked to the cave’s edge, looked out on bleak, jagged rock and blinding sweeps of snow where the sun’s light marched down into the valley below. Elsewhere, in shadow, the snow was as blue as the sky. ‘What have you done, Silchas?’
Behind him, the Tiste Andii replied, ‘What I deemed … necessary. I have no doubt that Kilava succeeded in forcing your people out of that realm — they won’t die, not there, not then. Udinaas is a clever man. In his life, he has come to understand the pragmatism of survival. He will have led the Imass away from there. And he will find them a home, somewhere to hide from humans-’
