With a sour grunt, Endest Silann began walking upstream. At the very least, the fire would warm his hands.
Thirty paces away, he could see the lone figure facing the smoky flames. Huge, round-shouldered, seated on a fallen log. And Endest Silann smiled in recognition.
Two trout speared on skewers cooked above the fire. A pot of simmering tea sat with one blackened shoulder banked in coals. Two tin cups warmed on the flat rock making up one side of the hearth. Another log waited opposite the one on which sat the warlord, Caladan Brood, who slowly twisted round to watch Endest Silann approach, The broad, oddly bestial face split into a wry smile. ‘Of all the guests I imagined this night, old friend, you did not come to mind. Forgive me. You took your time since begin-ning your descent into this valley, but for that 1 will happily make allowances-but do not complain if the fish is overcooked.’
‘Complaints are far away and will remain so, Caladan. You have awakened my appetite-for food, drink and, most of all, company.’
‘Then sit, make yourself comfortable.’
‘So you did indeed disband your army after the siege,’ said Endest Silann, making his way over to settle himself down. ‘There were rumours. Of course, my master said nothing.’
‘See me now,’ said the warlord, ‘commanding an army of wet stones, and yes, it proves far less troublesome than the last one. Finally, I can sleep soundly at night. Although, matching wits with these trout has challenged me mightily. There, take one of those plates, and here-beware the bones, though,’ he added as he set a fish on the plate.
‘Alone here, Caladan Brood-it makes me wonder if you are hiding.’
‘It may be that I am, Endest Silann. Unfortunately, hiding never works.’
‘No, it never does.’
Neither spoke for a time as they ate their supper. The trout was indeed over-done but Endest Silann said nothing, for it was delicious none the less.
If Anomander Rake was a mystery shrouded in darkness, then Caladan Brood was one clothed in geniality. Spare with words, he nevertheless could make virtually anyone feel welcome and, indeed, appreciated. Or rather, he could when the pressures of command weren’t crouched on his shoulders like a damned mountain. This night, then, Endest Silann well understood, was a gift, all the more precious in that it was wholly unexpected.
When the meal was done, night’s arrival closed out the world beyond the fire’s light. The rush of the river was a voice, a presence: Water flowed indifferent to the heave and plunge of the sun, the shrouded moon and the slow spin of the stars. The sound reached them in a song without words, and all effort to grasp its meaning was hopeless, for, like the water itself, one could not grasp hold of sound. The flow was ceaseless and immeasurable and just as stillness did not in fact exist, so too true, absolute silence.
‘Why are you here?’ Endest Silann asked after a time.
‘I wish I could answer you, old friend, and Burn knows the desire to ease the burden is almost overwhelming.’
‘You are assuming, Caladan, that I am ignorant of what awaits us.’
‘No, I do not do that-after all, you have sought a pilgrimage, out to this river-and among the Tiste Andii, this place has proved a mysterious lure. Yet you ask why I am here, and so your knowledge must be… incomplete. Endest Silann, I cannot say more. I cannot help you.’
The old Tiste Andii looked away, off into the dark where the river sang to the night. So, others had come here, then. Some instinctive need drawing them, yes, to the ghost of Dorssan Ryl. He wondered if they had felt the same disappointment as he had upon seeing these black (but not black enough) waters. It is not the stum. Nothing ever is, beginning with ourselves. ‘I do not,’ he said, ‘believe much in forgiveness.’
‘What of restitution?’
The question stunned him, stole his breath. The river rushed with the sound of ten thousand voices and those cries filled his head, spread into his chest to grip his heart. Cold pooled in his gut. By the Abyss… such… ambition. He felt the icy trickle of tears on his fire-warmed cheeks. ‘I will do all I can.’
‘He knows that,’ Caladan Brood said with such compassion that Endest Silann almost cried out. ‘You might not believe this now,’ the huge warrior continued, ‘but you will find this pilgrimage worthwhile. A remembrance to give strength when you need it most.’
No, he did not believe that now, and could not imagine ever believing it. Even so… the ambition. So appalling, so breathtaking.
Caladan Brood poured the tea and set a cup into Endest’s hands. The tin shot heat into his chilled fingers. The warlord was standing beside him now.
‘Listen to the river, Endest Silann. Such a peaceful sound…’
But in the ancient Tiste Andii’s mind that sound was a wailing chorus, an overwhelming flood of loss and despair. The ghost of Dorssan Ryl? No, this was where that long dead river emptied out, feeding the midnight madness of its history into a torrent where it swirled with a thousand other currents. Endless variations on the same bitter flavour.
And as he stared into the flames he saw once more the city dying in a confla-gration. Kharkanas beneath the raging sky. Blinding ash like sand in the eyes, smoke like poison in the lungs. Mother Darkness in her fury, denying her chil-dren, turning away as they died and died. And died.
Listen to the river. Remember the voices.
Wait, as does the warlord here. Wait, to see what comes.
The smell of the smoke remained long after the fire was done. They rode in on to charred ground and blackened wreckage. Collapsed, crumbled inward, the enormous carriage still reared like a malignant smoking pyre in the centre of stained earth. Detritus was scattered about to mark the disintegration of the community. Yet, although the scene was one of slaughter, there were no bodies. Trails set off in all directions, some broader than others.
Samar Dev studied the scene for a time, then watched as Traveller dismounted to walk over to the edge of the camp, where he began examining some of the tracks leading away. He was an odd man, she decided. Quiet, self- contained, a man used to being alone, yet beneath it all was a current of… yes, mayhem. As if it was his own solitude that kept the world safe.
Once, long ago now, she had found herself in the company of another warrior equally familiar with that concept. But there the similarity ended. Karsa Orlong, notwithstanding that first journey into the besieged fortress outside Ugarat, thrived on an audience. Witness, he would say, In full expectation of just that, He wanted his every deed observed, as if each set of eyes existed solely to mat It K.arsa Orlong, and the minds behind them served, to the exclusion of all else, to recount to all what he had done, what he had said, what he had begun and what he had ended, He makes us his history. Every witness contributes to the narrative-the life, the deeds of Toblakai-a narrative to which we are, each of us, bound.
Chains and shackles snaked out from the burned carriage. Empty, of course. And yet, despite this, Samar Dev understood that the survivors of this place remained slaves. Chained to Karsa Orlong, their liberator, chained to yet another grim episode in his history. He gives us freedom and enslaves us all. Oh, now there is irony. All the sweeter for that he does not mean to, no, the very opposite each and every time. The damned fool.
‘Many took horses, loaded down with loot,’ Traveller said, returning to his mount. ‘One trail heads north, the least marked-I believe it belongs to your friend.’’
My friend.
‘He is not far ahead of us now, and still on foot. We should catch up to him to-day.’
She nodded.
Traveller studied her for a moment. He then swung himself on to his horse and collected the reins. ‘Samar Dev, I cannot work out what happened here.’
‘He did,’ she replied. ‘He happened here.’
‘He killed no one. From what you have told me, well, I thought to find something else. It is as if he simply walked up to them and said, “It’s over.”‘ He frowned across at her. ‘How can that be?’
She shook her head.
He grunted, guiding his horse round. ‘The scourge of the Skathandi has ended.’
‘It has.’
‘My fear of your companion has… deepened. I am ever more reluctant to find him.’
