A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 1

shadows that held his features in darkness now flowed out around his body.
    Ammanas spoke, and to the girl his words seemed to come from a great distance. 'She's ideal. The Empress could never track her down, could never even so much as guess.' He raised his voice. 'It's not so bad a thing, lass, to be the pawn of a god.'
    'Prod and pull,' the fishergirl said quickly.
    Cotillion hesitated at her strange comment, then he shrugged. The shadows whirled out to engulf the girl. With their cold touch her mind fell away, down into darkness. Her last fleeting sensation was of the soft wax of the candle in her right hand, and how it seemed to well up between the fingers of her clenched fist.
     
    The captain shifted in his saddle and glanced at the woman riding beside him. 'We've closed the road on both sides, Adjunct. Moved the local traffic inland. So far, no word's leaked.' He wiped sweat from his brow and winced. The hot woollen cap beneath his helm had rubbed his forehead raw.
    'Something wrong, Captain?'
    He shook his head, squinting up the road. 'Helmet's loose. Had more hair the last time I wore it.'
    The Adjunct to the Empress did not reply.
    The mid-morning sun made the road's white, dusty surface almost blinding. The captain felt sweat running down his body, and the mail of his helm's lobster tail kept nipping the hairs on his neck. Already his lower back ached. It had been years since he'd last ridden a horse, and the roll was slow in coming. With every saddle-bounce he felt vertebrae crunch.
    It had been a long time since somebody's title had been enough to straighten him up. But this was the Adjunct to the Empress, Laseen's personal servant, an extension of her Imperial will. The last thing the captain wanted was to show his misery to this young, dangerous woman.
    Up ahead the road began its long, winding ascent. A salty wind blew from their left, whistling through the newly budding trees lining that side of the road. By mid-afternoon, that wind would breathe hot as a baker's oven, carrying with it the stench of the mudflats. And the sun's heat would bring something else as well. The captain hoped to be back in Kan by then.
    He tried not to think about the place they rode towards. Leave that to the Adjunct. In his years of service to the Empire, he'd seen enough to know when to shut everything down inside his skull. This was one of those times.
    The Adjunct spoke. 'You've been stationed here long, Captain?'
    'Aye,' the man growled.
    The woman waited, then asked, 'How long?'
    He hesitated. 'Thirteen years, Adjunct.'
    'You fought for the Emperor, then,' she said.
    'Aye.'
    'And survived the purge.'
    The captain threw her a look. If she felt his gaze, she gave no indication. Her eyes remained on the road ahead; she rolled easily in the saddle, the scabbarded longsword hitched high under her left arm – ready for mounted battle. Her hair was either cut short or drawn up under her helm. Her figure was lithe enough, the captain mused.
    'Finished?' she asked. 'I was asking about the purges commanded by Empress Laseen following her predecessor's untimely death.'
    The captain gritted his teeth, ducked his chin to draw up the helm's strap – he hadn't had time to shave and the buckle was chafing. 'Not everyone was killed, Adjunct. The people of Itko Kan aren't exactly excitable. None of those riots and mass executions that hit other parts of the Empire. We all just sat tight and waited.'
    'I take it,' the Adjunct said, with a slight smile, 'you're not noble-born, Captain.'
    He grunted. 'If I'd been noble-born, I wouldn't have survived, even here in Itko Kan. We both know that. Her orders were specific, and even the droll Kanese didn't dare disobey the Empress.' He scowled. 'No, up through the ranks, Adjunct.'
    'Your last engagement?'
    'Wickan Plains.'
    They rode on in silence for a time, passing the occasional soldier stationed on the road. Off to their left the trees fell away to ragged heather, and the sea beyond showed its white-capped expanse. The Adjunct spoke. 'This area you've contained, how many of your guard have you deployed to patrol it?'
    'Eleven hundred,' the captain replied.
    Her head turned at this, her cool gaze tightening beneath the rim of her helm.
    The captain studied her expression. 'The carnage stretches half a league from the sea, Adjunct, and a quarter-league inland.'
    The woman said nothing.
    They approached the summit. A score of soldiers had gathered there, and others waited along the slope's