A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 1

ridge half a league distant. Though she could not see it, she knew that on the other side of the ridge, the land slumped down to the sea. The plain itself was marked by regular humps, the mounds were arrayed in concentric circles, and at the centre was a larger dome – all covered in a mantle of lava and ash. The rotted tooth of a ruined tower rose from the plain's edge, at the base of the first line of hills. Those hills, as she had noted the first time she had visited this place, were themselves far too evenly spaced to be natural.
    The Bonecaster lifted her head. The mingled scents were unmistakable, one ancient and dead, the other.. . less so. The boy stirred in her clasp, but remained asleep.
    'Ah,' she murmured, 'you sense it as well.'
    Skirting the plain, she walked towards the blackened tower.
    The gate was just beyond the ragged edifice, suspended in the air at about six times her height. She saw it as a red welt, a thing damaged, but no longer bleeding. She could not recognize the warren – the old damage obscured the portal's characteristics. Unease rippled faintly through her.
    The Bonecaster set the children down by the tower, then sat on a block of tumbled masonry. Her gaze fell to the two young Jaghut, still curled in sleep, lying on their beds of ash. 'What choice?' she whispered. 'It must be Omtose Phellack. It certainly isn't Tellann. Starvald Demelain? Unlikely.' Her eyes were pulled to the plain, narrowing on the mound rings. 'Who dwelt here? Who else was in the habit of building in stone?' She fell silent for a long moment, then swung her attention back to the ruin. 'This tower is the final proof, for it is naught else but Jaghut, and such a structure would not be raised this close to an inimical warren. No, the gate is Omtose Phellack. It must be so.'
    Still, there were additional risks. An adult Jaghut in the warren beyond, coming upon two children not of its own blood, might as easily kill them as adopt them. 'Then their deaths stain another's hands, a Jaghut's.' Scant comfort, that distinction. It matters not which of you kills us, only that you kill us. The breath hissed between the woman's teeth. 'What choice?' she asked again.
    She would let them sleep a little longer. Then, she would send them through the gate. A word to the boy – take care of your sister. The journey shall not be long. And to them both – your mother waits beyond. A lie, but they would need courage. If she cannot find you, then one of her kin will. Go then, to safety, to salvation.
    After all, what could be worse than death?
    She rose as they approached. Pran Chole tested the air, frowned. The Jaghut had not unveiled her warren. Even more disconcerting, where were her children?
    'She greets us with calm,' Cannig Tol muttered.
    'She does,' the Bonecaster agreed.
    'I've no trust in that – we should kill her immediately.'
    'She would speak with us,' Pran Chole said.
    'A deadly risk, to appease her desire.'
    'I cannot disagree, Clan Leader. Yet. . . what has she done with her children?'
    'Can you not sense them?'
    Pran Chole shook his head. 'Prepare your spearmen,' he said, stepping forward.
    There was peace in her eyes, so clear an acceptance of her own imminent death that the Bonecaster was shaken. He walked through shin-deep water, then stepped onto the island's sandy bank to stand face to face with the Jaghut. 'What have you done with them?' he demanded.
    The mother smiled, the skin peeling back to reveal her tusks. 'Gone.'
    'Where?'
    'Beyond your reach, Bonecaster.'
    Pran Chole's frown deepened. 'These are our lands. There is no place here that is beyond our reach. Have you slain them with your own hands?'
    The Jaghut cocked her head, studied the T'lan Imass. 'I had always believed you were united in your hatred of our kind. I had always believed that such concepts as compassion and mercy were alien to your natures.'
    The Bonecaster stared at the woman, then his gaze dropped away, past her, and scanned the soft clay ground. 'A T'lan Imass has been here,' he said. 'A woman. The Bonecaster—' The one I could not find in my spiritwalk. The one who chose not to be found. 'What has she done?'
    'She has explored this land,' the Jaghut replied. 'She has found a gate far to the south. It is Omtose Phellack.'
    'I am glad,' Pran Chole said, 'I am not a mother.' And you, woman, should be glad I am not cruel. He gestured. Heavy spears flashed past the Bonecaster. Six long, fluted heads of flint punched through the skin