A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 2

asked.
    'I want to walk. It's hard to breathe. I think I'm drowning.'
    'Drowning in the desert, aye,' the other grunted, then laughed.
    She staggered past, choosing a direction at random.
    Heavy. Filled up. Drowning in the desert.
    'Not this night, lass.'
    She stumbled as she turned about, threw both arms out for balance, and squinted at the guard who had followed. 'What?'
    'Febryl has wearied of your spying. He wants Bidithal
blind and deaf in this camp. It grieves me, Scillara. It does. Truly.' He took her by the arm, gauntleted fingers closing tight. 'It's a mercy, I think, and I will make it as painless as possible. For I liked you, once. Always smiling, you were, though of course that was mostly the durhang.' He was leading her away as he spoke, down from the main avenue into the rubbish-cluttered aisles between tent-walls. 'I'm tempted to take my pleasure of you first. Better a son of the desert than a bow-legged Napan for your last memory of love, yes?'
    'You mean to kill me?' She was having trouble with the thought, with thinking at all.
    'I'm afraid I must, lass. I cannot defy my master, especially in this. Still, you should be relieved that it is me and not some stranger. For I will not be cruel, as I have said. Here, into these ruins, Scillara – the floor has been swept clean – not the first time it's seen use, but if all signs are removed immediately there is no evidence to be found, is there? There's an old well in the garden for the bodies.'
    'You mean to throw me down the well?'
    'Not you, just your body. Your soul will be through Hood's gate by then, lass. I will make certain of that. Now, lie yourself down, here, on my cloak. I have looked upon your lovely body unable to touch for long enough. I have dreamt of kissing those lips, too.'
    She was lying on the cloak, staring up at dim, blurry stars, as the guard unhitched his sword-belt then began removing his armour. She saw him draw a knife, the blade gleaming black, and set it to one side on the flagstoned floor.
    Then his hands were pushing her thighs apart.
    There is no pleasure. It is gone. He is a handsome man. A woman's husband. He prefers pleasure before business, as I once did. I think. But now, I know nothing of pleasure.
    Leaving naught but business.
    The cloak was bunching beneath her as his grunts filled her ears. She calmly reached out to one side and closed her
hand around the hilt of the knife. Raised it, the other hand joining it over and above the guard.
    Then she drove the knife down into his lower back, the blade's edge gouging between two vertebrae, severing the cord, the point continuing on in a stuttering motion as it pierced membranes and tore deep into the guard's middle and lower intestines.
    He spilled into her at the moment of death, his shudders becoming twitches, the breath hissing from a suddenly slack mouth as his forehead struck the stone floor beside her right ear.
    She left the knife buried halfway to its hilt – as deep as her strength had taken it – in his back, and pushed at his limp body until it rolled to one side.
    A desert woman for your last memory of love.
    Scillara sat up, wanting to cough but swallowing until the urge passed. Heavy, and heavier still.
    I am a vessel ever filled, yet there's always room for more. More durhang. More men and their seeds. My master found my place of pleasure and removed it. Ever filled, yet never filled up. There is no base to this vessel. This is what he has done.
    To all of us.
    She tottered upright. Stared down at the guard's corpse, at the wet stains spreading out beneath him.
    A sound behind her. Scillara turned.
    'You murdering bitch.'
    She frowned at the second guard as he advanced, drawing a dagger.
    'The fool wanted you alone for a time. This is what he gets for ignoring Febryl's commands – I warned him—'
    She was staring at the hand gripping the dagger, so was caught unawares as the other hand flashed, knuckles cracking hard against her jaw.
    Her eyes blinked open to jostling, sickening motion. She was being dragged through rubbish by one arm. From somewhere ahead flowed the stench of the latrine trench, thick
as fog, a breath of warm, poisoned air. Her lips were broken and her mouth tasted of blood. The shoulder of the arm the guard gripped was throbbing.
    The man was muttering.'... pretty thing indeed. Hardly. When she's drowning in filth. The fool, and now he's dead. It was a simple task, after all. There's no shortage of whores in this damned camp.