A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 3

drawing close, eager and gleeful. And, somewhere in
the depths beyond the bay, waited the Eldest God. Mael
himself, that feeder on misery, the cruel taker of life and
hope.
    Rage rising within her, Smiles could feel her body straining
at the numbing turgid chains – she would not lie
unmoving, she would not smile up when her mother kissed
her one last time. She would not blink dreamily when the
warm water stole over her, into her.
    Hear me! All you cursed spirits, hear me! I defy you!
    Oh yes, flinch back! You know well enough to fear, because
I swear this – I will take you all down with me. I will take you
all into the Abyss, into the hands of the demons of chaos. It's the
cycle, you see. Order and chaos, a far older cycle than life and
death, wouldn't you agree?
    So, come closer, all of you.
    In the end, it was as she had known. They'd taken her
sister, and she, well, let's not be coy now, you delivered the last
kiss, dear girl. And no durhang oil to soothe away the
excuse, either.
    Running away never feels as fast, never as far, as it should.
     
    You could believe in whores. He had been born to a whore,
a Seti girl of fourteen who'd been flung away by her parents
– of course, she hadn't been a whore then, but to keep her
new son fed and clothed, well, it was the clearest course
before her.
    And he had learned the ways of worship among whores,
all those women knitted close to his mother, sharing fears
and everything else that came with the profession. Their
touch had been kindly and sincere, the language they knew
best.
    A half-blood could call on no gods. A half-blood walked
the gutter between two worlds, despised by both.
    Yet he had not been alone, and in many ways it was the
half-bloods who held closest to the traditional ways of
the Seti. The full-blood tribes had gone off to wars – all the
young lance warriors and the women archers – beneath
the standard of the Malazan Empire. When they had
returned, they were Seti no longer. They were Malazan.
    And so Koryk had been immersed in the old rituals –
those that could be remembered – and they had been, he
had known even then, godless and empty. Serving only the
living, the half-blood kin around each of them.
    There was no shame in that.
    There had been a time, much later, when Koryk had
come upon his own language, protecting the miserable lives
of the women from whom he had first learned the art of
empty worship. A mindful dialect, bound to no cause but
that of the living, of familiar, ageing faces, of repaying the
gifts the now unwanted once-whores had given him in his
youth. And then watching them one by one die. Worn out,
so scarred by so many brutal hands, the indifferent usage by
the men and women of the city – who proclaimed the
ecstasy of god-worship when it suited them, then defiled
human flesh with the cold need of carnivores straddling a
kill.
    Deep in the sleep of Carelbarra, the God Bringer, Koryk
beheld no visitors. For him, there was naught but oblivion.
    As for the fetishes, well, they were for something else.
Entirely something else.
     
    'Go on, mortal, pull it.'
    Crump glowered, first at Stump Flit, the Salamander
God, Highest of High Marshals, then at the vast, gloomy
swamp of Mott. What was he doing here? He didn't want
to be here. What if his brothers found him? 'No.'
    'Go on, I know you want to. Take my tail, mortal, and
watch me thrash about, a trapped god in your hands, it's what
you all do anyway. All of you.'
    'No. Go away. I don't want to talk to you. Go away.'
    'Oh, poor ]amber Bole, all so alone, now. Unless your
brothers find you, and then you'll want me on your side, yes you
will. If they find you, oh my, oh my.'
    'They won't. They ain't looking, neither.'
    'Yes they are, my foolish young friend —'
    'I ain't your friend. Go away.'
    'They're after you, Jamber Bole. Because of what you did —'
    'I didn't do nothing!'
    'Grab my tail. Go on. Here, just reach out ...'
    Jamber Bole, now known as Crump, sighed, reached out
and closed his hand on the Salamander God's tail.
    It bolted, and he was left holding the end of the tail in
his hand.
    Stump Flit raced away, laughing and laughing.
    Good thing too, Crump reflected. It was the only joke it
had.
     
    Corabb stood in the desert, and through the heat-haze
someone was coming. A child. Sha'ik reborn, the seer had
returned, to lead still more warriors to their deaths. He
could not see her face yet – there was something wrong
with his eyes. Burned, maybe. Scoured by blowing