A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 3

even the gods could trust, for that matter.
    She realized that, in joining this column, in coming
among these soldiers, she had become ensnared in yet
another web, and there was no guarantee she would be able
to cut herself free. Not in time.
    The entanglement worried her. She could not be certain
that she'd walk away from a fight with Kalam. Not a fight
that was face to face, that is. And now his guard was up. In
fact, she'd invited it. Partly from bravado, and partly to
gauge his reaction. And just a little ... misdirection.
    Well, there was plenty of that going round.
    The two undead lizards, Curdle and Telorast, were maintaining
some distance from the party of soldiers, although
Apsalar sensed that they were keeping pace, somewhere
out in the scrubland south of the raised road. Whatever
their hidden motives in accompanying her, they were for
the moment content to simply follow. That they possessed
secrets and a hidden purpose was obvious to her, as was the
possibility that that purpose involved, on some level,
betrayal. And that too is something that we all share.
     
    Sergeant Balm was cursing behind Bottle as they walked
the stony road. Scorched boots, soles flapping, mere rags
covering the man's shoulders beneath the kiln-hot sun,
Balm was giving voice to the miseries afflicting everyone
who had crawled out from under Y'Ghatan. Their pace was
slowing, as feet blistered and sharp rocks cut into tender
skin, and the sun raised a resisting wall of blinding heat
before them. Clawing through it had become a vicious,
enervating struggle.
    Where others among the squads carried children, Bottle
found himself carrying a mother rat and her brood of pups,
the former perched on his shoulder and the latter swathed
in rags in the crook of one arm. More sordid than comic,
and even he could see that, but he would not relinquish his
new ... allies.
    Striding at Bottle's side was the halfblood Seti, Koryk.
Freshly adorned in human finger bones and not much else.
He'd knotted them in the singed strands of his hair, and
with each step there was a soft clack and clatter, the music
grisly to Bottle's ears.
    Koryk carried more in a clay pot with a cracked rim that
he'd found in the pit of a looted grave. No doubt he
planned on distributing them to the other soldiers. As soon
as we've found enough clothes to wear.
    He caught a skittering sound off among the withered
scrub to his left. Those damned lizard skeletons. Chasing down
my scouts. He wondered to whom they belonged.
Reasonable to assume they were death-aspected, which
possibly made them servants of Hood. He knew of no
mages among the squads who used Hood's Warren – then
again those who did rarely advertised the fact. Maybe that
healer, Deadsmell, but why would he want familiars now?
He sure didn't have them down in the tunnels. Besides,
you'd need to be a powerful mage or priest to be able to
conjure up and bind two familiars. No, not Deadsmell.
Who, then?
    Quick Ben. That wizard had far too many warrens
swirling round him. Fiddler had vowed to drag Bottle up to
the man, and that was an introduction Bottle had no desire
to make. Fortunately, the sergeant seemed to have
forgotten his squad, caught up as he was in this sordid
reunion of old-timers.
    'Hungry enough yet?' Koryk asked.
    Startled, Bottle glanced over at the man. 'What do you
mean?'
    'Skewered pinkies to start, then braised rat – it's why
you've brought them along, isn't it?'
    'You're sick.'
    Just ahead, Smiles turned to fling back a nasty laugh.
'Good one. You can stop now, Koryk – you've reached your
quota for the year. Besides, Bottle ain't gonna eat them rats.
He's married the momma and adopted the whelps – you
missed the ceremony, Koryk, when you was off hunting
bones. Too bad, we all cried.'
    'We missed our chance,' Koryk said to Bottle. 'We
could've beat her unconscious and left her in the tunnels.'
    A good sign. Things are getting back to normal. Everything
except the haunted look in the eyes. It was there, in every
soldier who'd gone through the buried bones of Y'Ghatan.
Some cultures, he knew, used a ritual of burial and
resurrection to mark a rite of passage. But if this was a
rebirth, it was a dour one. They'd not emerged innocent, or
cleansed. If anything, the burdens seemed heavier. The
elation of having survived, of having slipped out from the
shadow of Hood's Gates, had proved woefully shortlived.
    It should have felt ... different. Something was missing.
The Bridgeburners had been forged by