A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 3

understand? Hurry!'
    Renewed, once again, to face what will come. Would that I
had my own prayers. Comforting words in my mind ... to
drown out the screams all around me. To drown out my own.
    Somewhere down below, Karsa Orlong struggled to calm
Havok, and the sudden hammer of hoofs against wood,
sending trembles through the deck beneath Samar Dev's
feet, indicated that it would be some time before the
animal quieted. She did not blame the Jhag horse. The air
below was foul, reeking with the sick and the dying, with
the sour stench that came from hopelessness.
    But we are spared that fate. We are Guests, because my giant
companion would kill the Emperor. The fool. The arrogant,
self-obsessed idiot. I should have stayed with Boatfinder, there
on that wild shore. I should have then turned around and walked
home. She had so wanted this to be a journey of exploration
and discovery, the lure of wonders waiting somewhere
ahead. Instead, she found herself imprisoned by an empire
gone mad with obsession. Self-righteous, seeing its own
might as if it was a gift bestowing piety. As if power
projected its own ethos, and the capability to do something
was justification enough for doing it. The mindset of the
street-corner bully, in his head two or three rules by which
he guided his own existence, and by which he sought to
shape his world. The ones he must fear, the ones he could
drive to their knees, and maybe ones he hungered to be
like, or ones he lusted after, but even there the relationship
was one of power. Samar Dev felt sick with disgust, fighting
a tide of tumultuous panic rising within her – and no dry
deck beneath her boots could keep her from that sort of
drowning.
    She had tried to keep out of the way of the human crew
who worked the huge ship's sails, and finally found a place
where she wouldn't be pushed aside or cursed, at the very
prow, holding tight to rat-lines as the waves lifted and
dropped the lumbering craft. In a strange way, each plunge
that stole her own weight proved satisfying, almost
comforting.
    Someone came to her side, and she was not surprised to
see the blonde, blue-eyed witch. No taller than Samar's
shoulder, her arms exposed to reveal the lean, cabled
muscles of someone familiar with hard, repetitive work.
Indicative as well, she believed, of a particular personality.
    Hard-edged, judgemental, perhaps even untrustworthy –
muscles like wires were ever stretched taut by some inner
extremity, a nervous agitation devoured like fuel, unending
in its acrid supply.
    'I am named Feather Witch,' the woman said, and Samar
Dev noted, with faint surprise, that she was young. 'You
understand me words?'
    'My words.'
    'My words. He teaches not well,' she added.
    She means the Taxilian. It's no surprise. He knows what will
happen when he outlives his usefulness.
    'You teach me,' Feather Witch said.
    Samar Dev reached out and flicked the withered finger
hanging from the young woman's neck, eliciting both a
flinch and a curse. 'I teach you ... nothing.'
    'I make Hanradi Khalag kill you.'
    'Then Karsa Orlong kills every damned person on this
ship. Except the chained ones.'
    Feather Witch, scowling, was clearly struggling to understand,
then, with a snarl, she spun round and walked away.
    Samar Dev returned her gaze to the heaving seas ahead.
A witch indeed, and one that did not play fair with the
spirits. One who did not recognize honour. Dangerous. She
will ... attempt things. She may even try to kill me, make it
look like an accident. There's a chance she will succeed, which
means I had better warn Karsa. If die, he will understand that
it will have been no accident. And so he will destroy every one
of these foul creatures.
    Her own thoughts shocked her. Ah, shame on me. I, too,
begin to think of Karsa Orlong as a weapon. To be wielded,
manipulated, and in the name of some imagined vengeance, no
less. But, she suspected, someone or something else was
already playing that game. With Karsa Orlong. And it
was that mystery she needed to pursue, until she had an
answer. And then? Am I not assuming that the Toblakai is
unaware of how he is being used? What if he already knows? Think
on that, woman ...
    All right. He accepts it ... for now. But, whenever he deems
it expedient to turn on those unseen manipulators, he will – and
they will regret ever having involved themselves in his life. Yes,
that well suits Karsa's own arrogance, his unshakeable
confidence. In fact, the more I think on it, the more I