A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 3

like an excited dog – the
roar of surf was much louder now, carried on the wind, and
he could not contain his eagerness to discover the source of
that sound.
    Cutter pulled his attention from Scillara and watched
Chaur for a time. 'What's with him?'
    'The sea,' Barathol said. 'He's never seen it. He probably
doesn't even know what it is. There's still some tea, Cutter,
and those packets in front of Scillara are your breakfast.'
    'It's late,' he said, rising. 'You should've woken me.' Then
he halted. 'The sea? Beru fend, we're that close?'
    'Can't you smell it? Hear it?'
    Cutter suddenly smiled – and it was a true smile – the
first Barathol had seen on the young man.
    'Did anyone see the moon last night?' Scillara asked. 'It was
mottled. Strange, like holes had been poked through it.'
    'Some of those holes,' Barathol observed, 'seem to be
getting bigger.'
    She looked over, nodding. 'Good, I thought so, too, but
I couldn't be sure. What do you think it means?'
    Barathol shrugged. 'It's said the moon is another realm,
like ours, with people on its surface. Sometimes things fall
from our sky. Rocks. Balls of fire. The Fall of the Crippled
God was said to be like that. Whole mountains plunging
down, obliterating most of a continent and filling half the
sky with smoke and ash.' He glanced across at Scillara, then
over at Cutter. 'I was thinking, maybe, that something hit
the moon in the same way.'
    'Like a god being pulled down?'
    'Yes, like that.'
    'So what are those dark blotches?'
    'I don't know. Could be smoke and ash. Could be pieces
of the world that broke away.'
    'Getting bigger ...'
    'Yes.' Barathol shrugged again. 'Smoke and ash spreads.
It stands to reason, then, doesn't it?'
    Cutter was quickly breaking his fast. 'Sorry to make you
all wait. We should get going. I want to see what's in that
abandoned village.'
    'Anything seaworthy is all we need,' Barathol said.
    'That is what I'm hoping we'll find.' Cutter brushed
crumbs from his hands, tossed one last dried fig into his
mouth, then rose. 'I'm ready,' he said around a mouthful.
    All right, Scillara, you did well.
     
    There were sun-bleached, dog-gnawed bones in the back
street of the fisher village. Doors to the residences within
sight, the inn and the Malazan assessor's building were all
open, drifts of fine sand heaped in the entranceways.
Moored on both sides of the stone jetty were half-submerged
fisher craft, the ropes holding them fast
stretched to unravelling, while in the shallow bay beyond,
two slightly larger carracks waited at anchor next to mooring
poles.
    Chaur still stood on the spot where he had first come in
sight of the sea and its rolling, white-edged waves. His
smile was unchanged, but tears streamed unchecked and
unabating from his eyes, and it seemed he was trying to
sing, without opening his mouth: strange mewling sounds
emerged. What had run down from his nose was now caked
with wind-blown sand.
    Scillara wandered through the village, looking for whatever
might prove useful on the voyage they now planned.
Rope, baskets, casks, dried foodstuffs, nets, gaffs, salt for
storing fish – anything. Mostly what she found were the
remnants of villagers – all worried by dogs. Two squat
storage buildings flanked the avenue that ran inward from
the jetty, and these were both locked. With Barathol's help,
both buildings were broken into, and in these structures
they found more supplies than they could ever use.
    Cutter swam out to examine the carracks, returning after
a time to report that both remained sound and neither was
particularly more seaworthy than the other. Of matching
length and beam, the craft were like twins.
    'Made by the same hands,' Cutter said. 'I think. You
could judge that better than me, Barathol, if you're at all
interested.'
    'I will take your word for it, Cutter. So, we can choose
either one, then.'
    'Yes. Of course, maybe they belong to the traders we
met.'
    'No, they're not Jelban. What are their names?'
    'Dhenrabi's Tail is the one on the left. The other's called Sanal's Grief. I wonder who Sanal was?'
    'We'll take Grief,' Barathol said, 'and before you ask,
don't.'
    Scillara laughed.
    Cutter waded alongside one of the swamped sculls beside
the jetty. 'We should bail one of these, to move our supplies
out to her.'
    Barathol rose. 'I'll start bringing those supplies down
from the warehouse.'
    Scillara watched the huge man make his way up the
avenue, then turned her attention to the Daru, who had
found a half-gourd