A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 4

unsurprised.
Skin and bones, scabbed and stained with fiery,
peeling rashes. At least he could now stand without the aid
of a stick, and his appetite had returned. Before long,
Redmask believed, the foreigner would recover, at least
physically. The poor man's mind was another matter.
    'Your people,' Anaster Toc continued after a moment,
'do not believe in poetry, in the power of simple words. Oh,
you sing with the coming of dawn and the fleeing sun. You
sing to storm clouds and wolf tracks and shed antlers
you find in the grass. You sing to decide the order of beads
on a thread. But no words to any of them. Just tonal
variations, as senseless as birdsong—'
    'Birds sing,' cut in Natarkas who stood on the foreigner's
other side, squinting westward to the dying sun, 'to
tell others they exist. They sing to warn of hunters.
They sing to woo mates. They sing in the days before they
die.'
    'Very well, the wrong example. You sing like whales—'
    'Like what?' asked Natarkas and two other copper-faces
behind them.
    'Oh, never mind, then. My point was, you sing without
words—'
    'Music is its own language.'
    'Natarkas,' said Anaster Toc, 'answer me this, if you will.
The song the children use when they slip beads onto a
thread, what does it mean?'
    'There is more than one, depending on the pattern
desired. The song sets the order of the type of bead, and its
colour.'
    'Why do such things have to be set?'
    'Because the beads tell a story.'
    'What story?'
    'Different stories, depending on the pattern, which is
assured by the song. The story is not lost, not corrupted,
because the song never changes.'
    'For Hood's sake,' the foreigner muttered. 'What's wrong
with words?'
    'With words,' said Redmask, turning away, 'meanings
change.'
    'Well,' Anaster Toc said, following as Redmask made his
way back to his army's camp, 'that is precisely the point.
That's their value – their ability to adapt—'
    'Grow corrupt, you mean. The Letherii are masters at
corrupting words, their meanings. They call war peace,
they call tyranny liberty. On which side of the shadow you
stand decides a word's meaning. Words are the weapons
used by those who see others with contempt. A contempt
which only deepens when they see how those others are
deceived and made into fools because they chose to
believe. Because in their naivety they thought the meaning
of a word was fixed, immune to abuse.'
    'Togg's teats, Redmask, that's a long speech coming from
you.'
    'I hold words in contempt, Anaster Toc. What do you
mean when you say "Togg's teats"?'
    'Togg's a god.'
    'Not a goddess?'
    'No.'
    'Then its teats are—'
    'Useless. Precisely.'
    'What of the others? "Hood's Breath"?'
    'Hood is the Lord of Death.'
    'Thus . . . no breath.'
    'Correct.'
    'Beru's mercy?'
    'She has no mercy.'
    'Mowri fend?'
    'The Lady of the Poor fends off nothing.'
    Redmask regarded the foreigner. 'Your people have a
strange relationship with your gods.'
    'I suppose we do. Some decry it as cynical and they may
have a point. It's all to do with power, Redmask, and what
it does to those who possess it. Gods not excepted.'
    'If they are so unhelpful, why do you worship them?'
    'Imagine how much more unhelpful they'd be if we
didn't.' At whatever Anaster Toc saw in Redmask's eyes, he
then laughed.
    Annoyed, Redmask said, 'You fought as an army devoted
to the Lord and Lady of the Wolves.'
    'And see where it got us.'
    'The reason your force was slaughtered is because my
people betrayed you. Such betrayal did not come from your
wolf gods.'
    'True, I suppose. We accepted the contract. We assumed
we shared the meaning of the words we had exchanged
with our employers—' At that he offered Redmask a wry
smile. 'We marched to war believing in honour. So. Togg
and Fanderay are not responsible – especially for the
stupidity of their followers.'
    'Are you now godless, Anaster Toc?'
    'Oh, I heard their sorrowful howls every now and then,
or at least I imagined I did.'
    'Wolves came to the place of slaughter and took the
hearts of the fallen.'
    'What? What do you mean?'
    'They broke open the chests of your comrades and ate
their hearts, leaving everything else.'
    'Well, I didn't know that.'
    'Why did you not die with them?' Redmask asked. 'Did
you flee?'
    'I was the best rider among the Grey Swords.
Accordingly, I was acting to maintain contact between our
forces. I was, unfortunately, with the Awl when the
decision was made to flee. They dragged me down from my
horse and beat me senseless. I don't know