A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 4

the moment.'
    'If the Redeemer cannot deny, then he is trapped in a
state of imbalance. I wonder, what would be needed to
redress that imbalance?'
    Spinnock Durav found his mouth dry, and if he'd built
proud castles of comprehension, if he'd raised sound fortifications
to guard his assumptions, and arrayed vast armies
to argue his case and to shift and align and manoeuvre to
defend his cherished notions – if he had done all this to
then sit in comfort, secure in his place in this conversation
– if this was indeed a game of Kef Tanar, then in one simple
question posed, his foe had crashed his empire to ruin.
    What would be needed to redress that imbalance?
    A man who refuses.
    You tell me time is short, my Lord. You lead me to elucidate
what bothers me – for you can see that something does – and
then, amidst the lofty clouds of religious discussion, you lash a
lightning bolt down, striking my very heart.
    If I am to do something, I must do it soon.
    My Lord, my awe of you is unbounded. My love for you and
the compassion you so delicately unveil leads me into this willingness,
to storm without hesitation what you would have me
storm, to stand for as long as needed, for it is what you need.
    'It is well I am immune to heat,' Anomander Rake said,
'for I have scorched my boots most severely.'
    And so the fire grows round you, yet you do not flinch.
    I will not fail you, my Lord.
    'Endest Silann is upon the mountain road now,' Anomander
Rake said, rising. 'And Crone has returned but
soon must wing away again. I shall ask her to send a few
grandchildren to guard him on his journey. Unless, of
course, you think it might offend Endest Silann should he
see them wheeling overhead?'
    'It might, Lord, but that should not change your decision.'
    A faint smile. 'Agreed. Send my regards to the priestess,
Spinnock.'
    Until that moment, he had not known he was going to
visit the High Priestess – who had scoured away her very
name in service to her role in the Temple of Darkness,
to make of her ever-open legs an impersonal act, that
made her body a vessel and nothing more – but he now
knew that he needed to do just that. Kurald Galain was a
most troubled warren right now. Storms rumbled within
it, drumming every thread of power. Energies crackled. Making her insatiable. So, she will want me – but that is not
what concerns Anomander Rake. There is something else. I
must go to her, and I don't even know why.
    But he does.
    Spinnock Durav found himself sitting alone in the small
chamber. The fire was down to coals. The air smelled of
burned leather.
    The High Priestess of the Temple of Dark had cut her
hair even shorter, making her disturbingly boyish as
she pushed him on to his back, straddling him with her
usual eagerness. Normally, he would now begin to slow
her down, providing a force of resistance defying her
impatience, and so drawing out her pleasure. This time,
however, he let her have her way. This was all incidental.
Since that unknown force had trembled through Kurald
Galain, all the priestesses had been frantic in their desire,
forcing male Tiste Andii into the temple and the rooms
with the plush beds. If the rumours were true, then even
the occasional human was dragged in for the same needful
interrogation.
    But no answers could be found in the indulgences of
the flesh, and perhaps all this was a kind of metaphorical
revelation of that raw truth, one that extended far beyond
the temple and the prescriptions of priestesses. Yet, did he
not want answers from Salind? From that young human
woman who could not be more than twenty years of age?
From another High Priestess?
    He had seen too much, had lived too long. All she faced
ahead and all the experiences still awaiting her – they
belonged to her age, and should indeed be shared – if
at all – by one of similar years. He had no desire to be a
mentor, for the student soon grows past the need of one
(if the mentor has done his job well), and then it is the
mentor who rails against the notion of equality, or of being
surpassed. But the impossibility of the notion went further.
She would never surpass him. Instead, she would grow old
all too quickly, and the sensibilities of her life, a life so
truncated, could never match his.
    Korlat had not hesitated with the Malazan sergeant
Whiskeyjack – Spinnock had heard the tragic tale, bound
up as it was in the conquest of Black Coral and the fall of
the Pannion Domin. And the prolonged absence of both
Korlat and her