A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 4

Brood.
    'Ah,' said Endest Silann. 'I know little of them, in truth.
What then was their bargain?'
    'Between them and the world? I don't even know if an
explanation is possible, or at least within the limits of my
sorry wit. Until the forging of the ice – defending against
the Imass – the Jaghut gave far more than they took.
Excepting the Tyrants, of course, which is what made such
tyranny all the more reprehensible in the eyes of other
Jaghut.'
    'So, they were stewards.'
    'No. The notion of stewardship implies superiority. A
certain arrogance.'
    'An earned one, surely, since the power to destroy
exists.'
    'Well, the illusion of power, I would say, Endest. After
all, if you destroy the things around you, eventually you
destroy yourself. It is arrogance that asserts a kind of
separation, and from that the notion that we can shape
and reshape the world to suit our purposes, and that we can use it, as if it was no more than a living tool composed of a
million parts.' He paused and shook his head. 'See? Already
my skull aches.'
    'Only with the truth, I think,' said Endest Silann. 'So,
the Jaghut did not think of themselves as stewards. Nor
as parasites. They were without arrogance? I find that an
extraordinary thing, Warlord. Beyond comprehension, in
fact.'
    'They shared this world with the Forkrul Assail, who
were their opposites. They were witnesses to the purest
manifestation of arrogance and separation.'
    'Was there war?'
    Caladan Brood was silent for so long that Endest began
to believe that no answer was forthcoming, and then he
glanced up with his bestial eyes glittering in the ebbing
flames of the hearth. '"Was"?'
    Endest Silann stared across at his old friend, and the
breath slowly hissed from him. 'Gods below, Caladan. No
war can last that long.'
    'It can, when the face of the army is without relevance.'
    The revelation was . . . monstrous. Insane. 'Where?'
    The warlord's smile was without humour. 'Far away from
here, friend, which is well. Imagine what your Lord might
elect to do, if it was otherwise.'
    He would intervene. He would not be able to stop himself.
    Caladan Brood rose then. 'We have company.'
    A moment later the heavy thud of wings sounded in the
fading darkness above them, and Endest Silann looked up
to see Crone, wings crooked now, riding shifting currents
of air as she descended, landing with a scatter of stones just
beyond the edge of firelight.
    'I smell fish!'
    'Wasn't aware your kind could smell at all,' Caladan
Brood said.
    'Funny oaf, although it must be acknowledged that our
eyes are the true gift of perfection – among many, of course.
Why, Great Ravens are plagued with excellence – and do
I see picked bones? I do, with despondent certainty – you
rude creatures have left me nothing!'
    She hopped closer, regarding the two men with first one
eye and then the other. 'Grim conversation? Glad I interrupted.
Endest Silann, your Lord summons you. Caladan
Brood, not you. There, messages delivered! Now I want
food!'
    Harak fled through Night. Old tumbled streets, the
wreckage of the siege picked clean save for shattered
blocks of quarried stone; into narrow, tortured alleys
where the garbage was heaped knee-high; across collapsed
buildings, scrambling like a spider. He knew Thove was
dead. He knew Bucch was dead, and a half-dozen other
conspirators. All dead. Killers had pounced. Tiste Andii,
he suspected, some kind of secret police, penetrating the
cells and now slaughtering every liberator they could hunt
down.
    He'd always known that the unhuman demon-spawn
were far from the innocent, benign occupiers they played
at being, oh, yes, they were rife with deadly secrets. Plans
of slavery and oppression, of tyranny, not just over Black
Coral, but beyond, out to the nearby cities – wherever
humans could be found, the Tiste Andii cast covetous eyes.
And now he had proof.
    Someone was after him, tracking with all the deliberate
malice of a hunting cat – he'd yet to spy that murderer, but
in a world such as Night that was not surprising. The Tiste
Andii were skilled in their realm of Darkness, deadly as
serpents.
    He needed to reach the barrow. He needed to get to
Gradithan. Once there, Harak knew he would be safe.
They had to be warned, and new plans would have to be
made. Harak knew that he might well be the last one left
in Black Coral.
    He stayed in the most ruined areas of the city, seeking to
circle round or, failing that, get out through the inland gate
that led into the forested