A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 4

mercy. I did not comprehend the truth
of that, not the real truth of it, the real truth. No. Besides,
I thought my inner sight would be enough – to challenge
Draconus. To steal Dragnipur. I was wrong, wrong. I was
wrong. The truth is a gift, a mercy.'
    'Who blinded you?'
    The Tiste Andii flinched, then seemed to curl into
himself. Tears glistened in the pits of his sockets. 'I blinded
myself,' Kadaspala whispered. 'When I saw what he'd
done. What he'd done. To his brother. To my sister. To my
sister.'
    Suddenly, Ditch did not want to ask any more questions
of this man. He pushed himself from between the two bodies.
    'I am going to . . . explore.'
    'Come back, mage. Nexus. Come back. Come back.'
    We'll see.
    *
    With all this time to reflect on things, Apsal'ara concluded
that her biggest mistake was not in finding her way into
Moon's Spawn. Nor in discovering the vaults and the
heaps of magicked stones, ensorcelled weapons, armour,
the blood-dipped idols and reliquaries from ten thousand
extinct cults. No, her greatest error in judgement had been
in trying to stab Anomander Rake in the back.
    He'd been amused at finding her. He'd not spoken of
executing her, or even chaining her in some deep crypt for
all eternity. He'd simply asked her how she had managed
to break in. Curiosity, more than a little wonder, perhaps
even some admiration. And then she went and tried to kill
him.
    The damned sword had been out of its scabbard faster
than an eye-blink, the deadly edge slicing across her belly
even as she lunged with her obsidian dagger.
    Such stupidity. But lessons only became lessons when
one has reached the state of humility required to heed
them. When one is past all the egotistical excuses and
explanations flung up to fend off honest culpability. It
was nature to attack first, abjuring all notions of guilt and
shame. Lash out, white with rage, then strut away convinced
of one's own righteousness.
    She had long since left such imbecilic posturing behind.
A journey of enlightenment, and it had begun with her last
mortal breath, as she found herself lying on the hard stone
floor, looking up into the eyes of Anomander Rake, and
seeing his dismay, his regret, his sorrow.
    She could feel the growing heat of the storm, could feel
its eternal hunger. Not long now, and then all her efforts
would be for naught. The kinks of the chain finally showed
some wear, but not enough, not nearly enough. She would
be destroyed along with everyone else. She was not unique.
She was, in fact, no different from every other idiot who'd
tried to kill Rake, or Draconus.
    The rain trickling down from the wagon bed was warmer
than usual, foul with sweat, blood and worse. It streamed
over her body. Her skin had been wet for so long it was
coming away in ragged pieces, white with death, revealing
raw red meat underneath. She was rotting.
    The time was coming when she would have to drop
down once more, emerge from under the wagon, and see
for herself the arrival of oblivion. There would be no pity in
its eyes – not that it had any – just the indifference that was
the other face of the universe, the one all would have for
ever turned away. The regard of chaos was the true source
of terror – all the rest were but flavours, variations.
    I was a child once. I am certain of it. A child. I have a
memory, one memory of that time. On a barren bank of a
broad river. The sky was blue perfection. The caribou were
crossing the river, in their tens and tens of thousands.
    I remember their up-thrust heads. I remember seeing the
weaker ones crowded in, pushed down to vanish in the murky
water. These carcasses would wash up down current, where the
short-nosed bears and the wolves and eagles and ravens waited
for them. But I stood with others. Father, mother, perhaps sisters
and brothers – just others – my eyes on the vast herd.
    Their seasonal migration, and this was but one of many
places of crossing. The caribou often chose different paths.
Still, the river had to be crossed, and the beasts would mill for
half a morning on the bank, until they plunged into the current,
until all at once they were flooding the river, a surging tide of
hide and flesh, of breaths drawn in and gusted out.
    Not even the beasts display eagerness when accosting
the inevitable, when it seems numbers alone can possibly confuse
fate, and so each life strives, strikes out into the icy flow. 'Save
me.' That is what is written in their eyes. 'Save me above all the
others. Save me,