A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 4

intended to
invite public scrutiny.
    She is bored. She wants a lover. She wants what she could
have had but didn't take. A second chance, that's what she
wants.
    Do second chances even exist?
    This would be . . . sordid. Despicable. How could he even
contemplate such a thing?
    Maybe Apsalar saw all too well. Saw right into me, to the
soul that was less than it should have been, to the will that was
weak. I do not stand before a woman, do I? No, I fall into
her arms. I change shape to fit each one, to make things snug,
as if matching their dreams is the only path I know into their
hearts.
    Maybe she was right to walk away.
    Was this all that Challice wanted? An amusing
diversion to alleviate the drudgery of her comfortable
life? He admitted to some suspicion that things were not
that simple. There had been a darker current, as if to
take him meant something more to Challice. Proof of her
own descent, perhaps. Her own fall. Or something else,
something even more pernicious.
    The Rhivi server had brought him a pot of tea, a plate
of fresh bread, a dipping jar of honey, and a bowl of diced
fruit. He now stared at the array on the table in front of
him, trying without success to recall the moment it had
all arrived.
    'I need you,' she had said, the words cutting through his
exhaustion as the sky began to show its colour. 'Crokus.
Cutter. Whatever name you want. I knew it the moment
I saw you. I had been walking, most of the night, just
walking. I didn't know it, but I was looking for someone.
My life's become a question that I thought no one could
answer. Not my husband, not anyone. And then, there you
were, standing in this cemetery, like a ghost.'
    Oh, he knew about ghosts, the way they could haunt one
day and night. The way they found places to hide in one's
own soul. Yes, he knew about ghosts. 'Challice—'
    'You loved me once. But I was young. A fool. Now,
I am neither young nor a fool. This time, I won't turn
away.'
    'Your husband—'
    'Doesn't care what I do, or with whom I do it.'
    'Why did you marry him then?'
    She had looked away, and it was some time before she
replied. 'When he saved my life, that night in the garden
of Simtal's estate, it was as if he then owned it. My life. He
owned it because he saved it. He wasn't alone in believing
that, either. So did I. All at once, it was as if I no longer
had any choice. He possessed my future, to do with as he
pleased.'
    'Your father—'
    'Should have counselled me?' She laughed, but it was
a bitter laugh. 'You didn't see it, but I was spoiled. I was
obnoxious, Crokus. Maybe he tried, I don't really recall.
But I think he was happy to see me go.'
    No, this was not the Challice he had known.
    'House Vidikas owns an annexe, a small building down
by the docks. It's almost never used. There are two levels.
On the main floor it's just storage, filled with the shipwright's
leavings after the trader boat was finished. On the
upper level is where the man lived while under contract.
I've . . . seen it, and I have a key.'
    Seen it? He wondered at her hesitation in that admission.
But not for long. She's used it before. She's using it still. For
trysts just like the one she's talking about right now. Challice,
why are you bothering with me?
    At his hesitation she leaned closer, one hand on his arm.
'We can just meet there, Crokus. To talk. A place where we
can talk about anything, where there's no chance of being
seen. We can just talk.'
    He knew, of course, that such a place was not for talking.
    And, this evening, he would meet her there.
    What was he— 'Ow!'
    The server had just cuffed him in the side of the head.
Astonished, he stared up at her.
    'If I go to all that work to make you a damned breakfast,
you'd better eat it!'
    'Sorry! I was just thinking—'
    'It's easier when you're chewing. Now, don't make me
have to come back here.'
    He glared at her as she walked away. If I was nobleborn
she'd never have done that. He caught the eye of a man sitting
at a nearby table.
    'You have a way with women, I see.'
    'Hah hah.'
    Events and moments can deliver unexpected mercy, and
though she did not know it, such mercy was granted to
Scillara at that instant, for she was not thinking of Cutter.
Instead, she was sitting beside the Malazan historian,
Duiker, fighting an instinct to close her arms round him
and so in some small measure ease his silent grief. All that
held her back, she knew, was the fear that he would not
welcome her sympathy. That, and the distinct possibility
that