A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 4

crust, cracking
as terror seethed beneath, the terror born of remote
possibilities. Da and Ma were going to a temple, a new
temple, one devoted to a god as broken and useless as
Bedek himself. The High Priest, who called himself
a prophet, was even more crippled. Nothing worked
below his arms, and half his face sagged and the eye on
that side had just dried up since the lids couldn't close
and now it looked like a rotten crab apple – Snell had
seen it for himself, when he'd stood at the side of the
street watching as the Prophet was being carried by his
diseased followers to the next square, where he'd croak
out yet another sermon predicting the end of the world
and how only the sick and the stupid would survive.
    No wonder Da was so eager. He'd found his god at last,
one in his own image, and that was usually the way, wasn't
it? People don't change to suit their god; they change their
god to suit them.
    Da and Ma were on their way to the Temple of the
Crippled God, where they hoped to speak to the Prophet
himself. Where they hoped to ask the god's blessing. Where
they hoped to discover what had happened to Harllo.
    Snell didn't believe anything would come of that. But
then, he couldn't be sure, could he? And that was what was
scaring him. What if the Crippled God knew about what
Snell had done? What if the Prophet prayed to it and was
told the truth, and then told Da and Ma?
Snell might have to run away. But he'd take Hinty and
Mew with him, selling them off to get some coin, which
he'd need and need bad. Let someone else wipe their stinking
. . .
    Yes, Ma, I'll take care of them. You two go, see what you
can find out.
    Just look at them, so filled with hope, so stupid with the
idea that something else will solve all their problems, swipe
away their miseries. The Crippled God: how good can a god
be if it's crippled? If it can't even heal itself? That Prophet
was getting big crowds. Plenty of useless people in the world,
so that was no surprise. And they all wanted sympathy.
Well, Snell's family deserved sympathy, and maybe some
coin, too. And a new house, all the food they could eat and
all the beer they could drink. In fact, they deserved maids
and servants, and people who would think for them, and do
everything that needed doing.
    Snell stepped outside to watch Ma wheeling Da off down
the alley, clickety-click.
    Behind him Hinty was snuffling, probably getting ready
to start bawling since Ma was out of sight and that didn't
happen often. Well, he'd just have to shut the brat up. A
good squeeze to the chest and she'd just pass out and things
would get quiet again. Maybe do that to both of them.
Make it easier wrapping them up in some kind of sling,
easier to carry in case he decided to run.
    Hinty started crying.
    Snell spun round and the runt looked at him and her
crying turned into shrieks.
    'Yes, Hinty,' Snell said, grinning, 'I'm coming for ya. I'm
coming for ya.'
    And so he did.
    Bellam Nom had known that something was wrong,
terribly so. The atmosphere in the school was sour, almost
toxic. Hardly conducive to learning about duelling, about
everything one needed to know about staying alive in a
contest of blades.
    On a personal, purely selfish level, all this was
frustrating, but one would have to be an insensitive
bastard to get caught up in that kind of thinking. The
problem was, something had broken Stonny Menackis.
Broken her utterly. And that in turn had left Murillio
shattered, because he loved her – no doubt about that,
since he wouldn't have hung around if he didn't, not
with the way she was treating him and everyone else, but
especially him.
    It hadn't been easy working out what was wrong, since
nobody was talking much, but he'd made a point of
lingering, standing in shadows as if doing little more than
cooling himself off after a bell's worth of footwork in the
sunlight. And Bellam Nom had sharp ears. He also had a
natural talent, one it seemed he had always possessed: he
could read lips. This had proved useful, of course. People
had a hard time keeping secrets from Bellam.
    Master Murillio had reached some sort of decision, and
walked as one driven now, and Bellam quickly realized that
he did not need to employ any stealth while trailing him
– an entire legion of Crimson Guard could be marching on
the man's heels and he wouldn't know it.
    Bellam was not certain what role he might be able to
play in whatever was coming. The only thing that mattered
to him was that he be there when the time