A Malazan Book of the Fallen Collection 4

Gedderone. One more night
to close the riot of senseless celebration.
    Dance, and dance on.
    Because, as everyone knows, all that you see about you will
last, well . . . for ever!

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
    My friend, this is not the place
The cut flowers lie scattered on the path
And the light of the moon glistens
In what the stems bleed
    In the day just for ever lost
I watched a black wasp darting into the face
Of a web, and the spider she dropped
Only to be caught in mid-air
    Footfalls leave no trace
In the wake of a hungry creature's wrath
You can only lie in hope, dreaming
She lightly touched ground
    And danced away like a breath
Hiding beneath leaves nodding in place
While the hunter circles and listens
But pray nothing is found
    My friend, this is not your face
So pale and still never again to laugh
When the moon's light fell and then stopped
Cold as silver in the glade
    Look back on the day, it's for ever lost
Stare into the night, where things confound
The web stretches empty, wind keening
In threads of absent songs
    (Song of) Old Friend
Fisher
    Voluminous in wonder, but, be assured, terse in grief.
Consider the woodsman standing facing the forest,
axe in hand. In a moment he will stride forward.
Consider now the first line of trees, rooted, helpless against
what comes.
    The seep of trickling water round roots does not quicken.
The sweet warmth of sunlight on leaves does not blaze
into urgent flame. The world and its pace cannot change.
What is to be done? Why, there is nothing to be done. The
woodsman swings his axe with blinding speed and splendid
indifference, and he hears not the chorus of cries.
    Is this fancy worthless? For some, perhaps many, it must
be. But know this, empathy is no game.
    Twist back time. Dusk still gathers, but it is early yet
and so it is a weak gathering. A lone rider draws up on a
ridge overlooking a mining camp. Up here the sun's light
remains. Dust streams gold and nothing wants to settle. In
the shadowy pit below figures seethe back and forth.
    He is finally seen. An old man works his way up the
path. A runner hurries to the main building squatting atop
a levelled heap of tailings.
    It begins.
    'Another guest? Come for the boy? What's so damned
special about that boy?' But Gorlas Vidikas wasn't much
interested in any answers to those questions, especially
since this runner was in no position to explain much of
anything, having been sent direct from the foreman. He
rose and pulled on his cloak, then collected up his fine
deerskin gloves, and set out. Would he have the pleasure of
killing yet another fool? He dearly hoped so.
    Was it that pompous old bastard, Coll? That would
be ideal, and who could say, maybe the ghost of Lady
Simtal would stir awake at the man's last gasp, to howl her
delight at this most perfect vengeance, this long-awaited
conclusion to the vile treachery of her last fête. Of course,
that was mostly Hanut Orr's business, and maybe Shardan
Lim's as well, but Gorlas welcomed the sudden unexpected
currency he would reap in reward for killing at least two of
the old conspirators.
    Coll's death would also leave open a seat on the Council.
Gorlas smiled at the thought as he climbed the slatted
wooden steps up towards the ridge where it wound behind
and above the main building. Humble Measure would offer
up his own reward for such a thing, no doubt one that
would make the gratitude of Hanut and Shardan seem
like a pauper's grudging gift. He had a sudden, odd image
then of a half-dozen such paupers – beggars and worse
– gathered in some abandoned building, squatting on damp
earth as they passed round a pathetic slab of grainy bread
and a mouldy lump of cheese. And, as he looked on like
some unseen ghost, he had the sense that the circle was
somehow . . . incomplete.
    Someone is missing. Who's missing?
    He shook himself then, dispelling the scene, and found
that he had halted just below the landing, one hand on
the rail at his side. At that last moment, as the image burst
apart, he thought he had caught a glimpse of something – a
corpse twisting beneath a thick branch, the face swinging
round to meet his own – then gone.
    Gorlas found his mouth unaccountably dry. Had some
god or spirit sent him a vision? Well, if something or someone
had, it was a poor one, for he could make no sense of
it, none at all.
    He tugged on his gloves and resumed the climb,
emerging out into the blessed sunlight where everything
was painted gold. Yes, the wealth of the world was