Dust of Dreams

seek?’
    ‘Everything that I have lost!’
    ‘Ah, old friend, then you do not remember everything.’
    ‘No?’
    ‘No. You have forgotten why you lost it in the first place.’
    A long moment of silence.
    The Errant rose and went over to pour himself a goblet of wine. He returned and stood looking down upon his fellow Elder God. ‘I am not here,’ he said, ‘for you alone.’
    Knuckles winced.
    ‘I intend, as well, to summon the Clan of Elders—all who have survived. I am Master of the Tiles. They cannot deny me.’
    ‘No,’ Knuckles muttered, ‘that we cannot do.’
    ‘Where is she?’
    ‘Sleeping.’
    The Errant grimaced. ‘I already knew that, Setch.’
    ‘Sit down, Errastas. For now, please. Let us just . . . sit here. Let us drink in remembrance of friendship. And innocence.’
    ‘When our goblets are empty, Knuckles.’
    He closed his eyes and nodded. ‘So be it.’
    ‘It pains me to see you so,’ the Errant said as he sat back down. ‘We shall return you to what you once were.’
    ‘Dear Errastas, have you not learned? Time cares nothing for our wants, and no god that has ever existed can be as cruel as time.’
    The Errant half-closed his remaining eye. ‘Wait until you see the world I shall make, Setch. Once more, you shall stand beside the Empty Throne. Once more, you shall know the pleasure of mischance, striking down hopeful mortals one by one.’
    ‘I do remember,’ Knuckles murmured, ‘how they railed at misfortune.’
    ‘And sought to appease ill fate with ever more blood. Upon the altars. Upon the fields of battle.’
    ‘And in the dark bargains of the soul.’
    The Errant nodded. Pleased. Relieved. Yes, he could wait for this time, this brief healing span. It served and served well.
    He could grant her a few more moments of rest.
    ‘So tell me,’ ventured Knuckles, ‘the tale.’
    ‘What tale?’
    ‘The one that took your eye.’
    The Errant scowled and looked away, his good mood evaporating. ‘Mortals,’ he said, ‘will eat anything.’
     
    In the tower of the Azath, within a chamber that was an entire realm, she slept and she dreamed. And since dreams existed outside of time, she was walking anew a landscape that had been dead for millennia. But the air was sharp still, the sky overhead as pure in its quicksilver brilliance as the day of its violent birth. On all sides buildings, reduced to rubble, formed steep-sided, jagged mounds. Passing floods had caked mud on everything to a height level with her hips. She walked, curious, half-disbelieving.
    Was this all that remained? It was hard to believe.
    The mounds looked strangely orderly, the chunks of stone almost uniform in size. No detritus had drifted down into the streets or lanes. Even the flood silts had settled smooth on every surface.
    ‘Nostalgia,’ a voice called down.
    She halted, looked up to see a white-skinned figure perched atop one of the mounds. Gold hair hanging long, loose, hinting of deep shades of crimson. A white-bladed two-handed sword leaned against one side of his chest, the multifacetedcrystal pommel flashing in the brightness. He took many forms, this creature. Some pleasant, others—like this one—like a spit of acid in her eyes.
    ‘This is your work, isn’t it?’
    One of his hands stroked the sword’s enamel blade, the sensuality of the gesture making her shiver. He said, ‘I deplore your messiness, Kilmandaros.’
    ‘While you make death seem so . . . tidy.’
    He shrugged. ‘Tell me, if on your very last day—day or night, it makes no difference—you find yourself in a room, on a bed, even. Too weak to move, but able to look around—that’s all. Tell me, Kilmandaros, will you not be comforted by the orderliness of all that you see? By the knowledge that it will persist beyond you, unchanged, bound to its own slow, so slow measure of decay?’
    ‘You ask if I will be what, Osserc? Nostalgic about a room I’m still in?’
    ‘Is that not the final gift of dying?’
    She held up her hands and showed him her fists. ‘Come down here and receive just such a gift, Osserc. I know this body—this face that you show me now. I know the seducer and know him too well. Come down—do you not miss my embrace?’
    And in the dread truths of dreams, Osserc then chuckled. The kind of laugh that cut into its victim, that shocked tight the throat. Dismissive, devoid of empathy. A laugh that said:
You no longer matter to me. I see your hurt and it amuses me. I see how you cannot