Dust of Dreams

scoured away as if blasted by a sandstorm. Others looked bloated, skin split and cracked open, as if the poor soldiers had been cooked from within.
    Crows and vultures scampered about in frustrated cacophony, picking clean what wasn’t buried, whilst Akrynnai warriors wandered the buried valley, tugging free the corpses of dead kin.
    Irkullas knew his daughter’s body was here, somewhere. The thought clenched in his stomach like a sickly knot leaching poison, weakening his limbs, tightening the breath in his throat. He dreaded the notion of sleep at this day’s end, the stalking return of anguish and despair. He would lie chilled beneath furs, chest aching, rushes of nausea squirming through him, his every breath harsh and strained—close to the clutch of panic.
    Something unexpected, something unknown, had come to this petty war. Asif the spirits of the earth and rock were convulsing in rage and, perhaps, disgust.
Demanding peace. Yes, this is what the spirits have told me, with this here—this . . . horror. They have had enough of our stupid bloodletting.
    We must make peace with the Barghast.
    He felt old, exhausted.
    A day ago vengeance seemed bright and pure. Retribution was sharp as a freshly honed knife. Four major battles, four successive victories. The Barghast clans were scattered, fleeing. Indeed, only one remained, the southernmost, largest clan, the Senan. Ruled by the one named Onos Toolan. The Akrynnai had three armies converging upon the Warleader and his encampment.
    We have wagons creaking beneath Barghast weapons and armour. Chests filled with foreign coins. Heaps of strange furs. Trinkets, jewellery, woven rugs, gourd bowls and clumsy pots of barely tempered clay. We have everything the Barghast possessed. Just the bodies that owned them have been removed. Barring a score of broken prisoners.
    We are a travelling museum of a people about to become extinct.
    And yet I will plead for peace.
    Upon hearing this, his officers would frown behind his back, thinking him an old man with a broken heart, and they would be right to think that. They would accept his commands, but this would be the last time. Once they rode home Sceptre Irkullas would be seen—would be known to all—as a ‘ruler in his grey dusk’. A man with no light of the future in his eyes, a man awaiting death.
But it comes to us all. Everything we fear comes to us all.
    Gafalk, who had been among the advance party, rode up and reined in near the Sceptre’s own horse. The warrior dismounted and walked to stand in front of Irkullas. ‘Sceptre, we have examined the western ridge of the valley—or what’s left of it. Old Yara,’ he continued, speaking of the Barghast spokesperson among the prisoners, ‘says he once fought outside some place called One-Eye Cat. He says the craters remind him of something called Moranth munitions, but not when those munitions are dropped from the sky as was done by the Moranth. Instead, the craters look like those made when the munitions are used by the Malazans. Buried in the ground, arranged to ignite all at once. Thus lifting the ground itself. Some kind of grenado. He called them cussers—’
    ‘We know there is a Malazan army in Lether,’ Irkullas said, musing. Then he shook his head. ‘Give me a reason for their being here—joining in a battle not of their making? Killing both Akrynnai and Barghast—’
    ‘The Barghast were once enemies of these Malazans, Sceptre. So claims Yara.’
    ‘Yet, have our scouts seen signs of their forces? Do any trails lead from this place? No. Are the Malazans
ghosts
, Gafalk?’
    The warrior spread his hands in helpless dismay. ‘Then what struck here, Sceptre?’
    The rage of gods.
‘Sorcery.’
    A sudden flicker in Gafalk’s eyes. ‘Letherii—’
    ‘Who might well be pleased to see the Akrynnai and Barghast destroy each other.’
    ‘It is said the Malazans left them few mages, Sceptre. And their new Ceda is an old man who is also the Chancellor—not one to lead an army—’
    But Irkullas was already shaking his head at his own suggestions. ‘Even a Letherii Ceda cannot hide an entire army. You are right to be sceptical, Gafalk.’
    A conversation doomed to circle round and devour its own tail. Irkullas stepped past the warrior and looked upon the obliterated valley once more. ‘Dig out as many of our warriors as you can. At dusk we cease all such efforts—leaving the rest to the earth. We shall drive back the night with the pyre of our