Dust of Dreams

you?’
    He nodded. ‘We roil in his wake. All this violence, this fury. It devours us, each one, and is shaped by what it eats. And so we believe each of us stands alone in our intent. Most troubling, Nom Kala. How soon before we turn upon one another?’
    ‘Then there is no measure of mercy,’ she replied.
    ‘That depends.’
    ‘On what?’
    ‘On how subtle is Onos T’oolan.’
    ‘Please, explain.’
    ‘Nom Kala, he has said he will not compel us to obedience. He will not be as a T’lan Imass. This is significant. Is he aware of the havoc wrought in his wake? I believe he is.’
    ‘Then, what purpose?’
    ‘We will see.’
    ‘Only if you are correct, and if the First Sword is then able to draw us to him—before it is too late. What you describe holds great risk, and the longer he waits, the less likely he will be able to gather us.’
    ‘That is true,’ he rumbled in reply.
    ‘You believe in him, don’t you?’
    ‘Faith is a strange thing—among the T’lan Imass, it is little more than a pale ghost of memory. Perhaps, Nom Kala, the First Sword seeks to awaken it in us once more. To make us more than T’lan Imass. Thus, he does not compel us. Instead, he shows us the freedom of mortality, which we’d all thought long lost. How do the living command their kin? How can a mortal army truly function, given the chaos within each soldier, these disparate desires?’
    ‘What value in showing us such things?’ Nom Kala asked. ‘We are not mortal. We are T’lan Imass.’
    He shrugged. ‘I have no answer to that, yet. But, I think, he will show us.’
    ‘He had better not wait too long, Bonecaster.’
    ‘Nom Kala,’ Ulag was regarding her, ‘I believe you were beautiful once.’
    ‘Yes. Once.’
    ‘Would that I had seen you then.’
    But she shook her head. ‘Imagine the pain now, had you done so.’
    ‘Ah, there is that. I am sorry.’
    ‘As am I, Bonecaster.’
     
    ‘Are we there yet? My feet hurt.’
    Draconus halted, turned to observe the half-blood Toblakai. ‘Yes, perhaps we can rest for a time. Are you hungry?’
    Ublala nodded. ‘And sleepy. And this armour chafes my shoulders. And the axe is heavy. And I miss my friends.’
    ‘There is a harness ring for your axe,’ Draconus said. ‘You don’t have to carry it at the ready. As you can see, no one can come upon us without our seeing them from some distance away.’
    ‘But if I see a rabbit or a chicken, I can run it down and then we can eat.’
    ‘That won’t be necessary—you have already seen that I am able to conjure food, and water.’
    Ublala scowled. ‘I want to do my part.’
    ‘I see. I am sure you will, before too long.’
    ‘You see something?’ Ublala straightened, looked round. ‘Rabbit? Cow? Those two women over there?’
    Draconus started, and then searched until he found the two figures, walking now towards them but still three hundred or so paces away. Coming up from the south, both on foot. ‘We shall await them,’ he said after a moment. ‘But, Ublala, there is no need to fight.’
    ‘No, sex is better. When it comes to women, I mean. I never touched that mule. That’s sick and I don’t care what they said. Can we eat now?’
    ‘Build us a fire,’ Draconus said. ‘Use the wood we gathered yesterday.’
    ‘All right. Where is it?’
    Draconus gestured and a modest stack of broken branches appeared almost at Ublala’s feet.
    ‘Oh, there it is! Never mind, Draconus, I found the wood.’
    The woman in the lead was young, her garb distinctly barbaric. Her eyesshone from a band of black paint that possibly denoted grief, while the rest of her face was painted white in the pattern of a skull. She was well-muscled, her long braided hair the colour of rust. Three steps behind her staggered an old woman, barefoot, her hide tunic smeared with filth. Rings glittered on blackened fingers, a jarring detail in the midst of her dishevelled state.
    The two stopped ten paces from Draconus and Ublala. The younger one spoke.
    Ublala looked up from the fire he’d just sparked to life. ‘Trader tongue—I understand you. Draconus, they’re hungry and thirsty.’
    ‘I know, Ublala. You will find food in that satchel. And a jug of ale.’
    ‘Really? What satchel—oh, never mind. Tell the pretty one I want to have sex with her, but say it more nicely—’
    ‘Ublala, you and I speak the same trader tongue, more often than not. As we are doing now.’ He stepped forward. ‘Welcome, then, we will share