Dust of Dreams

morality—just as Cotillion does now. But don’t be fooled, those two are ruthless—none of us mortals are worth a damned thing, except as a means to an end—’
    ‘And what, High Mage, would that end be?’
    Quick Ben threw up his hands and leaned back. ‘I have little more than rude guesses, Adjunct.’
    But Lostara saw something shining in the wizard’s eyes, as if he had been stirred into wakefulness from a long, long sleep. She wondered if this was how he had been with Whiskeyjack, with Dujek Onearm. No wonder they saw him as their shaved knuckle in the hole.
    ‘I would hear those guesses,’ the Adjunct said.
    ‘The pantheon comes crashing down—and what emerges from the dust andashes is almost unrecognizable. The same for sorcery—the warrens—the realm of K’rul. All fundamentally changed.’
    ‘Yet, one assumes, at the pinnacle . . . Shadowthrone and Cotillion.’
    ‘A safe assumption,’ Quick Ben admitted, ‘which is why I don’t trust it.’
    Tavore looked startled. ‘Altruism from those two?’
    ‘I don’t even believe in altruism, Adjunct.’
    ‘Thus,’ she observed, ‘your confusion.’
    The wizard’s ascetic face was pinched, as if he was tasting something unbearably foul. ‘Who’s to say that the changes create something better, something more equitable? Who’s to say that what emerges isn’t even worse than what we have right now? Yes, it might seem a good move—driving that mob of miserable gods off some cliff, or some other place that puts them out of reach, that puts
us
out of
their
reach.’ He was musing now, as if unaware of his audience. ‘But consider that eventuality. Without the gods, we’re on our own. And with us on our own—Abyss fend!—what mischief we might do! What grotesque invention to plague the world!’
    ‘But . . . not entirely on our own.’
    ‘The fun would pall,’ Quick Ben said, as if irritated with the objection. ‘Shadowthrone has to realize that. Who would he have left to play with? And with K’rul a corpse, sorcery will rot, grow septic—it will kill whoever dares use it.’
    ‘Perhaps,’ said Tavore with a certain remorselessness, ‘it is not Shadowthrone’s intent to reshape anything. Rather, to end it once and for all. To wipe the world clean.’
    ‘I doubt that. Kallor tried it and the lesson wasn’t lost on anyone—how could it be? Gods know, Kellanved then went and
claimed
that destroyed warren for the empire, so he couldn’t be blind . . .’ His words fell away, but Lostara saw how his thoughts suddenly raced down a new, treacherous track, destination unknown.
    Yes, they claimed Kallor’s legacy. But . . . what does that signify?
    No one spoke for a time. Blistig stood rooted—he had not moved from the moment the Adjunct began speaking, and what should have been a confused expression was nowhere to be seen on his rough features. Instead, he was closed up with a kind of obstinate belligerence, as if everything he had heard thus far wasn’t relevant, could not rattle the cage—for even as the cage imprisoned him within it, so it kept everything else at a safe distance.
    Sinn sat perched on the oversized chair, glowering at the tabletop, pretending not to listen to anything being said here, but she was paler than usual.
    Keneb leaned forward on his elbows, his hands against the sides of his face: the pose of a man wishing to be elsewhere.
    ‘It comes down to gates,’ Quick Ben muttered. ‘I don’t know how, or even why, but my gut tells me it comes down to gates. Kurald Emurlahn, Kurald Galain, Starvald Demelain—the old ones—and the Azath. No one has plumbed the secrets of the Houses as they have, not even Gothos. Windows on to the past, into the future, paths leading to places no mortal has ever visited. They have crawled up and down the skeleton of existence, eager as bone-grubs—’
    ‘Too many assumptions,’ Tavore said. ‘Rein yourself in, High Mage. Tell me, have you seen the face of our enemy to the east?’
    The look he shot her was bleak, wretched. ‘Justice is a sweet notion. Too bad its practice ends up awash in innocent blood. Honest judgement is cruel, Adjunct, so very cruel. And what makes it a disaster is the way it spreads outward, swallowing everything in its path. Allow me to quote Imperial Historian Duiker: “The object of justice is to drain the world of colour.” ’
    ‘Some would see it that way—’
    Quick Ben snorted. ‘Some? Those cold-eyed arbiters
can’t see