The Crippled God

can talk to him, Sergeant. Talk him back to how it should be .
    ‘Hedge is where we want him, Fid.’
    What?
    ‘We sent him to you … to this, I mean. He’s walked a lonely path back, sapper.’
    Mallet then spoke. ‘Bet he thought he’d made it all the way, too, when he stood before you, Fiddler. Only to have you back away.’
    I … oh, gods. Hedge. I better find him, chew it all out, come the dawn – we’ll make it that far, won’t we, Sergeant?
    ‘Until it rises, aye, sapper. Until it rises.’
    And then?
    ‘You’re so eager to join us?’
    Whiskeyjack – please – where else would I go?
    ‘If we were just waiting for the dawn, soldier, you’d have to ask, what in Hood’s name for? You think we’d see you put through all of this for nothing? And then there’s Hedge. He’s here to die beside you and that’s it? We sent him to you so you could just kiss and make up? Gods below, Fiddler, you’re not that important in this wretched scheme.’
    ‘Well,’ said Mallet, ‘he might be, Sergeant. Made Captain now, didn’t he? Got himself his own company of marines and heavies. Bloody insufferable now, is old Fid.’
    ‘Sky’s paling,’ Whiskeyjack said.
    Because you’re on damned horses. I can’t see it .
    ‘False dawn,’ growled Trotts. ‘And Fid’s fading, Sergeant. We can’t hold on here much longer. Once he stops thinking past his feet …’
    I was a mason’s apprentice. Had dreams of being a musician, getting fat and drunk in some royal court .
    ‘Not this again,’ someone said among the crowd. ‘Someone find him a fiddle, and me a hanky.’
    Glad you’re all here with me. Well, most of you, anyway. The Bridgeburners deserved a better way to die —
    The rider made a derisive sound. ‘Don’t be such an idiot, sapper. In your heads you’ve all built us up into something we never were. How quickly you’ve forgotten – we were mutinous at the best of times. The rest of the time – and that would be almost all the time – we were ateach other’s throats. Officers getting posted to us would desert first. It was that bad, Fiddler.’
    Look, I ain’t done nothing to make this fucking legend, Sergeant. I ain’t said a damned thing .
    ‘You don’t have to, and that’s just my point. People can talk up anything, can make a snivelling dollop of shit the god’s own mountain, given enough time and enough lies and enough silences .’
    I’m a Bonehunter now. Got nothing to do with any of you any more – which is what I was trying to tell Hedge .
    ‘Fine. Now go hunt down some bones.’
    Sure, why not? Whose bones do you want us to hunt for?
    Whiskeyjack rode slightly ahead and swung his mount round, blocking Fiddler’s path. But his old sergeant wasn’t looking good – he was a damned half-mummified corpse, and his mount wasn’t much better off. ‘Whose do you think, Fid?’ And yet that voice was his – no question. Whiskeyjack .
    ‘Where’d you come by that name, Fid?’ And that was Mallet, but he was badly chopped up, the wounds crusted with dried blood.
    The name? Bonehunters? It was finger bones, I think .
    ‘Whose hand?’
    What? Nobody’s – lots of people. Nameless ones, long dead ones – just nameless bones!
    They were all fading from his vision now. But he wanted them to stay. They were supposed to be here with him, to take up his soul when he died.
    Whiskeyjack was backing his horse even as he grew translucent. ‘Bones of the fallen, Fiddler. Now, who fell the furthest ?’
    Before him now nothing but that distant, flat line. Nothing but the horizon. Fiddler rubbed at his face. Fucking hallucinations. Least they could’ve done was give me a drink of water .
    He resumed walking. No reason to. No reason not to.
    ‘Who fell the furthest. Funny man, Whiskeyjack.’ But maybe it was so. Maybe she made us and named us to hunt down the bones of a damned god. Maybe she was telling us what she wanted all along, and we were too thick to know it .
    But look at that line. That perfect flat line. Just waiting for our bones to make us a shore, and once we’ve made it, why, we go no farther .
    Almost time .
    Hedge, I’ll find you if I can. A few words. A clasp of hands, or a clout upside the head, whichever best suits the moment .
    Bonehunters. Oh. Nice one .
    Lostara Yil wanted her god back. She wanted to feel that flow of strength, that appalling will. To take her out of here. To feel a sudden,immortal power filling her body, and she would reach out to draw