The Crippled God

unjust? Did he not pay terribly for his temerity?’
    Fiddler shook his head. ‘I know nothing about any of that, Lord.’
    ‘When he came to me – your emperor – when he offered me a wayout … I was mistrustful. And yet … and yet, what do I see now? Here, standing before me? A Malazan.’
    Fiddler said nothing. He could hear conversations from all the slope sides of the barrow, voices raised in wonder, and plenty of cursing.
    ‘You are not like the others. Why is this? I wish to understand, Malazan. Why is this?’
    ‘I don’t know.’
    ‘And now you will fight to protect me.’
    ‘We can’t break these chains – she was wrong about that.’
    ‘No matter, Malazan. If I am to lie here, bound for the rest of days, still – you will fight to defend me.’
    Fiddler nodded.
    ‘I wish I could understand.’
    ‘So do I,’ Fiddler said with a grimace. ‘But, maybe, in the scrap to come, you’ll get a … I don’t know … a better sense of us.’
    ‘You are going to die for me, a foreign god.’
    ‘Gods can live for ever and make real their every desire. We can’t. They got powers, to heal, to destroy, even to resurrect themselves. We don’t. Lord, to us, all gods are foreign gods.’
    The bound man sighed. ‘When you fight, then, I will listen. For this secret of yours. I will listen.’
    Suddenly so weary that his legs trembled beneath him, Fiddler shrugged and turned from the chained man. ‘Not long now, Lord,’ he said, and walked away.
    Hedge was waiting, seated on one of the tilted standing stones. ‘Hood take us all,’ he said, eyeing Fiddler as he approached. ‘They did it – her allies – they did what she needed them to do.’
    ‘Aye. And how many people died for that damned heart?’
    Cocking his head, Hedge drew off his battered leather cap. ‘Little late to be regretting all that now, Fid.’
    ‘It was Kellanved – all of this. Him and Dancer. They used Tavore Paran from the very start. They used all of us, Hedge.’
    ‘That’s what gods do, aye. So you don’t like it? Fine, but listen to me. Sometimes, what they want – what they need us to do – sometimes it’s all right. I mean, it’s the right thing to do. Sometimes, it makes us better people.’
    ‘You really believe that?’
    ‘And when we’re better people, we make better gods.’
    Fiddler looked away. ‘It’s hopeless, then. We can stuff a god with every virtue we got, it still won’t make us any better, will it? Because we’re not good with virtues, Hedge.’
    ‘Most of the time, aye, we’re not. But maybe then, at our worst, we might look up, we might see that god we made out of the best in us.Not vicious, not vengeful, not arrogant or spiteful. Not selfish, not greedy. Just clear-eyed, with no time for all our rubbish. The kind of god to give us a slap in the face for being such shits.’
    Fiddler sank back down on to the ground. He leaned forward and closed his eyes, hands covering his face. ‘Ever the optimist, you.’
    ‘When you been dead, everything after that’s looking up.’
    Fiddler snorted.
    ‘Listen, Fid. They did it. Now it’s our turn. Ours and Tavore’s. Who’d have thought we’d even get this far?’
    ‘Two names come to mind.’
    ‘Since when didn’t their empire demand the best in us, Fid? Since when?’
    ‘Wrong. It was as corrupt and self-serving as any other. Conquered half the fucking world.’
    ‘Not quite. World’s bigger than that.’
    Fiddler sighed, freed one hand to wave it in Hedge’s direction. ‘Go get some rest, will you?’
    The man rose. ‘Don’t want anyone interrupting all that feeling sorry for yourself, huh?’
    ‘For myself?’ Fiddler looked up, shook his head, and his gaze slipped past Hedge, down to where his soldiers were only now settling once again, desperate for sleep.
    ‘We’re not finished yet,’ Hedge said. ‘You plan on talking to ’em all? Before it all starts up?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Why not?’
    ‘Because this is their time, from now to the end. They can do the talking, Hedge. Right now, for me, I’ll do the listening. Just like that god back there.’
    ‘What do you expect to be hearing?’
    ‘No idea.’
    ‘It’s a good knoll,’ Hedge said. ‘Defendable.’ And then he departed.
    Closing his eyes again, Fiddler listened to the crunch of his boots, until they were gone. Chains. House of Chains. Us mortals know all about them. It’s where we live .
    Calm could see the rise where she had left him, could see a darker