The Crippled God

and they start looking around for something to kill. Because killing simplifies. It’s called an elimination of distractions .
    Her horse was content, watered and fed enough to send the occasional stream down and plant an island or two in their wake. Happy horse, happy Masan Gilani. Simple . Her companions were once more nowhere to be seen. Sour company besides; she hardly missed them.
    And she herself wasn’t feeling as saggy and slack as she’d been only a day earlier. Who knew where the T’lan Imass had found the smoked antelope meat, the tanned bladders filled to bursting with clean, cold water, the loaves of hard bread and the rancid jar of buttery cheese. Probably the same place as the forage for her horse. And wherever that was, it was a hundred leagues away from here – oh, speak it plain, Masan. It was through some infernal warren. Aye, I seen them fall into dust, but maybe that’s not what it seems. Maybe they just step into another place .
    Somewhere nice. Where at the point of a stone sword farmers hand over victuals with a beaming smile and good hale to you all .
    Dusk was darkening the sky. She’d have to stop soon.
    They must have heard her coming, for the two men stood waiting at the far end of the slope, staring up at her the instant she’d cleared the rise. Masan reined in, squinted for a moment, and then nudged her mount forward.
    ‘You’re not all that’s left,’ she said as she drew nearer. ‘You can’t be.’
    Captain Ruthan Gudd shook his head. ‘We’re not far from them. A league or two, I’d wager.’
    ‘We’d thought to just push on,’ added Bottle.
    ‘Do you know how bad it was?’
    ‘Not yet,’ said the captain, eyeing her horse. ‘That beast looks too fit, Masan Gilani.’
    ‘No such thing,’ she replied, dismounting, ‘as a too-fit horse, sir.’
    He made a face. ‘Meaning you’re not going to explain yourself.’
    ‘Didn’t you desert?’ Bottle asked. ‘If you did, Masan, you’re riding the wrong way, unless you’re happy with being strung up.’
    ‘She didn’t desert,’ Ruthan Gudd said, turning to resume walking. ‘Special mission for the Adjunct.’
    ‘How do you know anything about it, sir?’ Masan asked, falling in step with the two men.
    ‘I don’t. I’m just guessing.’ He combed at his beard. ‘I have a talent for that.’
    ‘Has plenty of talents does our captain here,’ Bottle muttered.
    Whatever was going on between these two, she had to admit to herself that she was happy to see them. ‘So how did you two get separated from the army?’ she asked. ‘By the way, you both look a mess. Bottle, you bathe in blood or something? I barely recognized you.’
    ‘You’d look the same,’ he retorted, ‘buried under fifty corpses for half a day.’
    ‘Not quite that long,’ the captain corrected.
    Her breath caught. ‘So you were at the battle,’ she said. ‘What battle? What in Hood’s name happened?’
    ‘Bits are missing,’ Bottle replied, shrugging.
    ‘Bits?’
    He seemed ready to say something, changed his mind and instead said, ‘I didn’t quite catch it all. Especially the, er, second half. But you know, Masan, all the stories about high attrition among officers in the Malazan military?’ He jerked a thumb at Ruthan Gudd. ‘It ain’t so with him.’
    The captain said, ‘If you hear a certain resentment in his tone, it’s because I saved his life.’
    ‘And as for the smugness in the captain’s tone—’
    ‘Fine,’ she snapped. ‘Aye, the Adjunct sent me to find some people.’
    ‘Which you evidently failed to do,’ observed Bottle.
    ‘No she didn’t,’ said Ruthan Gudd.
    ‘So all this crawling skin I’m feeling isn’t fleas?’
    Ruthan Gudd bared his teeth in a hard grin. ‘Well no, it probably is, soldier. Frankly, I’d be surprised if you did feel something – oh, I know, you’re a mage. Fid’s shaved knuckle, right? Even so, these bastards know how to hide.’
    ‘Let me guess: they’re inside the horse. Isn’t there some legend about—’
    ‘The moral of which,’ Rudd interjected, ‘is consistently misapprehended. It’s nothing to do with what you think it’s to do with. The fact is, that tale’s moral is “don’t trust horses”. Sometimes people look way too hard into such things. Other times, of course, they don’t look hard enough. But most of the time by far, they don’t look at all.’
    ‘If you want,’ said Masan Gilani, ‘I can ask them to show