House of Chains

There was history between the two warriors, of which Heboric was certain he sensed but a fraction. They had once shared a chain as prisoners of the Malazans, it was rumoured. Heboric wished the Malazans had shown less mercy in Toblakai’s case.

‘I will leave you now,’ Felisin said at the pit’s brick-lined edge. ‘When next I desire to clash views with you, I will seek you out.’

Grimacing, Heboric nodded and began making his way down the ladder. The air around him grew cooler in layers as he descended into the gloom. The smell of durhang was sweet and heavy-one of Leoman’s affectations, leading the ex-priest to wonder if young Felisin was following her mother’s path more closely than he had suspected.

The limestone floor was layered in rugs now. Ornate furniture-the portable kind wealthy travelling merchants used-made the spacious chamber seem crowded. Wood-framed screens stood against the walls here and there, the stretched fabric of their panels displaying woven scenes from tribal mythology. Where the walls were exposed, black and red ochre paintings from some ancient artist transformed the smooth, rippled stone into multi-layered vistas-savannas where transparent beasts roamed. For some reason these images remained clear and sharp to Heboric’s eyes, whispering memories of movement ever on the edges of his vision.

Old spirits wandered this pit, trapped for eternity by its high, sheer walls. Heboric hated this place, with all its spectral laminations of failure, of worlds long extinct.

Toblakai sat on a backless divan, rubbing oil into the blade of his wooden sword, not bothering to look up as Heboric reached the base of the ladder. Leoman lay sprawled among cushions near the wall opposite.

‘Ghost Hands,’ the desert warrior called in greeting. ‘You have hen’bara? Come, there is a brazier here, and water-’

‘I reserve that tea for just before I go to bed,’ Heboric replied, striding over. ‘You would speak with me, Leoman?’

‘Always, friend. Did not the Chosen One call us her sacred triangle? We three, here in this forgotten pit? Or perhaps I have jumbled my words, and should reverse my usage of “sacred” and “forgotten”? Come, sit. I have herbal tea, the kind that makes one wakeful.’

Heboric sat down on a cushion. ‘And what need have we to be wakeful?’

Leoman’s smile was loose, telling Heboric that durhang had swept away his usual reticence. ‘Dear Ghost Hands,’ the warrior murmured, ‘it is the need of the hunted . It is the gazelle with its nose to the ground that the lion sups with, after all.’

The ex-priest’s brows rose. ‘And who is stalking us now, Leoman?’

Leaning back, Leoman replied, ‘Why, the Malazans, of course. Who other?’

‘Why, most certainly then we must talk,’ Heboric said in mock earnestness. ‘I had no idea, after all, that the Malazans were planning on doing us harm. Are you certain of your information?’

Toblakai spoke to Leoman. ‘As I have told you before, this old man should be killed.’

Leoman laughed. ‘Ah, my friend, now that you are the only one of us three who still has the Chosen One’s ear… as it were… I would suggest you relinquish that subject. She has forbidden it and that is that. Nor am I inclined to agree with you in any case. It is an old refrain that needs burying.’

‘Toblakai hates me because I see too clearly what haunts his soul,’ Heboric said. ‘And, given his vow to not speak to me, his options for dialogue are sadly limited.’

‘I applaud your empathy, Ghost Hands.’

Heboric snorted. ‘If there is to be subject to this meeting, Leoman, let’s hear it. Else I’ll make my way back to the light.’

‘That would prove a long journey,’ the warrior chuckled. ‘Very well. Bidithal is back to his old ways.’

‘Bidithal, the High Mage? What “old ways”?’

‘His ways with children, Heboric. Girls. His unpleasant… hungers. Sha’ik is not all-knowing, alas. Oh, she knows Bidithal’s old predilections-she experienced them first-hand when she was Sha’ik Elder, after all. But there are close to a hundred thousand people in this city, now. A few children vanishing every week… easily passing virtually unnoticed. Mathok’s people, however, are by nature watchful.’

Heboric scowled. ‘And what would you have me do about it?’

‘Are you disinterested?’

‘Of course not. But I am one man, without, as you say, a voice. While Bidithal is one of the three sworn to Sha’ik, one of her most powerful High Mages.’