The Bonehunters

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Snoring from the tent. Mogora sat on a flat stone five paces from the dying fire. Had he been awake, Iskaral Pust would be relieved. The moon was back where it belonged, after all. Not that she'd actually moved it. That would have been very hard indeed, and would have attracted far too much attention besides. But she'd drawn away its power, somewhat, briefly, enough to effect the more thorough healing the Trell had required.

Someone stepped from the shadows. Walked a slow circle round the recumbent, motionless form of Mappo Trell, then halted and looked over at Mogora.

She scowled, then jerked a nod towards the tent. 'Iskaral Pust, he's the Magi of High House Shadow, isn't he?'

'Impressive healing, Mogora,' Cotillion observed. 'You do understand, of course, that the gift may in truth be a curse.'

'You sent Pust here to find him!'

'Shadowthrone, actually, not me. For that reason, I cannot say if mercy counted for anything in his decision.'

Mogora glanced again at the tent. 'Magi… that blathering idiot.'

Cotillion was gazing steadily at her, then he said, 'You're one of Ardata's, aren't you?'

She veered into a mass of spiders.

The god watched as they fled into every crack and, moments later, were gone. He sighed, took one last look round, momentarily meeting the placid eyes of the mule, then vanished in a flowing swirl of shadows.

Chapter Ten

When the day knew only darkness, the wind a mute beggar stirring ashes and stars in the discarded pools beneath the old retaining wall, down where the white rivers of sand slip grain by grain into the unseen, and every foundation is but a moment from a horizon's stagger, I found myself among friends and so was made at ease with my modest list of farewells.

Soldier Dying

Fisher kel Tath They emerged from the warren into the stench of smoke and ashes, and before them, in the growing light of dawn, reared a destroyed city.

The three stood unmoving for a time, silent, each seeking to comprehend this vista.

Stormy was the first to speak. 'Looks like the Imperial Warren's spilled out here.'

Ash and dead air, the light seeming listless – Kalam was not surprised by the marine's observation. They had just left a place of death and desolation, only to find themselves in another. 'I still recognize it,' the assassin said. 'Y'Ghatan.' Stormy coughed, then spat. 'Some siege.'

'The army's moved on,' Quick Ben observed, studying the tracks and rubbish where the main encampment had been. 'West.'

Stormy grunted, then said, 'Look at that gap in the wall. Moranth munitions, a whole damned wagon of 'em, I'd say.'

A viscous river had flowed out through that gap, and, motionless now, it glittered in the morning light. Fused glass and metals. There had been a firestorm, Kalam realized. Yet another one to afflict poor Y'

Ghatan. Had the sappers set that off? 'Olive oil,' said Quick Ben suddenly. 'The oil harvest must have been in the city.' He paused, then added, 'Makes me wonder if it was an accident.'

Kalam glanced over at the wizard. 'Seems a little extreme, Quick.

Besides, from what I've heard of Leoman, he's not the kind to throw his own life away.'

'Assuming he stayed around long enough.'

'We took losses here,' Stormy said. 'There's a grave mound there, under that ash.' He pointed. 'Scary big, unless they included rebel dead.'

'We make separate holes for them,' Kalam said, knowing that Stormy knew that as well. None of this looked good, and they were reluctant to admit that. Not out loud. 'The tracks look a few days old, at least. I suppose we should catch up with the Fourteenth.'

'Let's circle this first,' Quick Ben said, squinting at the ruined city. 'There's something… some residue… I don't know. Only…'

'Sound argument from the High Mage,' Stormy said. 'I'm convinced.'

Kalam glanced over at the mass burial mound, and wondered how many of his friends were lying trapped in that earth, unmoving in the eternal dark, the maggots and worms already at work to take away all that had made each of them unique. It wasn't something he enjoyed thinking about, but if he did not stand here and gift them a few more moments of thought, then who would?

****
Charred rubbish lay strewn on the road and in the flats to either side. Tent stakes still in place gripped burnt fragments of canvas, and in a trench beyond the road's bend as it made its way towards what used to be the city's gate, a dozen bloated horse carcasses had been dumped, legs upthrust like bony tree-stumps in a flyblown swamp. The stench of burnt things hung in the motionless air.