The Bonehunters

Spite then faced the west, the mainland. Whoever you are… thank you.

****
With a gasp, Paran opened his eyes, to find himself pitching forward – sandy gravel rising fast – then he struck, grunting with the impact.

His arms felt like unravelled ropes as he slowly dragged them up, sufficiently to push himself onto his side, which let him roll onto his back.

Above him, a ring of faces, all looking down.

'High Fist,' Rythe Bude asked, 'did you just save the world?'

'And us with it?' Noto Boil added, then frowned. 'Never mind that one, sir. After all, in answering the Fist's query, the second is implicitly-'

'Be quiet,' Paran said. 'If I saved the world – and by no means would I make such a claim – I am already regretting it. Does anyone have some water? With where I've just come back from, I've got a rather unpleasant taste in my mouth.'

Skins sloshed into view.

But Paran held up a hand. 'The east – how bad does it look?'

'Should have been much, much worse, sir,' Fist Rythe Bude said. '

There's a real ruckus over there, but nothing's actually coming out, if you understand me.'

'Good.' Good.

Oh, Hood. Did you truly mean it?

Gods, me and my promises…

****
Night to the east was a lurid, silent storm. Standing near the Adjunct, with Nil and Nether a few strides off to one side, Fist Keneb shivered beneath his heavy cloak, despite the peculiar, dry sultriness of the steady wind. He could not comprehend what had happened beyond that eastern horizon, not before, not now. The descent of green-flamed suns, the raging maelstrom. And, for a time there, a pervasive malaise enshrouding everyone – from what was coming, it had seemed, there would be no reprieve, no escape, no hope of survival.

Such a notion had, oddly enough, calmed Keneb. When struggle was meaningless, all pressure simply drained away. It struck him, now, that there was something to be said for holding on to such sentiments.

After all, death was itself inevitable, wasn't it? Inescapable – what point scratching and clawing in a doomed effort to evade it?

The comfort of that was momentary, alas. Death took care of itself – it was in life, in living, that things mattered. Acts, desires, motives, fears, the gifts of joy and the bitter taste of failure – a feast we must all attend.

At least until we leave.

Stars wavered overhead, streaks of cloud clung to the north, the kind that made Keneb think of snow. And yet here I stand sweating, the sweat cooling, this chill fashioned not by night or the wind, but by exhaustion. Nether had said something about this wind, its urgency, the will behind it. Thus, not natural. A god, then, manipulating us yet again.

The fleets of Nemil patrolled a vast stretch of this coast. Their war biremes were primitive, awkward-looking, never straying far from the rocky shoreline. That shoreline traditionally belonged to the Trell, but there had been wars, generations of wars, and now Nemil settlements dotted the bays and inlets, and the Trell, who had never been seafarers, had been driven far inland, into the hills, a dwindling enclave surrounded by settlers. Keneb had seen mixed-bloods among the Nemil crews in the trader ships that sailed out with supplies.

Belligerent as the Nemil were towards the Trell, they were not similarly inclined when facing a huge Malazan fleet entering their territorial waters. Sages among them had foretold this arrival, and the lure of profit had triggered a flotilla of merchant craft setting forth from the harbours, accompanied by a disorganized collection of escorts, some private, others royal. The resupply had resembled a feeding frenzy for a time there, until, that is, the eastern sky suddenly burst into savage light.

Not a single Nemil ship remained now, and that coastline had been left behind, as the second bell after midnight tolled dully at the sandwatcher's hand – the sound taken up by nearby ships, rippling outward through the imperial fleet.

From a Nemil captain, earlier in the day, had come interesting news, and it was that information that, despite the lateness, the Adjunct continued to discuss with her two Wickan companions.

'Are there any details from Malazan sources,' Nether was asking Tavore, 'of the peoples beyond the Catal Sea?'

'No more than a name,' the Adjunct replied, then said to Keneb, 'Fist, do you recall it?'

'Perish.'

'Yes.'

'And nothing more is known of them?' Nether asked.

There was no answer forthcoming from the others. And it seemed that the Wickans then waited.

'An interesting suggestion,' the Adjunct said after a moment. 'And, given this near-gale, we shall discover for ourselves soon enough what manner of people are these Perish.'