The Bonehunters

Kalam will deliver the Book into Sha'ik's hands. The Red Blades will kill the bitch. I am well pleased.' The next few lines had been carved into the clay after it had hardened, the script looking ragged and hurried. 'Heboric is with Sha'ik. Known now as Ghost Hands, and in those hands is the power to destroy us all. This entire world. And none can stop him.'

Written in terror and panic. Yet… Apsalar glanced over at the other tablets. Something must have happened to have eased his mind. Was Heboric now dead? She did not know. Had someone else stumbled on the man's trail, someone aware of the threat? And how in Hood's name had Heboric – a minor historian of Unta – ended up in Sha'ik's company?

Clearly the Red Blades had failed in their assassination attempt.

After all, the Adjunct Tavore had killed the woman, hadn't she? In front of ten thousand witnesses.

'This woman is waking up.'

She looked over at Telorast. The shade was hovering over the Pardu guard lying near the entrance. 'All right,' Apsalar said, pushing the heap of tablets back into the pit and replacing the stone. 'We're leaving.'

'Finally! It's almost light outside!'

'No causeway?'

'Nothing but ruin, Not-Apsalar. Oh, this place looks too much like home.'

Curdle hissed. 'Quiet, Telorast, you idiot! We don't talk about that, remember?'

'Sorry.'

'When we reach my room,' Apsalar said, 'I want you two to tell me about that throne.'

'She remembered.'

'I don't,' Curdle said.

'Me neither,' Telorast said. 'Throne? What throne?'

Apsalar studied the two ghosts, the faintly luminous eyes peering up at her. 'Oh, never mind.'

****
The Falah'd was a head shorter than Samar Dev – and she was of barely average height – and he likely weighed less than would one of her legs cut clean away at the hip. An unpleasant image, she allowed, but one frighteningly close to reality. A fierce infection had set in the broken bones and it had taken four witches to draw the malign presence out. That had been the night before and she still felt weak and lightheaded, and standing here in this blistering sun wasn't helping.

However short and slight the Falah'd was, he worked hard at presenting a noble, imposing figure, perched there atop his long-legged white mare. Alas, the beast was trembling beneath him, flinching every time Karsa Orlong's Jhag stallion tossed its head and rolled its eyes menacingly in the mare's direction. The Falah'd gripped the saddle horn with both hands, his thin dark lips pinched and a certain timidity in his eyes. His ornate, jewel-studded telaba was dishevelled, and the round, silken and padded hat on his head was askew as he looked on the one known to all as Toblakai, once-champion of Sha'ik. Who, standing beside his horse, was still able, had he so chosen, to look down on the ruler of Ugarat.

Fifty palace guards accompanied the Falah'd, none of them – nor their mounts – at ease.

Toblakai was studying the massive edifice known as Moraval Keep. An entire flat-topped mesa had been carved hollow, the rock walls shaped into imposing fortifications. A deep, steep-walled moat surrounded the keep. Moranth munitions or sorcery had destroyed the stone bridge spanning it, and the doors beyond, battered and scorched, were of solid iron. A few scattered windows were visible, high up and unadorned, each sealed by iron doors barbed with angled arrow-slits.

The besieging encampment was squalid, a few hundred soldiers sitting or standing near cookfires and looking on with vaguely jaded interest.

Off to one side, just north of the narrow road, sprawled a rough cemetery of a hundred or so makeshift, shin-high wooden platforms, each holding a cloth-wrapped corpse.

Toblakai finally turned to the Falah'd. 'When last was a Malazan seen at the battlements?'

The young ruler started, then scowled. 'I am to be addressed,' he said in his piping voice, 'in a manner due my authority as Holy Falah'd of Ugarat-'

'When?' Toblakai demanded, his expression darkening.

'Well, uh, well – Captain Inashan, answer this barbarian!'

With a quick salute, the captain walked over to the soldiers in the encampment. Samar watched him speaking with a half-dozen besiegers, saw the various shrugs in answer to his question, saw Inashan's back straighten and heard his voice get louder. The soldiers started arguing amongst themselves.

Toblakai made a grunting sound. He pointed at his horse. 'Stay here, Havok. Kill nothing.' Then the warrior strode to the edge of the moat.

Samar Dev hesitated, then followed.