Assail (Malazan Empire, #6)(70)

*

That evening they found a stream coming down out of the hills, and shelter in a cave. He watched the approach while she bedded the lad down. When she emerged, she wore only a long quilted gambeson, stained with sweat, and cut through in places from old sword-strokes. She glanced about in the twilight and frowned.

‘No fire?’

‘No.’

She grunted her understanding and returned to the cave to come out carrying her sword. She sat on a rock, unsheathed the weapon, and began working its edges.

‘A handsome weapon.’

‘Thank you. It was my father’s. I wish it had never come to me.’

‘You did not want it?’

She scowled as if this was an idiotic question. ‘My grandfather carried this weapon against the Malazans. As did my father.’ She took a heavy breath. ‘No. I prayed to the gods every day that it would never need to come to me.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘As am I.’

‘Your family fought the Malazans in the north. Where? In the west? The east?’

It was obvious to Kyle from her hesitation that she was reluctant to discuss it. Yet she drew a breath and said, ‘The east coast. Taph.’

Kyle dredged through what he’d heard of the northern Genabackan campaigns. Taph, he believed, had been among the very last cities to fall to the Malazans. ‘Those eastern Free Cities hired the Crimson Guard. Did you see them?’

She blew out a long breath. ‘Togg’s teeth, man. I was a just a child. I met one. Blues was his name. He seemed kind. Why?’

He considered telling her that he’d been of the Crimson Guard but decided it best not to say anything. Given his present unimpressive condition she’d probably think him the worst liar she’d ever met. He shrugged. ‘Just curious. I’ve heard much of them.’

‘They’re fools.’

He raised his brows. ‘Oh?’

‘You can’t defeat an empire. It’s just too damned huge.’

‘Then what have your family been doing all these years?’

She ran her sharpening stone down the blade’s length. ‘Only thing you can do when facing such a giant beast. Make your own little patch of ground too much trouble to bother with and it’ll just lumber on and swallow someone else.’

He thought about that. Sound, he supposed. Provided everything you cared for hadn’t been swallowed yet. He realized, with a small start, that once more he’d taken hold of the amber stone hanging about his neck and was rubbing it between finger and thumb as he considered his options. He let his hand fall.

A call sounded then from the dark and he stilled, listening. Lyan also froze, her hand poised above her weapon. It called again. Neither beast nor bird. It was a girl’s voice in a rising and falling song, taunting from the night: ‘White … blade …’ it beckoned, ‘white … blade …’

His gaze went to Lyan. She closed her hand on the grip of her weapon. He signed a negative, shot his gaze to the cave. She nodded and began backing away to the cave mouth. He went out to meet the challenger.

She stood plainly lit in the open among the monochrome grasses under the moon’s watery silver light. He pushed his way to her through the knee-high stiff blades, thinking; Ruthen’el must have lasted far longer than he’d imagined. Long enough to talk to whoever it was who had found him.

When he was close enough, he shouted: ‘Listen, whatever your name is – just turn around and head home. I’m tired of this. I don’t want to kill—’

Something crashed into his head from the side and the next thing he knew he was staring up, blinking, at two faces peering down at him. What was strange was that the faces were practically identical. He wondered whether he was seeing double.

‘We could’ve killed you,’ one girl said.

‘But we want you alive,’ said the other.

‘For the moment,’ finished the first.

Kyle felt his head; his fingers came away wet dark and wet. A birding arrow, or a sling stone. He felt for his weapons, but they were all gone. One of the girls, he saw, carried the sheathed sword.

‘We want you to take our names with you,’ the second said, ‘so that you can tell our forefathers and foremothers who killed you.’ She pointed to herself: ‘I am Neese.’

‘And I am Niala,’ said the one holding his blade. ‘You killed our cousin and our uncle.’

‘Ruthen’el will be ashamed to hear you avenged him with an ambush,’ Kyle croaked.

‘You killed all the ones with honour,’ Neese said. ‘We decided to win instead. Isn’t that so, Niala?’

‘It is so, Neese.’

Niala hefted the blade. ‘So this is it … We have heard the stories. I will use this to cut you to pieces. Then it will rest among our clan heirlooms as proof of our power.’ She took hold of the sheath to draw it.

‘Careful with that,’ Kyle warned. ‘You have to know how …’

Sneering, Niala yanked – and the blade slid through the leather and wood of the sheath taking her fingers with it. She stared at the streaming bloody stumps of her four fingers then screamed, dropping the blade to clench her hand.

Kyle lashed out with his foot, catching Neese in the knee as she leaned to take the weapon. She fell. He threw himself on her and they wrestled for the blade. Something crashed against Kyle’s head. Once more stars burst in his vision: it was Niala, standing over him, her crippled hand gripped in the other.