Assail (Malazan Empire, #6)(94)



By late in the day Fisher was stumbling, exhausted, hardly able to lift his burning bruised feet. He pushed through a thick copse of spruce and caught the welcome sight of Coots standing motionless on a rock outcropping that jutted from the mountain shoulder they were descending. The sun cast an amber-gold light over the valley side from where it sizzled on the western horizon.

Coots stood shading his gaze to the north. Fisher joined him, panting and gulping the biting chill air. The Lost brother shot him a sidelong glance and grunted his approval.

Fisher swallowed to wet his burning throat. ‘What is it?’

Coots gestured, inviting him to look. He stepped up, shaded his gaze. To the north, the mountain slopes graded down in falling arcs to reveal hazy foothills beyond. Past the hills, a body of water glimmered golden yellow in the sunset. Beyond the flat glittering field of water, mountains rose so far away as to be deep blue. These rearing heights climbed to snow-white peaks tinged with a hint of sapphire. The sunset washed the ice-capped heights in a glow of salmon-amber.

‘The Salt range,’ Fisher said. He did not add that the mountain range looked no different from what he remembered growing up beneath its looming bulk.

‘Aye.’ Coots pointed a blunt finger below. ‘And the Sea of Gold.’

‘Hazy,’ Fisher observed.

The man’s eyes, narrowed beneath his shelf-like hairless brows, appeared troubled. He rubbed one of his gold earrings between a thumb and forefinger. ‘Aye,’ he murmured, thinking.

Jethiss joined them. Fisher cast him a glance and was envious to see that the Andii did not even appear winded. That was just not fair.

‘We’ll camp here,’ Coots said, and he eased himself down on the rock, grunting and grumbling. He unrolled a strip of leather to reveal what was left of the roasted rabbit, and passed it round for them to pick at.

Badlands finally came staggering in. He had a hand pressed to his mouth and was keeping up a steady stream of slurred cursing as he came. He sat heavily. Fisher offered him the rabbit but the man winced at the sight of it and waved it off.

‘I’d better have a look at that,’ Coots said.

Badlands flinched away. ‘Theep y’ham hanths off, y’ox!’

‘You might get an infection,’ Fisher said.

‘Thalker can thake a look.’

‘Stalker does the cutting and bonesetting,’ Coots explained.

‘He might not make it …’

‘I’ll make it!’

Fisher shrugged. Fine. They’d see, he supposed. He turned to Jethiss. ‘How are you?’

The Andii shrugged.

Fisher wished to improve the fellow’s mood. ‘There are powers in the north. Perhaps one of them might find your name …’

The man’s head snapped up at that, his gaze suddenly sharp and fierce, as if Fisher’s words had awakened something within him. A memory, perhaps. For some vaguely troubling reason Fisher wished he hadn’t mentioned the possibility.

When night came Coots stood and peered out over the cliff’s edge. Curious, Fisher joined him again. He squinted down to the black glimmering slate-like expanse that was the Sea of Gold. A blush of lurid yellow light glowed in a halo around the sea.

‘A lot of fires,’ Coots rumbled, explaining. ‘Smoke by day, fire by night. Looks like war in the lowlands.’

‘We go round, I take it?’

The big fellow nodded. He ran a hand over the ridged and scarred armour-like pate of his skull. ‘Aye. We go round.’

* * *

On the eighth day riding north skirting the Sea of Dread, Kyle, Lyan and Dorrin pulled up short to stare at an amazing sight.

As far as they could see in a line running behind the low bare hills along the coast there stood a forest of bare spires: ship’s masts. A long parade of them, slowly edging along. Kyle and Lyan exchanged wondering glances. Then Kyle urged his mount east in a slow walk for a closer look.

They topped a hill that allowed line of sight on the shore and stopped. It was an immense convoy: a long train of roped ships being pulled by teams of men, plus the occasional horse and mule. Kyle had seen such things before, of course, mule teams pulling barges on canals, but this was the first time he’d seen the concept applied on the shore of a sea. He counted over twenty ships in this one flotilla.

‘Looks like they’ve found a way around your Sea of Dread,’ Lyan remarked.

Kyle rested his forearms on the saddle pommel and shook his head in awe. ‘Nothing like naked greed to find a way through any barrier.’

A susurration of noise reached them from the nearest teams of men and women heaving on the ropes. Individuals came running inland from the shore, knelt, and trained crossbows in their direction.

‘They think us hostile locals,’ Lyan said.

‘Yes. We’d best be going.’

A chuff of dirt behind stiffened Kyle’s back and in that instant he realized their mistake – they’d all been looking in the same direction. He turned his head, knowing what he would see: a cordon of soldiers advancing upon them from farther inland. It looked like they meant to drive them to the coast.

Lyan’s blade shushed against its wooden sheath as she yanked it free. She kneed her horse to stand between Dorrin and the soldiers. Kyle did not draw his weapons. He urged his mount down the hill a short distance. The men raised their crossbows and spears. ‘What do you want?’ he shouted in Talian, knowing exactly what it was they wanted.

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