Did we hurt you that day? Me and Stormy and Truth and that Trell? ‘I hear you,’ he whispered, studying the dog. ‘The way you wince when you get up after another night on cold ground. I see you limping at day’s end, Bent.’ You and me, we’re both breaking down. This journey will be the last of us, won’t it? You and me, Bent. The last of us . ‘I’ll take your side when the time comes,’ he said. ‘In fact, I will die for you, dog. It’s the least I can do.’ The promise sounded foolish, and he looked round to make certain no one else was near. Their only company was the other dog, Roach, digging frantically at some mouse hole. Gesler sighed. But who says my life’s worth any more than this dog’s? Or that its life is worth less than mine? Who stands around measuring these things? The gods? Hah! Good one. No. We do, and that’s the sorriest joke of all .
Feeling chilled, he shook himself.
Bent sat down on his left, yawned with a grinding, grating sound.
Gesler grunted. ‘We seen a lot, ain’t we? All that grey in our muzzles, hey?’
Aren Way. The sun was hot, but we could barely feel it. Truth brushing the flies from the wounds. We don’t like death. It’s as simple as that. We don’t like it .
He heard soft footpads and turned to see Destriant Kalyth approaching. When she settled down on Bent’s other side and rested a hand on the beast’s head, Gesler flinched. But the dog did not move.
He grunted. ‘Never seen Bent accept that from anybody, Destriant.’
‘South of the Glass Desert,’ she said. ‘We are soon to enter the homeland of my people. Not my tribes, but our kin. The Elan lived on the plains that enclose the Glass Desert on three sides. My own clan was to the north.’
‘Then you can’t be certain they’re all dead – these ones in the south.’
She shook her head. ‘I am. The voice-slayers from Kolanse hunted down the last of us. Those that didn’t die from the drought, I mean.’
‘Kalyth, if you got away, others did too.’
‘I hope not,’ she whispered, and she set to massaging the cattledog, along the shoulders, down the length of the beast’s back to the hips, and under her breath she chanted something in her own language. Bent’s eyes slowly closed.
Gesler watched her, wondering at the meaning of her reply. Whispered like a prayer. ‘It seems,’ he muttered after a moment, ‘that us survivors all share the same torment.’