Vomit spurted against Kalam’s leather-sheathed palm, but he held on to his grip, guiding the corpse to the ground. Straddling the body, he released his grip, wiped his hand dry against the grey shirt, then moved on.
Two hundred heartbeats later and there were but two left. Their route had taken them, via a twisting, roundabout path, towards a district marked by the ruins of what had once been grand temples. They were drawn up at the edge of a broad concourse, awaiting their comrades, no doubt.
Kalam approached them as would the third hunter in the line. Neither was paying attention, their gazes fixed on a building on the other side of the concourse. At the last moment Kalam drew both long-knives and thrust them into the backs of the two assassins.
Soft grunts, and both men sank to the dusty flagstones. The blow to the leader of the Talon’s hand was instantly fatal, but Kalam had twisted the other thrust slightly to one side, and he now crouched down beside the dying man. ‘If your masters are listening,’ he murmured, ‘and they should be. Compliments of the Claw. See you soon…’
He tugged the two knives free, cleaned the blades and sheathed them.
The hunters’ target was, he assumed, within the ruined building that had been the sole focus of their attention. Well enough-Kalam had no friends in this damned camp.
He set out along the edge of the concourse.
At the mouth of another alley he found three corpses, all young girls. The blood and knife-wounds indicated they had put up a fierce fight, and two spattered trails led away, in the direction of the temple.
Kalam tracked them until he was certain that they led through the half-ruined structure’s gaping doorway, then he halted.
The bitter reek of sorcery wafted from the broad entrance. Damn, this place has been newly sanctified .
There was no sound from within. He edged forward until he came to one side of the doorway.
A body lay just inside, grey-swathed, fixed in a contortion of limbs, evincing that he had died beneath a wave of magic. Shadows were flowing in the darkness beyond.
Kalam drew his otataral long-knife, crept in through the doorway.
The shadowy wraiths flinched back.
The floor had collapsed long ago, leaving a vast pit. Five paces ahead, at the base of a rubble-strewn ramp, a young girl sat amidst the blood and entrails of three more corpses. She was streaked with gore, her eyes darkly luminous as she looked up at Kalam. ‘Do you remember the dark?’ she asked.
Ignoring her question, he stepped past at a safe distance. ‘Make no move, lass, and you’ll survive my visit.’
A thin voice chuckled from the gloom at the far end of the pit. ‘Her mind is gone, Claw. No time, alas, to fully harden my subjects to the horrors of modern life, try though I might. In any case, you should know that I am not your enemy. Indeed, the one who seeks to kill me this night is none other than the Malazan renegade, Korbolo Dom. And, of course, Kamist Reloe. Shall I give you directions to their abode?’
‘I’ll find it in due course,’ Kalam murmured.
‘Do you think your otataral blade sufficient, Claw? Here, in my temple? Do you understand the nature of this place? I imagine you believe you do, but I am afraid you are in error. Slavemaster, offer our guest some wine from that jug.’
A misshapen figure squirmed wetly across the rubble from Kalam’s left. No hands or feet. A mass of suppurating sores and the mangled rot of leprosy. With horrible absurdity, a silver tray had been strapped to the creature’s back, on which sat a squat, fired clay jug.
‘He is rather slow, I’m afraid. But I assure you, the wine is so exquisite that you will agree it is worth the wait. Assassin, you are in the presence of Bidithal, archpriest of all that is sundered, broken, wounded and suffering. My own… awakening proved both long and torturous, I admit. I had fashioned, in my own mind, every detail of the cult I would lead. All the while unaware that the shaping was being… guided.
‘Blindness, wilful and, indeed, spiteful. Even when the fated new House was laid out before me, I did not realize the truth. This shattered fragment of Kurald Emurlahn, Claw, shall not be the plaything of a desert goddess. Nor of the Empress. None of you shall have it, for it shall become the heart of the new House of Chains. Tell your empress to stand aside, assassin. We are indifferent to who would rule the land beyond the Holy Desert. She can have it.’
‘And Sha’ik?’
‘You can have her as well. Marched back to Unta in chains-and that is far more poetic than you will ever know.’
The shadow-wraiths-torn souls from Kurald Emurlahn-were drawing closer round Kalam, and he realized, with a chill, that his otataral long-knife might well prove insufficient. ‘An interesting offer,’ he rumbled. ‘But something tells me there are more lies than truths within it, Bidithal.’