He made a face. ‘Mostly, nobody much cares. Very well, have it your way. These Shake were cursed. You didn’t reach them in time. Now what?’
‘I don’t know. But whatever Andii blood remains within them is all but drowned in human blood. You will find in them close company, and that is something.’
‘I have all the company I need in you, Sand.’
She snorted. ‘Sweet, but nonsense. See it this way, then. I am of the land-this land. You are of the sea-a distant sea. And the Shake? They are of the Shore. And look at us here, now, standing on a bridge.’ She paused and then grimaced. ‘I can almost see the blind poet’s face. I can almost see him nodding. When grief was too much, Withal, we were in the habit of tearing out our own eyes. What kind of people would do such a thing?’
He shrugged. ‘I’m not following you, Sand. You need simpler thoughts.’
‘The Shake are home, and yet more lost than they ever have been. Does Mother Dark forgive them? Will she give them her city? Will she grant them the legacy of the Tiste Andii?’
‘Then perhaps you have a purpose being here, after all, Sand.’
She searched his eyes, was stung by his compassion. ‘What do you mean?’
‘You need to convince Mother Dark to do all those things. For the Shake.’
Oh, husband. I was a hostage, nothing more. And then, and then, I lost even that. ‘Mother Dark has no time for the likes of me.’
‘Tell me, what was the purpose of being a hostage?’
He’d caught her thoughts. She looked away, studied the wreckage-cluttered river sliding under the bridge. Dark waters … ‘The First Families sparred. Power was a wayward tide. We were the coins they exchanged. So long as we were never spent, so long as we’- remained unsullied- ‘remained as we were, the battles saw little blood. We became the currency of power.’ But gold does not feel. Gold does not dream. Gold does not long for a man’s hand closing about it. You can win us, you can lose us, but you can’t eat us. You can hide us away. You can polish us bright and hang us from a chain round your neck. You can bury us, you can even carve a likeness of your face into us, but in the next season of fire all sign of you vanishes.
You can’t eat us, and you can’t fuck us. No, you can’t do that.
‘Sand?’
‘What?’
‘Were hostages ever killed?’
She shook her head. ‘Not until the end. When everything… fell apart. All it needs,’ she said, memories clouding her mind, ‘is the breaking of one rule, one law. A breaking that no one then calls to account. Once that happens, once the shock passes, every law shatters. Every rule of conduct, of proper behaviour, it all vanishes. Then the hounds inside each and every one of us are unleashed. At that moment, Withal’-she met his eyes, defiant against the anguish she saw in them- ‘we all show our true selves. We are not beasts-we are something far worse. There, deep inside us. You see it-the emptiness in the eyes, as horror upon horror is committed, and no one feels-no one feels a thing.’
She was trembling in his arms now and he held her tight-to keep her from sinking to her knees. Sandalath pressed her face into the curve of his shoulder and neck. Her words muffled, she said, ‘She should have stayed turned away. I will tell her-go away-we weren’t worth it then, we’re not worth it now. I will tell you-her-’
‘Sand-’
‘No, I will beg her. Turn away. I’m begging you, my love, turn away .’
‘Sand. The Shake-’
The bridge beneath them seemed to be swaying. She held him as hard as she could.
‘The Shake, my love. They’ve found us.’
Her eyes closed. I know. I know.
‘Well?’
Brevity adjusted her sword belt. ‘Well what?’
‘Should we go and talk to ’em, love?’
‘No, let’s just stand here. Maybe they’ll go away.’
Snorting, Pithy set out. ‘Dark dark dark,’ she muttered, ‘it’s all dark. I’m sick of dark. I’m gonna torch the forest, or maybe a few buildings. Fire, that’s the solution. And lanterns. Giant lanterns. Torches. Oil lamps. White paint.’
‘You going to go on like that all the way to ’em?’ Brevity asked, keeping pace a step behind her.
‘That woman looks like she walked outa one of them wall paintings in the temple.’
‘Maybe she did.’
‘Then what? Got lost? Our lookout watched ’em coming up the road. Nah, the point is, her people built this city. She’s got more claim to it than the Shake. And that’s a problem.’