‘Mortal Sword, will you return to the fold? Will you lead us in the war to come? Our need for you—’
She lifted her eyes, silenced him with their icy regard. A sneer curled her lips. ‘Is clearly past, Shield Anvil.’ She turned to the crowd. ‘I relinquish the title of Mortal Sword to the Wolves. In my vow to
the Adjunct, I seem to have betrayed you all. So be it, sirs. Let it be written that the betrayal – so forewarned by Destriant Run’Thurvian – belonged not to the Perish Grey Helms, but to Mortal Sword Krughava. The crime is mine and mine alone.’
Gods, the supreme egoism of this creature! Even in defeat, she will stand upon the mound, alone. I divest her of everything – I drive the knife into her very heart – and now she is suddenly transformed into a figure of breathtaking tragedy! How does she manage it? Every time!
‘How it shall be written,’ he said in a loud voice, ‘remains to be decided. Should you rediscover your faith, Krughava—’
She bared her teeth. ‘Should you discover your
humanity
, Tanakalian, should you find the courage – Hood knows where – to see the crisis in your own soul, then do come to me. Until then, I shall ride alone.’
He snorted. ‘And will you raise your own tent, too? Cook your own breakfast?’
‘I have ever given thanks to my brothers and sisters, Shield Anvil, for such kindnesses as they volunteer.’ She cocked her head. ‘I wonder … how long before doing the same slips from your mind, Tanakalian?’
As she walked away, he turned to the tent. ‘Here, my children, shall I help you with that?’
‘
Usurpation?
’
Krughava swept past Spax, flung her helm into a corner of the tent, and followed it with her gauntlets. ‘I would drink, Highness.’
Abrastal gestured savagely and Spax shook himself, went over to collect a jug. ‘Woman, you have the right of it. Get drunk, and then come to my bed. I vow to make you forget all your ills.’
The stern woman regarded the Barghast with a measuring stare, as if contemplating his offer. Spax felt sudden sweat upon the small of his back. He quickly poured out a goblet and handed it to her.
Queen Abrastal sank back into the heap of cushions. ‘Well, that didn’t take long.’
Krughava’s eyes flashed. ‘If I am too shameful in your eyes, Highness—’
‘Oh be quiet and drink that down. Spax, be ready to pour her another. I was but musing out loud, Mortal Sword, on my sense of the Adjunct’s—’
‘Her? And if it pleases, I am no longer Mortal Sword. No, none of this can be cast at Tavore’s feet—’
‘By all the river gods, woman, sit down and drink – in other words, be quiet! Leave me to do all the talking.’
‘What of me, Firehair?’
‘Should the miraculous moment ever arrive when you can say something of value, Spax of the Gilk, be sure to leap right in. Meanwhile,
I return to my point. The Adjunct. I can’t even guess at the manner of it, but clearly she somehow managed to bind you all to her – until the day of the parley, when she went and tore it all apart. Thus, not long – do you see? What she made she then un-made, and I do wonder at her appalling sense of timing.’
Krughava’s eyes were level above the rim of the goblet. ‘Highness, what did you make of her?’
‘Spax, hand me that damned jug if all you can do is stare – no, give it to me. Throw yourself down by the curtain – we might need to wipe our feet by the time the night’s done. Now, the Adjunct. Krughava – I swear, I will have you weeping, or whatever else I can wring from you. To hold it all inside as I see you doing will kill you.’
‘Tavore Paran, Highness.’
Abrastal sighed, watching Spax settle down near the curtain. ‘I miss the Khundryl,’ she muttered. She blinked and then looked away, seemed to study one of the thick tapestries hanging from the tent frame. Spax squinted at it. Some faded coronation scene, figures stiff as statues, the kind of formality that spoke of artistic incompetence or the absurdity of genius. He could never make up his mind over such things.
It’s just a stupid circlet of gold and silver and whatnot. It’s just a stupid proclamation of superiority – look at all the bowed heads! Where’s the real message here? Why, it’s with those guards lining the walls, and the swords under their hands
.
‘It is difficult,’ Abrastal said, frowning still at the tapestry. ‘Where does loyalty come from? What causes it to be born? What lifts one person above all the others, so that one chooses to follow her, or him? Is it nothing but our own desperation? Is it, as the Khundryl say, that vast crow’s wing stretching over us? Do we yearn for the shelter of competence – real or imagined, true or delusional?’
Spax cleared his throat. ‘In times of crisis, Firehair, even the smallest group of people will turn their heads, finding one among them. When we have no answers, we look to one who might – and that hope is born of qualities observed: of clearest thought, of wisdom or bold courage – all that each of us wishes to reflect.’
Krughava shifted to regard Spax, but said nothing.
‘Reflect, is it?’ Abrastal grunted, drank down a mouthful of wine. ‘Is this queen a mirror? Is that all I am? Is that all you are, Warchief Spax? A mirror for your people?’
‘In many ways, yes. But in looking into that mirror they ever choose, I think, to see only what they want to see.’
‘Sir,’ rumbled Krughava to Spax, ‘you invite an untenable position, for all who would command, who would take the lead, from the smallest band of warriors to the vastest empire.’ She scowled at her goblet and held it out to Abrastal, who leaned forward to refill it. ‘Among the
Perish, upon nights overcast and moonless, twenty hunters each would take to rath’avars and row out beyond the fiords. They would light bright lanterns, suspending them on poles out over the black, icy waters, and by that light they would call from the deeps the three-jawed nitals – a terrible fish that in vast numbers hunt the dhenrabi, and are able to strip those leviathan creatures down to the bones in a single sounding. The nitals, you see, hunt by the moon’s glow. And when they rose to the light, the hunters would spear them.’ She fell silent, lids lowering for a time.
Spax scratched at the bristle on his jaw, trying to work out the significance of that tale. He glanced at Abrastal, but the queen seemed fixated on the old tapestry.
‘Those fish would rise to the surface,’ Krughava said in a voice like gravel under a boot heel, ‘and the light would blind them, freeze them. There was no bravery in slaying them – it was nothing but slaughter, and would only end when the arms and shoulders of the hunters burned like fire, when they could no longer lift their harpoons.’
Spax snorted, nodding. ‘Yes, it does feel like that, at times.’
‘When I think of the wilds,’ she continued as if not hearing him, ‘I think of the nitals. We humans stand as the brightest light, and before us every living beast of this world freezes in place. My Shield Anvil has reawakened all the rage in my people, a rage confounded with guilt. We are to be the slaughterers defending the slaughtered.’
‘The Wolves of War—’
‘It is a damned cult!’ snapped Krughava, and then she shook her head. ‘The savagery of the wolf inspired us – is that so surprising?’
‘But there must be tenets of your faith,’ Spax persisted, ‘that do indeed cry out for retribution.’
‘Delusions, sir. Highness, speak of the Adjunct. Please.’
‘A most driven woman, Krughava. Desperation. And terrible need. But is she a mirror? And if so, what are we all meant to see?’
Krughava looked up, studied Abrastal. ‘The thought alone makes me want to weep, but I know not why.’
‘To reflect,’ said Spax, ‘a mirror is made hard, polished, unflawed.’
‘Find us more wine, Spax,’ Abrastal growled, ‘this one is done. Krughava – you swore allegiance to the Adjunct. Why?’
‘We were troubled. Questions had begun to plague us, especially the Destriant and his highest seneschals – those who had given their lives to the philosophy of our religion. We trained to be the weapons of war, you see, but we had begun to wonder if the only gesture of humanity was the one that delivered violence. Destruction. We wondered at the seemingly insurmountable might of vengeance, retribution and righteous punishment.’ Her eyes were bleak. ‘Is that all we possess? Is there nothing else that might challenge such weapons?’
‘Then,’ ventured Abrastal, ‘you must have seen something. In her. In Tavore Paran—’
But Krughava shook her head. ‘All that I knew of her, in that moment when I pledged my service and that of the Grey Helms – all that I knew, well, it came from the visions of the seneschals. The Fallen God was damaged. In terrible pain. Like a beast – like any of us – he lashed out at his tormentors. In that, he was more the wolf than we were. Or could ever hope to be. Highness, a knife to his throat would be a mercy, for so many – you must understand this – so many had now gathered to feed on his pain, to drink the sweet venom of his fevered blood. More than that, in witnessing his imprisonment, and his agony, they felt themselves elevated – it made them feel powerful, and in that power the only currency was cruelty. After all, is that not always our way?’
‘The dreams of the seneschals, Krughava? What did they offer?’
The iron-haired woman nodded. ‘An alternative. A way out. In those dreams stood a woman, a mortal woman, immune to all magics, immune to the seduction of the Fallen God’s eternal suffering. And she held something in her hand – it was small, indeed, so small that our dreamers could not discern its nature, but it haunted them – oh, how it haunted them!’
‘What was she holding?’ Abrastal demanded, leaning forward. ‘You must have an idea.’
‘An idea? Oh, hundreds of those, Highness. What she held had the power to free the Fallen God. It had the power to defy the gods of war – and every other god. It was a power to crush the life from vengeance, from retribution, from righteous punishment. The power to burn away the
seduction of suffering
itself.’ Her eyes glittered in the lantern light. ‘Can you imagine such a thing?’
Spax leaned back. ‘I have seen her enough times. I see nothing in her hand.’
Krughava had set the cup down. She now sat, her left hand held out, palm up, resting on her knee. She gazed down at it, as if seeking to conjure all that she needed. ‘That,’ she whispered, ‘is not a mirror. But … oh, how I wish it to be one.’
‘Krughava,’ Abrastal said in a low, almost tentative voice. ‘In the moment you stood before her, was there not doubt? Was there not even a single instant of … uncertainty?’
‘I thought – in her eyes, so flat … something. And now I wonder – I cannot help but wonder now if all that I thought I saw was nothing more than what I wanted to see.’ The hand slowly curled, closed like a dying flower. ‘
The mirror lies
.’
Those last words shook Spax to his very core. He climbed to his feet, feeling blood rushing into his face. ‘Then why didn’t you accept your Shield Anvil’s argument? Krughava! Why are you even here?’
With desolate eyes, she looked up at him. ‘I wanted a just war. I wanted it to be the last war of all wars. I wanted an end. One day the wolves will run only in our memories, our dreams. I do not want to live to see that day.’
‘There was something there,’ Abrastal insisted. ‘In her hand – your seers saw it, Krughava. They saw it. You must find out what it was – for all of us to do this, to do as she bids – for
us
, Krughava, you must find it!’
‘But I know what it is, Highness. In this moment, I have found my answer. And I see now how I have watched it weaken. How I have watched its light fade from the world. You see the Adjunct’s desperation – oh yes, she is desperate. We are too few. We are failing. That precious thing she found, she paid a price for it, and that price is now proving too high. For her, for the Bonehunters, for us.’
Spax bared his teeth. ‘Then the mirror did not lie.’
‘The lie is in the faith, sir. The faith that it can win, that it can even survive at all. You see, she is indeed but one woman, a mortal, and her strength is no greater than anyone else’s. She has been at war – I now think – all of her life. Is it any wonder she now stumbles?’
Spax thought back to that parley, and then shook his head. ‘From somewhere, Krughava, she is finding strength. I saw it – we all did, damn you—’
‘She turned me away.’
Abrastal snorted. ‘You feel slighted? Is that where all this has come from?’
‘Highness.’ Krughava’s tone hardened. ‘From the very beginning, I saw myself as the reflection of her faith. I would be her one unshakeable ally – sworn to her and her alone, no matter where she would lead us. And I knew that we understood each other. And that as much as I needed her – and what she held inside – she in turn needed
me
. Do you grasp any of this? I was the source of her strength. When her faith faltered, she needed only to look at me.’ Krughava held her palms against her face, covering her eyes, and slowly leaned forward. Muffled, she said, ‘She turned me away.’
Spax looked over at Abrastal and met the queen’s steady gaze. The Gilk Warchief slowly nodded.
‘You leave me in a difficult position,’ Abrastal said. ‘Krughava. If I understand you correctly, it is now your thought that in denying you, the Adjunct has in effect lost her faith. Yet was this not a matter of disposition? Two objectives, not one, and so we are to be divided in strength. And given the nature of the Glass Desert—’