Stonewielder (Novels of the Malazan Empire, #3)

by Ian C. Esslemont

The waters of the Ocean of Storms, risen far above ancient levels, tideswollen, driven by the sorceries of the Stormriders, poured through the gap in a burgeoning flood.

He’d be dead, he knew, if it weren’t for the Vow. Apparently the otataral does nothing to impede its effectiveness.

The lands? You fool! Your blood protected me from my old enemies! And now they are coming! ‘Our blood protected … you?’ Yes! Fool! Blood sacrifice forestalls them.

In Stygg, deep within the pleasure palace of Ebon, its ruler gaped at the image, heard its warning, then quickly acted upon its appearance: he gathered together all the twenty self-styled sorcerers, warlocks and witches he paid to protect him from such things and had them executed immediately.

‘How did you know that would help?’ she ground through her clenched teeth. ‘A mage named Tattersail told me – long ago.’

‘What was it like?’ she asked while they worked. ‘What was what like?’ ‘Your Warren. Darkness. Rashan.’ ‘I don’t know,’ Carfin answered, straight-faced. ‘It was dark.’

‘What’s with the chest?’ Lazar asked. ‘A fragment of the entity charading as the Lady,’ said Shell. ‘A fragment?’ Blues repeated, alarmed. ‘As in the other name for the Crippled God … the Shattered God?’

Below, unknowably far down in the black depths of the Hole, a figure glimmered. The unnatural clarity of the water allowed extraordinary detail. An armoured giant of a fellow in a full helm and holding, point-downward on his breast, a great grey blade.

She set her hands on her hips. ‘Where in Hood’s Realm are we?’ He gave a maddeningly unconcerned shrug. ‘Not there, I assure you.’ ‘Then where?’ He raised his arms, turning full circle. ‘Welcome to what I call … the Shores of Creation.’

The words of that last Fistian priest returned to him: Who protects you? It is of the earth! Could it be true? Another old fallen friend still with him? The amber stone had come from Ereko, a giant like these Toblakai and Tarthinoe – in fact he’d claimed to be of the race that was their ancestors.

Yes, he’d look up his friends, Stalker and his cousins. They’d come from the lands north of his birth plains. A land of mountains and forests. A land the elders of his clan named … Assail.