Reaper's Gale (Malazan Book of the Fallen, #7)

by Steven Erikson

Everything glowed, as if lit from fires within. The once-black stubble of crops blazed back into fierce life. Stones shone like precious gems. Incandescence raged on all sides. Fiddler saw his soldiers and he could see through, in pulsing flashes, to their very bones, the organs huddled within their cages. He saw, along one entire side of Koryk, old fractures on the ribs, the left arm, the shoulder blade, the hip. He saw three knuckle-sized dents on Cuttle’s skull beneath the now translucent helm – a rap he had taken when still a babe, soft-boned and vulnerable. He saw the damage between Smiles’s legs from all the times she savaged herself. He saw in Corabb Bhilan Thenu’alas the coursing blood that held in it the power to destroy every cancer that struck him, and he was a man under siege from that disease, but it would never kill. Would not even sicken him. He saw in Bottle coruscating waves of raw power, a refulgence devoid of all control – but that would come. It will come. Corporal Tarr crouched down in the hole he’d dug, and the light emanating from him looked solid as iron. Among the others he saw more than any mortal would want to see, yet he could not close his eyes, could not look away. Gesler and Stormy were lit in gold fire. Even Stormy’s beard and hair – all spun gold now – a brutal beauty cascading round his face, and the damned fool was laughing. The world beyond had vanished behind an opaque, curved wall of silver fire. Vague shapes on the other side – yes, h...

Beak was driven down by the immense weight, the horrible hunger. Yet he would not retreat. Instead, he let the fire within him lash out, devouring every candle, igniting everything. His friends, yes, the only ones he had ever known. Survival, he realized, could only be found through purity. Of his love for them all – how so many of them had smiled at him, laughed with him. How hands clapped him on the shoulder and even, now and then, tousled his hair. He would have liked to see the captain one last time, and maybe even kiss her. On the cheek, although of course he would have liked something far more…brave. But he was Beak, after all, and he could hold on to but one thing at a time. Arms wrapped tight, even as the fire began to burn the muscles of his arms. His shoulders and neck. His legs. He could hold on, now, until they found him. Those fires were so hot, now, burning – but there was no pain. Pain had been scoured away, cleansed away. Oh, the weight was vast, getting heavier still, but he would not let go. Not of his brothers and his sisters, the ones he so loved. My friends.

Captain Faradan Sort had, like so many other soldiers relatively close to where Beak had sat, been driven to the ground by the ferocity of his magic. She was slow to recover, and even as the silver glow pulsed in fitful death, she saw…white. Gleaming armour and weapons. Hair white as snow, faces devoid of all scars. Figures, picking themselves up in a half-daze, rising like perfect conjurations from the brilliant green shoots of some kind of grass that now snarled everything and seemed to be growing before her eyes. And, turning, she looked upon Beak. To burn, fire needed fuel. To save them all, Beak had used all the fuel within him. In horror, Faradan Sort found herself staring at a collapsed jumble of ashes and scorched bone. But no, there was pattern within that, a configuration, if she could but focus through her tears. Oh. The bones of the arms seemed to be hugging the knees, the crumpled skull settled on them. Like a child hiding in a closet, a child seeking to make himself small, so small… Beak. Gods below…Beak.

Another helping hand, lifting Beak to his feet. He looked round. Nothing much to see. White sand, a gate of white marble ahead, within which swirled silver light. The hand gripping his arm was skeletal, the skin a strange hue of green. The figure, very tall, was hooded and wearing black rags. It seemed to be studying the gate. ‘Is that where I’m supposed to go, now?’ Beak asked. ‘Yes.’ ‘All right. Are you coming with me?’ ‘No.’ ‘All right. Well, will you let go of my arm, then?’ The hand fell away. ‘It is not common,’ the figure then said. ‘What?’ ‘That I attend to…arrivals. In person.’ ‘My name is Beak.’ ‘Yes.’ ‘What’s through there?’ ‘Your brother waits for you, Beak. He has been waiting a long time.’ Beak smiled and stepped forward, all at once in a great hurry – the silver light within that gate was beautiful, reminding him of something. The stranger’s voice brought him round: ‘Beak.’ ‘Yes?’ ‘Your brother. He will not know you. Yet. Do you understand?’ Beak nodded. ‘Why aren’t you coming with me?’ ‘I choose to wait…for another.’ ‘My brother,’ Beak said, his smile broadening. ‘I’m taller now. Stronger. I can save him, can’t I?’ A long pause, and then the figure said, ‘Yes, Beak, you can save him.’ Yes, that made sense. He set out again. With sure strides. To the gate, into that silver glow, to emerge on the other side in a glade beside a trickling stream. And kneeling near the bank, his brother. The same as he remembered. On the ground on all sides there were hundreds o...

‘Awaken,’ Hood said. ‘Arise.’ And Toc the Younger, with a long sigh, did as Hood commanded. Standing, tottering, squinting now at the gate awaiting them both. ‘Damn,’ Toc muttered, ‘but that’s a poor excuse for a gate.’ ‘The dead see as they see, Toc the Younger. Not long ago, it shone white with purity.’ ‘My heart goes out to that poor, misguided soul.’ ‘Of course it does. Come. Walk with me.’ They set out towards that gate. ‘You do this for every soul?’ ‘I do not.’ ‘Oh.’ And then Toc halted – or tried to, but his feet dragged onward – ‘Hold on, my soul was sworn to the Wolves—’ ‘Too late. Your soul, Toc the Younger, was sworn to me. Long ago.’ ‘Really? Who was the fool who did that?’ ‘Your father,’ Hood replied. ‘Who, unlike Dassem Ultor, remained loyal.’ ‘Which you rewarded by killing him? You bastard piece of pigsh—’ ‘You will await him, Toc the Younger.’ ‘He lives still?’ ‘Death never lies.’ Toc the Younger tried to halt again. ‘Hood, a question – please.’ The god stopped, looked down at the mortal. ‘Hood, why do I still have only one eye?’ The God of Death, Reaper of Souls, made no reply. He had been wondering that himself. Damned wolves.

‘Were you always this thick? I cannot remember – by the spirits, my panic worsens. Of course it was me. You bound me to stone, with your eyes and hand. With, Onrack, your love. Yours was a forbidden desire and it wounded so many. But not me. I knew only that I must give answer. I must let my heart speak.’ She laid a hand on his chest. ‘As yours now does. You are flesh and blood, Onrack. The Ritual has relinquished your soul. Tell me, what do you seek?’ He held his eyes on hers. ‘I have found it,’ he said.

‘Sane people pace in their cabin. Skorgen paces with the whole damned ship.’ ‘Why so impatient?’ ‘I expect he wants to tie up in Letheras well before this army arrives. And take on panicky nobles with all their worldly goods. Then we head back out before the Malazan storm, dump the nobles over the side and share out the spoils.’ ‘As any proper pirate would do.’ ‘Precisely.’ ‘Do you enjoy your profession, Captain? Does it not get stale after a time?’ ‘No, that’s me who gets stale after a time. As for the profession, why yes, I do enjoy it, Withal.’ ‘Even throwing nobles overboard?’ ‘With all that money they should have paid for swimming lessons.’ ‘Belated financial advice.’ ‘Don’t make me laugh.’

On the foredeck, the demons had somehow managed to skewer themselves on the sword. The weapon pinned all three of them to the deck. The creatures writhed. Blood poured from their mouths, even as the bottom-most one began strangling from behind the one in the middle, who followed suit with the one on top. The demon in the middle began cracking the back of its head into the bottom demon’s face, smashing its already cut nose.

A short time later, while the sailors argued over who’d won what, the three nachts – who had been lying motionless as if dead – stirred and deftly extricated themselves from the shortsword. One of them kicked the weapon into the river, held its hands over its ears at the soft splash. The three then exchanged hugs and caresses. Amused and curious from where he sat with his back to a rail on the foredeck, Banaschar, the last Demidrek of the Worm of Autumn, continued watching. And was nevertheless caught entirely by surprise when the nachts swarmed over the side and a moment later there followed three distinct splashes.

‘Because, not only do I have more money than you, Invigilator, I am – unlike you – entirely indifferent regarding who ends up owning it. Hand me over, by all means, sir. And watch me buy my life.’

And one night, as you lie sleeping in your furs in the hut where you were born, someone will slip in and slide a blade across your throat. Because the world within your mind is not the world beyond. You are named Taralack Veed and they have taken of its power. From the name, the face. From the name, the self, and with it all the history, and so by your own power – so freely given away long, long ago – you are slain.’

When you are but the hands holding the sword, the sword rules, and the sword knows nothing but what it was made for. It can achieve no resolutions, can manage no subtle diplomacy, can solve none of the problems afflicting people in their tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands. Leave a sword to rule an empire and the empire falls. Amidst war, amidst anarchy, amidst a torrent of blood and a sea of misery.

‘“Brys Beddict, Saviour of the Empty Hold.” I summon you.’

Emerging from the pathway crossing the yard, Trull Sengar, the butt of the spear ringing like the heel of a staff on the cobbles, walked out into the street. And set off in the direction of the Eternal Domicile. From the shadows of an alley opposite, the Errant watched him.

Watching from an unseen place, the Errant stepped back, pulled away as if he would hurl himself from a cliff. He was what he was. A tipper of balances. And now, this day – may the Abyss devour him whole – a maker of widows.

‘This is exhausting!’ Emperor Tehol Beddict said, slumping down onto his throne. Bugg’s face soured as he said, ‘Why? You haven’t done anything yet.’ ‘Well, it’s only been three weeks. I tell you, my list of reforms is so long I’ll never get around to any of them.’ ‘I applaud your embrace of incompetence,’ Bugg said. ‘You’ll make a fine Emperor.’