'A moment,' the Adjunct said as Keneb prepared to follow suit. 'How fare the soldiers, Fist?'

He hesitated, then said, 'For the most part, Adjunct, they are relieved.'

'I am not surprised,' she said.

'Shall I inform them that we are returning home?'

She half-smiled. 'I have no doubt the rumour is already among them. By all means, Fist. There is no reason to keep it a secret.'

'Unta,' Keneb mused, 'my wife and children are likely there. Of course, it stands to reason that the Fourteenth will not stay long in Unta.'

'True. Our ranks will be refilled.'

'And then?'

She shrugged. 'Korel, I expect. Nok thinks the assault on Theft will be renewed.'

It was a moment before Keneb realized that she did not believe a word she was saying to him. Why not Korel? What might Laseen have in store for us, if not another campaign? What does Tavore suspect? He hid his confusion by fumbling over the cloak's clasps for a few heartbeats.

When he glanced up again, the Adjunct seemed to be staring at one of the tent's mottled walls.

Standing, always standing – he could not recall ever having seen her seated, except on a horse. 'Adjunct?'

She started, then nodded and said, 'You are dismissed, Keneb.'

He felt like a coward as he made his way outside, angry at his own sense of relief. Still, a new unease now plagued him. Unta. His wife.

What was, is no longer. I'm old enough to know the truth of that.

Things change. We change'Make it three days.'

Keneb blinked, looked down to see Grub, flanked by Bent and Roach. The huge cattle-dog's attention was fixed elsewhere – southeastward – while the lapdog sniffed at one of Grub's worn moccasins, where the child's big toe protruded from a split in the upper seam. 'Make what three days, Grub?'

'Until we leave. Three days.' The boy wiped his nose.

'Dig into one of the spare kits,' Keneb said, 'and find some warmer clothes, Grub. This sea is a cold one, and it's going to get colder yet.'

'I'm fine. My nose runs, but so does Bent's, so does Roach's. We're fine. Three days.'

'We'll be gone in two.'

'No. It has to be three days, or we will never get anywhere. We'll die in the sea, two days after we leave Sepik Island.'

A chill rippled through the Fist. 'How did you know we were headed west, Grub?'

The boy looked down, watched as Roach licked clean his big toe. '

Sepik, but that will be bad. Nemil will be good. Then bad. And after that, we find friends, twice. And then we end up where it all started, and that will be very bad. But that's when she realizes everything, almost everything, I mean, enough of everything to be enough. And the big man with the cut hands says yes.' He looked up, eyes bright. 'I found a bone whistle and I'm keeping it for him because he'll want it back. We're off to collect seashells!'

With that all three ran off, down towards the beach.

Three days, not two. Or we all die. 'Don't worry, Grub,' he said in a whisper, 'not all grown-ups are stupid.'

Lieutenant Pores looked down at the soldier's collection. 'What in Hood's name are these?'

'Bones, sir,' the woman replied. 'Bird bones. They was coming out of the cliff – look, they're hard as rock – we're going to add them to our collection, us heavies, I mean. Hanfeno, he's drilling holes in ' em – the others, I mean, we got hundreds. You want us to make you some, sir?'

'Give me a few,' he said, reaching out.

She dropped into his hand two leg bones, each the length of his thumb, then another that looked like a knuckle, slightly broader than his own. 'You idiot. This one's not from a bird.'

'Well I don't know, sir. Could be a skull?'

'It's solid.'

'A woodpecker?'

'Go back to your squad, Senny. When are you on the ramp?'

'Looks like tomorrow now, sir. Fist Keneb's soldiers got delayed – he pulled half of 'em back off, it was complete chaos! There's no figuring officers, uh, sir.'

A wave sent the woman scurrying. Lieutenant Pores nestled the small bones into his palm, closing his fingers over to hold them in place, then he walked back to where Captain Kindly stood beside the four trunks that comprised his camp kit. Two retainers were busy repacking one of the trunks, and Pores saw, arranged on a camel-hair blanket, an assortment of combs – two dozen, maybe more, no two alike. Bone, shell, antler, tortoiseshell, ivory, wood, slate, silver, gold and blood-copper. Clearly, they had been collected over years of travel, the captain's sojourn as a soldier laid out, the succession of cultures, the tribes and peoples he had either befriended or annihilated. Even so… Pores frowned. Combs?

Kindly was mostly bald.

The captain was instructing his retainers on how to pack the items.

'… those cotton buds, and the goat wool or whatever you call it.

Each one, and carefully – if I find a scratch, a nick or a broken tooth I will have no choice but to kill you both. Ah, Lieutenant, I trust you are now fully recovered from your wounds? Good. What's wrong, man? Are you choking?'

Gagging, his face reddening, Pores waited until Kindly stepped closer, then he let loose a cough, loud and bursting and from his right hand – held before his mouth – three bones were spat out to clunk and bounce on the ground. Pores drew in a deep breath, shook his head and cleared his throat.

'Apologies, Captain,' he said in a rasp. 'Some broken bones still in me, I guess. Been wanting to come out for a while now.'

'Well,' Kindly said, 'are you done?'

'Yes sir.'

The two retainers were staring at the bones. One reached over and collected the knuckle.

Pores wiped imaginary sweat from his brow. 'That was some cough, wasn' t it? I'd swear someone punched me in the gut.'

The retainer reached over with the knuckle. 'He left you this, Lieutenant.'

'Ah, thank you, soldier.'

'If you think any of this is amusing, Lieutenant,' Kindly said. 'You are mistaken. Now, explain to me this damned delay.'

'I can't, Captain. Fist Keneb's soldiers, some kind of recall. There doesn't seem to be a reasonable explanation.'

'Typical. Armies are run by fools. If I had an army you'd see things done differently. I can't abide lazy soldiers. I've personally killed more lazy soldiers than enemies of the empire. If this was my army, Lieutenant, we would have been on those ships in two days flat, and anybody still on shore by then we'd leave behind, stripped naked with only a crust of bread in their hands and the order to march to Quon Tali.'

'Across the sea.'

'I'm glad we're understood. Now, stand here and guard my kit, Lieutenant. I must find my fellow captains Madan'Tul Rada and Ruthan Gudd – they're complete idiots but I mean to fix that.'

Pores watched his captain walk away, then he looked back down at the retainers and smiled. 'Now wouldn't that be something? High Fist Kindly, commanding all the Malazan armies.'

'Leastways,' one of the men said, 'we'd always know what we was up to.'

The lieutenant's eyes narrowed. 'You would like Kindly doing your thinking for you?'

'I'm a soldier, ain't I?'

'And what if I told you Captain Kindly was insane?'

'You be testing us? Anyway, don't matter if'n he is or not, so long as he knows what he's doing and he keeps telling us what we're supposed to be doing.' He nudged his companion, 'Ain't that right, Thikburd?'

'Right enough,' the other mumbled, examining one of the combs.

'The Malazan soldier is trained to think,' Pores said. 'That tradition has been with us since Kellanved and Dassem Ultor. Have you forgotten that?'

'No, sir, we ain't. There's thinkin' and there's thinkin' and that's jus' the way it is. Soldiers do one kind and leaders do the other.

Ain't good the two gettin' mixed up.'

'Must make life easy for you.'