‘Again?’

‘Omtose Phellack-the heart of this city is ice, Taralack Veed. A most violent imposition.’

Are you certain? I do not understand-’

‘Nor I. Yet. But I shall. No secret shall survive my sojourn here. It will change.’

‘What will change?’

Icarium smiled, one hand resting on the pommel of his sword, and did not reply.

‘You will face this Emperor then?’

‘So it is expected of me, Taralack Veed.’ A bright glance. ‘How could I refuse them?’

Spirits below, my death draws close. It was what we wanted all along. So why do I now rail at it? Who has stolen my courage?

‘It is as if,’ Icarium whispered, ‘my life awakens anew’

The hand shot out in the gloom, snatching the rat from atop the wooden cage holding the forward pump. The scrawny creature had a moment to squeal in panic before its neck was snapped. There was a thud as the dead rat was flung to one side, where it slid down into the murky bilge water.

‘Oh, how I hate you when you lose patience,’ Samar Dev said in a weary tone. ‘That’s an invitation to disease, Karsa Orlong.’

‘Life is an invitation to disease,’ the huge warrior rumbled from the shadows. After a moment, he added, ‘I’ll feed it to the turtles.’ Then he snorted. ‘Turtles big enough to drag down this damned ship. These Letherii live in a mad god’s nightmare.’

‘More than you realize,’ Samar Dev muttered. ‘Listen. Shouts from shore. We’re finally drawing in.’

‘The rats are relieved.’

‘Don’t you have something you need to do to get ready?’

‘Such as?’

‘I don’t know. Knock a few more chips off your sword, or something. Get it sharp.’

‘The sword is unbreakable.’

‘What about that armour? Most of the shells are broken-it’s not worthy of the name and won’t stop a blade-’

‘No blade will reach it, witch. I shall face but one man, not twenty. And he is small-my people call you children. And that is all you truly are. Short-lived, stick-limbed, with laces I want to pinch. The Edur are little different, just stretched out a bit.’

‘Pinch? Would that be before or after decapitation?’

He grunted a laugh.

Samar Dev leaned back against the bale in which some-thing hard and lumpy had been packed-despite the mild discomfort she was not inclined to explore any further. Both the Edur and the Letherii had peculiar ideas about what constituted booty. In this very hold there were amphorae containing spiced human blood and a dozen wax-clad corpses of Edur ‘refugees’ from Sepik who had not survived the journey, stacked like bolts of cloth against a bloodstained conch-shell throne that had belonged to some remote island chieftain-whose pickled head probably resided in one of the jars Karsa Orlong leaned against. ‘At least we’re soon to get off this damned ship. My skin has all dried up. Look at my hands-I’ve seen mummified ones looking better than these. All this damned salt-it clings like a second skin, and it’s moulting-’

‘Spirits below, woman, you incite me to wring another rat’s neck.’

‘So I am responsible for that last rat’s death, am I? Needless to say, I take exception to that. Was your hand that reached out, Toblakai. Your hand that-’

‘And your mouth that never stops, making me need to kill something.’

‘I am not to blame for your violent impulses. Besides, I was just passing time in harmless conversation. We’ve not spoken in a while, you and I. I find I prefer Taxilian’s company, and were he not sick with homesickness and even more miserable than you…’

‘Conversation. Is that what you call it? Then why are my ears numb?’

‘You know, I too am impatient. I’ve not cast a curse on anyone in a long time.’

‘Your squalling spirits do not frighten me,’ Karsa Orlong replied. ‘And they have been squalling, ever since we made

– 

the river. A thousand voices clamouring in my skull-can you not silence them?’

Sighing, she tilted her head back and closed her eyes. Toblakai… you will have quite an audience when you clash swords with this Edur Emperor.’

‘What has that to do with your spirits, Samar Dev?’

‘Yes, that was too obscure, wasn’t it? Then I shall be more precise. There are gods in this city we approach. Resident gods.’

‘Do they ever get a moment’s rest?’

‘They don’t live in temples. Nor any signs above the doors of their residences, Karsa Orlong. They are in the city, yet few know of it. Understand, the spirits shriek because they are not welcome, and, even more worrying, should any one of those gods seek to wrest them away from me, well, there is little I could do against them.’

‘Yet they are bound to me as well, aren’t they?’

She clamped her mouth shut, squinted across at him in the gloom. The hull thumped as the ship edged up along-side the dock. She saw the glimmer of bared teeth, feral, and a chill rippled through her. ‘What do you know of. that?’ she asked.

‘It is my curse to gather souls,’ he replied. ‘What are spirits, witch, if not simply powerful souls? They haunt me… I haunt them. The candles I lit, in that apothecary of yours-they were in the wax, weren’t they?’

‘Released, then held close, yes. I gathered them… after I’d sent you away.’

‘Bound them into that knife at your belt,’ Karsa said. ‘Tell me, do you sense the two Toblakai souls in my own weapon?’

‘Yes, no. That is, I sense them, but I dare not approach.’

‘Why?’

‘Karsa, they are too strong for me. They are like fire in the crystal of that flint, trapped by your will.’

‘Not trapped,’ he replied. ‘They dwell within because they choose to, because the weapon honours them. They are my companions, Samar Dev.’ The Toblakai rose suddenly, hunching beneath the ceiling. ‘Should a god be foolish enough to seek to steal our spirits, I will kill it.’

She regarded him from half-closed eyes. Declarative statements such as that one were not rare utterances from Karsa Orlong, and she had long since learned that they were not empty boasts, no matter how absurd the assertion might have sounded. ‘That would not be wise,’ she said after a moment.

‘A god devoid of wisdom deserves what it gets.’

‘That’s not what I meant.’

Karsa stooped momentarily to retrieve the dead rat, then he headed for the hatch.

She followed.

When she reached the main deck, the Toblakai was walking towards the captain. She watched as he placed the sodden rat in the Letherii’s hands, then turned away, saying, ‘Get the hoists-I want my horse on deck and off this damned hulk.’ Behind him, the captain stared down at the creature in his hands, then, with a snarl, he flung it over the rail.

Samar Dev contemplated a few quick words with the captain, to stave off the coming storm-a storm that Karsa had nonchalantly triggered innumerable times before on this voyage-then decided it was not worth the effort. It seemed that the captain concluded much the same, as a sailor hurried up with a bucket of seawater, into which the Letherii thrust his hands.

The main hatch to the cargo hold was being removed, while other hands set to assembling the winches.

Karsa strode to the gangway. He halted, then said in a loud voice, ‘This city reeks. When I am done with its Emperor, I may well burn it to the ground.’

The planks sagged and bounced as the Toblakai descended to the landing.

Samar Dev hurried after him.

One of two fully armoured guards had already begun addressing Karsa in contemptuous tones. ‘-to be unarmed whenever you are permitted to leave the compound, said permission to be granted only by the ranking officer of the Watch. Our immediate task is to escort you to your quarters, where the filth will be scrubbed from your body and hair-’

He got no further, as Karsa reached out, closed his hand on the guard’s leather weapons harness, and with a single heave flung the Letherii into the air. Six or more paces to the left he sailed, colliding with three stevedores who had been watching the proceedings. All four went down.