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‘Witness, Endest Silann. But remain silent. You are a presence, do you under-stand!’

He did.

They appeared almost simultaneously, one from the north, one from the east and one from the south. Three brothers. Three sons. This was to be a meeting of blood and yes, they would resent him, for he did not belong. Indeed, the Temple did not belong. Would they send him away?

The trees wept their promise of a new season of life-a season that would never come, for there was nowhere left for the filaments to take root-not for scores of leagues in any direction. The river would take millions, but even those fine black threads could not float on its waters, and so what the river took the river kept, buried in the dead silts of Dorssan Ryl. Our breath was meant to give life, not take it away. Our breath was a gift, and in that gift the blackwood found betrayal.

This was and is our crime, and it was and remains unforgivable. ‘Good evening, priest,’ said Andarist, who then added, ‘Anomander, it seems you were right.’

‘An easy prediction,’ Anomander replied. ‘The Temple watches me the way a rove of rhotes watch a dying ginaf.’

Endest blinked. The last wild ginaf vanished a century past and no longer did the silver-backed herds thunder across the south plains; and these days roves of rhotes winged above battlefields and nowhere else-and no, they did not starve. Are you the last, Lord? Is this what you are saying! Mother bless me, I never know what you are saying. No one does. We share language but not meaning.

The third brother was silent, his red eyes fixed upon the forges beneath the western sky.

‘The clash between Drethdenan and Vanut Degalla draws to an end,’ said n-darist. ‘It may be time-’

‘Should we be speaking of this?’ Silchas Ruin cut in, finally turning to face Endest Silann. ‘None of this is for the Temple. Especially not some pathetic third level acolyte.’

Anomander seemed uninterested in settling his attention upon Endest Silann. In the face of his brother’s belligerence, he shrugged. ‘This way, Silchas, perhaps we can insure the Temple remains… neutral.’

‘By unveiling to it all that we intend? Why should the Temple hold to any particular faith in us? What makes the three of us more worthy of trust than, say, Manalle, or Hish Tulla?’

‘There is an obvious answer to that,’ said Andarist. ‘Priest?’

He could refuse a reply. He could feign ignorance. He was naught but a thirdlevel acolyte, alter all. Instead, he said, ‘You three are not standing here trying to kill each other.’

Andarist smiled at Silchas Ruin.

Who scowled and looked away once again.

‘We have things to discuss,’ said Anomander. ‘Andarist?’

‘I have already sent representatives to both camps. An offer to mitigate. Veiled hints of potential alliances against the rest of you. The key will be in getting Drethdenan and Vanut into the same room, weapons sheathed.’

‘Silchas?’

‘Both Hish and Manalle have agreed to our pact. Manalle still worries me, brothers. She is no fool-’

‘And Hish is?’ laughed Andarist-a maddeningly easy laugh, given the treachery they were discussing.

‘Hish Tulla is not subtle. Her desires are plain. It is as they all say: she does not lie. No, Manalle is suspicious. After all, I am speaking of the greatest crime of all, the spilling of kin’s blood.’ He paused, then faced Anomander, and suddenly his expression was transformed. Unease, something bewildered and lit with horror. ‘Anomander,’ he whispered, ‘what are we doing?’

Anomander’s features hardened. ‘We are strong enough to survive this. You will see.’ Then he looked at Andarist. ‘The one who will break our hearts stands before us. Andarist, who chooses to turn away.’

‘A choice, was it?’ At the heavy silence that followed, he laughed again. ‘Yes, it was. One of us… it must be, at least one of us, and I have no desire to walk your path. I have not the courage for such a thing. The courage, and the… cruel madness. No, brothers, mine is the easiest task-I am to do nothing.’

‘Until I betray you,’ said Silchas, and Endest was shocked to see the white-skinned Lord’s wet eyes.

‘There is no other way through,’ said Andarist.

Centuries into millennia, Endest Silann would wonder-and never truly know-if all that followed was as these three had planned. Courage, Andarist had called it. And… cruel madness-by the Mother, yes-such destruction, the sheer audacity of the treachery-could they have meant all of that?

The next time Anomander had met Endest Silann had been on the bridge at the foot of the Citadel, and in his words he made it clear that he had not recognized him as the same man as the one sent to witness his meeting with his brothers. A strange carelessness for one such as Anomander. Although, unquestionably, the Lord had other things on his mind at that moment.

Endest Silann had delivered to the High Priestess his account of that fell meeting. And in relating the details of the betrayal, such as could be culled from what he had heard-all the implications-he had expected to see outrage in her face. Instead-and, he would think later with prescient symbolism-she had but turned away.

There had been no storms in the sky then. Nothing to hint of what would come. The blackwood trees of Suruth Common had lived for two millennia, maybe longer, and each season they shed their elongated seeds to the wind, Yet, when next he looked upon those stately trees, they would be on fire.

‘You have grown far too quiet, old friend.’

Endest Silann looked up from the dying flames. Dawn was fast approaching. ‘I was reminded… the way that wood crumbles into dissolution.’

‘The release of energy. Perhaps a better way of seeing it.’

‘Such release is ever fatal.’

‘Among plants, yes,’ said Caladan Brood.

Among plants… ‘I think of the breath we give them-our gift.’

‘And the breath they give back,’ said the warlord, ‘that burns if touched. I am fortunate, I think,’ he continued, ‘that I have no appreciation for irony.’

‘It is a false gift, for with it we claim ownership. Like crooked merchants, every one of us. We give so that we can then justify taking it back. I have come to believe that this exchange is the central tenet of our relationship… with everything in the world. Any world. Human, Andii, Edur, Liosan. Imass, Barghast, Jaghut-’

‘Not Jaghut,’ cut in Caladan Brood.

‘Ah,’ said Endest Silann. ‘I know little of them, in truth. What then was their bargain?’

‘Between them and the world? I don’t even know if an explanation is possible, or at least within the limits of my sorry wit. Until the forging of the ice-defending against the Imass-the Jaghut gave far more than they took. Excepting the Tyrants, of course, which is what made such tyranny all the more reprehensible in the eyes of other Jaghut.’

‘So, they were stewards.’

‘No.’The notion of stewardship implies superiority. A certain arrogance.’

‘An earned one, surely, since the power to destroy exists.’

‘Well, the illusion of power, I would say, Endest. After all, if you destroy the things around you, eventually you destroy yourself. It is arrogance that asserts a kind of separation, and from that the notion that we can shape and reshape the world to suit our purposes, and that we can use it, as if it was no more than a living tool composed of a million parts.’ He paused and shook his head. ‘See? Already my skull aches.’

‘Only with the truth, I think,’ said Endest Silann. ‘So, the Jaghut did not think of themselves as stewards. Nor as parasites. They were without arrogance? I find that an extraordinary thing, Warlord. Beyond comprehension, in fact.’

‘They shared this world with the Forkrul Assail, who were their opposites. They were witnesses to the purest manifestation of arrogance and separation.’

‘Was there war?’

Caladan Brood was silent for so long that Endest began to believe that no answer was forthcoming, and then he glanced up with his bestial eyes glittering in the ebbing flames of the hearth.’”Was”?’