She ducked beneath the lead axle and heaved the chain on her shoulders up and on to the wooden beam. Then climbed up after it. ‘No, Draconus, you could not do that, could you?’

There had been pity in Rake’s eyes when he killed her. There had been sorrow. But she had seen, even then, in that last moment of locked gazes, how such sentiments were tempered.

By a future fast closing in. Only now, here, did she comprehend that.

You give us chaos. You give us an end to this.

And she knew, were she in Anomander Rake’s place, were she the one possessing Dragnipur, she would fail in this sacrifice. The power of the weapon would seduce her utterly, irrevocably.

None other. None other but you, Anomander Rake.

Thank the gods.

He awoke to the sting of a needle at the corner of one eye. Flinching back, gasping, scrabbling away over the warm bodies. In his wake, that blind artist, the mad Tiste Andii, Kadaspala, face twisted in dismay, the bone stylus drawing back.

‘Wait! Come back! Wait and wait, stay and stay, I am almost done! I am almost done and I must be done before it’s too late, before it’s too late!’

Ditch saw that half his mangled body now bore tattoos, all down one side-wherever skin had been exposed whilst he was lying unconscious atop the heap of the fallen. How long had he been lying there, insensate, whilst the insane creature stitched him full of holes? ‘I told you,’ he said, ‘not me. Not me!’

‘Necessary. The apex and the crux and the fulcrum and the heart. He chose you. I chose you. Necessary! Else we are all lost, we are all lost, we are all lost. Come back. Where you were and where you were, lying just so, your arm over, the wrist-the very twitch of your eye-’’I said no! Come at me again, Kadaspala, and I will choke the life from you, I swear it. I will crush your neck to pulp. Or snap your fingers, every damned one of them!’

Lying on his stomach, gaping sockets seeming to glare, Kadaspala snatched his hands back, hiding them beneath his chest. ‘You must not do that and you must not do that. I was almost finished with you. I saw your mind went away, leaving me your flesh-to do what was needed and what was needed is still needed, can’t you understand that?’

Ditch crawled further away, well beyond the Tiste Andii’s reach, rolling and then sinking down between two demonic forms, both of which shifted sicken-ingly beneath his weight. ‘Don’t come any closer,’ he hissed.

‘I must convince you. I have summoned Draconus. He is summoned. There will be threats, they come with Draconus, they always come with Draconus. I have summoned him.’

Ditch slowly lowered himself down on to his back. There would be no end to this, he knew. Each time his mind fell away, fled to whatever oblivion it found, this mad artist would crawl to his side, and, blind or not, he would resume bis work. What of it! Why should I really care? This body is mostly destroyed now, anyway. If Kadaspala wants it-no, damn him, it is all I have left.

‘So many are pleased,’ the Tiste Andii murmured, ‘to think that they have become something greater than they once were. It is a question of sacrifices, of which I know all there is to know, yes, I know all there is to know. And,’ he added, somewhat breathlessly, ‘there is of course more to it, more to it. Salvation-’

‘You cannot be serious.’

‘It is not quite a lie, not quite a lie, my friend. Not quite a lie: And truth, well, truth is never as true as you think it is, or if it is, then not for long not for long not long for long.’

Ditch stared up at the sickly sky overhead, the flashes of reflected argent spilling through what seemed to be roiling clouds of grey dust. Everything felt imminent, something hovering at the edge of his vision. There was a strangeness in his mind, as if he was but moments from hearing some devastating news, a fatal illness no healer could solve; he knew it was coming, knew it to be inevitable, but the details were unknown and all he could do was wait. Live on in endless anticipation of that cruel, senseless pronouncement.

If there were so many sides to existing, why did grief and pain overwhelm all else? Why were such grim forces so much more powerful than joy, or love, or even compassion? And, in the face of that, did dignity really provide a worthy response? It was but a lifted shield, a display to others, whilst the soul cowered be-hind it, in no way ready to stand unmoved by catastrophe, especially the personal kind.

He felt a sudden hatred for the futility of things.

Kadaspala was crawling closer, his slithering stalking betrayed in minute gasps of effort, the attempts at stealth pathetic, almost comical. Blood and ink, ink and blood, right, Kadaspala? The physical and the spiritual, each painting the truth of the other.

I will wring your neck, I swear it.

He felt motion, heard soft groans, and all at once a figure was crouching down beside him. Ditch opened his eyes. ‘Yes,’ he said, sneering, ‘you were summoned.’

‘Just how many battles, wizard, are you prepared to lose?’

The question irritated him, but then it was meant to. ‘Either way, I have few left, don’t I?’

Draconus reached down and dragged Ditch from between the two demons, roughly throwing him on to his stomach-no easy thing, since Ditch was not a small man, yet the muscles behind that effort made the wizard feel like a child.

‘What are you doing?’ Ditch demanded, as Draconus placed his hands to either side of the wizard’s head, fingers lacing below his jaw.

Ditch sought to pull his head back, away from that tightening grip, but the effort failed.

A sudden wrench to one side. Something in his neck broke clean, a crunch and snap that reverberated up into his skull, a brief flare of what might have been pain, then… nothing.

‘What have you done?

‘Not the solution I would have preferred,’ Draconus said from above him, ‘but it was obvious that argument alone would not convince you to cooperate.’

Ditch could not feel his body. Nothing, nothing at all beneath his neck. He broke it-my neck, severed the spinal cord. He-gods! Gods! ‘Torment take you, Elder God. Torment take your soul. An eternity of agony. Death of all your dreams, sorrow unending among your kin-may they too know misery, despair-all your-’ •

‘Oh, be quiet, Ditch. I haven’t the time for this.’

The scene before Ditch’s eyes rocked then, swung wild and spun, as Draconus dragged him back to where he had been lying before, to where Kadaspala needed him to be. The apex, the crux, the heart, the whatever. You have me now, Tiste Andii.

And yes, I did not heed your threat, and look at me now. True and true, you might say, Ditch never learns. Not about threats. Not about risks. And no, nothing-nothing-about creatures such as Draconus. Or Anomander Rake. Or any of them, who do what they have to do, when it needs doing.

‘Hold your face still,’ Kadaspala whispered close to one ear. ‘I do not want to blind you, I do not want to blind you. You do not want to be blind, trust me, you do not want to be blind. No twitching, this is too important, too too too important and important, too.’

The stab of the stylus, a faint sting, and now, as it was the only sensation he had left, the pain shivered like a blessing, a god’s merciful touch to remind him of his flesh-that it still existed, that blood still flowed beneath the skin.

The healer, Ditch, has devastating news.

But you still have your dignity. You still have that. Oh yes, he still has his dignity. See the calm resignation in these steady eyes, the steeled expression, the courage of no choice. Be impressed, won’t you!

The south-facing slopes of God’s Walk Mountains were crowded with ruins. Shattered domes, most of them elliptical in shape, lined the stepped tiers like broken teeth. Low walls linked them, although these too had collapsed in places, where run-off from the snow-clad peaks had cut trenches and gullies like gouges down the faces, as if the mountains themselves were eager to wash away the last remnants of the long-dead civilization.