Midnight Tides & The Bonehunters - By Steven Erikson Page 0,366

Dev,' she said loudly. 'Will you risk a curse from me? Any of you?' People shrank back, then quickly turned away.

Karsa glanced back at her. 'You are a witch?'

'You have no idea.'

'And had I left you on the trail, you would have cursed me?'

'Most certainly.'

He grunted, said nothing for the next ten paces, then turned once again. 'Why did you not call upon spirits to heal yourself?'

'I had nothing with which to bargain,' she replied. 'The spirits one finds in the wastelands are hungry things, Karsa Orlong. Covetous and not to be trusted.'

'You cannot be much of a witch, then, if you need to bargain. Why not just bind them and demand that they heal your leg?'

'One who binds risks getting bound in return. I will not walk that path.'

He made no reply to that.

'Here is Trosfalhadan Street. Up one avenue, there, see that big building with the walled compound beside it? Inn of the Wood, it's called. Hurry, before the guards reach this corner.'

'They will find us nonetheless,' Karsa said. 'You have failed in your task.'

'I wasn't the one who threw that guard into a cart!'

'He spoke rudely. You should have warned him.'

They reached the double gates at the compound.

From the corner behind them came shouts. Samar twisted round on the horse and watched the guards rush towards them. Karsa strode past her, drawing free the huge flint sword. 'Wait!' she cried. 'Let me speak with them first, warrior, else you find yourself fighting a whole city's worth of guards.'

He paused. 'They are deserving of mercy?'

She studied him a moment, then nodded. 'If not them, then their families.'

'You are under arrest!' The shout came from the rapidly closing guards.

Karsa's tattooed face darkened.

Samar edged down from the horse and hobbled to place herself between the giant and the guards, all of whom had drawn scimitars and were fanning out on the street. Beyond, a crowd of onlookers was gathering. She held up her hands. 'There has been a misunderstanding.'

'Samar Dev,' one man said in a growl. 'Best you step aside – this is no affair of yours—'

'But it is, Captain Inashan. This warrior has saved my life. My wagon broke down out in the wastes, and I broke my leg – look at me. I was dying. And so I called upon a spirit of the wild-lands.'

The captain's eyes widened as he regarded Karsa Orlong. 'This is a spirit?'

'Most assuredly,' Samar replied. 'One who is of course ignorant of our customs. That gate guard acted in what this spirit perceived as a hostile manner. Does he still live?'

The captain nodded. 'Knocked senseless, that is all.' The man then pointed towards the severed heads. 'What are those?'

'Trophies,' she answered. 'Demons. They had escaped their own realm and were approaching Ugarat. Had not this spirit killed them, they would have descended upon us with great slaughter. And with not a single worthy mage left in Ugarat, we would have fared poorly indeed.'

Captain Inashan narrowed his gaze on Karsa. 'Can you understand my words?'

'They have been simple enough thus far,' the warrior replied.

The captain scowled. 'Does she speak the truth?'

'More than she realizes, yet even so, there are untruths in her tale. I am not a spirit. I am Toblakai, once bodyguard to Sha'ik. Yet this woman bargained with me as she would a spirit. More, she knew nothing of where I came from or who I was, and so she might well have imagined I was a spirit of the wild-lands.'

Voices rose among both guards and citizens at the name Sha'ik, and Samar saw a dawning recognition in the captain's expression. 'Toblakai, companion to Leoman of the Flails. Tales of you have reached us.' He pointed with his scimitar at the fur riding Karsa's shoulders. 'Slayer of a Soletaken, a white bear. Executioner of Sha'ik's betrayers in Raraku. It is said you slew demons the night before Sha'ik was killed,' he added, eyes on the rotted, flailed heads. 'And, when she had been slain by the Adjunct, you rode out to face the Malazan army – and they would not fight you.'

'There is some truth in what you have spoken,' Karsa said, 'barring the words I exchanged with the Malazans—'

'One of Sha'ik's own,' Samar quickly said, sensing the warrior was about to say something unwise, 'how could we of Ugarat not welcome you? The Malazan garrison has been driven from this city and is even now starving in Moraval Keep on the other side of the river, besieged with no hope of