Midnight Tides & The Bonehunters - By Steven Erikson Page 0,652

now, and not much when we seal the barrow and leave the old man in peace. 'We're following pilgrims. Why? Because I want to know where they're going, that's why.' That should do. Mentally shrugging, Paran set off. In his wake followed Hurlochel and then, ten paces back, the young G'danii woman Naval D'natha, who was now, it seemed, a part of his entourage.

'High Fist?'

'What is it, Hurlochel?'

'Where are we going?'

'To visit the imperial artist.'

'Oh, him. May I ask why?'

'Why suffer such torment, you mean? Well, I have a request to make of him.'

'High Fist?'

I need a new Deck of Dragons. 'Is he skilled, do you know?'

'A subject of constant debate, High Fist.'

'Really? Among whom? The soldiers? I find that hard to believe.'

'Ormulogun has, accompanying him everywhere, a critic'

Oh, the poor man.

The body was lying on the trail, the limbs lacerated, the tanned-hide shirt stiff and black with dried blood. Boatfinder crouched beside it. 'Stonefinder,' he said. 'In the frozen time now. We shared tales.'

'Someone cut off one of his fingers,' Karsa Orlong said. 'The rest of the wounds, they came from torture, except that spear-thrust, beneath the left shoulder blade. See the tracks – the killer stepped out from cover as the man passed – he was not running, but staggering. They but played with him.'

Samar Dev settled a hand on Boatfinder's shoulder, and felt the Anibar trembling with grief. 'How long ago?' she asked Karsa.

The Teblor shrugged. 'It does not matter. They are close.'

She straightened in alarm. 'How close?'

'They have made camp and they are careless with its wastes.' He unslung his flint sword. 'They have more prisoners.'

'How do you know that?'

'I smell their suffering.'

Not possible. Is such a thing possible? She looked round, seeking more obvious signs of all that the Toblakai claimed to know. A peat-filled basin was to their right, a short descent from the bedrock path on which they stood. Greyboled black spruce trees rose from it, leaning this way and that, most of their branches bereft of needles. Glinting strands of spider's web spanned the spaces in between, like scratches on transparent glass. To the left, flattened sprawls of juniper occupied a fold in the bedrock that ran parallel to the trail. Samar frowned.

'What cover?' she asked. 'You said the killer stepped out from cover to drive that spear into the Anibar's back. But there isn't any, Karsa.'

'None that remains,' he said.

Her frown deepened into a scowl. 'Are they swathed in branches and leaves, then?'

'There are other ways of hiding, woman.'

'Such as?'

Karsa shrugged off his fur cloak. 'Sorcery,' he said. 'Wait here.'

Like Hood I will. She set off after Karsa as the Toblakai, sword held before him in both hands, moved forward in a gliding half-run. Four strides later and she had to sprint in an effort to keep up.

The jog, silent, grew swifter. Became lightning fast.

Gasping, she scrambled after the huge warrior, but he was already lost to sight.

At the sound of a sudden shriek to her left, Samar skidded to a halt – Karsa had left the trail somewhere behind her, had plunged into the forest, over jumbled, moss-slick boulders, fallen trees, thick skeins of dead branches – leaving in his wake no sign. More screams.

Heart hammering in her chest, Samar Dev pushed into the stand, clawing aside undergrowth, webs pulling against her before snapping, dust and bark flakes cascading down—

—while the slaughter somewhere ahead continued.

Weapons clashed, iron against stone. The crunch of splintered wood – blurred motion between trees ahead of her, figures running – a body, cartwheeling in a mist of crimson – she reached the edge of the encampment—

And saw Karsa Orlong – and a half hundred, maybe more, tall grey-skinned warriors, wielding spears, cutlasses, long-knives and axes, now closing in on the Toblakai.

Karsa's path into their midst was marked by a grisly corridor of corpses and fallen, mortally wounded foes.

But there were too many—

The huge flint sword burst into view at the end of a sweeping upswing, amid fragments of bone and thick, whipping threads of gore. Two figures reeled back, a third struck so hard that his moccasined feet flashed up and over at Karsa's eye-level, and, falling back, dragged down the spear-shafts of two more warriors – and into that opening the Toblakai surged, evading a half-dozen thrusts and swings, most of them appearing in his wake, for the giant's speed was extraordinary – no, more, it was appalling.

The two foes, weapons snagged, sought to launch themselves back, beyond the reach of Karsa – but