Night of Knives_ A Novel of the Malazan Empire - By Ian C. Esslemont Page 0,30

The braziers and low torches now supplied the only light, dim and smoky-yellow. The fire hadn’t been blown out or smothered. Rather it seemed to Temper as if the flames had been sucked back down into the very stone itself. A damp cold bit at his ankles. There was sorcery gathering as of a slow summoning, an upwelling like the pressure behind a geyser. Temper had felt its like on a hundred battlefields; soon it would burst.

Low under his breath, Temper hissed to Faro, ‘Stop it. No sense making things worse.’

The old man blinked his rheumy eyes as if he were fluttering on his own knife-edge. ’Things,’ he announced, ‘will become much worse if you do not leave this place at once.’

Temper gaped and pushed himself back from the table. What was the old man up to?

Eli had heard. ‘That’s damn well it!’ he shouted, and came marching across the room.

Temper shot an appeal for help to the other three guards. They looked on with lazy indifference. None moved to help.

Eli waved the knife. ‘Get out of the damned booth.’

Faro didn’t even seem aware of the threat. He stared off into space.

‘Come on,’ said Temper, trying to sound reasonable, ‘the old man’s booze-addled.’

The blade swung to him. ‘You,’ breathed Eli, his eyes dilated, ‘can shut the Abyss up.’

Temper said nothing. At first he’d been hopeful, seeing that no veteran had remained behind. Now he wished one was here. Any veteran of Imperial engagements, marine or otherwise, would smell the danger, the oddness, the charged atmosphere. It reeked of the Warrens; of sorcery. And all any poor foot soldier could do in the face of that was run for cover.

Faro broke the stalemate. He announced, unbidden, ‘You have all been warned.’

Eli lunged into the booth but Trenech’s hand grabbed his arm. He gave a sharp twist and Temper heard the snap of bones, then Coop’s scream. Trenech released the arm and Eli straightened, gaping at the ragged end of bone poking out from the meat of his forearm. He threw his head back and loosed a shriek that ended when Trenech chopped a hand across his throat. A lash of hot blood droplets whipped across the booth as he toppled backwards.

Coop screamed again but Temper clamped a hand over the brewer’s mouth. He held himself motionless, staring into Faro’s glazed eyes.

A stunned pause, then the trample of boots as the three remaining guards rushed Trenech. Curses, a hoarse yell, a crash as a body slammed into one of the heavy oak tables. Then silence. It had lasted barely an instant.

Coop struggled in Temper’s grip then froze. Faro was staring across the table. His lips climbed into a satisfied smile. Temper released Coop, who lay his head on the table, whimpering.

‘Leave now,’ Faro said. ‘Shadow – and Others – come. The Heralds announce. We must be ready.’

Temper swallowed, nodded. Coop took breath to speak but Temper covered his mouth again and edged out of the booth, dragging the man after him. Trenech stood with his back to the room, blocking the front entrance like a granite obelisk.

Temper pulled Coop to the back door but across the floor lay all the guards, dead, crushed by blunt blows. The brewer took one look at the mangled bodies and fainted dead away.

CHAPTER THREE

HOUNDS OF SHADOW

T

HE SINGLE TINY VESSEL STRUGGLED LOST ON AN OCEAN OF storm. Above, lightning lashed through a solid roof of cloud. The brazier at the boat’s mid-thwart glowed, a single beacon of orange against the night. The fisherman rowed, driving the skiff’s prow into the heaving waves. All around hail and driven rain tore the slate-grey waters, yet no spray touched the boat to hiss in the brazier or flatten the fisherman’s blowing hair. Bronze tores gleamed at his tanned wrists and the bulk of his wool sweater hid the strength of his arms. Overhead, the roiling clouds seemed to shudder with each sweep of his oars, and every flex of his broad back. He chanted louder now, teeth clamped onto the stem of his pipe, keening into the raging wind:

‘Was summer I went a rowin’ with my glowing bride

We laughed and tarried ‘mid the silken pools.

Prettier than the lily blossom is my love,

She moves with grace upon the sheen.

Her eyes are deeper than the sea,

Her heart is warmer than all the cold, cold, sea.’

Out amid the waves, riders broached the surface. Their opalescent armour shone silver and sapphire. They leant back then heaved jagged ice-lances. The gleaming weapons darted across the