the four levels of the ancient ruins. The fortifications looked to Temper like nothing more solid than simple rammed earth. Beyond, the jagged incisor-like ridges of the Thalas Mountains darkened the northern horizon.
Flags snapped in the strong wind. Orders carried, distorted by the wind’s own voice. Soldiers marched. Temper squinted into the dust, pushed back his helmet and hawked up grit. A canteen thumped against the chest of his scaled hauberk. He took it with a nod to the bearded and armoured man at his side. ‘Thanks, Point.’
‘What in Burn’s Wisdom are we doing in this god-forsaken waste?’ Point grumbled as he drew on his own helmet, an iron pot bearing cheek guards embossed to resemble the jaws of a roaring lion.
Temper said nothing. There was little to say. Point grumbled about everything; it was his way. Across the lines mixed Gral, Debrahl and Tregyn of the Y’Ghatan guard rode back and forth, shouting insults hoarse and unintelligible from this distance, clashing their swords against round bronze-faced shields. Temper turned to examine the rippling white walls of the command tent. ‘The last one, he says.’
Point snorted. ‘Not in this rat’s nest of a land. There’ll always be another, and another. These people will never face the truth.’
Temper watched the snapping cloth, the marines standing guard at the entrance, and his four brother bodyguards waiting next to them. ‘Maybe so. But he says it’s his last.’
Point glanced at him, his eyes narrow within the shade of his helm. ‘You don’t really believe that. He’s always sayin’ that.’
‘I don’t know. That Bloorgian priest, Lanesh – you’ve heard the things he’s been ranting.’
Point slapped the sword sheathed at his side. ‘That pig. He’s just eaten up that Dassem’s closer to Hood than he’ll ever be. Ferrule says we ought to gut him, and for once I agree with that murdering brute.’
Temper straightened as the tent flap was thrown back and officers filed out. ‘Here they come.’
Dassem stepped out, his horsehair-plumed helm under one arm. The four others of his ‘sword’ bodyguard met him there. Soldiers nearby in the ranks shouted, ‘Hail the Sword!’ Dassem raised a gauntleted hand in answer. A few of the mage cadre emerged: old man A’Karonys with a staff taller than he was; the giant Bedurian; the woman Nightchill; and the short bald walking stump of a man, Hairlock.
Point murmured, ‘I wish the old ogre was still around. He always kept that bitch in check.’
Temper grunted agreement. The bitch, Surly, remained hidden within the tent. Talian and Falaran Sub-Fists and commanders came out and headed to their posts. In their wake they left messengers running with last minute orders. From behind the city walls horns sounded distant alarm. After a last dust-ridden pass and javelin toss, the harrying Y’Ghatan cavalry withdrew.
The assault lasted through the entire day. The thunder and roar of battle rose and fell as flank commanders probed the defences, searching for a weakness. Smoke and the stench of burnt flesh washed over Temper as A’Karonys lashed the walls with flames, only to be pushed back by what remained of the Holy Falah’d. Ranged around Dassem, Sword of the Empire and commander of the Imperial forces, Temper and his brethren watched and waited through the day’s punishing heat for the time when the Sword would commit itself to the field. Runners came and went, conveying intelligence to Dassem, relaying his orders. A company of saboteurs emerged from the churning winds. Caked in dust but grinning, they saluted Dassem. Somewhere, the defences had been breached.
Slowly, step by step, the regular infantry advanced. They scrambled up the first incline of the lowest terrace to the broached first ring of walls. Here the Imperial sappers had done their work, undermining and blasting entire sections. So far, the defenders held a death-grip on these breaches. Piled cask and timber barriers went up at night, while each day the Malazans tore them down. Scaling a siege ramp, Temper calculated that every footstep taken up the dusty rotten slope cost a thousand men. An impenetrable cloud of reddish dust obscured everything. Ahead, muted screams and the thundering clash of arms reached him through the gusting wind.
Temper scanned the next walls – no more than heaped sun-baked mud bricks. Why here at this pathetic backwater? Why had the surviving rag-ends of insurrectionist armies and a last few newly anointed Falah’d converged here? Prisoners boasted of its extraordinary antiquity and named it the hidden progenitor of all the Holy Cities themselves. A convenient claim now