Surrender to the Will of the Night - By Glen Cook Page 0,126

new generation of warriors. Meantime, former enemies could fill the holes in the ranks. Most of his warriors had ancestors who had been his enemies.

The refugees were willing. They were too hungry to scruple.

* * *

A mountain of ice calved off the south shore of eastern Andoray, knocked loose by savage tidal bores roaring back and forth through the Ormo Strait. Sliding away, the berg exposed acres of stony beach. The monster toad crawled onto that, now more a two-legged transition between tadpole and adult. The withered god lay motionless, most all strength gone. And did so more than a month.

Kharoulke had escaped the sea. Continued existence remained problematic. He drew power out of the ether at about the rate he consumed it to remain viable.

Darts of silver-tainted iron remained at work throughout the Windwalker, blessing him with their poison.

Kharoulke’s great advantage was his bulk. It would take him an age to perish, even in his current dire circumstance.

Smaller Instrumentalities—those quick and clever enough—streaked in and carved off bits of foul god flesh. The small eating the great, rather than the reverse. Familiar in the middle world but unseen before in the Night.

Vigorously engaged in resisting the embrace of the ultimate, the Windwalker became ever more intimate with the time-point where he was engaged in the awful struggle. Being thus tied and preoccupied, a fragment of his consciousness opened to happenings in that one present and one particular world.

He sensed the movements of his enemies. He could follow those. But he did not have the power to act. His emotions were like those of a man who had been buried alive.

He made no headway recovering. And, because time participated in an inevitable progress, summer would come.

Warmth, even just to the point of surface thawing, was no friend of a winter god.

23. Lucidia: Shamramdi

The Mountain honored the martyr Ambel by standing in for him in the wicked dives of Shamramdi. He drank in taverns belonging to Antast Chaldareans, for whom wine consumption was no sin, and whose customers were mostly Believer sinners in disguise. He whored in brothels high and low, a vice he had indulged at no time before, even when young. He had a wife …

In truth, he had no idea what had become of the woman. He had not seen her since his last approved visit to al-Qarn, years ago. His agents in al-Minphet reported nothing. He suspected they were making no effort. They would not care. Women were of no consequence. Plus, getting close risked bringing them to the attention of er-Rashal al-Dhulquarnen.

* * *

Tonight, his fifth in Shamramdi, Nassim was drinking in a place with an unpronounceable name. Its signboard showed faded keys, dice, and a strange fish. The managing family spoke numerous languages, few of them well. Nassim communicated good enough to keep the wine coming. Coins did most of his talking.

He did not like the wine. It lay sour in his mouth.

The great question tonight was why he went on when he loathed the wine and was ashamed of what it did.

He persevered. Alone. In Ambel’s memory. Though there was a young man in shadow across the way who seemed inclined to flirt.

An alternative accepted by many Faithful. Nassim Alizarin was not among them. The idea repelled him. Nor was he capable of wrapping his mind around the sophistry involved in justifying the act.

The Written proclaimed homosexuals an abomination in the eyes of God. They were to be slain wherever discovered, preferably by stoning. Yet across the Realm of Peace it was acceptable for an older man to relieve his needs by using the body of a boy. Shamramdi had its male brothels. Even holy men indulged. No stones got thrown.

Nassim drank wine and was glad his comrades from Tel Moussa were not witnesses. Though they, more than most, would understand.

Ambel, really, was nothing to him. A boy he had known only by name before he went off to assassinate Black Rogert. A boy who, in the normal course, might have fallen anyway, before his time in the field ended. Whose loss, in that event, would have touched the Mountain no more than that of any other warrior.

The flirt did not become discouraged. The Mountain first thought the lad had no idea who he was trying to attract, then decided that the opposite must be true. There was villainy afoot. More appealing and much more likely targets were available.

The wine, however, encouraged Nassim to play along, to find out what was up. Which might