Reaper's Gate & Toll the Hounds - By Steven Erikson Page 0,469

commiserated, walking up to them. He paused upon seeing the heaved and cracked slabs of ice crowding the centre of the lake. 'It's pushing, is it?'

'Took your time, too,' Pinosel muttered, casting her husband her third glowering look since Ormly had arrived. She swished whatever was in the jug in her left hand, then tilted it back to drink deep. Then wiped at her mouth, leaned forward and glared up at Ormly from lowered brows. 'Ain't gonna have no jus' one upper lip, neither. Gonna be healthy—'

'Really, Pinosel,' Ormly said, 'the likelihood of that—'

'You don't know nothing!'

'All right, maybe I don't. Not about the likes of you two, anyway. But here's what I do know. In the Old Palace there's a panel in the baths that was painted about six hundred years ago. Of Settle Lake or something a lot like it, with buildings in the background. And who's sitting there in the grasses on the bank, sharing a jug? Why, an ugly woman and an even uglier man – both looking a lot like you two!'

'Watchoo yer callin' ugly,' Pinosel said, lifting her head with an effort, taking a deep breath to compose her features, then patting at her crow's nest hair. 'Sure,' she said, 'I've had better days.'

'Ain't that the truth,' mumbled Ursto.

'An' I 'eard that! An' oose fault is that, porker-nose?'

'Only the people that ain't no more 'ere t'worship us an' all that.'

' 'Zactly!'

Ormly frowned at the pond and its ice. At that moment a huge slab buckled with a loud crack! And he found himself involuntarily stepping back, one step, two. 'Is it coming up?' he demanded.

'No,' Ursto said, squinting one-eyed at the groaning heap of ice. 'That'd be the one needing his finger back.'

The meltwater fringing the lake was bubbling and swirling now, bringing up clouds of silt as some current swept round the solid mass in the middle. Round and round, like a whirlpool only in reverse.

And all at once there was a thrashing, a spray of water, and a figure in its midst – struggling onto the bank, coughing, streaming muddy water, and holding in one incomplete hand a scabbarded sword.

Pinosel, her eyes bright as diamonds, lifted the jug in a wavering toast. 'Hail the Saviour! Hail the half-drowned dog spitting mud!' And then she crowed, the cry shifting into a cackle, before drinking deep once more.

Ormly plucked the severed finger from his purse and walked down to where knelt Brys Beddict. 'Looking for this?' he asked.

There had been a time of sleep, and then a time of pain. Neither had seemed to last very long, and now Brys Beddict, who had died of poison in the throne room of the Eternal Domicile, was on his hands and knees beside a lake of icy water. Racked with shivers, still coughing out water and slime.

And some man was crouched beside him, trying to give him a severed finger swollen and dyed pink.

He felt his left hand gripping a scabbard, and knew it for his own. Blinking to clear his eyes, he flitted a glance to confirm that the sword still resided within it. It did. Then, pushing the man's gift away, he slowly settled onto his haunches, and looked round.

Familiar, yes.

The man beside him now laid a warm hand on his shoulder, as if to still his shivering. 'Brys Beddict,' he said in a low voice. 'Tehol is about to die. Brys, your brother needs you now.'

And, as Brys let the man help him to his feet, he drew out his sword, half expecting to see it rusted, useless – but no, the weapon gleamed with fresh oil.

'Hold on!' shouted another voice.

The man steadying Brys turned slightly. 'What is it, Ursto?'

'The demon god's about to get free! Ask 'im!'

'Ask him what?'

'The name! Ask 'im what's its name, damn you! We can't send it away without its name!'

Brys spat grit from his mouth. Tried to think. The demon god in the ice, the ice that was failing. Moments from release, moments from . . . 'Ay'edenan of the Spring,' he said. 'Ay'edenan tek' velut !enan.'

The man beside him snorted. 'Try saying that five times fast! Errant, try saying it once!'

But someone was cackling.

'Brys—'

He nodded. Yes. Tehol. My brother – 'Take me,' he said.

'Take me to him.'

'I will,' the man promised. 'And on the way, I'll do some explaining. All right?'

Brys Beddict, Saviour of the Empty Throne, nodded.

'Imagine,' Pinosel said with a gusty sigh, 'a name in the old tongue. Oh now, ain't this one come