The first night following the gate and his parting ways with Cafal and Setoc, he had come upon a ruined tower, ragged as a rotten fang, the walls of which seemed to have melted under enormous heat. The destruction was so thorough not a single window or dressed facing survived, and much of the structure’s skeleton was visible as sagging latticework snarled with twisted ropes of rusting metal wire. He had never before seen anything remotely like it, and superstitious fear kept him from riding closer.

Since then, Torrent had seen nothing of interest, nothing to break the monotony of the blasted landscape. No mounds, no hills, not even ancient remnants of myrid, rodara and goat pens, as one often found on the Awl’dan.

It was nearing dawn when he made out a humped shape ahead, directly in his path, barely rising above the cracked rock. The ripple of furs-a torn, frayed hide riding hunched, narrow shoulders. Thin, grey hair seeming to float up from the head in the faint, sighing wind. A girdled skirt of rotted strips of snakeskin flared out from the seated form. He drew closer. The figure’s back was to Torrent, and beyond the wind-tugged hair and accoutrements, it remained motionless as he walked his horse up and halted five paces behind it.

A corpse? From the weathered pate beneath the sparse hair, it was likely. But who would have simply left one of their own out on this lifeless pan?

When the figure spoke, Torrent’s horse started back, nostrils flaring. ‘The fool. I needed him.’

The voice was rough as sand, hollow as a wind-sculpted cave. He could not tell if it belonged to a man or a woman.

It uttered something between a sigh and a hissing snarl, and then asked, ‘What am I to do now?’

The Awl warrior hesitated, and then said, ‘You speak the language of my people. Are you Awl? No, you cannot be. I am the last-and what you wear-’

‘You have no answer, then. I am used to disappointment. Indeed, surprise is an emotion I have not known for so long, I believe I have forgotten its taste. Be on your way then-this world and its needs are too vast for one such as you. He would have fared better, of course, but now he’s dead. I am so… irritated.’

Torrent dismounted, collecting one of his waterskins. ‘You must be thirsty, old one.’

‘Yes, my throat is parched, but there is nothing you can do for that.’

‘I have some water-’

‘Which you need more than I do. Still, it is a kind gesture. Foolish, but most kind gestures are.’

When he walked round to face the elder, he frowned. Much of the face was hidden in the shadow of protruding brows, but it seemed it was adorned in rough strings of beads or threads. He caught the dull gleam of teeth and a shiver whispered through him. Involuntarily he made a warding gesture with his free hand.

Rasping laughter. ‘Your spirits of wind and earth, warrior, are my children. And you imagine such fends work on me? But wait, there is this, isn’t there? The long thread of shared blood between us. I might be foolish, to think such things, but if anyone has earned the right to be a fool, it must surely be me. Thus yielding this… gesture.’

The figure rose in a clatter of bones grating in dry sockets. Torrent saw the long tubes of bare, withered breasts, the skin patched and rotted; a sagging belly cut and slashed, the edges of the wounds dry and hanging, and in the gashes themselves there was impenetrable darkness-as if this woman was as dried up inside as she was on the outside.

Torrent licked parched lips, struggled to swallow, and then spoke in a hushed tone, ‘Woman, are you dead?’

‘Life and death is such an old game. I’m too old to play. Did you know, these lips once touched those of the Son of Darkness? In our days of youth, in a world far from this one-far, yes, but little different in the end. But what value such grim lessons? We see and we do, but we know nothing.’ A desiccated hand made a fluttering gesture. ‘The fool presses a knife to his chest. He thinks it is done. He too knows nothing, because, you see, I will not let go.’

The words, confusing as they were, chilled Torrent nonetheless. The waterskin dangled in his hand, and its pathetic weight now mocked him.

The head lifted, and beneath those jutting brow ridges Torrent saw a face of dead skin stretched across prominent bones. Black pits regarded him above a permanent grin. The beaded threads he had thought he’d seen turned out to be strips of flesh-as if some clawed beast had raked talons down the old woman’s face. ‘You need water. Your horse needs fodder. Come, I will lead you and so save your useless lives. Then, if you are lucky, I will eventually find a reason to keep you alive.’

Something told Torrent that refusing her was impossible. ‘I am named Torrent,’ he said.

‘I know your name. The one-eyed Herald begged me on your behalf.’ She snorted. ‘As if I am known for mercy.’

‘The one-eyed Herald?’

‘The Dead Rider, out from Hood’s Hollow. He knows little respite of late. An omen harsh as a crow’s laugh, thus comes Toc the Younger-but do I not cherish the privacy of my dreams? He is rude.’

‘He haunts my dreams as well, Old One-’

‘Stop calling me that. It is… inaccurate. Call me by my name, and that name is Olar Ethil.’

‘Olar Ethil,’ said Torrent, ‘will he come again?’

She cocked her head, was silent a moment. ‘As they shall, to their regret, soon discover, the answer is yes.’

Sunlight spilled over a grotesque scene. Cradling his injured arm, Bakal stood with a half-dozen other Senan. Behind them, the new self-acclaimed Warleader of the White Faces, Maral Eb, was cajoling his warriors to wakefulness. The night had been long. The air smelled of spilled beer and puke. The Barahn were rising rough and loud, unwilling to relinquish their abandon.

Before Bakal and the others was the flat where their encampment had been-not a tent remained, not a single cookfire still smouldered. The Senan, silent, grim-faced, were ready to begin the march back home. A reluctant escort to the new Warleader. They sat on the ground to one side, watching the Barahn.

Flies were awakening. Crows circled overhead and would soon land to feed.

Onos Toolan’s body had been torn apart, the flesh deboned and pieces of him scattered everywhere. His bones had been systematically shattered, the fragments strewn about. His skull had been crushed. Eight Barahn warriors had tried to break the flint sword and had failed. In the end, it was pushed into a fire built from dung and Tool’s furs and clothing, and then, when everything had burned down, scores of Barahn warriors pissed on the blackened stone, seeking to shatter it. They had failed, but the desecration was complete.

Deep inside Bakal, rage seethed black and biting as acid upon his soul. Yet for all its virulence, it could not destroy the knot of guilt at the very centre of his being. He could still feel the handle of his dagger in his hand, could swear that the wire impressions remained on his palm, seared like a brand. He felt sick.

‘He has agents in our camp,’ said the warrior beside him, his voice barely a murmur. ‘Barahn women married into the Senan. And others. Stolmen’s wife, her mother. We know what Hetan’s fate will be-and Maral Eb will not permit us to travel ahead of him-he does not trust us.’

‘Nor should he, Strahl,’ replied Bakal.

‘If there were more of us and less of them.’

‘I know.’

‘Bakal, do we tell the Warleader? Of the enemy Onos Toolan described?’

‘No.’

‘Then he will lead us all to our deaths.’

Bakal glared across at the warrior. ‘Not the Senan.’ He studied the array of faces before him, gauging the effect of his words, and then nodded. ‘We must cut ourselves loose.’

‘Into the Lether Empire,’ said Strahl, ‘as Tool said. Negotiate settlement treaties, make peace with the Akrynnai.’