Sudden bellowing roars, the impact of something huge against bare flesh and bone. Splintering blows drumming the road beneath him-the hot splash of something drenching his back-he clawed the blood from his eyes, managed to lift himself to his hands and knees-coughing, spewing vomit.

The thundering concussions continued, and then Sandalath was kneeling beside him. ‘Withal! My love! Are you hurt-oh, Abyss take me! Too much blood-I’m sorry, oh, I’m sorry, my love!’

‘My horse.’

‘What?’

He spat to clear his mouth. ‘Someone chopped off my horse’s head. With his hand.’

‘What? That’s your horse’s blood? All over you? You’re not even hurt?’ The hands that had been caressing him now shoved him away. ‘Don’t you dare do that again!’

Withal spat a second time, and then pushed himself to his feet, eyes fixing on Sandalath. ‘This is enough.’ As she opened her mouth for a retort he stepped close and set a filthy finger against her lips. ‘If I was a different kind of man, I’d be beating you senseless right about now-no, don’t give me that shocked look. I’m not here to be kicked around whenever your mood happens to turn foul. A little measure of respect-’

‘But you can’t even fight!’

‘Maybe not, and neither can you. What I can do, though, is make things. And something else, too, I can decide, at any time, when I’ve had enough. And I will tell you this right now, I’m damned close.’ He stepped back. ‘Now, what in Hood’s name just-gods below!’

This shout burst from him in shock-three enormous, hulking, black-skinned demons were on the road just beyond the dead horse. One of them held a club of driftwood that looked like a drummer’s baton in its huge hands, and was using it to pound down some more on a mangled, crushed corpse. The other two followed the blows as if gauging the effects of each and every crushing impact. Bluish blood had sprayed out on the road, along with other less identifiable discharges from the pulped ruin of their victim’s body.

In a low voice Sandalath said, ‘Your Nachts-the Jaghut were inveterate jokers. Hah hah. That was a Forkrul Assail. It seems the Shake stirred things up somewhat-they’re probably all dead, in fact, and this one was backtracking with the intention of cleaning up any stragglers-out through the gate, probably, to murder every refugee on that shoreline we’ve just left behind. Instead, he ran into us-and your Venath demons.’

Withal wiped blood from his eyes. ‘I’m, uh, starting to see the resemblances-they were ensorcelled before?’

‘In a manner of speaking. A geas, I suspect. They’re Soletaken… or maybe D’ivers. Either way, this particular realm forced a veering-or a sembling-who can say which species is the original, after all?’

‘Then what do the Jaghut have to do with any of this?’

‘They created the Nachts. Or so I gathered-the mage Obo in Malaz City seemed to be certain of that. Of course, if he’s right and they did, then what they managed to do was something no one else has ever managed-they found a way to chain the wild forces of Soletaken and D’ivers. Now, husband, get cleaned up and saddle a new horse-we can’t stay here long. We ride as far as we need to on this road to confirm the slaughter of the Shake, and then we ride back out the way we came.’ She paused. ‘Even with these Venath, we’ll be in danger-if there’s one Forkrul Assail, there’s bound to be more.’

The Venath demons had evidently decided they were done with the destruction of the Forkrul Assail, as they now bounded up the road a few paces to then huddle round the club and examine the damage to their lone weapon.

Gods, they’re still stupid Nachts. Only bigger.

What a horrid thought.

‘Withal.’

He faced her again.

‘I’m sorry.’

Withal shrugged. ‘It will be all right, Sand, if you don’t expect me to be what I’m not.’

‘I may have found them infuriating, but I fear for Nimander, Aranatha, Desra, all of them. I fear for them so.’

He grimaced, and then shook his head. ‘You underestimate them, I think, Sand.’ And may Phaed’s ghost forgive us all for that.

‘I hope so.’

He went to work loose the saddle, paused to pat the animal’s gore-soaked neck. ‘Should’ve given you a name, at least. You deserved that much.’

Her mind was free. It could slip down among the sharp knuckles of quartz studding the plain, where nothing lived on the surface. It could slide beneath the stone-hard clay to where the diamonds, rubies and opals hid from the cruel heat. All this land’s wealth. And deep into the crumbling marrow of living bones wrapped in withered meat, crouched in fever worlds where blood boiled. In the moments before the very end, she could hover behind hot, bright eyes-the brightness that was the final looking upon all the surrounding things-all the precious vistas-that announced saying goodbye. That look, she now knew, did not shine forth solely among old people, though perhaps they were the only ones to whom it belonged. No, here, in this gaunt, slow, slithery snake, it was the beacon blazing in the eyes of children.

But she could fly away from such things. She could wing high and higher still, to ride the fuzzy backs of capemoths, or the feathered tips of vultures’ wings. And look down wheeling round and round the crawling, dying worm far below, that red, scorched string winking with dull motion. Thread of food, knots of promise, the countless strands of salvation-and see all the bits and pieces falling off, left in its wake, and down and down low and lower still, to eat and pick at leather skin, pluck the brightness from eyes.

Her mind was free. Free to make beauty with a host of beautiful, terrible words. She could swim through the cool language of loss, rising to touch precious surfaces, diving into midnight depths where broken thoughts fluttered down, where the floor fashioned vast, intricate tales.

Tales, yes, of the fallen.

There was no pain in this place. Her untethered will recalled no aching joints, no crusting flies upon split, raw lips; no blackened, lacerated feet. It was free to float and then sing across hungry winds, and comfort was a most natural thing, reasonable, a proper state of being. Worries dwindled, the future threatened no alteration to what was and one could easily believe that what was would always be.

She could be an adult here, splashing water on to pretty flowers, dipping fingers into dreaming fountains, damming up rivers and devouring trees. Filling lakes and ponds with poison rubbish. Thickening the air with bitter smoke. And nothing would ever change and what changes came would never touch her adultness, her perfect preoccupation with petty extravagances and indulgences. The adults knew such a nice world, didn’t they?

And if the bony snake of their children now wandered dying in a glass wilderness, what of it? The adults don’t care. Even the moaners among them-their caring had sharp borders, not far, only a few steps away, patrolled borders with thick walls and bristling towers and on the outside there was agonizing sacrifice and inside there was convenience. Adults knew what to guard and they knew, too, how far to think, which wasn’t far, not far, not far at all.

Even words, especially words, could not penetrate those walls, could not overwhelm those towers. Words bounced off obstinate stupidity, brainless stupidity, breathtaking, appalling stupidity. Against the blank gaze, words are useless.

Her mind was free to luxuriate in adulthood, knowing as it did that she would never in truth reach it. And this was her own preoccupation, a modest one, not very extravagant, not much of an indulgence, but her own which meant that she owned it.

She wondered what adults owned, these days. Apart from this murderous legacy, of course. Great inventions beneath layers of sand and dust. Proud monuments that not even spiders could map, palaces empty as caves, sculptures announcing immortality to grinning white skulls, tapestries displaying grand moments to fill the guts of moths. All this, such a bold, joyous legacy.