If there was any doubt in this chamber that this woman commanded the Bonehunters, it had been obliterated. Succinctly.
‘Presumably,’ she went on, her voice a rasp, ‘you wish to learn of our destination. We are marching to war. We are marching to an enemy that does not know we even exist.’ Her icy gaze fixed on Quick Ben and it was a measure of the man’s courage that he did not flinch. ‘High Mage, your dissembling is at an end. Know that I value your penchant for consorting with the gods. You will now report to me what you believe is coming.’
Quick Ben licked his lips. ‘Shall I be specific or will a summary suffice, Adjunct?’
She said nothing.
The High Mage shrugged. ‘It will be war, yes, but a messy one. The Crippled God’s been busy, but his efforts have been, without exception, defensive, for the Fallen One also happens to know what is coming. The bastard’s desperate, probably terrified, and thus far, he has failed more often than succeeded.’
‘Why?’
He blinked. ‘Well, people have been getting in the way-’
‘People, yes. Mortals.’
Quick Ben nodded, eyes narrowing. ‘We have been the weapons of the gods.’
‘Tell me, High Mage, how does it feel?’
Her questions struck from unanticipated directions, Lostara could see, and it was clear that Quick Ben was mentally reeling. This was a sharp talent, a surprising one, and it told Lostara that Adjunct Tavore possessed traits that made her a formidable tactician-but why had none of them seen this before?
‘Adjunct,’ the wizard ventured, ‘the gods have inevitably regretted using me.’
The answer evidently satisfied her. ‘Go on, High Mage.’
‘They will chain him again. This time it will be absolute, and once chained, they will suck everything out of him-like bloodflies-’
‘Are the gods united on this?’
‘Of course not-excuse me, Adjunct. Rather, the gods are never united, even when in agreement. Betrayals are virtually guaranteed-which is why I cannot fathom Shadowthrone’s thinking. He’s not that stupid-he can’t be that stupid-’
‘He has outwitted you,’ Tavore said. ‘You “cannot fathom” his innermost intentions. High Mage, the first god you have mentioned here is one that most of us wouldn’t expect to be at the forefront of all of this. Hood, yes. Togg, Fanderay-even Fener. Or Oponn. And what of the Elder Gods? Mael, K’rul, Kilmandaros. No. Instead, you speak of Shadowthrone, the upstart-’
‘The once Emperor of the Malazan Empire,’ cut in Keneb.
Quick Ben scowled. ‘Aye, even back then-and it’s not easy to admit this-he was a wily bastard. The times I thought I’d worked round him, beat him clean, it turned out he had been playing me all along. He was the ruler of shadows long before he even ascended to that title. Dancer gave him the civilized face, that mask of honest morality-just as Cotillion does now. But don’t be fooled, those two are ruthless-none of us mortals are worth a damned thing, except as a means to an end-’
‘And what, High Mage, would that end be?’
Quick Ben threw up his hands and leaned back. ‘I have little more than rude guesses, Adjunct.’
But Lostara saw something shining in the wizard’s eyes, as if he had been stirred into wakefulness from a long, long sleep. She wondered if this was how he had been with Whiskeyjack, with Dujek Onearm. No wonder they saw him as their shaved knuckle in the hole.
‘I would hear those guesses,’ the Adjunct said.
‘The pantheon comes crashing down-and what emerges from the dust and ashes is almost unrecognizable. The same for sorcery-the warrens-the realm of K’rul. All fundamentally changed.’
‘Yet, one assumes, at the pinnacle… Shadowthrone and Cotillion.’
‘A safe assumption,’ Quick Ben admitted, ‘which is why I don’t trust it.’
Tavore looked startled. ‘Altruism from those two?’
‘I don’t even believe in altruism, Adjunct.’
‘Thus,’ she observed, ‘your confusion.’
The wizard’s ascetic face was pinched, as if he was tasting something unbearably foul. ‘Who’s to say that the changes create something better, something more equitable? Who’s to say that what emerges isn’t even worse than what we have right now? Yes, it might seem a good move-driving that mob of miserable gods off some cliff, or some other place that puts them out of reach, that puts us out of their reach.’ He was musing now, as if unaware of his audience. ‘But consider that eventuality. Without the gods, we’re on our own. And with us on our own-Abyss fend! — what mischief we might do! What grotesque invention to plague the world!’
