‘We are skilled in such things, Queen of Dreams.’
She nodded, still not meeting his eyes. ‘As are all the Tiste. Anomander once spent almost two centuries in the guise of a royal bodyguard… human, in the manner you have achieved.’
‘Mistress,’ L’oric said, ‘my father-’
‘Sleeps. We all long ago made our choices, L’oric. Behind us, our paths stretch, long and worn deep. There is bitter pathos in the prospect of retracing them. Yet, for those of us who remain… awake, it seems we do nothing but just that. An endless retracing of paths, yet each step we take is forward, for the path has proved itself to be a circle. Yet-and here is the true pathos-the knowledge never slows our steps.’
‘ “Wide-eyed stupid”, the Malazans say.’
‘Somewhat rough-edged, but accurate enough,’ she replied. She reached a long-fingered hand down to the water.
L’oric watched it vanish beneath the surface, but it was the scene around them that seemed to waken, a faint turbulence, the hint of ripples. ‘Queen of Dreams, Kurald Thyrllan has lost its protector.’
‘Yes. Tellann and Thyr were ever close, and now more than ever.’
A strange statement… that he would have to think on later. ‘I cannot do it alone-’
‘No, you cannot. Your own path is about to become fraught, L’oric. And so you have come to me, in the hopes that I will find a suitable… protector.’
‘Yes.’
‘Your desperation urges you to trust… where no trust has been earned-’
‘You were my father’s friend!’
‘Friend? L’oric, we were too powerful to know friendship. Our endeavours far too fierce. Our war was with chaos itself, and, at times, with each other. We battled to shape all that would follow. And some of us lost that battle. Do not misapprehend, I held no deep enmity for your father. Rather, he was as unfathomable as the rest of us-a bemusement we all shared, perhaps the only thing we shared.’
‘You will not help?’
‘I did not say that.’
He waited.
She continued holding her hand beneath the pool’s placid surface, had yet to lift her head and meet his eyes. ‘This will take some time,’ she murmured. ‘The present… vulnerability… will exist in the interval. I have someone in mind, but the shaping towards the opportunity remains distant. Nor do I think my choice will please you. In the meantime…’
‘Yes?’
She shrugged. ‘We had best hope that potentially interested entities remain suitably distracted.’
He saw her expression suddenly change, and when she spoke again the tone was urgent. ‘Return to your realm, L’oric! Another circle has been closed-terribly closed.’ She drew her hand from the pool.
L’oric gasped.
It was covered in blood.
His eyes snapped open, and he was kneeling in his tent once more. Night had arrived, and the sounds outside were muted, peaceful, a city settling down to its evening meal. Yet, he knew, something horrible had happened. He went still, questing outward. His powers-so weakened, so tremulous-‘Gods below!’ A swirl of violence, knotted upon itself, radiating waves of agony-a figure, small, twisted inward, in shredded clothes soaked through with blood, crawling through darkness.
L’oric lurched to his feet, head spinning with anguish.
Then he was outside, and suddenly running.
He found her trail, a smeared track through sand and dust, out beyond the ruins, into the petrified forest. Towards, he knew instinctively, the sacred glade that had been fashioned by Toblakai.
But there would be no succour for her there. Another abode of false gods. And Toblakai was gone, off to cross blades with his own fate.
But she was without clear thought. She was only pain, lancing out to fire instincts of flight. She crawled as would any dying creature.
He saw her at the edge of the glade, small, bedraggled, pulling herself forward in torturous increments.
L’oric reached her side, a hand reaching to settle at the back of her head, onto sweat-snarled hair. She flinched away with a squeal, fingers clawing against his arm. ‘Felisin! He’s gone! It is L’oric. You are safe with me. Safe, now-’
But still she sought to escape.
‘I shall call upon Sha’ik-’
‘No,’ she shrieked, curling tight on the sand. ‘No! She needs him! She needs him still!’ Her words were blunted by broken lips but understandable none the less.
L’oric sank back, struck mute by the horror. Not simply a wounded creature, then. A mind clear enough to weigh, to calculate, to put itself aside… ‘She will know, lass-she can’t help but know.’