‘Come back to the fire, beloved,’ the Teblor called, ‘and drink some tea. It has real leaves in it and stuff that smells nice.’
Ralata massaged her temples for a moment, and then turned about. ‘I am not your beloved. I belong to no one. I never will.’
At seeing the half-smile on the face of Draconus as he tossed another dung chip on to the fire, Ralata scowled. ‘It is rude,’ she pronounced as she walked over, squatted down and took the cup Ublala proffered, ‘to talk in a language I don’t understand. You could be plotting my rape and murder for all I know.’
The warrior’s brows arched. ‘Now, why would we want to do that, Barghast? Besides,’ he added, ‘Ublala is courting you.’
‘He might as well give up now. I don’t want him.’
Draconus shrugged. ‘I have explained to him that most of what we call courting boils down to just being there. Every time you turn, you see him, until his company feels perfectly natural to you. “Courting is the art of growing like mould on the one you want.”’ He paused, scratched at the stubble on his jaw. ‘I can’t lay claim to that observation, but I don’t recall who said it first.’
Ralata spat into the fire to announce her disgust. ‘We’re not all like Hetan, you know. She used to say she gauged the attractiveness of a man by imagining how he looked when she was staring up at his red face and bulging eyes.’ She spat again. ‘I am a Skincut, a slayer, a collector of scalps. When I look upon a man, I imagine what he’ll look like with the skin of his face sliced away.’
‘She’s not very nice, is she?’ Ublala asked Draconus.
‘Trying hard, you mean,’ Draconus replied.
‘Makes me want to sex her even more than before.’
‘That’s how these things work.’
‘It’s torture. I don’t like it. No, I do. No, I don’t. I do. Oh, I’m going to polish my hammer.’
Ralata stared at Ublala as he surged to his feet and thumped off.
Low and in the language of the White Faces, Draconus murmured, ‘He means that literally, by the way.’
She shot him a look, and snorted. ‘I knew that. He has no wits for anything else.’ She hesitated, and then said, ‘His armour looks expensive.’
‘It cost dearly, aye, Ralata. He wears it well, better than one might have hoped.’ He nodded, mostly to himself, she suspected, and said, ‘He will stand well, I think, when the time comes.’
She remembered this warrior killing Sekara the Vile, snapping the old woman’s neck. The ease of the gesture, the way he seemed to embrace her to keep her from falling, as if her lifeless body still clung to something like dignity. He was not a man easily understood. ‘What are you two seeking? You walk into the east. Why?’
‘There are unfortunate things in the world, Ralata.’
She frowned. ‘I don’t know what that means.’
He sighed, studied the fire. ‘Have you ever stepped on something unintentionally? Out through a doorway, a sudden crunching underfoot. What was it? An insect? A snail? A lizard?’ He lifted his head and fixed her with his dark eyes, the embers gleaming in lurid reflection. ‘Not worth a second thought, was it? Such are the vagaries of life. An ant dreaming of war, a wasp devouring a spider, a lizard stalking the wasp. All these dramas, and crunch – all over with. What to make of it? Nothing, I suppose. If you’ve a heart, you apportion out some small measure of guilt and remorse, and then continue on your way.’
She shook her head, baffled. ‘You stepped on something?’
‘In a manner of speaking.’ He nudged the embers and watched as sparks spun upward. ‘No matter. A few ants survived. No end to the little bastards, in fact. I could crush a thousand nests under heel and it’d not make a whit of difference. That’s the best way of thinking about it, in fact.’ He met her eyes again. ‘Does that make me cold? What did I leave behind in those chains, I wonder, still shackled there, a host of forlorn virtues … whatever. I am having odd dreams of late.’
‘I dream only of vengeance.’
‘The more you dream of one particular and pleasing thing, Ralata, the quicker it palls. The edges get worn down, the lustre fades. To leave such obsessions behind, dream of them often.’
‘You speak like an old man, a Barghast shaman. Riddles and bad advice, Onos Toolan was right to discount them all.’ She almost looked to the west, past his shoulder, as if she might find her people and the Warleader, all marching straight for them. Instead, she finished the last of the tea in her cup.