Dust of Dreams

‘It is not an offer you can refuse, sir,’ said the sergeant.

Nor will I. Lesson learned, Adjunct.

The soldiers were attempting to heave the woman named Sinter back into her saddle. Ublala Pung stepped up to them. ‘I will carry her,’ he said. ‘She’s pretty.’

‘Do as the Toblakai says,’ said the sergeant.

‘She’s pretty,’ Ublala Pung said again, as he took her limp form in his arms. ‘Pretty smelly, too, but that’s okay.’

‘Perimeter escort,’ snapped the sergeant, ‘crossbows cocked. Anybody steps out, nail ’em.’

Brys prayed there would be no early risers between here and the palace. ‘Best we hurry,’ he ventured.

On a rooftop not far away, Quick Ben sighed and then relaxed.

‘What was all that about?’ Hedge asked beside him.

‘Damned Toblakai… but that’s not the interesting bit, though, is it? No, it’s that Dal Honese woman. Well, that can all wait.’

‘You’re babbling, wizard.’

Magus of Dark. Gods below.

Alone in the cellar beneath the dormitories, Fiddler stared down at the card in his hand. The lacquered wood glistened, dripped as if slick with sweat. The smell rising from it was of humus, rich and dark, a scent of the raw earth.

‘Tartheno Toblakai,’ he whispered.

Herald of Life.

Well, just so.

He set it down and then squinted at the second card he had withdrawn to close this dread night. Unaligned. Chain. Aye, we all know about those, my dear. Fret naught, it’s the price of living.

Now, if only you weren’t so… strong. If only you were weaker. If only your chains didn’t reach right into the heart of the Bonehunters-if only I knew who was dragging who, why, I might have reason to hope.

But he didn’t, and so there wasn’t.

Chapter Four

Behold these joyful devourers
The land laid out skewered in silver
Candlesticks of softest pewter
Rolling the logs down cut on end
To make roads through the forest
That once was-before the logs
(Were rolled down cut on end)-
We called it stump road and we
Called it forest road when
Our imaginations starved
You can make fans with ribs
Of sheep and pouches for baubles
By pounding flat the ears
Of old women and old men-
Older is best for the ear grows
For ever it’s said, even when
There’s not a scrap anywhere to eat
So we carried our wealth
In pendulum pouches wrinkled
And hairy, diamonds and gems
Enough to buy a forest or a road
But maybe not both
Enough even for slippers of
Supplest skin feathered in down
Like a baby’s cheek
There is a secret we know
When nothing else is left
And the sky stops its tears
A belly can bulge full
On diamonds and gems
And a forest can make a road
Through what once was
You just won’t find any shade

PENDULUMS WERE ONCE TOYS

BADALLE OF KORBANSE SNAKE

To journey into the other worlds, a shaman or witch of the Elan would ride the Spotted Horse. Seven herbs, softened with beeswax and rolled into a ball and then flattened into an oblong disc that was taken into the mouth and held between lip and gum. Coolness slowly numbing and saliva rising as if the throat was the mouth of a spring, a tingling sensation lifting to gather behind the eyes in coalescing colours and then, in a blinding flash, the veil between worlds vanished. Patterns swirled in the air; complex geometries played across the landscape-a landscape that could be the limitless wall of a hide tent, or the rolling plains of a cave wall where ran the beasts-until the heart-stains emerged, pulsing, blotting the scene in undulating rows, sweet as waves and tasting of mother’s milk.

So arrived the Spotted Horse, a cascade of heart-stains rippling across the beast, down its long neck, sweeping along its withers, flowing like seed-heads from its mane and tail.