Dust of Dreams (The Malazan Book of the Fallen #9)

Dust of Dreams (The Malazan Book of the Fallen #9) Page 199

‘My sappers, aye. Now I better go and meet-’

‘Here come two of ’em now, Captain.’

He turned and almost stepped back. Two enormous, sweaty women had fixed small eyes on him and were closing in.

They saluted and the blonde one said, ‘Corporal Sweetlard, sir, and this is Corporal Rumjugs. We got a request, sir.’

‘Go on.’

‘We want to move from where we was put down. Too many flies, sir.’

‘An army never marches or camps alone, Corporal,’ said Hedge. ‘We got rats, we got mice, we got capemoths and crows, ravens and rhizan. And we got flies.’

‘That’s true enough, sir,’ said the black-haired one, Rumjugs, ‘but even over here there ain’t so many of ’em. Ten more paces between us and the trench there, sir, is all we’re asking.’

‘Your first lesson,’ said Hedge. ‘If the choice is between comfortable and miserable, choose comfortable-don’t wait for any damned orders neither. Distracted and irritated makes you more tired. Tired gets you killed. If it’s hot look for shade. If it’s cold bundle t’gether when not on post. If you’re in a bad spot for flies, find a better one close by and move. Now, I got a question for you two. Why are you bringing me this request and not your sergeants?’

‘They was going to,’ said Rumjugs, ‘but then me and Sweet here, we pointed out that you’re a man and we’re whores or used to be, and you was more likely to be nice to us than to them. Assuming you prefer women an’ not men.’

‘Good assumption and smart thinking. Now, go back there and get everybody on their feet and over here.’

‘Yes, sir.’

He returned their salute and watched them wheeze and waddle back to the others.

Bavedict moved up beside him. ‘Maybe there’s hope for them after all.’

‘Just needs teasing out, that’s all,’ said Hedge. ‘Now, find a wax tablet or something-I need a list of their names made up-my memory is bad these days, ever since I died and came back, in fact.’

The alchemist blinked, and then recovered. ‘Right away, Captain.’

All in all, Hedge concluded, a decent start.

Lostara slammed the knife back into its sheath, then walked to examine an array of tribal trophies lining one wall of the presence chamber. ‘Fist Keneb is not at his best,’ she said. Behind her in the centre of the room, the Adjunct said nothing. After a moment Lostara went on. ‘Grub’s disappearance hit him hard. And the thought that he might have been swallowed up by an Azath is enough to curdle anyone’s toes. It’s not helping that Fist Blistig seems to have decided he’s already good as dead.’

She turned to see the Adjunct slowly drawing off her gauntlets. Tavore’s face was pale, a taut web of lines trapping her eyes. She’d lost weight, further reducing the few feminine traits she possessed. Beyond grief waited emptiness, a place where loneliness haunted in mocking company, and memories were entombed in cold stone. The woman that was the Adjunct had decided that no one would ever take T’amber’s place. Tavore’s last tie to the gentler gifts of humanity had been severed. Now there was nothing left. Nothing but her army, which looked ready to unravel all on its own-and even to this she seemed indifferent.

‘It’s not like the King to keep us waiting,’ Lostara muttered, reaching to unsheathe her knife.

‘Leave it,’ the Adjunct snapped.

‘Of course. My apologies, Adjunct.’ She dropped her hand and resumed her uninterested examination of the artifacts. ‘These Letherii devoured a lot of tribes.’

‘Empires will, Lieutenant.’

‘I imagine this Kolanse did the same. It is an empire, is it not?’

‘I do not know,’ the Adjunct replied, then added, ‘it does not matter.’

‘It doesn’t?’

But with her next words it was clear that the Adjunct was not interested in elaborating. ‘My predecessor, a woman named Lorn, was murdered in a street in Darujhistan. She had, by that point, completed her tasks, insofar as anyone can tell. Her death seemed to be little more than ill luck, a mugging or something similar. Her corpse was deposited in a pauper’s pit.’

‘Forgive me, Adjunct, but what is this story in aid of?’

‘Legacies are never what one would hope for, are they, Captain? In the end, it does not matter what was achieved. Fate holds no tally of past triumphs, courageous deeds, or moments of profound integrity.’

‘I suppose not, Adjunct.’