Reaper's Gale

After a moment, the weaponsmith raised the hammer.

Then brought it down.

EPILOGUE

She walked through the shrouds of dusk

And came to repast

At the Gates of Madness.

Where the living gamed with death And crowed triumphant At the Gates of Madness.

Where the dead mocked the living And told tales of futility At the Gates of Madness.

She came to set down her new child There on the stained altar At the Gates of Madness.

‘This,’ said she, ‘is what we must do, In hope and humility At the Gates of Madness.’

And the child did cry in the night To a

Have we dreamed this enough now? Our promise of suffering At the Gates of Madness?

Will you look down upon its new face And whisper songs of anguish At the Gates of Madness?

Taking the sawtoothed key in hand To let loose a broken future At the Gates of Madness?

Tell then your tale of futility to the child All your games with death At the Gates of Madness.

We who stand here have heard it before On this the other side Of the Gates of Madness.

Dragging his soul from its place of exhaustion and horror, the sound of a spi

Nimander rose from the bed, made his way to the door, out into the chilly hallway. Grit and dust beneath his bare feet as he padded down the rickety stairs.

Emerging, he rushed out into the street.

Yes, night’s deepest pit, and this was not-could not be-a dream.

The hissing chain and soft clack, close, brought him round. To see another Tiste Andii emerge from the gloom. A stranger. Nimander gasped.

The stranger was twirling a chain from one upraised hand, a chain with rings at each end.

‘Hello, Nimander Golit.’

‘Who-who are you? How do you know my name?’

‘I have come a long way, to this Isle of the Shake-they are our kin, did you know that? I suppose you did-but they can wait, for they are not yet ready and perhaps will never be ready. Not just Andii blood, after all. But Edur. Maybe even Liosan, not to mention human. No matter. Leave Twilight her island…’ he laughed, ‘empire.’

‘What do you want?’

‘You, Nimander Golit. And your kin. Go now, gather them. It is time for us to leave.’

‘What? Where?’

‘Are you truly a child?’ the stranger snapped in frustration. The rings clicked, the chain spiralled tight about his index finger. ‘I am here to lead you home, Nimander. All you spawn of Anomander Rake, the Black-Winged Lord.’

‘But where is home?’

‘Listen to me! I am taking you to him!’

Nimander stared, then stepped back. ‘He does not want us-’

‘It does not matter what he wants. Nor even what I want! Do you understand yet? I am her Herald!’

Her?

All at once Nimander cried out, dropped hard down onto his knees on the cobbles, his hands at his face. ‘This-this is not a dream?’

The stranger sneered. ‘You can keep your nightmares, Nimander. You can stare down at the blood on your hands for all eternity, for all I care. She was, as you say, insane. And dangerous. I tell you this, I would have left her corpse lying here in the street, this night, if she still lived. So, enough of that.

‘Go, bring your kin here. Quickly, Nimander, while Darkness still holds this island.’

And Nimander climbed to his feet, then hobbled into the decrepit tenement.

Her Herald. Oh, Mother Dark, you would summon our father, as you now summon us?

But why?,

OK, it must be. Yes. Our exile-Abyss below-our exile is at an end!

Waiting in the street, Clip spun his chain. A pathetic bunch, if this Nimander was the best among them. Well, they would have to do, for he did not lie when he said the Shake were not yet ready.

That was, in fact, the only truth he had told, on this darkest of nights.

And how did you fare in Letheras, Silchas Ruin? Not well, I’d wager.

You’re not your brother. You never were.

Oh, Anomander Rake, we will find you. And you will give answer to us. No, not even a god can blithely walk away, can escape the consequences. Of betrayal.

Yes, we will find you. And we will show you. We will show you just how it feels.

Rud Elalle found his father seated atop a weathered boulder at the edge of the small valley near the village. Climbed up and joined Udinaas, settling onto the sun-warmed stone at his side.

A ranag calf had somehow become separated from its mother, and indeed the entire herd, and now wandered the valley floor, bawling.

‘We could feast on that one,’ Rud said.

‘We could,’ Udinaas replied. ‘If you have no heart.’

‘We must live, and to live we must eat-’

‘And to live and eat, we must kill. Yes, yes, Rud, I am aware of all that.’

‘How long will you stay?’ Rud asked, then his breath caught in his throat. The question had just come out-the one he had been dreading to ask for so long.

Udinaas shot him a surprised look, then returned his attention to the lost calf. ‘She grieves,’ he said. ‘She grieves, so deep in her heart that it reaches out to me-as if the distance was nothing. Nothing. This is what comes,’ he added without a trace of bitterness, ‘of rape.’

Rud decided it was too hard to watch his father’s face at this moment, so he swung his gaze down to the distant calf.

‘I told Onrack,’ Udinaas continued. ‘I had to. To just… get it out, before it devoured me. Now, well, I regret doing that.’

‘You need not. Onrack had no greater friend. It was necessary that he know the truth-’

‘No, Rud, that is never necessary. Expedient, sometimes. Useful, other times. The rest of the time, it just wounds.’

‘Father, what will you do?’

‘Do? Why, nothing. Not for Seren, not for Onrack. I’m nothing but an ex-slave.’ A momentary smile, wry. ‘Living with the savages.’

‘You are more than just that,’ Rud said.

‘I am?’

‘Yes, you are my father. And so I ask again, how long will you stay?’

‘Until you toss me out, I suppose.’

Rud came as close to bursting into tears as he had ever been. His throat closed up, so tight that he could say nothing for a long moment, as the tide of feeling rose within him and only slowly subsided. Through blurred eyes, he watched the calf wander in the valley.

Udinaas resumed as if unmindful of the reaction his words had elicited. ‘Not that I can teach you much, Rud. Mending nets, maybe.’

‘No, father, you can teach me the most important thing of all.’

Udinaas eyed him askance, sceptical and suspicious.

Three adult ranag appeared on a crest, lumbered down towards the calf. Seeing them, the young beast cried out again, even louder this time, and raced to meet them.

Rud sighed. ‘Father, you can teach me your greatest skill. How to survive.’

Neither said anything then for some time, and Rud held his eyes on the ranag as they ascended the far side of the valley. In this time, it seemed Udinaas had found something wrong with his eyes, for his hands went to his face again and again. Rud did not turn to observe any of that.

Then, eventually, with the valley empty before them, his father rose. ‘Looks like we go hungry after all.’

‘Never for long,’ Rud replied, also rising.

‘No, that’s true.’

They made their way back to the village.