‘If they find us, they find us. We cannot run from… from ghosts. Nor can we trust in the protection of Gu’Rull. So, we drive south-straight as a lance. Gunth Mach, give me your back to ride. This will be a long day-there is so much, so much we must now leave behind us.’ She looked to Rythok. ‘Brother, I mean to honour Kor Thuran-we all must-by succeeding in our quest.’
The K’ell Hunter’s reptilian eyes remained fixed on her, cold, unyielding.
Sag’Churok and Gunth Mach rarely spoke to her these days, and when they did it seemed their voices were more distant, harder to make out. She did not think the fault was theirs. I am dwindling within myself. The world narrows-but how is it I even know this? What part within me is aware of its own measure?
No matter. We must do this.
‘It is time.’
Sag’Churok watched Gunth Mach force her own body into the configuration necessary to accommodate the Destriant. The heady, spice-drenched scents roiled from her in tendrils that spread like branches on the currents of air, and they carried to the K’ell Hunter echoes of Kor Thuran’s last moments of agony.
When the hunter became the hunted, every retort was reduced to a defiant snarl, a few primitive threat postures, and the body existed to absorb damage-to weather and withstand all it could as the soul that dwelt within it sought, if not escape, then a kind of comprehension. A recognition. That even the hunter must know fear. No matter how powerful, no matter how superior, how supreme, sooner or later forces it could not defeat or flee from would find it.
Domination was an illusion. Its coherence could only hold for so long.
This lesson was a seared brand upon the memories of the K’Chain Che’Malle. Its bitter taste soured the dust of the Wastelands, and eastward, on the vast plain that had once known great cities and the whisper of hundreds of thousands of K’Chain Che’Malle, now there was nothing but melted and crushed fragments, and what the winds sought they could not find, and so wandered for ever lost.
Kor Thuran had been young. No other crime belonged to the K’ell Hunter. He had made no foolish decisions. Had not fallen victim to his own arrogance or sense of invulnerability. He had simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time. And now so much was lost. And for all the Destriant’s noble words-her sudden, unwarranted confidence and determination-Sag’Churok, along with Rythok and Gunth Mach, knew that the quest had failed. Indeed, it was not likely that they would survive the day.
Sag’Churok shifted his gaze from Gunth Mach as she suffered her transformation in runnels of oil that dripped like blood.
Gu’Rull was gone, probably dead. Every effort to brush his thoughts had failed. Of course, the Shi’gal Assassin could shield his mind, but he had no reason to do so. No, two of the five protectors were gone. And still this puny human stood, her soft face set in an expression Sag’Churok had come to know as defiant, weak eyes fixed on the undulating horizon to the south as if her will alone could conjure into being her precious Shield Anvil and Mortal Sword. It was brave. It was… unexpected. For all that the Matron’s gifts were fading from the woman, she had indeed found some kind of inner strength.
All for naught. They would die, and soon. Their torn and broken bodies would lie scattered, lost, their great ambitions unheralded.
Sag’Churok lifted his head, drank in the air, and caught the taint of the enemy. Close. Drawing closer. Threat oils rising between his scales, he scanned the horizon, and finally settled on the west-where Kor Thuran had fallen.
Rythok had done the same, and even Gunth Mach’s head had swivelled round.
The Destriant was not blind to their sudden fixation. She bared her teeth. ‘Guardians,’ she said. ‘It seems we need your help-not some time in the future, but now. What can you send to us? Who among you can stand against that which my companions will not let me even see?’
Sag’Churok did not understand her meaning. He did not know whom she was addressing. Was this the Matron’s madness, or Kalyth’s very own?
The Destriant’s gait was stiff with fear as she walked up to Gunth Mach, who helped the woman on to the gnarled saddle of scales behind her shoulders.
Sag’Churok faced Rythok. Hunter. Slow them down.
Rythok stretched his jaws until they creaked, and then drew the edges of his blades against each other in a singing rasp. Tail lashing-spraying thick droplets of oil that pattered the ground-the K’ell Hunter set off at a run, head dipping in the attack posture. Westward.
‘Where is he going?’ Kalyth shouted. ‘Call him back! Sag’Churok-’