Toll the Hounds - Page 144/467

The highest of the walls revealed a section of ceiling just below the uppermost set of stones, projecting without any other obvious support to cast a deep shadow upon the ground floor beneath it. The facing wall reached only high enough to encompass a narrow, steeply arched doorway. Just outside this entrance and to one side was a belly-shaped pot in which grew a few Straggly plants with drooping flowers, so incongruous amid the air of abandonment that Nimander simply stared down at them, disbelieving. Kallor walked up to the entrance, drew off a sealed gauntlet and wrapped it against the root-tracked frame. ‘Will you greet us?’ he demanded in a loud voice.

From within a faint shuffling sound, and then a thin, rasping reply: ‘Must I?’

‘The lce is long gone, Jaghut. The plains beyond are dry and empty. Even the dust of the T’lan Imass has blown away. Would you know something of the world you have ignored for so long?’

‘Why? Nothing changes.’

Kallor turned a pleased smirk upon Nimander and Skintick and then faced the dark doorway once more. ‘Will you invite us in, Jaghut? I am the High-’

‘I know who you are, O Lord of Futility. King of Ashes. Ruler of Dead Lands. Born to glory and cursed to destroy it every time. Killer of Dreams. Despoiler of-’

‘All right, enough of all that. I’m not the one living in ruins.’

‘No, but you ever leave them in your wake, Kallor. Come in, then, you and your two Others. I greet you as guests and so will not crush the life from you and devour your souls with peals of laughter. No, instead, I will make some tea.’

Nimander and Skintick followed Kallor into the darkness within.

The air of the two-walled chamber was frigid, the stones sheathed in amber-streaked hoarfrost. Where the other two walls should have been rose black, glimmering barriers of some unknown substance, and to look upon them too long was to feel vertiginous-Nimander almost pitched forward, drawn up only by Skintick’s sudden grip, and his friend whispered, ‘Never mind the ice, cousin.’

Ice, yes, it was just that. Astonishingly transparent ice-

A figure crouched at a small hearth, long-fingered hands working a blackened kettle on to an iron hook above the coals. ‘I ate the last batch of cookies, I’m afraid.’ The words drifted out inflectionless from beneath a broad-brimmed black felt hat. ‘Most people pass by, when they pass by. Seeing nothing of interest. None draw close to admire my garden.’

‘Your garden?’ Skintick asked.

‘Yes. Small, I know. Modest.’

‘The pot with the two flowers.’

‘Just so. Manageable-anything larger and the weeding would drive me mad, you see.’

‘Taking up all your time,’ Kallor commented, looking round. ‘Just so.’

A long stone altar provided the Jaghut with his bed, on which pale furs were neatly folded. A desk sat nearby, the wood stained black, the chair before it high-backed and padded in deerskin. On a niche set in the highest wall squatted a three-legged silver candlestick, oxidized black. Beeswax candles flickered in gut-tered pools. Leaning near the altar was an enormous scabbarded greatsword, the cross-hilt as long as a child’s arm. Cobwebs coated the weapon.

‘You know my name,’ Kallor said. ‘But I have not yet heard yours.’

‘That is true.’

Something dangerous edged into Kallor’s voice as he said, ‘I would know the name of my host.’’Once, long ago, a wolf god came before me, Tell me, Kallor, do you understand the nature of beast gods? Of course not. You are only a beast in the unfairly pejo-rative sense-unfair to beasts, that is. How is it, then, that the most ancient gods of this world were, one and all, beasts?’

‘The question does not interest me, Jaghut.’

‘What of the answer?’

‘You possess one?’

The hands reached out and lifted the kettle from the hook as steam rushed up round the long fingers. ‘This must now steep for a time. Am I unusual in my penchant for evading such direct questions? A trait exclusive to Jaghut? Hardly. Knowledge may be free; my voice is not. I am a miser, alas, although I was not always this way.’

‘Since I see little value in this particular matter,’ said Kallor, ‘I would not bargain with you.’

‘Ah, and what of the Others with you? Might not they be interested?’ Clearing his throat, Skintick said, ‘Venerable one, we possess nothing of worth to one such as you.’

‘You are too modest, Tiste Andii.’

‘I am?’

‘Each creature is born from one not its kind. This is a wonder, a miracle forged in the fires of chaos, for chaos indeed whispers in our blood, no matter its particular hue. If I but scrape your skin, so lightly as to leave but a momentary streak, that which I take from you beneath my nail contains every truth of you, your life, even your death, assuming violence does not claim you. A code, if you will, seemingly precise and so very ordered. Yet chaos churns. For all your similarities to your father, neither you nor the one named Nimander-nor any of your brothers and sisters-is identical to Anomander Dragnipurake. Do you refute this?’