For the briefest yet most satisfying of moments, Kalam saw a flicker of uncertainty rattle Elan’s face, before a smooth smile appeared. ‘And where does he hide, up in the crow’s nest with that dubiously named lookout?’

Kalam turned away. ‘Where else?’

The assassin felt Salk Elan’s eyes on his back as he strode away. You’ve the arrogance common to every mage, friend. You’ll have to excuse my pleasure in spreading cracks through it.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

I stood in a place

where all shadows converged

the end of the Path of Hands

Soletaken and D’ivers

through the gates of truth

where from the darkness

all mysteries emerged.

The Path

Trout Sen’al’Bhok’arala

They came upon the four bodies at the edge of an upthrust of roots that seemed to mark the entrance to a vast maze. The figures were contorted, limbs shattered, their dark robes twisted and stiff with dried blood.

Recognition arrived dull and heavy in Mappo’s mind, an answering of suspicions that came with little surprise. Nameless Ones . . . Priests of the Azath, if such entities can have priests. How many cold hands have guided us here? Myself . . . Icarium . . . these two twisted roots . . . journeying to Tremorlor—

With a grunt, Icarium stepped forward, his eyes on a broken staff lying beside one of the corpses. ‘I have seen those before,’ he said.

The Trell frowned at his friend. ‘How? Where?’

‘In a dream.’

‘Dream?’

The Jhag gave him a half-smile. ‘Oh yes, Mappo, I have dreams.’ He faced the bodies again. ‘It began as all such dreams begin. I am stumbling. In pain. Yet I bear no wounds, and my weapons are clean. No, the pain is within me, as of a knowledge once gained, then lost yet again.’

Mappo stared at his friend’s back, struggling to comprehend his words.

‘I arrive,’ the Jhag continued in dry tones, ‘at the outskirts of a town. A Trellish town on the plain. It has been destroyed. Scars of sorcery stain the ground ... the air. Bodies rot in the streets, and Great Ravens have come to feed – their laughter is the voice of the stench.’

‘Icarium—’

‘And then a woman appears, dressed as are these here before us. A priestess. She holds a staff, from which fell power still bleeds.

‘“What have you done?” I ask her.

‘“Only what is necessary,” is her soft reply. I see in her face a great fear as she looks upon me, and I am saddened by it. “Jhag, you must not wander alone.”