‘Ritual?’ Wareth stared at Dathenar. ‘What ritual?’

‘We sent a rider last night,’ Prazek said. ‘Southwest, to the Dog-Runners.’

‘Why?’

‘We seek a Bonecaster,’ Dathenar said. ‘It will be understood,’ he added, ‘that a demon possesses Rance, one that needs to be exorcized. But this ritual – and comprehend well what I mean here, both of you – will speak in answer not just to Rance, but to the prisoners – every prisoner – and, indeed, to the Hust Legion itself.’

‘The demons need exposing,’ said Prazek. ‘Dragged into the day, as it were.’

‘And then extirpated.’

Wareth stared at the two men. ‘Dog-Runners? Sirs, we are soldiers in the service of Mother Dark. You would invite a witch of the Dog-Runners? We are the Hust Legion!’

‘Indeed,’ said Dathenar. ‘And as it stands, lieutenant, we are also, to not put too fine a point on it, royally fucked.’

‘We believe,’ added Prazek, ‘that Galar Baras will return with Commander Toras Redone. What of her demons, lieutenant?’

‘But our goddess—’

Prazek leaned forward, his eyes suddenly hard. ‘A ritual, sir, to make the iron howl. Until we turn about this imbalance of power, until we stand as masters over our own blades, over the links sheathing us, we are nothing. The crimes crowding us are vast, countless, of such myriad details as to paralyse us all. This legion, and all within it, needs purging.’ He nodded, not without sympathy, towards Rance. ‘And she will lead us. Face to face with what she was, and is. A child-slayer.’

Faror Hend remained at a distance, but within sight of the tent entrance, and watched as Rance emerged. The woman seemed almost too weak to remain upright, and when Wareth appeared, moving quickly to take her weight, she pushed him away and stumbled into an alley, where she fell to her knees and was sick.

Prazek and Dathenar had sent Listar away in the depth of the night just past. Upon one horse, with two more trailing, the man had set out on to the plain.

There were many rituals in the world, private and public, honest and false. At some point, in each and every one, some kind of transformation was invited in the participant, to be embraced with belief. And, at that same instant, those who were there to observe were in turn invited into participation, and with it, that selfsame belief.

She understood all of that. A mirror was held up, one purporting a truth that could be hitherto believed hidden, unseen, or simply unrecognized. And a single step was invited, from one reflection into the other. In this step, she knew, an entire world could change. Irrevocably.

Listar, haunted man, wearing his accusation as if it truly fitted him, rode to find a witch, or a shaman – a Bonecaster of the Dog-Runners, a people unlike the Tiste, a people brushing shoulders with something wild and primitive.