She studied him with red-rimmed eyes, from a face bleak and desolate. ‘And what did this ritual achieve, beyond the collapse of my soldiers?’

He hesitated, and then said, ‘Sir, forgive me. I do not know.’

BOOK FOUR

The Most Honourable Man

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

THE SEA FADED INTO MISTS BEHIND THEM, AND BELOW A VAST rolling plain appeared. Skillen Droe tilted the cant of his wings and began descending. The landing was rougher than K’rul had expected and he tumbled from his companion’s clutches, coming to a stop against the edge of a ring of stones mostly hidden by yellow grasses.

‘There is the dust of a settlement ahead,’ Skillen Droe said, folding his wings. ‘I am of no mind to invite arrows and curses, and besides, I weary of flight.’

Groaning, K’rul sat up. ‘We return to our world,’ he said, looking around. ‘We are in the lands of the Jheleck.’ He paused and eyed Skillen Droe. ‘I suppose they don’t like you either. I can’t recall if you’ve mentioned them already.’

‘It is not in my nature to offend people. Endeavouring to do well invariably yields unexpected consequences.’

‘And the Jheleck?’

Skillen Droe shrugged his sharp-angled shoulders. ‘Taking offence is all too often the retreat of a petty mind.’

‘Passive aggression, is what you mean,’ said K’rul, pushing himself to his feet. ‘The act of taking offence becomes a weapon, and its wielder feels empowered by the false indignation. That said, I doubt this is what afflicted the Jhelarkan.’ He tottered for a moment before recovering his balance. ‘My legs are half asleep and my skull is empty of blood. I am in need of a meal, I think, but the walk will do some good. An encampment, you say?’

‘A gathering, and some excitement. K’rul, we have met too many fellow Azathanai. Such encounters leave me despondent.’

They set out, at K’rul’s slow, halting pace. ‘We are afflicted with the stature of gods without the incumbent sense of responsibility. Our endless wandering is in fact an eternal flight from worshippers, no different from a father fleeing his wife and children.’

‘And between the man’s legs, the opportunity to repeat the whole mess. With another woman, in another place. K’rul, you impugn my good deeds.’

‘It’s all down to actually acknowledging the need to grow up, something so many men have trouble with. A weathered visage and a loose child behind it. A door slammed in the face of every potential lesson, the rapid thump of footsteps off into the night.’

‘An entire people can succumb to this same crime,’ observed Skillen Droe. ‘Irresponsible flight redefined as progress.’

‘Yes, the delusion of godhood belongs to us all, mortal and immortal alike. Can we say, with any certainty, whether some other god exists, a being beyond all of us, and we to it as children to a parent?’