‘You can argue with nature and of course you will lose. You can argue with someone else and unless the wager is one of life or death, then the exercise is meaningless. Nature awaits us all, with emphatic solidity. All that is won is an illusion. All that is lost, you were doomed to lose anyway, eventually. They call the houses the Azath, and from this the Tiste name us, but we are not all worshippers of stone, are we, Setch?’

‘It seems,’ said Sechul, leaning back and wiping dirt from his battered hands, ‘that you have won this particular argument, Errastas.’

Grunting as he rose, Errastas made his way over. ‘I knew as much,’ he said. ‘Not even a Jaghut tower could withstand half a hill of earth and rock descending on it.’

Sechul Lath thought back to the power of his companion’s conjuration. The sorcery was brutal, and the sound it had made – like a clap of thunder inside the skull – still reverberated through his bones. ‘This could begin a war,’ he said.

‘I have purpose,’ Errastas replied, dropping into a crouch to peer into the small cave dug into the mound. ‘This may seem madness – murder often does. But this table I set will see multitudes gathering to the feast, dear brother of mine.’

‘Half-brother,’ corrected Sechul Lath, feeling the need to assert the distinction. ‘Will they thank you?’

Errastas shrugged. ‘They will gorge, friend, and grow fat and think not once upon the farmer, or the herder, or the one crushing the grapes. Nor will they muse on the maker of the utensils they wield, or the hand that hammered out their pewter plates. They will sit upon chairs that creak to their weight, and give no thought to the carpenter, or indeed the tree. They will listen to the rain upon the roof, and give no thanks to the mason. I do not seek notoriety, friend. I do not yearn for adulation. But I will remain the bringer of feasts.’

Sechul Lath rose, arching to work out the aches in his body, and then stepped back as Errastas crawled partway into the hole. His companion emerged dragging out the crushed corpse of the unknown Jaghut who had lived in the tower. The splintered ends of bones jutted from bruised and bloody flesh, making the broken body and its limbs look like shredded sacks. Some falling chunk of masonry had crushed the skull almost flat.

Errastas pulled the corpse into full view and then straightened, anchoring his hands on his hips. ‘I felt his death,’ he said, face flushed, ‘like a hand on my cock.’

Turning, half in disgust, Sechul Lath scanned the sky. It looked wrong to his eyes, but in a way he could not fathom. ‘I see no searchers,’ he said.

‘We have time,’ Errastas agreed. ‘K’rul gropes. He has not yet seen our faces. He does not yet know his quarry.’