The Adjunct cursed. Then she saw him waiting a hundred yards ahead of her, back-lit by the rising sun. The crimson sky seemed to have cast a red flame about the warrior. The effect jangled her nerves, as if she looked upon a scene that touched her deepest, oldest memories – memories that went beyond her own life. The T'lan Imass stood unmoving until she reached him, then fell into step beside her.

Lorn tightened her knees about the horse's shoulders and closed the reins until the mare settled down. 'Do you have to be so literal-minded, Tool?' she asked.

The desiccated warrior seemed to consider, then nodded. 'I accept that name. All of my history is dead. Existence begins anew, and with it shall be a new name. It is suitable.'

'Why were you selected to accompany me?' the Adjunct asked.

'In the lands west and north of Seven Cities, I alone among my clan survived the Twenty-eighth Jaghut War.'

Lorn's eyes widened. 'I thought those wars numbered twenty-seven,' she said quietly. 'When your legions left us after conquering Seven Cities, and you marched into the wastelands—'

'Our Bone Casters sensed an enclave of surviving Jaghut,' Tool said. 'Our commander Logros T'lan determined that we exterminate them. Thus we did.'

'Which explains your decimated numbers upon returning,' Lorn said. 'You could have explained your decision to the Empress. As it was, she was left without her most powerful army, and no knowledge of when it might return.'

'Return was not guaranteed, Adjunct,' Tool said.

Lorn stared at the tattered creature. 'I see.'

'The cessation of my clan's chieftain, Kig Aven, was accompanied by all my kin. Thus alone, I am unbound to Logro. Kig Aven's Bone Caster was Kilava Onass, who has been lost since long before the Emperor reawakened us.'

Lorn's mind raced. Among the Malazan Empire, the T'lan Imass were also known as the Silent Host. She'd never known an Imass as loquacious as this Tool. Perhaps it had something to do with this 'unbounding'. Within the Imass, only Commander Logros ever spoke to humans on a regular basis. As for the Bone Casters – Imass shamans – they stayed out of sight. The only one that had ever appeared was one named Olar Ethil, who stood alongside the clan chieftain Eitholos Ilm during the battle of Kartool, which had seen an exchange of sorcery that made Moon's Spawn look like a child's cantrip.

In any case, she'd already learned more of the Imass from this brief conversation with Tool than was present in the Empire Annals. The Emperor had known more, much more, but making records of such knowledge had never been his style. That he had reawakened the Imass had been a theory argued among scholars for years. And now she knew it to be true. How many other secrets would this T'lan Imass reveal in casual conversation?

'Tool,' she said, 'had you ever met the Emperor personally?'