Pain clenched Toc the Younger, wrapped iron bands around his body, his limbs, lifted him into the air. Bones snapped. The Malazan screamed.

‘Break! Yes, break into pieces! But I won’t kill you, no, not yet, not for a long, long time! Oh, look at you writhe, but what do you know of true pain, mortal? Nothing. I will show you, Toc the Younger. I will teach you-’ He gestured again.

Toc found himself hovering in absolute darkness. The agony clutching him did not cease, yet drew no tighter. His gasps echoed dully in heavy, stale air. He – he sent me away. My god sent me away . . . and now I’m truly alone. Alone . . .

Something moved nearby, something huge, hard skin rasping against stone. A mewling sound reached Toc’s ears, growing louder, closer.

With a shriek, leathery arms wrapped around the Malazan, pulled him into a suffocating, desperate embrace. Pinned against a flabby, pebble-skinned bosom, Toc found himself in the company of a score or more corpses, in various stages of decomposition – all within the yearning hug of giant, reptilian arms.

Broken ribs ground and tore in Toc’s chest. His skin was slippery with blood, yet whatever healing sorcery the Seer had gifted to him persisted, slowly mending, knitting, only to have the bones break yet again within the savage embrace of the creature who now held him.

The Seer’s voice filled his skull. I tired of the others . . .but you I shaft keep alive. You are worthy to take my place in that sweet, motherly hug. Oh, she is mad. Mindless with insanity, yet the sparks of need reside within her. Such need. Beware, or it will devour you, as it did me – until I grew so foul that she spat me back out. Need, when it overwhelms, becomes poison, Toc the Younger. The great corrupter of love, and so it shall corrupt you. Your flesh. Your mind. Can you feel it? It has begun. Dear Malazan, can you feel it?

He had no breath with which to scream, yet the arms holding him felt his shudder, and squeezed tighter.

Soft whimpers filled the chamber, the twin voices of Toc and his captor.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Onearm’s Host, in that time, was perhaps the finest army the Malazan Empire had yet to produce, even given the decimation of the Bridgeburners at the Siege of Pale. Drawn from disparate regiments that included companies from Seven Cities, Falar, and Malaz Island, these ten thousand soldiers were, by roll, four thousand nine hundred and twelve women, the remaining men; one thousand two hundred and sixty-seven under the recorded age of twenty-five years, seven hundred and twenty-one over the age of thirty-five years; the remaining in between.

Remarkable indeed. More so when one considers this: among its soldiers could be found veterans of the Wickan Wars (see Coltaine’s Rebellion), the Aren Uprising (on both sides), and Blackdog Forest and Mott Wood.