‘No, I was not Gidrath. Not Capan. I am not, I think, from this continent at all. I do not know why I appeared here. Nor how. I have not been here long. This is as my master wills. Of my past, I recall but one thing.’

Coll carried Murillio to the back of the wagon and laid the man down. ‘And what’s that?’

‘I once stood within fire.’

After a long moment, Coll sighed roughly. ‘An unfortunate memory. . .’

‘There was pain. Yet I held on. Fought on. Or so I believe. I was, I think, sworn to defend a child’s life. But the child was no more. It may be ... that I failed.’

‘Well, we still need a name for you.’

‘Perhaps one will come to you eventually, Coll of Darujhistan.’

‘I promise it.’

‘Or perhaps one day my memories will return in full, and with them my name.’

And if Hood has any mercy in him that day will never come, friend. For I think there was nothing easy in your life. Or in your death. And it seems he does possess mercy, for he’s taken you far away from all that you once knew, for if I’m not mistaken, if only by your features and never mind that strange skin, you’re Malazan.

Itkovian had crossed on the last barge, beneath a vast spread of spearpoint stars, in the company of Stonny Menackis and Gruntle and his score of barbed followers, along with a hundred or so Rhivi – mostly elders and their dogs. The animals snapped and squabbled in the confines of the flat, shallow craft, then settled down for the journey’s second half once they’d managed to fight their way to the gunnels and could look out over the river.

The dogs were the first off when the barge ground ashore on the south side, barking wildly as they splashed through the reeds, and Itkovian was glad for their departure. Only half listening to Gruntle and Stonny exchanging insults like a husband and wife who had known each other far too long, Itkovian readied his horse to await the laying down of planks, and watched with mild interest the Rhivi elders following in the wake of their dogs without heed to the shore’s churned mud and matted reeds.

The low, worn-down hills on this side of the river still held a haze of dust and dung-smoke, draped like a mourner’s veil over the army’s score thousand or more tents. Apart from a few hundred Rhivi herders and the bhederin herd they were tasked to drive across come the dawn, the entire force of the invaders was now on Pannion territory.

No-one had contested the landing. The low hills to the south seemed devoid of life, revealing naught but the worn tracks left behind by Septarch Kulpath’s besieging army.