She drew him round and settled against him, murmured, ‘If there is to be a conversation, keep it short, please. What I desire is not answered by words.’

He closed his arms around her. ‘I’d only wondered if you’d found Silverfox.’

‘No. It seems she is able to travel paths I did not think still existed. Instead, two of her undead wolves arrived ... to escort me home. They are ... unusual.’

Whiskeyjack thought back to when he’d first seen the T’lan Ay, rising as dust from the yellow grasses, finding their bestial shapes until the hills on all sides were covered. ‘I know. There’s something strangely disproportionate about them—’

‘Yes, you are right. They jar the eye. Too long limbs, too large shoulders, yet short-necked and wide-jawed. But there is more than just their physical appearance that I found ... alarming.’

‘More so than the T’lan Imass?’

She nodded. ‘There is, within the T’lan Imass, an emptiness, as of a smoke-blackened cavity. But not with the T’lan Ay. Within these wolves ... I see sorrow. Eternal sorrow...’

She shivered in his arms. Whiskeyjack said nothing. You see in their eyes, dear lover, what I see in yours. And it is the reflection – the recognition – that has shaken you so.

‘At the camp’s edge,’ Korlat went on, ‘they fell to dust. One moment trotting on either side, then ... gone. I don’t know why, but that disturbed me more than anything else.’

Because it is what awaits all of us. Even you, Korlat. ‘This conversation was supposed to be short. It ends now. Come to bed, lass.’

She looked into his eyes. ‘And after tonight?’

He grimaced. ‘It may be a while, aye.’

‘Crone has returned.’

‘Has she now?’

Korlat nodded. She was about to say more, then hesitated, searching his eyes, and said nothing.

Setta, Lest, Maurik. The cities were empty. Yet the armies were dividing none the less. And neither would speak of why. Both sides of the alliance had things to hide, secrets to maintain, and the closer they got to Coral the more problematic it became maintaining those secrets.

Most of the Tiste Andii have vanished. Gone with Rake, probably to Moon’s Spawn. But where is Moon’s Spawn? And what in Hood’s name are they planning? Will we arrive at Coral only to find the city already fallen, the Pannion Seer dead – his soul taken by Dragnipur – and that massive mountain hanging overhead?

The Black Moranth have searched for that damned floating rock . . . to no avail.

And then there are our secrets. We’re sending Paran and the Bridgeburners ahead; Hood take us, we’re doing a lot more than that.

This is an unwelcome play for power, now imminent – we all knew it was coming. Setta, Lest, Maurik. The subtle game is no longer subtle.

‘My heart is yours, Korlat,’ Whiskeyjack said to the woman in his arms. ‘Nothing else matters to me. Nothing – no-one.’