‘Worship? Only a fool worships what is already inevitable. If I cared – if I thought it would prove efficacious, I would tell our kin this. Your obeisance is pointless. Your adoration kisses a skull, and where you kneel, there is only dust. Your faith is in a god with no face.’
Once again, K’rul passed a hand over his hidden visage. ‘Skillen D
roe, you name me a fool, and rightly so.’
‘What inspired your gift, K’rul?’
‘Does it matter?’
Skillen shrugged his sharp, protruding shoulders. ‘I cannot yet say.’
Sighing, K’rul resumed walking, and a moment later they strode side by side again, skirting the endless crater. ‘I sought a breaking of the rules, Skillen. Oh, I know, what rules? Well, it seemed – seems – to me that they exist. More to the point, they do not answer to us. Look well on each of us. We Azathanai. On our habits, our proclivities and predilections, and how they serve our need to distinguish each of us from the others. But rules precede us, as cause precedes effect.
‘Some things we do share. For one, the habit that is our possessiveness, when it comes to our power. I admit, I found inspiration in the Suzerain of Night, when from love he gave a mortal woman so much of his own power. And, once it was done – well, he could not take it back.’
‘I was unaware of this. I am shocked by this news. I did not think Draconus so … careless. Tell me of his regrets.’
‘I do not know that he has any, Skillen. There is, I have found, something almost addictive in surrendering power. To become drunk on helplessness – well, it has ceased being so strange a notion. I heeded the Suzerain’s gift, and deemed it, in the end, too modest. That has since changed, as Draconus has gone yet further, but of that I will tell you later.’
‘I fear tragedy in that tale.’
‘Again, a modest one. If not for what I was driven to do. So, together now, Draconus and K’rul, we come to threaten the realm with devastation. By our gifts. By the helplessness we so coveted. Understand, it did not seem that way, not to begin with. The acts were … generous. Was this, in fact, our purpose? The mystery of our existence, solved by simple sacrifice? By yielding so much of ourselves?’
‘You have given to mortals the gift of sorcery. But it is not mortals who now threaten you, is it? You spoke of Errastas, and the flavour of influence he seeks to impose upon your gifts. You say that you cannot stop him. If that is true, what do you now hope to achieve?’
‘Ah. And this, old friend, is why I sought you out. I admit, I considered your remorse. The burden of regret you carry, so fierce as to drive you from our company.’
‘You would use me so?’
‘I would rather you did not see it that way, Skillen. Consider this, instead, yet one more gift. From me to you. Nothing substantial, as we might measure it, but sufficient to give purpose.’
‘You offer me purpose? Born of old crimes? Name me this gift, then. And consider well before you speak, since I am contemplating rending you limb from limb for your temerity.’
‘Redemption.’
Skillen Droe was silent – even in his thoughts – as his soul seemed to recoil from that word. Rejection and disbelief, denial and refusal. Such impulses needed no language.
K’rul seemed to comprehend at least some of that, for he sighed and said, ‘Errastas seeks to impose a kind of order upon my gifts, and make of chance a secret assassin to hope and desire. Droe, there are gates, now. They await guardians. Suzerain powers. But I cannot look to the Azathanai. Draconus would seek them among the Tiste, but I deem that dubious and, indeed, fraught. No, I knew I must look elsewhere.’ He hesitated, and then said, ‘Old friend, Starvald Demelain has opened on to this realm, twice now. There are dragons among us – the boldest of the kin, no doubt. Ambitious, acquisitive.’
‘You would bargain with them? K’rul, you are a fool! To think they would welcome my presence! I am the last they would yearn to see!’
‘I disagree, Droe,’ K’rul replied, with anger in his tone now. ‘I told you. I am not done with my gifts. This yielding rises from a tide to a flood. We need no other treasure to dangle in the bargain. In all instances but one, Skillen, the dragons will fight for what we offer.’
‘You would unleash such battles? Will you see Tiam herself manifest on this realm?’
‘No, we will find them as they are – singly, dispersed and eager to keep it that way. As for Tiam, again I have an answer, a means of preventing her. I believe it will work, but once more, in this I will truly need your help. Indeed, our powers must be combined.’
‘I see now. Your gift of redemption to me, and from this, my gratitude to you, and from that, my power conjoined to yours. You have thought far, K’rul, with me like a loyal hound at your heel every step of the way.’
‘I considered only the means by which I could win your allegiance.’
‘And have you contrived similar manipulations for those others whose alliance you seek? What of Ardata, then? Ah, of course, the chaos of the Vitr, so close in substance to the lifeblood of dragons.’
‘Chaos is necessary,’ K’rul said, ‘to balance what Errastas seeks.’
‘Who else waits unknowing in the wings? Mael? Grizzin Farl? No, not him, unless it is to send him among your enemies. Kilmandaros? Nightchill? Farander Tarag? What of Caladan Brood – I would have thought that the High Mason, above any of us, would have been your first choice in this. With Brood at your side, not even Errastas could—’
‘Caladan Brood is, for the time being, lost to us.’