Page 335 (1/2)
Prologue
1164 Burn's Sleep Istral'fennidahn, the season of D'rek, Worm of Autumn Twenty-four days since the Execution of Sha'ik in Raraku The webs between the toere visible in glistening sheets far overhead, and the faint wind co in from the sea shivered the vast threads so that a mist of rain descended on Kartool City, as it did everyin the Clear Season
Most things a person could get used to, eventually, and since the yellow-banded paralt spiders had been the first to occupy the once infa the Malazan conquest of the island, and that was decades past now, there had been plenty of tiulls and pigeons suspended , before the fistsized spiders eed from their upper-floor dens to retrieve their prey, yielded littlethe citizens of Kartool City
Sergeant Hellian of the Septarch District city guard, alas, was an exception to this There were gods, she suspected, convulsed in perpetual hilarity at her wretched fate, for which they were no doubt responsible Born in the city, cursed with a fear of all manner of spiders, she had lived the entirety of her nineteen years in unrelieved terror
Why not just leave? A question asked by comrades and acquaintances more times than she cared to count But it wasn't that simple It was impossible, in fact The murky waters of the harbour were fouled withhere and there Inland, things got even worse The young paralt, upon escaping their elders in the city, struggled to h young, they were no less aggressive or virulent While traders and farmers told her that one could walk the trails and roads all day without encountering a single one, Hellian didn't care She knew the gods aiting Just like the spiders
When sober, the sergeant noticed things, in a proper and diligent uard And while she was not consistently drunk, cold sobriety was an invitation to hysteria, so Hellian endeavoured to proceed steadily on the wobbly rope of not-quite-drunk
Accordingly, she had not known of the odd ship now moored in the Free Docks, that had arrived before sunrise, its pennons indicating that it had come from Malaz Island
Ships hailing from Malaz Island were not of themselves unusual or noteworthy; however, autu winds of the Clear Season ate for at least the next two months
Were things less bleary, she ht also have noticed – had she taken the time to head down to the docks, which perhaps could have been ed at sword-point – that the ship was not the usual barque or trader, nor a , styled in a manner not employed in the past fifty years by any shipbuilders of the es adorned the blade-like prow,serpents and worunnels alth of the ship The stern was squared and strangely high, with a side- oar The crew numbered about a dozen, quiet for sailors, and disinclined to leave the ship as it lolled alongside the dock A lone figure had diseplank had settled, shortly before dawn
For Hellian, these details came later The runner that found her was a local brat hen he wasn't breaking laws, loitered around the docks in the hopes of being hired as a guide for visitors The fragment of parchment he handed her was, she could feel, of soe, the contents of which made her scowl
Prologue
1164 Burn's Sleep Istral'fennidahn, the season of D'rek, Worm of Autumn Twenty-four days since the Execution of Sha'ik in Raraku The webs between the toere visible in glistening sheets far overhead, and the faint wind co in from the sea shivered the vast threads so that a mist of rain descended on Kartool City, as it did everyin the Clear Season
Most things a person could get used to, eventually, and since the yellow-banded paralt spiders had been the first to occupy the once infa the Malazan conquest of the island, and that was decades past now, there had been plenty of tiulls and pigeons suspended , before the fistsized spiders eed from their upper-floor dens to retrieve their prey, yielded littlethe citizens of Kartool City
Sergeant Hellian of the Septarch District city guard, alas, was an exception to this There were gods, she suspected, convulsed in perpetual hilarity at her wretched fate, for which they were no doubt responsible Born in the city, cursed with a fear of all manner of spiders, she had lived the entirety of her nineteen years in unrelieved terror
Why not just leave? A question asked by comrades and acquaintances more times than she cared to count But it wasn't that simple It was impossible, in fact The murky waters of the harbour were fouled withhere and there Inland, things got even worse The young paralt, upon escaping their elders in the city, struggled to h young, they were no less aggressive or virulent While traders and farmers told her that one could walk the trails and roads all day without encountering a single one, Hellian didn't care She knew the gods aiting Just like the spiders
When sober, the sergeant noticed things, in a proper and diligent uard And while she was not consistently drunk, cold sobriety was an invitation to hysteria, so Hellian endeavoured to proceed steadily on the wobbly rope of not-quite-drunk