There is a cabal breathing
deeper than the bellows
drawing up the emerald fires
beneath rain-glistened cobbles,
while you may hear the groaning
from the caverns below,
the whisper of sorcery
is less than the dying sigh
of a thief stumbling unwilling
into Darujhistan's secret web• • •
CABAL (FRAGMENT)
PUDDLE (B.1122?)
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The splayed tip of her right wing brushed the scarred black rock as Crone climbed the whistling updrafts of Moon's Spawn. From the pocked caves and starlit ledges her restless brothers and sisters called out to her as she passed. "Do we fly?" they asked. But Crone made no reply. Her glittering black eyes were fixed on heaven's vault. Her enormous wings beat a thundering refrain of taut, unrelenting power. She had no time for the nervous cackling of the younglings; no time for answering their simplistic needs with the wisdom her thousands of years of life had earned her.
.
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This night, Crone flew for her lord.
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As she rose above the shattered peaks of the Moon's crest a high wind swept her wings, rasping dry and cold along her oily feathers. Around her, thin wisps of shredded smoke rode the currents of night air like lost spirits. Crone circled once, her sharp gaze catching the glimmer of the few remaining fires among the crags below, then she dipped a wing and sailed out on the wind's tide as it rolled northward to Lake Azur.
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The featureless expanse of the Dwelling Plain was beneath her, the grass sweeping in gray waves unbroken by house or hill. Directly ahead lay the glittering jeweled cloak that was Darujhistan, casting into the sky a sapphire glow. As she neared the city her unnaturally acute vision detected, here and there among the estates crowding the upper tier, the aqua-marine emanation of sorcery.
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Crone cackled aloud. Magic was ambrosia to Great Ravens. They were drawn to it by the scent of blood and power, and within its aura their lifespans lengthened into centuries. Its musk had other effects as well. Crone cackled again. Her gaze fixed on one particular estate, around which glowed a profusion of protective sorcery. Her lord had imparted to her a thorough description of the magical signature she must find, and now she had found it. Crooking her wings, she sank gracefully toward the estate.
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Inland from Gadrobi District's harbor the land rose in four tiers climbing eastward. Ramped cobblestone streets, worn to a polished mosaic, marked Gadrobi District's Trade Streets, five in all, which were the only routes through Marsh District and into the next tier, Lake-front District. Beyond Lakefront's crooked aisles twelve wooden gates opened onto Daru District, and from Daru another twelve gates-these ones manned by the City Watch and barred by iron portcullis-connected the lower and upper cities.
.
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On the fourth and highest tier brooded the estates of Darujhistan's nobility as well as its publicly known sorcerers. At the intersection of Old King's Walk and View Street rose a flat-topped hill on which sat Majesty Hall, where each day the Council gathered. A narrow park encircled the hill, with sand-strewn pathways winding among centuries-old acacias. At the park's entrance, near High Gallows Hill, stood a massive rough-hewn stone gate, the last-surviving remnant of the castle that once commanded Majesty Hill.
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The days of kings had long since ended in Darujhistan. The gate, known as Despot's Barbican, stood stark and unadorned, its lattice of cracks a fading script of past tyranny.
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In the shadow of the Barbican's single massive lintel stone stood two men. One, his shoulder against the pitted rock, wore a ringed hauberk and a boiled leather cap bearing the City Watch insignia. Scabbarded to his belt was a plain shorts-word, its grip of wrapped leather worn smooth. A pike leaned against one shoulder. He was nearing the end of his midnight guard duty and patiently awaited the arrival of the man who would officially relieve him. The guard's eyes flicked on occasion to the second man, with whom he had shared this place many another night over the past year. The glances he cast at the well-dressed gentleman were surreptitious, empty of expression.
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As with every other time Councilman Turban Orr came to the gate at this dead hour of night, the nobleman had scarcely deemed the guard worthy of notice; nor had he ever given an indication that he recognized the guard as being the same man each time.
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Turban Orr seemed a man short on patience, forever pacing and fretting, pausing every now and then to adjust his jeweled burgundy cloak. The councilman's polished boots clicked as he paced, throwing a soft echo under the Barbican. From the shadow the guard's gaze caught Orr's gloved hand where it rested on the silver pommel of a duelling sword, noting the index finger tapping in time with the boot clicks.
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At the early part of his watch, long before the arrival of the councilman, the guard would walk slowly around the Barbican, reaching out on occasion to touch the ancient, grim stonework. Six years' worth of night watch at this gate had bred a close relationship between the man and the rough cut basalt: he knew every crack, every chisel scar; he knew where the fittings had weakened, where time and the elements had squeezed mortar from between the stones then gnawed it to dust. And he also knew that its apparent weaknesses were but a deception. The Barbican, and all it stood for, patiently waited still, a specter of the past, hungry to be born yet again.
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And that, the guard had long ago vowed, he would never let it doif such things were within his power. Despot's Barbican provided the man with every reason he needed to be what he was: Circle Breaker, a spy.
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Both he and the councilman awaited the arrival of the other; the one who never failed to appear. Turban Orr would growl his usual complaint, disgusted with tardiness; then he would grasp the other's arm and they would walk side by side beneath the Barbican's brooding lintel stone. And, with eyes long accustomed to darkness, the guard would mark the other's face, burning it indelibly in the superb memory hidden behind expressionless, unmemorable features.
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By the time the two Council members returned from their walk, the guard would have been relieved and well on his way to delivering a message according to his master's instructions. If Circle Breaker's luck held, he might survive the civil war into which Darujhistan, he felt, was about to plunge-and never mind the Malazan nemesis. One nightmare at a time, he often told himself, particularly on nights like these, when Despot's Barbican seemed to breathe its promise of resurrection with mocking certainty.
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"As this may be in your interest," High Alchemist Baruk read aloud from the parchment note in his plump hands. Always the same opening line, hinting of disquieting knowledge. An hour earlier his servant Roald had delivered the note, which, like all the others that had come to him over the past year, had been found tucked into one of the ornamental murder holes in the estate's rear postern gate.
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Recognizing the pattern, Baruk had immediately read the missive then dispatched his messengers out into the city. Such news demanded action, and he was one of the few secret powers within Darujhistan capable of dealing with it.
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Now he sat in a plush chair in his study, musing. His deceptively sleepy gaze flicked down again to the words on the parchment.
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"Councilman Turban Orr walks in the garden with Councilman Feder. I remain known only as Circle Breaker, a servant of the Eel, whose interests continue to coincide with your own. Once again Baruk felt temptation. With his talents it would be a small thing to discover the writer's identity- though not the Eel's, of course: that was an identity sought by many, all to no avail--but, as always, something held him back.
.
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He shifted his bulk on the chair and sighed. "Very well, Circle Breaker, I'll continue to honor you, though clearly you know more of me than I of you, and fortunate it is indeed that your master's interests coincide with my own. Still." He frowned, thinking about the Eel, about the man's-or woman's-undisclosed interests. He knew enough to recognise that too many forces had come into play-a gathering of Ascendant powers was a fell thing. To continue to step unseen in defence of the city was becoming increasingly difficult.
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So, the question came yet again: Was this Eel using him as well?
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Oddly enough, he did not feel too concerned about this possibility. So much vital information had been passed into his hands already.
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He folded the parchment carefully and muttered a simple cantrip. The note vanished with a small plop of displaced air, joining the others in a safe place.
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