The Crippled God/Chapter 10

The Crippled God
Dramatis Personae	Pagination
"He was a soldier"
Chapter 1	Chapter 2
Chapter 3	Chapter 4
All the takers of my days
Chapter 5	Chapter 6
Chapter 7
To charge the spear
Chapter 8	Chapter 9
Chapter 10
The fists of the world
Chapter 11	Chapter 12
Chapter 13
A hand upon the fates
Chapter 14	Chapter 15
Chapter 16
To one in chains
Chapter 17	Chapter 18
Chapter 19	Chapter 20
Your private shore
Chapter 21	Chapter 22
Chapter 23	Chapter 24
Epilogue I	Epilogue II

Epigraph

What is it about this world That so causes you trouble? Why avow in your tone This victim role? And the plaintive hurt Painting your eyes Bemoans a life's struggle Ever paying a grievous toll We gathered in one place Under the selfsame sun And the bronze woman Holding the basin, Her breasts settled in the bowl, Looked down with pity Or was it contempt? She is a queen of dreams And her gift is yours to take Pity if you choose it Or contempt behind the veil I would have polished those eyes For a better look I would have caressed those roses For a sweeter taste When we drink from the same cup And you make bitter recoil I wonder at the tongue in waiting And your deadening flavours So eager to now despoil What is it about this world That so causes you trouble? What could I say to change Your wounded regard? If my cold kiss must fail And my milk run sour Beneath the temple bell That so blights your reward? Ten thousand hang from trees Their limbs bared roots Starved of hope in the sun And the wood-cutters are long gone Up to where the road gives way To trails in the dust That spiral and curl Like the smoke of fires They are blazing beacons In the desert night. It was said by the lepers Huddled against the hill That a man with no hands Who could stare only As could the blind Upon the horrors of argument Did with one hand gone Reach into the dark sky And with the other too gone He led me home Wood-Cutters Tablets II & III Hethra of Aren

Adjunct Tavore and the Bonehunters have started across the Glass Desert. The allied armies are passing to the south of it when Brys Beddict and the Letherii army meet the Che'Malle. It is Tavore's intention that Gesler and Stormy, the leaders of the Che'Malle army, should be in overall command of the allies.

Tanakalian, the Perish Grey Helms' Shield Anvil, finally confronts Krughava, their Mortal Sword. The Perish are sworn to the Wolves of War, the Lord and Lady of the Beast Hold. Yet Tanakalian accuses Krughava of betraying that oath when she vowed to follow Tavore. He convinces the Grey Helms, and Krughava resigns her position.