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’This , suddenly, in a place of great pressure’

’Aye’ Quick Ben sighed He glanced out over the river ’There’s a trench, a crevasse, out there -- you can see it by the current’s upstream pull out in thethe river bed That trench is deep’

’Hold it,’ Paran said ’You’re suggesting that this Tiste Edur appeared, suddenly, somewhere down in that underwater trench The only way that could be true is if he’d opened a warren in order to get there -- that’s a seriously complicated means of suicide’

’Only if he’d intended to do as he did,’ Quick Ben replied ’Only if he was the one who opened the warren in the first place If you want to kill someone -- nastily -- you throw them, push them, trip them -- whatever -- into an inimical portal I think this poor bastard was e of Sere?’

’More like a High Mage of Ruse -- the Path of the Sea Captain, the Malazan E e You won’t find a true High Mage of Ruse in all the empire It’s the hardest warren toyour Blue Moranth? Your Silver or Gold? Any High Mages of Ruse?’

The warrior shook his helmed head ’Nor do our annals reveal any in our past’

’And how far back do those annals go?’ Quick Ben asked casually, returning his attention to the corpse

’Seven tens’

’Decades?’

’Centuries’

’So,’ the wizard said, straightening, ’a singular killer’

’Then why,’ Paran murmured, ’do I now believe that this man was killed by another Tiste Edur?’

The Moranth and Quick Ben turned to hiut whisper’