by Barb Hendee
One window shutter was slightly cracked open, and she hurried over.
Swinging the shutter wide, she flinched when it creaked too loudly. She craned up on tiptoe to peer through the panes.
Light from the nearest street lantern wasn't enough to fill the shop's front room, but perhaps someone was still working in the back. She would have to knock at the door after all. Then two closely spaced footfalls pounded inside the shop. It sounded like someone stomping.
Wynn grabbed the sill with both hands, pulling herself up with her face close to the panes. But she saw nothing.
An indistinct form shifted in the dark, near the door to the back workroom.
Wynn's nose squashed against the pane.
A tall, broad-shouldered man in a dark cloak stood beyond the front counter. His hood was down, and he held a leather folio in his hand.
Wynn's stomach hardened.
Someone had beaten her here and gotten in, and she tried to make out his face. Besides Master a'Seatt, she'd never seen anyone of such stature here. In the dark, his skin was so light she began to make out a narrow face, straight nose, and red-brown hair, and maybe…
Sparkling eyes looked about the shop's front room.
Wynn stopped breathing… and stared at Chane.
The last time she'd seen him was south of the Farlands in the company of Welstiel, Magiere's undead half brother. Half a world away atop the Pock Peaks, in the library of Li'kän's castle, he'd promised never to follow her.
He'd promised—yet here he was, holding a folio.
Confusion scrambled Wynn's thoughts.
It wasn't possible, not for the way all the victims had died. Except that Chane had kept company with Welstiel for a long while. And Welstiel had been trained by his father's retainer—Ubâd, that decrepit necromancer and the architect of Magiere's unnatural birth.
Welstiel was a conjuror. As a Noble Dead he'd had many years to refine his skills. And what might Chane, a conjuror himself, have learned under that madman's tutelage?
Everything kept racing along twisted paths in Wynn's mind, and they all led to Chane.
She remembered spirits, walking corpses, and dismembered body parts floating in milky fluids within Ubâd's hideaway. Chane had been there as well, trying to save her, but looking back…
Wynn's chill faded, and bile burned in the back of her throat.
It was him. Chane was murdering sages… her own kind.
He suddenly shoved the folio under one arm, and a long line of silver appeared before him in the dark shop.
Wynn quickly realized it was his sword—but why was he drawing a weapon? He wasn't looking her way but off toward the shopfront's far [opfly side. She tried to shift left along the window and glimpse the room's far right side.
A black form floated across the floor into sight.
Wynn's eyes widened as she followed it—and then she flinched back.
Chane was looking right at her. His eyes widened as well, but he quickly returned his attention to the black mass.
She thought she saw the shape of a black hood and cloak upon a tall form—just before a shout filled the night street.
"Move in!"
A strong arm latched around Wynn from behind and heaved her off the ground.
Chane heard a male voice shouting outside, and then Wynn cried out.
He glanced toward the window, but the shutter's narrow space was empty. And the wafting black figure rushed him—straight through the counter.
Chane didn't even think to swing his sword. He twisted sideways into the door frame, blade out, but he still couldn't make out a face within the hood.
The figure hesitated. Was it looking at the sword? Then it surged forward, and Chane slashed.
The blade's tip passed through the figure's midsection.
The steel didn't even drag, as if cutting only air. Lack of resistance took him by surprise, and he lost the sword's balance. It jarred against the door frame, and the figure's cloth-wrapped fingers shot out at him. On instinct Chane jerked the sword's hilt upward, blade tilted to block.
The black hand glided straight through the steel and sank into his chest.
Agonizing cold spread through him before he could shut out the pain. The frigid cold in his chest was so harsh it felt as if he burned. Something seemed to gnaw at him from within.
Chane's knees buckled in weakness. Then a hollow moan filled the shop. It rose to a shriek, piercing his ears with equal pain.
The black figure jerked its hand from Chane's chest. It held up shivering fingers, as if it had suddenly succumbed to the same searing cold.
Chane wobbled, and his shoulder struck the door frame before he could catch himself.
A hiss grew inside the shop.
The sound seemed to rise all around as the figure's pit of a hood turned to its own raised hand wrapped in shreds of black cloth. Its fingers twitched in convulsions as it retreated through the counter. And the hood's opening turned once more toward Chane.
He felt the cold fade within him and his strength returned.
He had no notion of what had just happened, but it had not been what his attacker expected. Once its hand jerked from his body, the sudden weakness simply faded. As if it tried to d [it berain his strength and failed.
And Chane had felt something else in that painful contact—empty of life.
He righted himself in panic. This thing that walked through solid walls was undead, but unlike any he had ever seen or heard of. Chane quickly glanced to the rear door and then up to the hole in the roof.
He had to escape, and Wynn was still out front. But he would never gain the roof quickly enough, nor have time to get past the rear door's inner bar. Not before…
He glanced back again. The rear door's brackets were empty, and the bar leaned against the wall beside it. The door might still contain a basic lock, but why had it not been barred when the staff left the shop?
The robed form curled its fingers into hooks and slid through the counter again.
Chane dodged out the doorway and behind the counter. The back room was too tight and cluttered for fighting. At best, he would have to break through a front window and run. Then the folio was jerked from under his arm.
"No!" he rasped.
He snatched hold of the leather case with his free hand and spun about, swinging his sword back in reflex.
Chane watched his blade pass through a black-wrapped forearm and hit the countertop. The figure's fingers still clutched the folio's other end. Chane barely blinked as something struck the side of his head.
He felt the figure's other hand driving his head sideways and down. He thought he smelled spices—perhaps cinnamon—and dust. Then his skull smashed against the counter's edge, hammering the side of his jaw.
Darkness swallowed Chane's sight as he felt the folio ripped from his hand.
Wynn struggled, kicking back at her captor, until she heard him shout, "Move, all of you!"
The voice behind her head was deafening, but she recognized it. Captain Rodian held her off the ground with one arm.
"Take the back door first," he called.
Three red-surcoated Shyldfälches ran into sight with swords drawn. One took position at the shop's front door while the other two watched the front windows. Wynn heard more running feet and the sound of battering and breaking wood from somewhere at the shop's rear.
A grating hiss rose into a hollow wail inside the shop.
Wynn shivered inside, wanting to cover her ears.
"Move, all of you!"
Chane barely heard the shout through the ache in his head. He tried to push himself up, but gouged his hand on a piece of broken wood. His balance failed, and he toppled against the second door behind the counter. He had no idea what was happening, but he heard that voice again outside the shop.
Take the back first!"
Chane crawled to his knees and peered into the rear workroom. The back door bucked and crackled as something heavy struck it from the outside. It
had been locked but not barred, which would slow any escape but still make it possible to force entry from the outside. Chane grabbed his sword off the floor and struggled to his feet.
The figure stood just beyond the counter.
Its cloak and robe were quiet and still, and the folio remained gripped in its hand. Its hood turned slowly, as if whoever hid within it looked from one front window to the door.
How could this thing be solid and then not, at the same time? Yet it never showed a sign of that change.
Finally it fixed upon the other window—the one where Chane had seen Wynn—and it stopped.
Another slam hit the rear door, and Chane heard wood splintering sharply. Someone had set a trap here—but to catch him or this thing? He threw himself over the countertop's remains, rolling to the far side. As he lunged for the folio, the figure slipped beyond reach. It flew straight at the window like whipping cloth driven on a windstorm—and passed straight through.
No glass shattered; no wallboards broke. Not even the shutters beyond the panes swung in its passing. Then the folio in its grip hit against glass—and did not pass through.
The black figure might be noncorporeal, but the folio was solid.
Chane lunged for it.
An angry wailing shriek echoed outside, and the window shattered outward.
The shop filled with the sound of breaking glass. Then the noise of breaking wood and shouts carried from the rear workroom.
Chane bolted for the broken window as a scream erupted outside the shop.
Rodian watched something blacker than night bleed through the shop's front wall. He still held on to Wynn, but the sage had ceased struggling.
The blot spread quickly over the shop's wood planks, blocking out one window. Then it bulged like a shroud cloth in a gale. It took shape in something he'd seen once before.
The black-cloaked and — robed figure halted, one arm stretched out behind it. Its hand was still beyond one pane of the window. And Rodian saw what it held in its trailing grip.
It held a folio, still stuck behind the window, inside the shop.
The pane creaked and began to crack.
Rodian dropped Wynn and shoved her out of the way, and the window exploded outward.
He raised his sword arm before his face. Glass fragments tinkled off steel and across his glove. A wailing scream rose before his sight line cleared.
Then Wynn cried out, "Captain!"
He'd kept three guardsmen with him out front: Shâth, Ecgbryht, and Ruben.
And Shâth was rushing toward the black figure.
"Stay back!" Rodian ordered, raising his sword.
The figure stood before the shop, folio in one hand, as its cloak writhed around its robed form. But its other hand…
Black fingers lanced through Shâth's chest and out his back, like barbs of shadow emerging from the guardsman's body. The rest of its hand followed instantly as Ruben and Ecgbryht closed in. Shâth hung impaled and shuddering as the figure's hand clenched into a fist.
Mute crackling rose as Shâth choked, but he never screamed. A dark stain spread across the back of his tabard around the figure's protruding wrist. The robed figure wrenched its arm back.
Shâth arched as the black fist ripped back through his torso.
Blood spattered over Ecgbryht as Shâth collapsed. His body hit the street hard, with his face frozen into a gaping mouth and eyes.
The front of his tabard and hauberk were torn around a mangled hole.
It happened so fast.
A low hiss rose all around in the street. The dark space of the figure's wide hood turned toward Rodian—no, beyond him, toward Wynn. And it rushed her like some coal-colored ghost, solid and real and yet not.
Rodian dodged in, uncertain what he could do against this thing. Ecgbryht was closer, and swung hard at the figure as Wynn scrambled back across the cobblestones. Rodian stepped in front of her.
"Wynn… stay away! Do not let it touch you!"
Those rasping words came like a shout. Rodian didn't know who'd given this warning, but then he saw someone crouched upon the shattered window's sill.
The man wore a long dark cloak with its hood thrown back. His face was pale and narrow, and there was something wrong with his eyes. Two killers emerged from the scribe shop—but why had the second one warned Wynn off?
"Stay behind me!" Rodian shouted at her. He swung, aiming for the black figure's wrist just above the clutched folio.
Too much happened at once.
The black figure swung its free hand and latched it solidly around Ecgbryht's throat. Rodian's blade passed through the figure's wrist with no resistance, and its tip clanged off a street stone.
Garrogh bolted out of the shop's front door with two guards, Lúcan and Taméne, running behind him… just as Ruben charged the figure, trying to force it off Ecgbryht.
The second killer upon the sill, sword in one hand, reached out and grabbed the folio.
All this passed by the time Rodian righted his sword.
Locked in the figure's grip, Ecgbryht drew short, rapid breaths. His features twisted and paled. The robed one released him, and he crumpled instantly. It tried to pull the folio back, and the second killer slipped off the sill to the street. Garrogh closed on the other would-be thief clinging to his end of the folio.
"Get back!" Rodian shouted at his men. "It's a mage!"
The robed one turned its hood toward Wynn.
"No!" the other thief hissed. "You will leave her alone!"
He jerked hard on the folio, and Rodian faltered.
The two caught in his trap were at odds, but not just over the folio. Another conflict existed between them over the journeyor. Rodian set himself against either coming at Wynn.
And then a snarl trailed into a howl somewhere in the open street. He heard rapid claws on cobblestone and had to turn his head.
A tall, dark-coated dog charged along buildings in the thicker shadows beneath their eaves. Or was it a wolf?
Rodian thought he saw a streetlight catch upon its eyes, which glittered like pale blue gems.
Wynn barely spotted Chane before Rodian stepped in her way. All she saw around the captain was the robed figure. When she stared into its hood, the pitch-black within it seemed to bleed over everything in her sight. She couldn't look at anything else.
Then she heard a distant snarl.
It seemed so far away, but so did every other noise around her. Then it trailed into a familiar wailing howl. She'd heard it so many times she knew it like the voice of an old friend in her head.
Chap was here, and he was hunting!
She wasn't mad, delusional, like everyone whispered. This thing killing her people was an undead. No other reason would cause Chap to howl like that.
For an instant his face rose in her thoughts—fur so silver it might tint blue in moonlight, and eyes like crystals catching an afternoon sky.
A hissing shriek rang in her ears as she heard claws scrabbling on cobblestones. Another deep snarl sounded as a dark gray form rushed past her. It spun and circled before her on four long legs ending in large paws, and its head swung briefly toward her.
Wynn saw the outline of tall peaked ears over a long muzzle—and pale blue eyes gazed at her. Then the dog wheeled, facing the robed undead beyond the captain. She reached out, screaming his name.
"Chap!"
Rodian sucked a breath. He'd lost all control here. Everything splintered into chaos.
Garrogh grabbed the pal [rabplie-faced man by his cloak, jerking him back. The man lost his grip on the folio but ducked around the lieutenant and took a swing. His fist landed hard, and Garrogh twisted away under the impact, slamming against the shop's front.
"Don't let him escape!" Rodian shouted.
Lúcan rushed the pale man, while Ruben swung his sword at the robed figure's back.
A hissing shriek broke over the noise and shouts.
Rodian lurched sideways as the robed figure recoiled. Only then did Ruben
's sword connect and pass straight through, not even ruffling robe or cloak. The figure's hood remained fixed on Wynn somewhere behind Rodian. He glanced back.
Her eyes were wide yet vacant as she stared up and beyond Rodian, as if locking her gaze with whoever hid inside the robe's large cowl.
And the wolf rushed in between him and Wynn.
Rodian instinctively turned his sword point toward the animal, but it didn't go for the sage. It circled her quickly, coming around between her and everyone else. Its charcoal fur was nearly as dark as the robed thief, but strange shimmers showed wherever muscles rolled beneath its coat. It was taller than any wolf that Rodian had seen, and its eyes scintillated blue in the dark.
The animal glanced once at Wynn and then rushed at Rodian, snapping its jaws.
Rodian lunged aside, raising his sword.
"Chap!"
He flinched at Wynn's voice and saw her reaching out after the wolf, and the animal raced by him. Jaws clacking beneath snarls, it went straight for the robed figure.
The murderous, faceless mage cowered back—and then bolted, folio still clutched in its hand. Ruben was behind it, and Taméne was the only guard still standing in its path. The figure struck him across the face. Rodian heard bones crack as Taméne went down limp and flopping.
And the wolf ran after the figure. An eerie baying rose in its wake.
Rodian was stunned. But Ruben and Lúcan both instantly spread wide to either side, boxing the pale man against the shop's front. Garrogh climbed to his feet, blinking as he shook his head once. The lieutenant spun about and lifted his sword.
Rodian regained his wits, pointing at the pale man. "Put him down, if you have to," he barked at Ruben and Lúcan. "But don't let him get away."
With a quick wave for Garrogh to follow, Rodian rushed after the fading howls of the wolf.
Chane locked eyes on Wynn, but she did not look at him. She looked down the way, where the officer had vanished.
"Chap?" she whispered weakly.
She teetered around, and at the sight of him, Chane heard breath rush between her clenched teeth. The fear in her eyes was nothing co [wased mpared to the hate that followed, spreading quickly over her face.
