by Anthony Ryan
Lohren gave a wan smile and raised her face to Vaelin, eyes wide and unblinking. He knew she wasn’t seeing him, or anything else in this room. “Last night I dreamt of a wolf. He was very big and very beautiful. Also, old. So old. He’s showed me many things. One was a man, also old but not nearly as old as the wolf. He’s worn many faces, lived many lives. Done so many things. He’s come such a long way, Uncle. He has something to tell you.” A line appeared in Lohren’s smooth brow as she frowned, a shadow passing over her small face. She blinked and he saw a tear trace down her cheek. “But he has people to kill first.”
The wolf. It had been so long since he last saw it, but the memory was as sharp and real as if it had been moments before, in the Great Northern Forest when its mighty howl summoned the Seordah Sil to war against the Volarians. All the other encounters tumbled through his mind in a rush. That first glimpse in the Urlish Forest before it had intervened to save him from the assassins, a vision of silver-grey predatory beauty licking blood from its jaws. Its snarl in the Martishe that had made him step back from the brink of outright murder. Outside the walls of Linesh during the Alpiran war before it summoned the sandstorm that saved him, but failed to save Dentos. Said we should listen for the wolf’s call, Nortah had said, words spoken to him by a dead man in a dream. Vaelin well knew the wolf’s call often brought salvation, but it also brought death.
“Where?” Vaelin said. He moved to crouch at Lohren’s side, laying a hand on her shoulder. “When?”
“The tower,” she said and he felt her shudder. “Now.” Her shudder abruptly turned into a convulsion, her face bleaching of colour as she fought down a retch. “Part of him . . .” She grimaced in confusion. “Someone he used to be . . . wants to meet his daughter again. It was a delightful surprise to find her here. He never got to kill her when he was alive. Something he’s always regretted.”
Someone he used to be . . . his daughter . . .
Vaelin tore himself from Lohren’s side, unhooking his sword from the back of his chair before rushing to the door. The realisation sang in his mind with all the force of a scream. Ellese!
* * *
◆ ◆ ◆
Vaelin dragged his horse to a halt in the courtyard, leaping down from the saddle and sprinting for the stables. He drew his sword and forced himself into a walk before entering the shadowy interior, ears alive for any sound beyond the snorting of many annoyed horses.
“Ellese!” he called out, moving towards the rear of the stables. “Show yourself!”
“Uncle?”
He turned to find her framed in a doorway, blanket clutched around her unclothed body and an aggrieved scowl on her face. Beyond her, Vaelin could see the pale form of Sehmon Vek frantically struggling into his trews.
“Get dressed,” Vaelin told Ellese.
“Much as I appreciate your concern,” she said with a sigh, “I am not yours to command . . .”
“Get!” Vaelin broke in, moving towards her, staring into her eyes with unmistakable intent. “Dressed!”
She blinked and stepped back, her eyes flicking to the sword he held and scowl fading as she gave a nod of understanding. “Of course.”
The North Guard sergeant who had charge of the night watch hurried into the stables, two poleaxe-bearing guardsmen at his back. “Trouble, my lord?” he asked.
Alum appeared behind the guardsmen, breathing heavily. He wasn’t an experienced rider and Vaelin had quickly outpaced him in his dash to the tower.
“You,” he said, nodding at one of the guardsmen and gesturing to Alum. “Give this man your poleaxe.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“Sergeant,” Vaelin went on. “Rouse Lord Orven, and the entire garrison. There is an intruder in the tower. It’s to be searched from top to bottom.”
The sergeant, a veteran of many years’ service, gave only the slightest hesitation before saluting smartly and turning about, voice raised to bark out the requisite orders.
“What’s happening?” Ellese asked, Vaelin glancing over to see her now mostly clothed, hands moving rapidly as she laced up her boots.
“You have your weapons?” Vaelin asked her.
“Always.”
“Good. Get them.”
“Your pardon, my lord.” Sehmon appeared at Ellese’s side, bowing low, voice strained with panicked contrition. “If I have offended in any way . . .”
“Oh, shut up, you!” Ellese snapped. She strapped on her belt with its two hunting knives, one long and the other short. “Here,” she said, handing him the shorter blade. “Might as well make yourself useful.”
“Stay close,” Vaelin told them, heading back to the courtyard.
“Where are we going?” Ellese asked, nocking an arrow to her bow.
Lohren’s words played through his mind. He’s come such a long way . . . “We need to check on our visitors.”
* * *
◆ ◆ ◆
Ambassador Kohn had at least received a quick death. He lay on the voluminous bed in the large chamber reserved for the most honoured guests, steel-grey beard stained red below the chin and the sheets on either side soaked with fresh blood.
A single cut, Vaelin saw, teasing aside the beard to peer at the wound, an almost surgical one-inch incision severing the main artery in the neck. His attendants hadn’t been so lucky. Four of them lay around the chamber, each body featuring at least three stab wounds to the chest. The blood sprayed onto the walls, and the general state of disorder indicated a frenzied slaughter.
“This all happened very quickly,” Alum said, surveying the carnage with a practised eye. “The old man was killed first, probably in full view of these others.” His foot nudged the hand of one of the slain attendants, the fist slack around the hilt of a knife. “No blood on the blade. They tried to fight, but it did them no good.”
“He’s not here,” Ellese said, moving from one corpse to another, face set in the predatory tension of the hunt. “The one with the scar.” She straightened and turned to Vaelin. “He knew me. That’s what I saw . . . what I failed to see. It’s him, isn’t it?”
“In here, my lord!” Lord Orven’s voice called from an adjoining chamber.
He found Orven crouched beside the bloodied, wheezing form of General Gian. Another three attendants lay close by, all dead. The general clutched his sword tight in his fist, Vaelin noting the red stain on the blade.
“You wounded him?” he asked in Chu-Shin, crouched at the man’s side.
“Leg . . .” Gian gasped, a cloud of blood accompanying the word. He convulsed, letting out a shout that was both enraged and despairing. “Known him since . . . he was a boy . . . practically raised the little bastard . . .”
“Send for Brother Kehlan,” Vaelin told Orven. “The assassin’s wounded in the leg. Have the guards look for a blood trail, and get the hounds out of the kennels.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“Wait . . .” Gian groaned, dropping his sword to reach for Vaelin’s cloak as he made to follow Orven from the chamber. “The weapons . . .”
“A concern for another time, sir,” Vaelin said. He tried to pry Gian’s hand loose but the man held on, staring up at him, a fierce plea for understanding in his gaze.
“We need them . . .” Gian convulsed again, a thick torrent rushing from his mouth to bathe the flagstones. He dragged air into his lungs and spoke on, fighting through the pain. “They’re coming, thousands upon thousands of the fuckers . . .”
“Who?” Vaelin leaned close as Gian’s voice descended into a ragged whisper. “Who is coming?”
The word emerged in a wet sibilant rasp, Vaelin seeing a familiar dimness creep into Gian’s eyes. “S-Stahlhast . . .” He groaned, a brief flare of life returning to the gaze he fixed on Vaelin. “Coming for us . . . then you . . . then everything . . .”
“General?”
Gian’s eyes continued to stare into his, but the glimmer of life had gone and his hand slipped from Vaelin’s cloak. “General of the Seventh Cohort of the Venerable Host,” Vaelin murmured, reaching out to close the man’s eyes. “I suspect you deserved a better end.”
“Blood here,” Alum called from the corridor outside. Vaelin cast a final look at the general’s corpse and left the chamber, finding the Moreska crouching to inspect a small red spatter on the flagstones.
“He’s bound the wound,” he said, fingers tracing through the still-wet blood. “This was moments ago.” His brows bunched in concentration as he rose, reaching out to pluck a torch from an iron bracket on the wall. “Strange,” he murmured, casting the light over the floor and the walls.
“What is it?” Vaelin asked.
“The blood, the mark it leaves, like a shooting star.” Alum paused to point at a single elongated drop on the wall. “Like the trail left by a wounded cheetah. But surely no man can move so fast.”
“This is not truly a man,” Vaelin said. He followed Alum to the end of the corridor where it met the tower’s western stairs. The hunter’s torch revealed more blood on the steps leading to the tower’s lower reaches but none leading up.
“Wait,” he said as Vaelin started down. “No more shooting stars, see?” His torchlight played on a series of small rounded drops.
“It’s a false trail to be sure, my lord.”
Vaelin glanced up to find Sehmon standing alongside Ellese. “Really?”
The youth blanched a little but straightened, finding the resolve to meet Vaelin’s gaze. “It’s an old trick,” he said. “One I learned young. People always expect you to go down,” he inclined his head at the stairs to the left, “when it’s usually better to go up. Rooftops are an outlaw’s friend.”
Vaelin gestured for two North Guard to follow the descending trail, then started up, eyes scanning the stonework for more blood but finding nothing. He paused at a doorway to an open walkway overlooking the North Guard barracks, but saw nothing of interest. He was about to move on when Alum stopped him with a touch to the arm, moving out onto the walkway to run his hand along the stones of the low battlement.
“Here,” he said, raising a hand to display a small drop of blood on his finger. “Still fresh.”
“Then where . . . ?” Vaelin’s gaze roamed the walkway. The door it led to guarded the tower’s secondary armoury and was consequently secured with no less than five locks. The wall above offered no handholds, nor did the wall below.
“Uncle,” Ellese said softly. Vaelin turned to see her raising her bow, eyes focused on something below. Following her gaze, he could see only the shadowed angles of the barracks roof. The tower was loud with alarm now, the shouts of the North Guard punctuated by the excited yapping of the hounds. Many torches had been lit and cast a shifting flicker of shadow that only made it harder to discern the object of Ellese’s interest. Then he saw it, a small shape crouched near the western edge of the barracks roof, as still as any statue but undoubtedly the form of a man. The barracks lay within the walls of the keep, but the gap between the roof and the outer battlement was an easy jump even for a man without Dark-born speed.
“I need him alive,” Vaelin told Ellese as she drew the bow.
He heard the mirthful anticipation in her voice as the arrow’s fletching brushed her cheek. “So do I.”
The shadow moved the same instant she loosed, becoming a blur in the flickering torchlight. Ellese let out a curse as her arrow careened off the roof tiles and spun away. She immediately nocked and drew again, body moving with a speed and skill that could match the best archers Vaelin had seen. The shadow, moving faster than any man ever could, streaked across the apex of the roof and leapt just as Ellese’s bow thrummed once more. Vaelin saw the shadow twist as the shaft struck home, the blurring form seeming to slow in midair as it tumbled, colliding with the outer battlement of the keep before plummeting to the ground beyond.
Vaelin jumped up onto the battlement, resisting the impulse to leap down onto the barracks roof, knowing all he would accomplish would be two shattered legs. Instead, he cupped his hands around his mouth and bellowed to the North Guard in the courtyard. “Get the hounds through the gate! Make sure they don’t kill him!”
He turned and leapt down from the battlement, descending the stairwell and emerging into the courtyard in a sprint, with Ellese and the others close behind. He ran through the gate, following the barking cacophony of the hounds until he caught sight of the pack. They were all Renfaelin hunting dogs, each standing three feet tall at the shoulder with long snouts and strong jaws. The pack whirled in a cluster about a blurred, thrashing shape. Dogs repeatedly darted forward in an attempt to bite their quarry, without apparent success. Vaelin saw three cast away by the blurred shape, the hounds tumbling through the air and coming to rest several yards distant with a pained whimper. But the pack was fifty strong and tireless.
As he drew closer Vaelin noticed how the shape became less blurred, resolving into a man. It blurred a few more times, casting another brace of dogs into the air, but came to a sudden halt as four hounds leapt in to clamp their jaws on its limbs.
“Easy now,” Sergeant Jolna called out as the pack closed in for the kill, the man in the centre of the pack jerking in pain as ever more teeth sank into his flesh. Jolna had held the position of Master of Hounds for many years, rearing all of these dogs since birth. They shrank from him as he waded amongst them with his cane whipping the air. The enraged snarls of the pack slowly descended into growls, though those holding the man continued to do so.
“Sorry, my lord,” Jolna said as Vaelin halted nearby. “Their blood’s truly up tonight. Not often they get to hunt all together like this.”
“And fine work they did, Sergeant,” Vaelin told him. He fixed his gaze on the assassin, the hounds parting as he moved closer. The broken stub of Ellese’s arrow jutted from the man’s shoulder, and a heavily stained bandage was wrapped around his thigh. He shuddered in suppressed pain as he raised his face, Vaelin finding it masked in a thick sheen of blood. He noted it was thickest around the eyes and nose, a clear sign of prolonged use of a gift. Despite the blood, Vaelin could make out the scar on the man’s forehead.
“Brother . . .” the assassin gasped, grimacing in pain before offering Vaelin a broad grin, his teeth gleaming red and white in the gloom. “It’s been far too long.” His eyes flicked to Ellese as she came to a halt at the edge of the pack. Despite the recent exertion her face was bleached of colour and devoid of expression as she stared at the scarred assassin.
“And my lovely daughter,” he said. “Have you missed me?”
She moved too fast for Vaelin to stop her, the hounds scattering as she charged, a scream of fury escaping her throat. The sound produced by her fist as it connected with the assassin’s face reminded Vaelin of a hammer striking hard stone. He managed to catch her wrist as she drew her arm back for another blow, pulling her into a close embrace.
“I am owed this!” She thrashed in his arms, legs kicking. “For what he did to my mother! What he did to me!”
“I know.” Vaelin’s arms tightened on her, holding her close until her struggles ceased and she subsided into sobs. “You’ll get what you’re owed, I promise,” he whispered, letting her fall to her knees before turning his gaze back on the assassin. He sagged in the hounds’ clutches, blood dripping from his bowed head. “But first I need to hear what he has to tell me.”
Vaelin nodded to Sergeant Jolna. “Tell Brother Kehlan he has another patient. And fetch chains. The heaviest you can find.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Ellese stationed herself outside the cell door and refused to leave whilst Brother Kehlan tended the captive’s wounds.
“You should sleep,” Vaelin told her, which earned him a withering glance.
“Could you?” she asked. “Knowing that thing is still alive and in t
his tower.” Her voice slipped into a sibilant hiss as she stared through the slat in the cell door. “He might wear a different face, speak with a different voice, but I see it now, that smile. He wore it the day he killed my mother.”
Vaelin eased her aside to peer through the slat. The man chained to the wall favoured Brother Kehlan with a grateful smile as he finished fixing a bandage on his wounded shoulder. Like Ellese, Vaelin had seen that smile before, on Barkus’s face when the mask finally slipped and all the malice of the Ally’s servant stood revealed. For years this thing had worn his brother’s form like a cloak, along with so many others: Ellese’s father, who had plotted with god-worshipping fanatics to orchestrate the downfall of Cumbrael; the blind shaman who brought the Bear People to the brink of extinction; the Volarian slave soldier who had taken Dahrena from him.
How many times, he wondered, will I have to kill it before it no longer feels as though I’m murdering my brother?
Brother Kehlan emerged shortly after, his lean features beset by a mix of disdain and curiosity. “I must say I find him strangely polite, my lord,” he told Vaelin. “Given his . . . nature.”
Vaelin had never told Kehlan the full details of Dahrena’s death. The healer had loved her like a daughter so it seemed kind to spare him, an impulse Vaelin was now grateful for. Had Kehlan known the creature in the cell was responsible for her demise, he would never have treated him, regardless of the strictures of the Fifth Order, which required all those in need to be cared for with equal diligence.
“Will he live?” Vaelin asked.
“If properly tended,” the brother replied. “However, he seems somewhat convinced that he won’t survive to see another dawn, and that his death is likely to be highly prolonged. Is that the case, my lord?”
Ellese let out a very small chuckle. “He’ll be lucky to see noon, never mind the dawn.”
Kehlan’s jaws bunched in annoyance but he kept his gaze on Vaelin. “My lord is fully aware of my concerns regarding torture . . .”
