Dawnbringer

Chapter Eight

NEAR SHADRUN-OF-THE-SNOWS

1585 DR-THE YEAR OF THE BLOODIED MANACLES

At the lip of the ridge two figures crouched. One was so close to the edge, she seemed almost suspended at the crux of falling, but she was rooted at the crest, still as the statue of an archer on the turrets of Belcaine Castle. Not a strand of her silver-marked hair, bound back in braids, stirred, and her face, which was marked with a wide pale band across her eyes like a mask, was impassive. Her hands were empty, and a greatsword was slung across her back.

At her shoulder a taller figure was poised, a golden image on one knee. His hair, steely in the late-afternoon sun that slanted through the pines clustered on the crest, hung free about his shoulders, and his face was also marked, with four thin stripes slanted and branched like a tiger’s over each cheek. He held a longbow gripped loosely in one hand.

Below them, in the fern-choked gully that bordered the road, there was a stir of hunched, muscular figures, and a clatter of weapons. Then all again was still.

Lakini felt Lusk tap her shoulder: once, twice, thrice, seven times. Seven brigands were hidden below. She nodded once. It matched her count. He withdrew his hand, and she heard a faint twang as he nocked an arrow to the string.

Down the road came the clatter of horses’ hooves and the sound of people calling to one another-a merchant caravan, about to venture into a trap. Lakini wondered at the rogues that lay in wait, about to ambush the caravan so close to the Sanctuary of Shadrun-of-the-Snows, but risky as it was, it might be a clever plan. In more hostile territory the guard would be on the alert, but here they were so close, they were probably relaxing and eager for a rest, a meal, and a soak in the mineral springs. And the thieves might not know two devas patrolled the slopes around the sanctuary.

The company came into view around a distant bend. Her sharp eyes saw that the four riders in front were clustered together, instead of spaced out so they could watch for attack from the side as well as in front. She wondered if the rear guard was slackly organized.

Internally, Lakini shook her head at their folly. If they had any experience at all, they should know to be vigilant always, even when they thought they’d reached the heart of safety. If they didn’t have experience, their employers were foolish to put their lives and goods in their hands.

Some would say they deserved their fate. Lakini wouldn’t. She reached back for her greatsword and drew it, slowly so the metal wouldn’t ring out against the scabbard. At the same time, Lusk nocked a second arrow to his string.

The jingle of reins could be heard clearly in the cool air, and there was the faint but unmistakable sound of a woman’s laughter. Five horsemen in blue-gray livery led the group, still ranged in their sloppy formation. A wagon drawn by a matched pair, heavy-boned draft horses by the look of them, brought up the rear, flanked by two more guards. Several riders, men and women both, clustered between the wagon and the foreguard, and one, a slight figure in a long, dull red dress, had dismounted and led her bay by the reins. Lakini watched while she bent and plucked some stalks of lupine by the side of the road.

Yes, she would make it a point to have a word with those guards-if they survived the experience. It was foolishness to allow a traveler under one’s protection to stray by the side of the road in unknown territory.

She flexed her hands around the worn leather of the grip, waiting. The birdsong stilled and each second stretched impossibly long. Each step the horses took seemed interminable, and she entered that state of perfect awareness of everything around her: the rough bark of the twig that pressed into the leather of her legging against her knee; the smell of the leaves the heavy feet of the brigands below had crushed; the body heat of her companion behind her. If she concentrated, she could hear the raspy breathing of one of the rogues. Either he was very nervous or had a head cold.

The feeling, the result of waiting, ready for battle, many times over many lifetimes, was familiar.

The guards in front were almost beneath them before they sprung the ambush. With fierce shouts, three of the brigands leaped into the road. The horse of one of the blue-clad guards squealed and reared, more from its rider’s panicked reaction than anything else. The centermost man, a burly, bearded fellow who looked older than the rest and might have been in charge, drew his sword and advanced on the attackers.

Three more rogues charged from the ditch, leaving one behind to cover them. Lakini leaped from her perch, lifting her sword overhead in a two-handed grip. She felt the wind of Lusk’s two arrows as they flew by her left shoulder, and an instant later she heard the hiss of their passage. They hit the back and shoulder of one of the attackers, who screamed and crumpled into the road. Lakini landed on both feet behind the centermost rogue. Just as she did, he lifted his arm, took aim, and a crossbow bolt pierced the chest of the burly guard.

Using the force of her landing, Lakini brought her blade down slantwise between the neck and shoulder of the man before her. The thick metal chopped into the soft flesh, almost severing the spine. Over his head her eyes met those of the mounted guard. The short, wicked shaft of the bolt quivered in the center of his chest; it had pierced the leather and mail he wore like a pin through paper. His face held nothing but astonishment. He stared at her, uncomprehending, and groped blindly for the shaft with one gloved hand.

He looked as if he was about to tell her something, and a scarlet trickle bubbled from the corner of his mouth. With no alteration of expression he slid off his jittery horse, lying unmoving in the dust of the road.

She tore her eyes away from his body as another brigand leaped at her, slicing at her with a curved, eastern-style blade. She couldn’t pull her greatsword from the body quickly enough; she maintained her grip with her left hand and drew her long-bladed dagger with the right, deflecting the light blade as it bore down on her. Letting her blade slide down his sword to the hilt, she flicked the tip of the dagger in a circular motion, slicing the man’s wrist. He jumped back with an oath, grasping the wound with his free hand. Blood spurted between his fingers. She hoped she’d cut through a sinew.

Putting her foot on the first man’s back, she pulled the sword free, using her left hand to slash at her opponent with the same movement. He stumbled backward.

“Meddling bitch,” he snarled. “I’ll have that mask off you, and teach you to use parlor tricks in a fair fight.” He had the protruding lower canines of a half-orc.

Lakini grinned and flipped her dagger, grasping it by the blade.

“Mind your manners,” she replied, and tossed the dagger with a strong arm and a sure aim. It pieced the half-orc’s throat with a satisfying thunk. He staggered backward, his crimson-streaked hands clutching at his neck.

Lakini glanced behind her and saw another of the brigands lying limp at the lip of the ditch, Lusk’s arrows bristling from his body. Lusk kneeled by his side, making sure he was dead.

Three of the brigands remained. Lakini saw that two of the mounted guards had recovered control of their horses and were attempting to box in one of the attackers, a female tall and bulky enough to be another half-orc. The fourth blue-clad guard, who had slid off his horse to check the body of the burly man, was now engaged in a desperate clashing of swords with another rogue. It was clear that the guard was formally trained and had the advantage of youth, and that the brigand was older and had the inferior weapon. But Lakini’s keen eye told her the brigand had years of fighting experience under his belt-street fighting and raids, fights where the goal was to overpower, to draw blood and kill, not to score points under an instructor’s eye in an exercise yard. If Lakini had the inclination to gamble, she’d bet the guard had never fought for his life before.

Lakini retrieved her dagger from her opponent’s throat with a deft twist, the big ruby on the hilt smooth to her palm. Wiping the blade clean on the brigand’s shoulder, she considered interfering but decided to let the boy fight it out. If he lived, he’d learn several valuable lessons. Never let one’s attention slide on the trail. Make sure all enemies are accounted for before succoring the wounded or attending the dead. Never give up the advantage of horseback before necessary.

That left one rogue unaccounted for. Quickly she sheathed her dagger and gripped the sword in both hands, scanning the scene before her. The caravan was in chaos. Horses and riders milled about, calling out in confusion, and the wagon was stopped aslant the road. One of the mounted rear guard had forced his horse through the shambles and joined his companions in trying to corner the half-orc, while the other stayed behind, frantically looking around in case of an attack to the rear.

Lakini spotted the seventh brigand. The girl in the garnet dress had lost her mare’s reins and, knee-deep in purple lupine and yellow flowers, stood by the side of the road, looking unsure whether to flee on foot or to pursue her mount. The rogue was charging straight for her, holding a long knife at his side. She stared at him wide-eyed, her mouth an “O,” frozen in shock.

One of the mounted travelers, a tallish woman perched sidesaddle on her gelding, saw what Lakini had seen.

“Kestrel!” she shouted, and, wheeling her horse away from the confusion in the center of the road, she urged her horse toward the girl and her attacker.

Behind her, Lakini heard Lusk mutter an oath. The mounted woman came between the deva and the rogue, and he was unable to release his arrow.

The girl in the red dress, Kestrel, backed away from the man with the knife. In her right hand she held a bunch of lupines, their purple blooms incongruously cheerful, and she raised them as if she were going to strike him down with her bouquet. He reached for her arm and raised his knife at the same time. Lakini raised her sword to her shoulder and ran at them. She couldn’t be sure of her aim with the dagger, not at this range and not with the mounted woman between them.

The man seized the girl by the wrist and jerked her forward. The mounted woman wheeled her horse about so violently, Lakini was surprised she didn’t fall off. The mounted woman uttered an oath and slashed at the man with her riding whip.

Startled, the man also swore in his turn and, without releasing Kestrel, turned and lashed at the woman with the long knife. He might have meant to slice at her leg, but he cut into the gelding’s side. The horse whinnied shrilly and shied away from him, while the woman fought to stay mounted.

He turned back to the terrified girl and raised his knife, streaked with the horse’s blood, once more. Two strides and Lakini would have him.

In that instant, the black-feathered shaft of an arrow sprouted from the man’s back. His head flung back and his spine arched, but he still held Kestrel by the wrist. The knife slipped from his fingers, and he flopped to the ground right at her feet. Kestrel wrenched her arm out of his grip as he fell. She looked ahead and flinched back, her eyes wide. Lakini turned to see Lusk before them, another arrow ready, pointed straight at the girl. He lowered his bow to cover the man sprawled before her, but seeing no movement, loosened the gut string.

A glance told Lakini the girl was unhurt. The other woman had subdued her horse and dismounted, her blue dress streaked with the gelding’s blood.

Lakini turned to survey the situation at the center of the road. The rear guard, armed with a pike, managed to knock the half-orc’s sword away, but she had drawn a wicked-looking dagger and was slashing at their horses’ heads. Lakini clucked her tongue in annoyance. It should not be such a task for three horsemen to take down someone on foot, even if it was a half-orc.

She cupped her left hand at her mouth. “You, with the crossbow! Yes, that thing slung on your back. It has a use.” The guard-like the others, little more than a boy-threw her a bewildered look.

“Don’t look so confused!” seconded the pikeman, who seemed to know what he was doing. “Shoot her in the leg, and get this over with.”

The young guard nodded, urged his horse back a few paces, and retrieved the crossbow, inserted a bolt, cocked it, and promptly sent it into the ground a man’s-length from the half-orc’s foot. Lakini stifled a groan and looked for the guard engaged one-on-one with the rogue.

He had managed to survive thus far. Blood streamed down his cheek, collar, and blue tunic from a cut beneath his eye, and he had a desperate look. The brigand was pressing him hard and Lakini was about to step in, when the guard’s stance shifted slightly and the panic vanished from his face, replaced by an expression of intense concentration.

Lakini paused, interested. Training and more, a fighter’s instinct, had taken over for the frightened boy, struggling for his life. Anyone who might make the warrior’s art his life’s work experienced this moment, being at once fully engaged with the opponent and detached from the battle, able to see it from all angles. The boy might make a fighter yet.

Behind them, she saw Lusk nock an arrow and look at her inquiringly. She gave him a slight shake of her head, and he nodded.

The guard let the brigand swing high and came, swift and deadly, under his opponent’s guard, slashing his sword across his midriff. With a piercing scream the man staggered back, clutching his belly. Without giving quarter, the guard swung at his foe’s shoulder, laying him down in the road.

Panting, with his sword raised, the guard stared down at the still body of the rogue. His face was once more that of a bewildered boy. As Lakini approached, he lifted his face to look at her, and he let the tip of his weapon fall.

In that moment the brigand, still gripping his sword, drew a last dying breath and with a convulsive movement lunged at the young guard’s leg. The blade was a handbreadth from his knee when Lakini kicked the rogue’s arm, deflecting the blow, which went wide. At the same time she plunged her greatsword into the base of the outlaw’s neck, delivering the coup de grace. Facedown in the dirt, the man convulsed, sighed, and was still.

There was a strangled cry from the cluster of horses as a crossbow bolt hamstrung the half-orc. She fell to the ground heavily, and the guard with the pike kicked the knife from her hand. Crouched on her hands and knees, she snarled ferociously, until the pikeman brought the butt of his weapon down hard on the small of her back, pinning her in the dust of the road while the other two bound her arms to her sides.

Lakini pulled her sword free and crouched, carefully wiping the blood from the blade with the dead man’s tattered sleeve and sheathing it only when it was clean. When she stood, she was a headspan taller than the young guard, who still held his sword as if expecting an attack.

“What’s your name?” asked Lakini as gently as she could.

The boy swallowed. “An … Ansel.” He looked up at her and frowned, trying to puzzle her out. “Ansel Chuit, ma’am.” He started to shake.

She made her voice stern. “Clean your blade, Ansel Chuit. Now. Never sheathe it soiled.”

He blinked at her, and his trembling ceased. Mechanically he pulled the edge of his shirt free from under his tunic and wiped the sword.

“Your first fight?”

He sheathed his weapon and straightened. “I was trained at the Three Fists Academy in Nonthal. First in my class at free combat.”

She cut him off. “Playing at swords. Your first kill, then.”

He slumped. “Yes.”

“You did well. You lived. Perhaps next time you’ll learn to guard what you’re hired to protect. But not bad, for the first. You’ll have a lovely scar to remember it by.”

Ansel felt his face as if he hadn’t noticed the wound. In the heat of battle he probably hadn’t.

“Don’t worry about it. It’s clotting up. They’ll take care of that at Shadrun.”

“Shadrun-of-the-Snows,” he whispered. “We’re almost there, aren’t we? Captain Nimor …” He glanced at the big man who lay with the bristles of the crossbow bolt protruding from his chest. “He said it was close, and we could relax.”

Lakini frowned. “He was wrong.”

Having retrieved her mare, Kestrel stood at the gelding’s head, stroking it to keep it calm while the woman in blue who had come to her aid examined its side. The gelding shifted restlessly but was otherwise still.

The guards slung the captured half-orc, trussed like a goat for the roasting pit, over their dead captain’s horse. The rear guard who’d come to the aid of his fellows was taking command, barking orders at the others to flank the sides of the road and look out for more attackers. Lusk, still holding his lowered bow at the ready, came to her, looking intently at the trees on either side of the road and sniffing the air.

“There may be more,” he told her, barely sparing a glance for Ansel, who looked from his striped face to Lakini’s in puzzlement. He had probably just realized the band across her eyes was not a mask.

She nodded. The faster they got the caravan to the sanctuary, the better. The rear guard with the pike, having marshaled everyone into some sort of order and remounted, urged his horse next to them and nodded.

“From Shadrun?” he asked. His face was lined and he had his own set of scars. His eyes, alert, flickered from them to the fallen brigands to the forest around them. He knows what he’s doing, thought Lakini. Why wasn’t he in charge?

“Lakini and Lusk, in the service of the sanctuary,” replied Lusk. “It’s one hour’s ride up the mountain path. We’ll stay with you and come back with horses for the bodies. We should hurry. We haven’t seen any others, but there might be another attack regardless.”

“Kaarl vor Beguine,” said the guard, and Lakini swiftly searched her memory for various naming customs and determined that Kaarl was a descendant of an illegitimate but acknowledged child of a Beguine scion.

“You’ve come from Turmish as part of the wedding negotiations?” she asked, and he nodded.

“I’m acting captain now, I suppose,” he continued, with a glance at his dead predecessor. He pursed his lips. “By the helm, what folly. I thought him too old a campaigner to let his guard down like that; to let the men play at ladies’ afternoon stroll, without a thought of the danger. I spoke to him of it, and he told me to get behind and not play nursemaid. Almost got the young mistress killed, if not for your skill with the bow, sir.”

He shook his head and spotted Ansel, still staring at the odd pair. “Wake up, Chuit. Catch your mount and fall in.” Kaarl vor Beguine gave the field of slaughter an appraising glance. “Pretty efficient, for holy folk,” he remarked.

Ansel obeyed, and Kaarl vor Beguine trotted over to the two women-the girl in the red dress must be Kestrel Beguine, betrothed to Arna Jadaren. The woman in blue, with the injured horse, looked too young to be her mother or governess and too self-assured to be a servant, and she wasn’t dressed as a bodyguard. Perhaps she was her sister. She turned from examining the horse to speak to Kaarl, making emphatic motions with her hands.

“Yes, Mistress Ciari,” Lakini heard the guard say.

Lakini stood beside Lusk. “Notice anything?” she said.

Lusk nodded. “Of course. It’s not customary for a raiding party to be in uniform,” he said, nudging the man at his feet with his foot. Lakini winced internally. It was against her nature to disrespect the dead, no matter the path they took in life. It used to be against Lusk’s nature, as well. But increasingly she noticed that her deva companion seemed to cherish the divine spark that existed in all living creatures less and less, and to regard his fellow creatures with a cynical air.

She would not think less of him. Lusk was her dagger-mate, as the knife at her belt and his proved, and had been for a matter of lifetimes. But it did distress her.

“Sage tunics, with a chevron on the sleeve,” she said. “The livery of House Jadaren.”

“Attacking the scion on House Beguine, on her way to negotiate her marriage to Arna Jadaren,” said Lusk. “Interesting, to say the least.”

“And I’ve heard nothing of the Jadaren party’s arrival,” said Lakini. “Curious that they’re not here yet.”

Again, she sensed rather than saw Lusk’s reaction to the name “Jadaren,” so small that it might have been merely his blinking at a gnat near his face.

“Very curious,” was all he said, securing his bow in its place across his back, and Lakini wondered if she had imagined it.

Under Kaarl vor Beguine’s urging, the caravan gathered into some sort of order and turned from the road to the winding path that led to Shadrun-of-the-Snows, following Lusk as he led them on foot. Before she fell in behind them, Lakini waited for the girl in the red dress to pass by, leading her bay mare. This must be Kestrel Beguine, soon to wed an enemy of her House and make him a friend. Lakini had the impression of intelligent green-brown eyes in a smooth, olive face. Kestrel still held her bouquet of lupines, and gave Lakini a hesitant smile. She slowed her horse.

“Thank you,” she said in a low voice. “You, and your … partner …” She indicated Lusk’s back. “I’m sure that man would’ve killed me. His face …” She shuddered. “I was foolish to dismount. I thought it was safe. I know better now.”

“You’ll be safe at the sanctuary,” said Lakini.

The girl glanced at the place where the late captain lay. One of his men had thrown a sage green cloak over the body. Her green-brown eyes filled with tears.

“Poor Captain Nimor,” she said. “He used to lead me on his horse when I was a child, and he a guardsman. My uncle will be especially saddened. They were close friends.”

“He didn’t suffer,” said Lakini. “I saw it, and I promise you that. Quick and clean.”

He had also died very surprised, even after the fight began, a fact that made Lakini suspicious. But this wasn’t the time to make mention of that.

The woman in blue was close behind, gentling her gelding. The animal was rolling its eyes nervously at the vociferous objections of the half-orc prisoner to being tied on the back of a horse. Lakini doubted the horse thought much of the idea, either.

“Can any at the Shadrun see to Goldstone’s wound?” The woman addressed Lakini, but she was clearly concerned about the animal, so the deva took no offense.

“We have a stable-mistress skilled in tending animals,” she said, studying the woman’s face. She was taller and more solidly made than Kestrel, with determined eyebrows and a redder tinge to her hair, but her features were similar enough that Lakini thought she must, indeed, be the girl’s sister. “She’ll treat your Goldstone well.”

The woman nodded.

“We are much beholden to you,” she said in her straightforward way, gathering her skirts and tugging the gelding forward. “Thanks to the incompetence of our guards, my sister was almost killed this day.”

As she let the caravan precede her up the slope and fell in after the wagon passed, Lakini wondered. If the rogue intended to kill the Beguine girl, a long knife was a poor choice. It was more likely he would put it at her throat and take her hostage. He had tried to grasp her wrist, after all.

Was it coincidence that it was Kestrel he had targeted? Standing by the side of the road, was she the easiest mark? Or did it have something to do with her betrothed state? Many would profit from this proposed alliance, but many, too, would profit from the chaos that would result if it fell through.

What of the sage green livery? Were they ex-Jadarens, gone rogue? Had they plotted to meet the Beguine emissaries as friends but changed their plans midway?

And then there was that Captain Nimor, that expression on his face of surprise and more-betrayal.

It bothered her to think of Kestrel Beguine as a target. She liked the girl’s face.

Bithesi met the party and took charge of Goldstone personally, examining his wound while the children who helped her in the stables saw to the rest of the horses. As the simple stone buildings of Shadrun-of-the-Snows came into view, a messenger came to first Lusk, then Lakini, telling them that Sanwar Beguine, brother of Nicol-and Kestrel’s uncle-had arrived in the morning, while the devas were on patrol in the woods at the base of the mountain, and eagerly awaited the arrival of his nieces.

Sanwar Beguine regarded the bodies laid in a row outside the courtyard before the sanctuary.

“The livery of House Jadaren,” he said, his voice shaking in rage. “They dare set an ambush for my niece, on her way to make an alliance with them! Kestrel!” He turned to the girl next to him, who surveyed the bloodstained corpses with a pale but resolute face. “You see the madness in this plan now, I hope, even if your father does not.”

Lakini studied the man’s face-handsome, and indolent in a way she suspected was just for show. She wondered again why he hadn’t made part of the caravan.

He had said that once the traveling party had left, he feared treachery and had a premonition of an assassination attempt, and so had ridden to the sanctuary on his own, risking the dangers of a solitary journey out of love for his niece.

Commendable enough, Lakini thought. But it was strange he had missed the caravan along the way and had chosen instead a back route to reach Shadrun-of-the-Snows before Kestrel and her escort.

Instead of replying to Sanwar directly, Kestrel left her sister’s side and crouched beside the body of the man Ansel Chuit had killed. She took a bit of sage green cloth gingerly between her fingertips. Ansel, having taken Lakini’s lecture to heart, stood close by her side, his hands on the hilt of his newly bloodied weapon. His gaze flicked across the gathered folk, which included those who dwelt at the sanctuary, as well as curious pilgrims. Among them was Diamar, the Vashtun’s right hand. Long ago he had given up family name, status, and inheritance to serve at Shadrun-of-the-Snows and would eventually take on the duties of his master.

Better Ansel take his duties too seriously than neglect them, thought Lakini, as the young guard glanced at the forest stretched below them, at the white-marbled entrance to the Great Hall of the sanctuary, and at the human and half-orc bodies as if their deaths were an elaborate ruse and they were likely to jump up and fight again. If he lived long enough, he would learn balance.

“This cloth is terribly worn,” Kestrel said. “Look. The seam is torn halfway up and has been repaired with crude twine.”

She rubbed the tunic between her forefinger and thumb. “And it has a strange feel to it, as though it’s been churned in the washing like work clothes.”

She straightened and rubbed her hand on her skirt, frowning in concentration.

“What of it?” said Sanwar. “It’s unsurprising that a crew of brigands would take poor care of their clothing.”

“Unsurprising for brigands,” broke in Lakini. “But what of the guards you hire in your household? How do you clothe them? I’ll wager their uniforms are kept in good condition. And likewise I wager House Jadaren is no different.”

“Our worn livery is stripped of its insignia and sold down-market,” said Kestrel. “I know, because I keep the records. I wonder if those chevrons are real.”

“They’re not.”

Kestrel started as a slender young man, perhaps in his mid-twenties, with a thin face and mouse brown hair, spoke behind her. He grinned at her startled expression and made a low bow.

“Arna Jadaren, at your service, my lady,” he said.

Ansel started and drew his sword a few inches from its scabbard. Lakini managed to catch his eye, and at her fierce look he reddened and let it slide back, taking his too-ready hand from the hilt as he did so.

Lakini didn’t miss how Sanwar Beguine, flushed with anger and sputtering at the appearance of the Jadaren heir, looked eagerly at the young guard when he seized his weapon, and frowned when at Lakini’s look he stood down. An attack on Arna Jadaren by those sworn to House Beguine would be disastrous at this point. Lakini was reasonably sure Sanwar knew that.

Kestrel rose, looking at Arna with a puzzled expression.

“But … I’ve seen you before,” she said, her voice uncertain.

Ciari strode over to the young man and peered closely at his face. “As have I,” she said flatly. “On market day in Nonthal, with the Druit boy with the cantrips.”

Arna turned beet red as she put her hands on her hips and lowered her brows at him. “Just what did you mean by that, sneaking under false pretenses into my town? You’re lucky you weren’t found out.”

“In my defense, fairlady,” said Arna, with all the dignity he could muster, “I never said I wasn’t who I am.”

He glanced at Kestrel’s bewildered face with an abashed smile. Then he made a deep, formal bow to Ciari.

“Forgive my curiosity, Mistress Kestrel,” he said, “but when the opportunity to see the maiden that might become my bride arose, I couldn’t resist.”

Ciari looked from the back of his reddened neck to her sister, and back again. At her silence, Arna looked up from his bow, puzzled. She had turned as red as he and made a sputtering noise not unlike the hiss of a kettle.

Arna turned to Lakini, bewildered.

“She’s not going to hit me, is she?” he said.

“She might,” the deva replied.

Ciari didn’t hit him, bursting into laughter instead. Her sister went to her and placed a solicitous arm around her shoulders, a rueful smile playing on her lips.

Arna blinked. “Perhaps someone might tell me the joke?” he asked mildly.

Ansel Chuit had taken his hand from the hilt of his weapon.

“It might have something to do with the fact that you were addressing Mistress Ciari, not Kestrel,” he said, somewhat tartly.

Arna opened his mouth, considered what to say, then shut it with a snap.

“I’m sorry for your disappointment,” said Kestrel, as her sister quieted, “but it’s no more than you deserve for trying to spy us out in the first place.”

She sounded amused, but there was an edge of hurt to her voice.

“I’m not disappointed …” sputtered Arna. He stopped and turned to Ciari. “That is, I wouldn’t … You’re both very …”

He gasped and looked a little like a fish, unable to stop an expression of delight from passing over his face.

“Get over yourself, Jadaren,” said Ciari, pushing Kestrel toward him. “You well know you’re not man enough for me.”

Arna recovered himself and inclined his head to her. “I have no doubt you are correct, Mistress Ciari,” he said.

He turned to the rest of the party.

“My apologies for my early and unceremonious arrival,” he said, acutely aware of Kestrel standing beside him. With an abashed expression he addressed Sanwar. “And to you, sir, for not knowing who you were when you arrived and making your acquaintance.”

Sanwar found his tongue. He was as red as Arna, but with anger instead of embarrassment.

“Am I to understand that you came to Nonthal to spy upon my niece, to see if she was fair enough for you?” he said. “And that you came by stealth to a place of negotiation, seeking to find the advantage of the ground?”

He spat on the ground at Arna’s feet, drawing a low protest from Kestrel. “It shouldn’t surprise me, considering that you sent your men to ambush my niece.”

Lakini tensed, feeling Lusk do the same. But before they could interfere, a voice came from the crowd.

“Arna Jadaren is a guest in this place.” Diamar, clad in a simple white robe and barefoot, stepped forward. In response to his voice, which was at once mild and full of authority, everyone stepped back a pace.

“I gave my name freely when I arrived,” returned Arna, angry in his turn. “I came without guards, only a representative empowered to negotiate for my family. It’s not my fault you didn’t inquire after the guests of the sanctuary when you arrived-as quietly as I did, I notice.”

“Calm yourself, Uncle,” said Kestrel, moving between the two men. “He has no reason to harm me. And he was merely curious.”

Sanwar was still fuming. “So, Jadaren, this ambush was no plan of yours?”

Ciari broke in before her uncle could speak again, and her voice was forceful but not accusing. “I assure you, sir, and my lady, neither I nor my House would contemplate such a thing,” said Arna, keeping his temper in check. “As Mistress-as Kestrel suspected, these uniforms are castoffs, and these chevrons are nothing like those our guard wear. Ours are crafted as a piece, while these”-with his toe he indicated the scraps of fabric on the half-orc’s sleeve-“are bits of ribbon sewn directly onto the cloth. They’re also the wrong color.”

He gathered his courage and looked directly at Kestrel. “I assist in the record keeping as well.”

A corner of her mouth quirked up. “Do you also decide what to do with the bad plums?” she said.

“I’ve given orders that they be made into plum butter,” he replied.

Kestrel placed a tentative hand on his sleeve. “Shall I give you my source for brandy?”

“I would be grateful.”

At a gesture from Diamar, two of the Beguine guards manhandled the surviving rogue, her arms bound tightly at her back. She was cocooned in yards of rope. Kaarl vor Beguine stood nearby with his pike.

“Sanwar Beguine has a quick temper at the best of times,” he confided to Lusk and Lakini. “And Nimor, Captain of the Guard, was his picked man.” He nodded at the shrouded body that lay apart from the brigands. “He has no love for anything Jadaren at this moment.”

Sanwar pushed past Diamar to confront the half-orc, who still wore the tattered tunic that mimicked the Jadaren livery.

“Out with it,” he growled. “Who sent you? Which of the Jadarens? Bron?” He indicated Arna with a jerk of his head. “Or was it this upstart?”

“Look,” breathed Lusk into Lakini’s ear.

“I saw,” she mouthed back.

During his tirade, Sanwar had made a gesture with his left hand-a closed fist with the thumb outside along the knuckles, and then a shift to a fist with the thumb enclosed. It was at an angle where only the half-orc-and the two of them-could see it.

Lakini didn’t know what it meant, exactly, but she knew what it was. She and Lusk were very familiar with the various kinds of hand signals used to communicate in secret. She’d never seen this one, but she could guess-Keep it inside. Don’t reveal the truth.

The brigand grinned at Sanwar, her lower tusks protruding over her upper lip. “Who and what you are don’t mean a thing to us, worm,” she said in the guttural accent of her kind. “We were just looking for the easy pickings.”

“Liar,” thundered Sanwar.

Lakini and Lusk saw his left hand move again. This time the fingers curved half-open, with the thumb tapping the palm.

More coin for you, Lakini guessed.

“Sir,” said Diamar, touching Sanwar gently on the shoulder. “Her kind’s not susceptible to angry words and threats. Let me try.”

Sanwar’s mouth twisted, but he stepped aside, not without a quick, meaningful look at the brigand. Lakini thought she saw the brute nod briefly in response. No matter. Diamar would have the truth out of her.

The Vashtun’s Second pulled his homespun cowl back from his head and stood before the half-orc, his face completely blank. The brigand threw him a look of utter contempt and tried to pull away from her guards. They both hung on, and Kaarl prodded her meaningfully over the kidneys.

Diamar closed his eyes a long moment and suddenly opened them. They had the particularly blank look that Lakini had noticed in the Vashtun.

The half-orc stopped struggling and, ignoring the pike at her back, seemed to relax, returning the Second’s blank look. When Diamar spoke, his voice seemed to come from a long way away.

“What did you mean to do?” Diamar asked, almost offhandedly.

The half-orc opened her mouth, then shut it with a snap, pulling her left-hand guard almost off his feet. Diamar raised his hand, palm out, and closed his eyes again, his forehead creased in concentration. The half-orc relaxed again.

The Second repeated the question.

“We meant to kill the guards and take the girls,” she replied, with a voice as detached and unemotional as Diamar’s had been. “Kill the others if it was convenient, and if we cared to. We could take the goods. But the girls … not them. They were worth more alive than dead. Let the older one go if she struggled and take the little one. Especially make sure the older guard in blue, the fat man, make sure he was dead.”

“Were you working for the Jadarens?” Diamar asked.

The half-orc furrowed her brow, as if puzzled. “I shouldn’t tell you,” she said, a little indignantly. “You know it’s a secret.”

“I told you it was the Jadarens,” snarled Sanwar, glaring at Arna, who looked at Kestrel beside him and shrugged, shaking his head in denial.

“Let the man do his work, Uncle,” said Kestrel, with some asperity.

Diamar’s tone was that of a kindly teacher to a promising but recalcitrant student. “It’s better if you tell me, you know that.” His eyes narrowed, as if he were shuffling through the brigand’s mind as he would through loose papers on an untidy desk. “Garush. That’s your name. It’s easier if you tell me. Whom are you working for, Garush, yourself, or the Jadarens?”

While both the Vashtun and his Second’s ability to shake the truth from someone was always a matter of fascination for Lakini, she always had the unpleasant sensation that her mind was being probed as well when she was in their presence, as if some remote, utterly alien entity were examining the inside of her skull like a curiosity. The Vashtun had almost entirely disappeared from any public appearance, and she must admit it was a relief, for she fancied she could see some other consciousness, infinitely aware yet infinitely distant, looking out of his eyes. She preferred dealing with Diamar, but lately she had the same feeling when he spoke to her or to Lusk.

“The girl was wearing a red dress,” remarked the now-docile Garush. She glanced at Kestrel and she flinched back. “He was right about that. Don’t hurt her much, he said.”

“Who, Garush?”

The half-orc’s eyes bulged, and her entire body convulsed so violently that she pulled free of her startled guard, sprawling to the ground.

“Can’t … breathe-” she managed, and struggled to her knees.

Diamar’s palm was still raised, and his expression was bemused. With a single smooth movement, Kaarl cut the ropes binding Garush’s arms down the middle with the point of his pike. Her hands free, the half-orc grasped at her throat. Her face was purple now, and a trickle of blackish blood trailed from her nostril.

The movement was small, but Lakini saw it. The fingers of Sanwar’s left hand were flickering rapidly. A leather cord, studded with intricate knots, was looped around his wrist. As Garush’s mouth stretched open in a silent scream, Sanwar slipped his hand underneath his tunic, but the movement of his fingers continued.

Lakini tensed, ready to stop Sanwar, but paused when she felt Lusk’s strong hand circle her upper arm.

“It’s not our quarrel, Cserhelm,” he whispered. “Let the merchants find their own way.”

“He’s killing the witness,” Lakini hissed back. “Are you seriously suggesting we let that happen?”

“Perhaps he is. Perhaps he’s trying to signal to her again. Perhaps it’s your imagination. It doesn’t concern us.”

With a final shudder, Garush fell over. Her hands remained locked about her throat, and a bluish tongue protruded from between the swollen, purple lips. Kestrel turned away, and Lakini noticed that Arna had his hand on her shoulder.

Diamar looked down at the half-orc’s body, sprawled between the nonplussed guards, who looked back at Kaarl as if asking him what they should do now. Kaarl laid his pike on the ground and kneeled by the body, gently loosing the huge, battle-scarred hand from the half-orc’s throat and forcing the jaw open. He took his short, practical knife and pressed the back of the protruding tongue down, peering as best he could down Garush’s maw.

“There’s nothing down her throat that I can see, sir,” Kaarl told the Vashtun’s Second, closing the mouth and wiping his knife on his leggings. “Nothing that’s not supposed to be there already. If she was killed by magic, it was an invisible sort.”

“Interesting,” remarked Diamar, in his dispassionate way. If he was angry that some sorcerer had killed on the very steps of the Shadrun sanctuary, he didn’t show it. “It does appear very clear that House Jadaren, in its official capacity, had nothing to do with this unfortunate attack.”

“I will swear under any penalty we did not,” declared Arna.

“A pity we couldn’t find out more,” said Diamar, pulling the cowl back over his shaved head and turning to the Shadrun’s entrance. “But to many who plague our guests, crime is its own reward, just as our gift of sanctuary is ours.”

Lakini was tempted to call out to him, to accuse Sanwar of killing the witness, but she forbore. It was a relief to have the oppressive feeling of something watching and waiting gone from her mind. And Lusk was right. It was none of their concern.

Kill the big guard, the one in charge, Garush had said, referring to Sanwar’s picked man. This was the one who had told the younger guards to relax, that they were within the realm of safety now, that there was no need to be alert. This was the one who had placed his more experienced guards at the rear, knowing an attack would come from the front.

This was the one who must have realized, the moment before the crossbow bolt had killed him, that he’d been betrayed-betrayed by an old friend.

She let her gaze trail over Sanwar Beguine, now in intent conversation with Diamar and Ciari, probably making his demands about the conditions of the negotiations Shadrun-of-the-Snows had condescended to host. The knotted leather cord had vanished, but a light sheen of sweat remained on his brow. As if he knew someone had noticed, he mopped his forehead with his sleeve.

Lusk was right. It would complicate matters to make an accusation, and their sworn duty was the protection of the sanctuary and its visitors from the dangers that were all too common in Faerun.

Diamar had turned to lead the others into the sanctuary. As he looked back, casually looking at the folk ranged behind him, his gaze brushed across hers. She felt something, gentle but insistent, touch her mind.

Get out of my head, she growled internally, with an annoyance she had not allowed herself to feel before. Like a sea anemone touched roughly, the invisible tendril withdrew.

“Your friend-the Clan Druit boy with the cantrips-did he come with you?”

Startled, Arna glanced up at Ciari. “No. He’s on family business.”

“A shame. I liked him. Tell him to see me about investing in the venture once the knife-sharpening cantrip’s improved.”

“I think he’s planning to,” said Arna, masking his surprise. On impulse he went on. “He hasn’t seen me in some tendays. I think he’s been jealous. And he’s been writing poetry of late. I think he’ll be very glad to hear of this … unexpected development.”

Ciari grinned and patted his cheek. “That’s my boy,” she said.

In the quarters assigned him by the sanctuary’s steward, Sanwar Beguine raged internally. The plan, which had seemed so foolproof before, was a disaster. When he had shared his dismay at his brother’s insane determination to ally the House to their longtime enemy, Harilpina Andula had been sympathetic and referred him to a company of mercenaries that had proved useful to her in several situations requiring both force and secrecy. He had met with Garush and her crew, supplied the cast-off uniforms, and instructed them to kill whomever they wished as long as they spared Kestrel and Ciari and eliminated Nimor.

He regretted the necessity of removing the captain of the guard, who had always been loyal to the House and, since he had a sister who was ruined because of a debt the accountants of House Jadaren had held over her head, understood together with Sanwar who House Beguine’s enemies were. But he had assured Nimor the mercenaries’ mission was to scare, not to kill, and, once blood was shed, he could not be sure the man wouldn’t betray him.

The beauty of the plan was that whatever the outcome, his goal should be accomplished. If men in the livery of House Jadaren savaged a Beguine caravan and kidnapped the daughter of its head, or if the same men were killed but had evidence of being from the enemy House, the result was the same: a rending of the tentative truce between the Houses and an end to this mad plot of marrying Kestrel to the Jadaren whelp.

He had not factored in the interference of those two fighters, those tall, preternaturally still, bizarrely marked creatures who’d attached themselves to the sanctuary. He’d not factored in Garush’s allowing herself to be captured.

And he’d not factored in Arna Jadaren’s already being here, ready to defend his House, to confirm Kestrel’s suspicions about the uniforms. Damn the boy, making moon eyes at Kestrel! It was bound to affect her judgment.

He must assume the worst would happen and make his contingency plan. He drew a deep breath, sat on the simple pallet, and mastered his temper.

There were strange figures painted on the white plaster wall before him. Despite his agitation, he studied them with interest. They were lines drawn in a flat black pigment, and shadowed with another color that looked either blue or purple, but it was hard to determine. It was a color rather difficult to look at. The lines looked as if they had been drawn randomly within a square roughly the length and breadth of Sanwar’s forearm, but, when he looked at them for a minute, they seemed to shift and form a mathematical figure, unknown to him but certainly drawn with some sort of intent.

As he looked at it, the last of his anger dissipated. He didn’t know how long he’d sat there before he realized the lines were vibrating, quivering in time to a hum that had built up, almost unnoticeably, in his head.

The figure couldn’t be moving or making a sound. It must be some kind of trick of the light. When he rose and went closer to examine the sharp angles and interwoven circles, the illusion of movement vanished and the sound died away.

He reached out to touch it. When his forefinger was just shy of the pigment, he heard a voice in his head, an articulate voice that spoke carefully as if it were translating from one language to another.

Why your anger? the voice queried.

He should be alarmed at the notion of an alien voice in his mind, he knew. But it didn’t seem real. It seemed simply a fancy, a way of one part of his consciousness communicating with another.

He concentrated, playing the exercise of ordering his tumultuous emotions for the examination of an outsider, trying to find a way to victory through defeat.

The members of House Jadaren were little better than pirates, and had found ways to cheat House Beguine over and over again. More than one competitor and jealous noble had tried to infiltrate them from the inside, to find a way to strike at them from within. But the House’s headquarters, the heart and brain of their organization, was within a tunnel-riddled volcanic lump, thoroughly protected and warded with powerful spells set in place by the Jadarens’ buccaneer ancestor. How he was able to do it no one knew; the Jadarens were not well-known for their spellcraft.

Send an agent. The thought surfaced in his mind, and he laughed. He well knew many had tried. He himself had tried.

Send an agent who doesn’t know she is an agent. An agent of your blood. Send … What is the word? Your daughter.

Sanwar sat and stared at the odd glyphs, feeling as if he’d been given the last half of an equation that had stymied him for years; a formula breathtaking in its simplicity.

He reached into his shirt for a soft leather pouch and with the tips of his fingers pulled out a slip of parchment, folded lengthwise. Inside were five long hairs, brown with glints of amber. He held them carefully between forefinger and thumb, considering.

He remembered when Vorsha, weeping, had brought them to him, trusting he’d do what he promised. At the time, he had every intention of doing just that: creating a charm of protection that would ward Kestrel in the midst of her enemies. A good idea, he realized now, but not ambitious enough. He could do more.

You can do much more. Especially since you sired her.

It would take planning and careful timing, and would test and tax his skills. But he could do it. With Nicol’s simplicity, Kestrel’s trust, and a few men still loyal to him and his cause, he could do it.

Folding the strands of Kestrel’s hair back into the parchment, he steeled himself to leave the room and meet the others, to feign that he had bowed to fate and intended to support the alliance. At the door, he paused and looked back at the figure on the wall. Some strange decoration, that was all; nothing but the random artistic musing of some pilgrim.

As he turned his back, the blue-purple lines glowed, intensely and briefly, and faded away.

Fandour cautiously probed the hard surface of his prison and contemplated this new information. Since beings from all across the Rogue Plane had journeyed to the place, the sanctuary, they called it, that housed the Vector and the Nexus, Fandour had been able to collect an astonishing amount of information. His imprisoned mind, strengthened by roots inextricably bound into the brains of the first Vashtun and all his successors, probed and questioned and sometimes was able to plant a seed into the folk who visited and revisited Shadrun, bringing news, gifts, sensations, and their own personal histories. Over several hundred years, the fragmented pieces of Faerun’s varied folk were beginning to fit together, like a puzzle picture that would begin to become distinguishable once partially completed.

Fandour had gleaned information and influenced these little minds to bring him more. The Nexus-the Vashtun, and to a lesser extent his Second, remained Fandour’s primary links to the Rogue Plane, but increasingly he was able to influence other inhabitants of Shadrun. This latestentity-the human who began to engage the small Vector drawn in his room-Fandour could plant a seed in this one. He didn’t understand its emotions. But he could use them.

Over the years, Fandour had become aware of a shadowy place, a fortress warded by enchantments. He couldn’t see into it, but he was connected to it by mortal blood, by pain, by a stripping of its Power. Someone inside that dark place, he knew, was the Rhythanko.

This new entity desired to breach that fortress, and Fandour would help it.

Late that night, Kestrel Beguine sat cross-legged by the light of a single candle, her traveling desk in her lap. Ciari snored gently on the pallet in the corner of the simple room.

The parchment on the sloped surface of the traveling desk bore but one line of writing:

My Dear Father:

Kestrel sat a long time, her quill still in her hand, and contemplated what else to write. Her legs were beginning to cramp, and the flickering light of the candle danced across all surfaces, making her work difficult to see.

Finally she smiled and wrote quickly.

I like the boy. And the boy likes me.

She let the ink dry and put away her quill, rolling up the letter to give to one of the sanctuary messengers tomorrow at first light. Before she blew out the candle and crawled next to Ciari’s warmth, she paused, frowning at the dark line someone had drawn on the clean white plaster wall.

That was a shame. In thanks to the sanctuary, she would try to clean it off in the morning.