Toll the Hounds

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Fisher

Voluminous in wonder, but, be assured, terse in grief. Consider the woodsman standing facing the forest, axe in hand. In a moment he will stride forward. Consider now the first line of trees, rooted, helpless against what comes.

The seep of trickling water round roots does not quicken. The sweet warmth of sunlight on leaves does not blaze into urgent flame. The world and its pace can shy;not change. What is to be done? Why, there is nothing to be done. The woodsman swings his axe with blinding speed and splendid indifference, and he hears not the chorus of cries.

Is this fancy worthless? For some, perhaps many, it must be. But know this, empathy is no game.

Twist back time. Dusk still gathers, but it is early yet and so it is a weak gath shy;ering. A lone rider draws up on a ridge overlooking a mining camp. Up here the sun’s light remains. Dust streams gold and nothing wants to settle. In the shadowy pit below figures seethe back and forth.

He is finally seen. An old man works his way up the path. A runner hurries to the main building squatting atop a levelled heap of tailings.

It begins.

‘Another guest? Come for the boy? What’s so damned special about that boy?’ But Gorlas Vidikas wasn’t much interested in any answers to those questions, especially since this runner was in no position to explain much of anything, having been sent direct from the foreman. He rose and pulled on his cloak, then collected up his fine deerskin gloves, and set out. Would he have the pleasure of killing yet another fool? He dearly hoped so.

Was it that pompous old bastard, Coll? That would be ideal, and who could say, maybe the ghost of Lady Simtal would stir awake at the man’s last gasp, to howl her delight at this most perfect vengeance, this long-awaited conclusion to the vile treachery of her last fete. Of course, that was mostly Hanut Orr’s business, and maybe Shardan Lim’s as well, but Gorlas welcomed the sudden unexpected currency he would reap in reward for killing at least two of the old conspirators.

Coll’s death would also leave open a seat on the Council. Gorlas smiled at the thought as he climbed the slatted wooden steps up towards the ridge where it wound behind and above the main building. Humble Measure would offer up his own reward for such a thing, no doubt one that would make the gratitude of Hanut and Shardan seem like a pauper’s grudging gift. He had a sudden, odd image then of a half-dozen such paupers — beggars and worse — gathered in some abandoned building, squatting on damp earth as they passed round a pathetic slab of grainy bread and a mouldy lump of cheese. And, as he looked on like some unseen ghost, he had the sense that the circle was somehow. . incomplete.

Someone is missing. Who’s missing?

He shook himself then, dispelling the scene, and found that he had halted just below the landing, one hand on the rail at his side. At that last moment, as the image burst apart, he thought he had caught a glimpse of something — a corpse twisting beneath a thick branch, the face swinging round to meet his own — then gone.

Gorlas found his mouth unaccountably dry. Had some god or spirit sent him a vision? Well, if something or someone had, it was a poor one, for he could make no sense of it, none at all.

He tugged on his gloves and resumed the climb, emerging out into the blessed sunlight where everything was painted gold. Yes, the wealth of the world was within reach. He’d never understood poor people, their stupidity, their lack of ambition, their laziness. So much within reach — couldn’t they see that? And then how dare they bitch and complain and cast him dark looks, when he went and took all that he could? Let them fall to the wayside, let them tumble underfoot. He was going where he wanted to be and if that meant pushing them out of the way, or crushing them down, so be it.

Why, he could have been born in the damned gutter, and he’d still be where he was today. It was his nature to succeed, to win. The fools could keep their resent shy;ment and envy. Hard work, discipline, and the courage to grasp opportunity when it presented itself — these were all the things most people lacked. What they didn’t lack, not in the least, was the boundless energy to complain. Bitterness was a waste of energy, and, like acid, it ate the vessel that held it.

As he came round the curve of the ridge he saw at once that the man awaiting him was not Coll. Nor, Gorlas realized, was he a stranger. Gods below, can this be? Oponn, is it you so blessing me now? Pull me forward, Lady. Shove him closer, Lord.

The young man (well, they were of the same age, but not in Gorlas’s eyes) saw him approach and slowly dismounted, stepping round the horse and positioning himself in the centre of the path facing Gorlas.

‘She was not foolish enough to send you here, was she?’

‘You know me, then.’

Gorlas smiled. ‘I watched you once, only a few days back, from across a street. You looked guilty, did you know that? You looked like a coward — what is your name? I want to know your name, so I can be precise when I tell her what I’ve done to you. . and your corpse.’

The man stood unmoving, arms at his sides. ‘I am not here for Challice,’ he said.

‘If you want to think it was all your idea, fine. But I should tell you, I know her well — far better than you. She’s been working on you, filling your head — she’s pretty much led you here by the hand, even if you’re too thick to realize it. Of course, she probably didn’t want anyone too smart, since a clever man would have seen through her deadly scheming. A clever man would have walked away. Or run.’

The man tilted his head slightly. ‘What is the value of all this, Gorlas Vidikas?’

Gorlas sighed, glanced back at the foreman, who stood watching and listening — yes, something would have to be done about that — and then faced the man once more. ‘Since you’re too much the coward to actually tell me your name, I will just have to slice off your face, to take back to her as proof. Look at you, you’re not even wearing a sword. Foreman! Do we still have Murillio’s rapier? I forget, did that go back with him?’

‘Not sure, sir — want me to go and look?’

‘Well, find the waif a sword. Anything will do — it’s not as if he knows how to use it in any case. And hurry, before we lose the light and the mob down there gets bored waiting.’ He smiled at the man. ‘They’ve got bloodthirsty of late — my fault, that-’

‘Yes, about Murillio. .’

‘Ah, is that why you’ve come? The duel was fairly fought. He simply could not match my skill.’

‘Where is the boy?’

‘So he’s the reason you’re here? This is getting difficult to believe. The child’s not some orphaned prince or something, is he? Rather, was he?’

‘Was?’

‘Yes. He’s dead, I’m afraid.’

‘I see.’

‘So, still interested?’ Gorlas asked. ‘Of course, that’s not really relevant any more, because I want you to stay. I suppose you can try to run, but I assure you, you’ll be cut down before you get astride that fine horse — a horse I will welcome in my stables. Tell me, are you a better duellist than Murillio was? You’ll have to be. Much better.’

The foreman had gone halfway down the trail before yelling instructions, and now a youth was scurrying up cradling a sword — not Murillio’s, but some shy;thing found in one of the workings from the look of it. Thin, tapered to a point that was slightly bent. Iron, at least, but the patina was a thick crust over the blade’s spine, and both edges were severely notched. The handle, Gorlas saw as the foreman — breath wheezing — delivered it, wasn’t even wrapped.

‘Sorry about the lack of grip,’ Gorlas said. ‘But really, you should have come prepared.’

‘How did it feel,’ the man asked, ‘killing an old man?’

‘The duel was fair-’

‘Agreed to the death? I doubt that, Vidikas.’

‘I dislike the lack of respect in using my last name like that — especially when you won’t even tell me your name.’

‘Well, your wife calls you Useless, so if you’d prefer that. .’

Gorlas flung the weapon at the man’s feet, where it skidded in a puff of golden dust. ‘On guard,’ he ordered in a rasp. ‘To the death.’

The man made no move to pick up the weapon. He stood as he had before, head tipped a fraction to one side.

‘You are a coward in truth,’ Gorlas said, drawing his rapier. ‘Cowards do not deserve to be treated with honour, so let us dispense with convention-’

‘I was waiting for you to say that.’

The foreman, standing off to one side, still struggling with the ache in his chest from a labouring heart, was in the process of licking his gritty lips. Before he had finished that instinctive flicker, the scene before him irrevocably changed.

And Gorlas Vidikas was falling forward, landing hard. His rapier rolled from his hand to catch up in the grass lining the track. Dust puffed up, then slowly set shy;tled.

The stranger — had he even moved? the foreman was unsure — now turned to him and said, ‘You heard him dispense with the rules of the duel, correct?’

The foreman nodded.

‘And, think back now, good sir, did you even once hear me voice a formal chal shy;lenge?’

‘Well, I was part of the way down the trail for a moment-’

‘But not beyond range of hearing, I’m sure.’

‘Ah, no, unless you did whisper something-’

‘Think back. Gorlas was babbling on and on — could I have said anything even if I’d wanted to?’

‘True enough, thinking on it.’

‘Then are we satisfied here?’

‘Ain’t for me to say that either way,’ the foreman replied. ‘It’s the man this one was working for.’

‘Who, being absent, will have to rely solely upon your report.’

‘Er, I suppose so.’

The man shrugged. ‘Do as you see fit, then.’ He glanced down into the pit. ‘You get the feeling they’re about to start cheering,’ he said.

‘They ain’t decided.’

‘No?’

‘They ain’t decided if whoever replaces Vidikas is gonna be any better, you see?’

‘Because, in their experience, they’re all the same.’

The foreman nodded. ‘Didn’t think you was nobleborn.’

‘No, I’m not.’

‘No, you’re pretty much like them below. Like me, even.’

‘I suppose so.’ The man walked to the body of Gorlas Vidikas, bent down to roll it on to its back, and the foreman saw the two knife handles, blades buried to the hilts, jutting from Gorlas’s chest.

He decided to lick his lips again, and somehow the dust suddenly tasted sweeter. ‘Know anything ’bout property law, any chance?’

‘Sorry, what?’

‘Like, if I was paying on a loan to this man-’

‘No, no idea. Though I imagine if you just sit tight, maybe wait to see if anybody ever shows up to collect, well, that would hardly be considered illegal. Would it now?’

‘No, seems proper enough to me,’ the foreman agreed.

The man worked the knives back out, wiped the blood off on the stained, rum shy;pled cloak. ‘Did he tell true about Harllo?’

‘What? Oh. He did. The lad tried to escape, and was killed.’

The man sighed, and then straightened. ‘Ah, shit, Murillio,’ he muttered. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘Wait — this Harllo — was he that important? I mean-’ and the foreman gestured, to encompass not only the corpse lying on the road, but the one that had been there the day before as well, ‘all this killing. Who was Harllo?’

The man walked to his horse and swung himself into the saddle. He collected the reins. ‘I’m not sure,’ he said after a moment’s consideration. ‘The way it started, well, it seemed. .’ he hesitated, and then said, ‘he was a boy nobody loved.’

Bitter and scarred as he was, even the foreman winced at that. ‘Most of ’em are, as end up here. Most of ’em are.’

The man studied him from the saddle.

The foreman wondered — he didn’t see much in the way of triumph or satisfaction in that face looking down at him. He wasn’t sure what he was seeing, in fact. Whatever it was, it didn’t fit.

Collecting the reins, the stranger drew the horse round and set off up the road. Heading back to the city.

The foreman coughed up a throatful of rank phlegm, then stepped forward and spat down, quite precisely, on to the upturned face of Gorlas Vidikas. Then he turned round. ‘I want three guards and the fastest horses we got!’

He watched the runner scramble.

From the pit below rose the occasional snatch of harsh laughter. The foreman understood that well enough, and so he nodded. ‘Damn and below, I’ll give ’em all an extra flagon of ale anyway.’

Cutter rode for a time as dusk surrendered to darkness. The horse was the first to sense a loss of will, as the rider on its back ceased all efforts at guiding its pace. The beast dropped from a canter to a trot, then a walk, and then it came to rest and stood at the edge of the road, head lowering to snag a tuft of grass.

Cutter stared down at his hands, watched as the reins slithered free. And then he began to weep. For Murillio, for a boy he had never met. But most of all, he wept for himself.

Come to me, my love. Come to me now.

A short time later, three messengers thundered past — paying him no heed at all. The drum of horse hoofs was slow to fade, and the clouds of dust left in their wake hung suspended, lit only by starlight.

Venaz the hero, Venaz who followed orders, and if those meant something vicious, even murderous, then that was how it would be. No questions, no qualms. He had returned up top in grim triumph. Another escape thwarted, the message sweetly delivered. Even so, he liked being thorough. In fact, he’d wanted to make sure.

And so, in keeping with his new privileges as head of the moles, when he col shy;lected a knotted climbing rope and set off back into the tunnels, he was not ac shy;costed. He could do as he liked now, couldn’t he? And when he returned, carrying whatever proof he could find of the deaths of Bainisk and Harllo, then Gorlas Vidikas would see just how valuable he was, and Venaz would find a new life for himself,

Good work led to good rewards. A simple enough truth.

Whatever flood had filled part of the passage deep in the Settle had mostly drained away, easing his trek to the crevasse. When he reached it he crouched at the edge, listening carefully — to make certain that no one was still alive, maybe scuffling about in the pitch blackness down below. Satisfied, he worked Bainisk’s rope off the knob of stone and replaced it with his own, then sent the rest of the coil tumbling over the edge.

Venaz set his lantern to its lowest setting and tied half a body-length of twine to the handle, and the other end to one ankle. He let the lantern down, and then followed with his legs. He brought both feet together, the rope in between, and edged further over until they rested on a knot. Now, so long as the twine didn’t get fouled with the rope, he’d be fine.

Moving with great caution, he began his descent.

Broken, bleeding bodies somewhere below, killed by rocks — not by Venaz, since he’d not even cut the rope. Bainisk had done that, the fool. Still, Venaz could still take the credit — nothing wrong with that.

Even with the knots, the slow going was making his arms and shoulders ache. He didn’t really have to do this. But maybe it would be the one deed that made all the difference in the eyes of Gorlas Vidikas. Nobles looked for certain things, mysterious things. They were born with skills and talents. He needed to show the man as much as he could of his own talents and all that.

The lantern clunked below him and he looked down to see the faint blush of dull light playing across dry, jagged stones. A few moments later he was standing, somewhat uneasily as the rocks shifted about beneath him. He untied the lantern and put away the twine, and then twisted the wick up a couple of notches. The circle of light widened.

He saw Bainisk’s feet, the worn soles of the moccasins, the black-spattered shins, both of which were snapped and showing the split ends of bones. But there was no flowing blood. Bainisk was dead as dead come.

He worked his way closer and stared down at the smashed face, slightly startled by the way it seemed fixed in a smile.

Venaz crouched. He would collect Bainisk’s belt-pouch, where he kept all his valuables — the small ivory-handled knife that Venaz so coveted; the half-dozen coppers earned as rewards for special tasks; the one silver coin that Bainisk had cherished the most, as it showed on one face a city skyline beneath a rainbow or some sort of huge moon filling the sky — a coin, someone had said, from Daru shy;jhistan, but long ago, in the time of the Tyrants. Treasures now belonging to Venaz.

But he could not find the pouch. He rolled the body over, scanned the blood-smeared rocks beneath and to all sides. No pouch. Not even fragments of string.

He must have given it to Harllo. Or maybe he’d lost it somewhere back up the passage — if Venaz didn’t find it down here he could make a careful search on his way back up top.

Now, time to find the other boy, the one he’d hated almost from the first. Al shy;ways acted like he was smarter than everyone else. It was that look in his eyes, as if he knew he was better, so much better it was easy to be nice to all the stupider people. Easy to smile and say nice things. Easy to be helpful and generous.

Venaz wandered out from Bainisk’s body. Something was missing and not just Harllo’s body. And then, after a moment, he realized what it was. The rest of the damned rope, which should have fallen close to the cliff base, close to Bainisk. The damned rope was gone — and so was Harllo.

He worked his way along the crevasse and after twenty or so steps he reached the edge of the floor, which he discovered wasn’t a floor at all, but a plug, a bridge of fallen rock. The crevasse dropped away an unknown depth, and the air rising from below was hot and dry. Frightened by the realization that he was standing on something that could collapse and fall away at any moment, Venaz hurried back in the other direction.

Harllo was probably badly hurt. He must have been. Unless. . maybe he had been already down, standing, holding the damned rope, just waiting for Bainisk to join him. Venaz found his mouth suddenly dry. He’d been careless. That wouldn’t go down well, would it? This could only work out right if he tracked the runt down and finished him off. The thought sent a cold tremor through him — he’d never actually killed somebody before. Could he even do it? He’d have to, to make everything right.

The plug sloped slightly upward on the other side of Bainisk’s body, and each chunk of stone was bigger, the spaces between them whistling with winds from below. Terrifying grating sounds accompanied his every tender step.

Fifteen paces on, another sudden drop-off. Baffled, Venaz worked his way along the edge. He reached the facing wall — the other side of the crevasse — and held high the lantern. In the light he saw an angular fissure, two shelves of bedrock where one side had shifted faster and farther than the other — he could even see where the broken seams continued between the shelves. The drop had been about a body’s height, and the fissure — barely a forearm wide — angled sharply into a kind of chute.

Bainisk would never have squeezed into that crack. But Harllo could, and did — it was the only way off the plug.

Venaz retied the lantern, and then forced himself into the fissure. A tight fit. He could only draw half-breaths before the cage of his ribs met solid, unyielding stone. Whimpering, he pushed himself deeper, but not so deep as to get stuck — no, to climb he’d need at least one arm free. By crabbing one leg sideways and squirming with his torso, he moved himself into a position whereby he could hitch himself up in increments. The dry, baked feel of the stone began as a salvation. Had it been wet he would simply have slid back down again and again. Before he’d managed two man-heights, however, he was slick with sweat, and finding streaks of the same above him, attesting to Harllo’s own struggles. And he found that the only way he could hold himself in place between forward hitches was to take the deepest breath he could manage, turning his own chest into a wedge, a plug. The rough, worn fabric of his tunic was rubbing his skin raw.

How much time passed? How long this near vertical passage? Venaz lost all sense of such details. He was in darkness, a world of stone walls, dry gusts of air along one flank, a right arm that screamed with fatigue. He bled. He oozed sweat. He was a mass of scrapes and gouges. But then the fissure widened in step fractures, each one providing a blessed ledge on which to finally rest his quivering muscles. Widening, becoming a manageable chute. He was able to draw in deep breaths, and the creaking ache of his ribs slowly faded. He continued on, and before long he reached a new stress fracture, this one cutting straight into the bedrock, perpendicular to the chute.

Venaz hesitated, and then worked his way into it, to see how far it went — and almost instantly he smelled humus, faint and stale, and a little farther in he arrived at an almost horizontal dip where forest detritus had settled. Behind that heady smell there was something else — acrid, fresh. He brightened the lantern and held it out before him. A steep slope of scree rose along the passage, and even as he scanned it there was the clatter of stones bouncing down to patter amidst the dried leaves and dead moss.

He hurried to the base of the slide and peered upward.

And saw Harllo — no more than twenty man-heights above him, flattened on the scree, pulling himself upward with feeble motions.

Yes, he had smelled the boy.

Venaz smiled, and then quickly shuttered the lantern. If Harllo found out he was being chased still, he might try to kick loose a deadly slide of the rubble — of course, if he did that it’d take him down with it. Harllo wasn’t stupid. Any wrong move on this slide and they’d both die. The real risk was when he reached the very top, pulling clear. Then there could be real trouble for Venaz.

And smell that downward draught — that was fresh, clean air. Smelling of reeds and mud. The lake shore.

Venaz thought about things, and thought some more. And then settled on a plan. A desperate, risky one. But really, he had no choice. No matter what, Harllo would hear him on this climb. Fine, then, let him.

He laughed, a low, throaty laugh that he knew would travel up the stones like a hundred serpents, coiling with icy poison round Harllo’s heart. Laughed, and then crooned, ‘Harrllo! Found youuu!’

And he heard an answering cry. A squeal like a crippled puppy underfoot, a whimper of bleak terror. And all of this was good.

Panic was what he wanted. Not the kind that would make the boy scrabble wildly — since that might just send him all the way back down — but the kind that would, once he gained the top, send him flying out into the night, to run and run and run.

Venaz abandoned the lantern and began climbing.

The chase was torturous. Like two worms they snaked up the dusty slabs of shale. Desperate flight and pursuit were both trapped in the stuttering beating of hearts, the quaking gasps of needful lungs. All trapped inside, for their limbs could move but slowly, locked in an agonizing tentativeness. Minute slides froze them both, queasy shifts made them spread arms and legs wide, breaths held, eyes squeezed shut.

Venaz would have to kill him. For all of this, Harllo would die. There was no other choice now, and Venaz found it suddenly easy to think about choking the life from the boy. His hands round Harllo’s chicken neck, the face above them turning blue, then grey. Jutting tongue, bulging eyes — yes, that wouldn’t be hard at all.

Sudden scrambling above, a skitter of stones, and then Venaz realized he was alone on the slide. Harllo had reached the surface, and thank the gods, he was running.

Your one mistake, Harllo, and now I’ll have you. Your throat in my hands.

I have you.

The soft whisper of arrivals once more awakens, even as figures depart. From places of hiding, from refuges, from squalid nests. Into the streams of darkness, shadowy shapes slide unseen.

Thordy watched as the killer who was her husband set out from the cage of lies they called, with quaint irony, their home. As his chopping footfalls faded, she walked out to her garden, to stand at the edge of the pavestone circle. She looked skyward, but there was no moon as yet, no bright smudge to bleach the blue glow of the city’s gaslight.

A voice murmured in her head, a heavy, weighted voice. And what it told her made her heart slow its wild hammering, brought peace to her thoughts. Even as it spoke, in measured tones, of a terrible legacy of death.

She drew the one decent kitchen knife they possessed, and held the cold flat of the blade against one wrist. In this odd, ominous stance, she waited.

In the city, at that moment, Gaz walked an alley. Wanting to find someone. Anyone. To kill, to beat into a ruin, smashing bones, bursting eyes, tearing slack lips across the sharp stumps of broken teeth. Anticipation was such a delicious game, wasn’t it?

In another home, this one part residence, part studio, Tiserra dried her freshly washed hands. Every sense within her felt suddenly raw, as if scraped with crushed glass. She hesitated, listening, hearing naught but her own breathing, this frail bellows of life that now seemed so frighteningly vulnerable. Something had begun. She was, she realized, terrified.

Tiserra hurried to a certain place in the house. Began a frantic search. Found the hidden cache where her husband had stored his precious gifts from the Blue Moranth.

Empty.

Yes, she told herself, her husband was no fool. He was a survivor — it was his greatest talent. Hard won at that — nowhere near that treacherous arena where Oponn played push and pull. He’d taken what he needed. He’d done what he could,

She stood, feeling helpless. This particular feeling was not pleasant, not pleasant at all. It promised that the night ahead would stretch out into eternity.

Blend descended to the main floor, where she paused. The bard sat on the edge of the stage, tuning his lyre. Duiker sat at his usual table, frowning at a tankard of ale that his hands were wrapped round as if he was throttling some hard, unyielding fate.

Antsy — Antsy was in gaol. Scillara had wandered out a few bells earlier and had not returned. Barathol was spending his last night in his own cell — he’d be on a wagon headed out to some ironworks come the dawn.

Picker was lying on a cot upstairs, eyes closed, breaths shallow and weak. She was, in truth, gone. Probably never to return.

Blend drew on her cloak. Neither man paid her any attention.

She left the bar.

Ever since the pretty scary woman had left earlier — how long, days, weeks, years, Chaur had no idea — he had sat alone, clutching the sweating lance a dead man wearing a mask had once given C’ur, and rocking back and forth. Then, all at once, he wanted to leave. Why? Because the gulls outside never stopped talking, and the boat squeaked like a rat in a fist, and all the slapping water made him need to pee.

Besides, he had to find Baral. The one face that was always kind, making it easy to remember. The face that belonged to Da and Ma both, just one face, to make it easier to remember. Without Baral, the world turned cold. And mean, and nothing felt solid, and trying to stay together when everything else wasn’t was so hard.

So he dropped the lance, rose and set out.

To find Baral. And yes, he knew where to find him. How he knew no one could say. How he thought, no one could imagine. How deep and vast his love, no one could conceive.

Spite stood across the street from the infernal estate that was the temporary residence of her infernal sister, and contemplated her next move, each considera shy;tion accompanied by a pensive tap of one finger against her full, sweetly painted lips.

All at once that tapping finger froze in mid-tap, and she slowly cocked her head. ‘Oh,’ she murmured. And again, ‘Oh.’

The wind howled in the distance.

But, of course, there was no wind, was there?

‘Oh.’

And how would this change things?

A guard, ignoring once more the dull ache in his chest and the occasional stab of pain shooting down his left arm, walked out from the guard annexe to begin his rounds, making his way to the Lakefront District and the wall that divided it from the Daru District — the nightly murders had begun clustering to either side of that wall. Maybe this time he’d be lucky and see something — someone — and everything would fall into place. Maybe.

He had put in a requisition for a mage, a necromancer, in fact, but alas the wheels of bureaucracy ground reluctantly in such matters. It would probably take the slaying of someone important before things could lurch into motion. He really couldn’t wait for that. Finding this killer had become a personal crusade.

The night was strangely quiet, given that it marked the culmination of the Gedderone Fete. Most people were still in the taverns and bars, he told himself, even as he fought off a preternatural unease, and even as he noted the taut expres shy;sions of those people he passed, and the way they seemed to scurry by. Where was the revelry? The delirious dancing? Early yet, he told himself. But those two words and everything behind them felt oddly flat.

He could hear a distant storm on the plains south of the city. Steady thunder, an echoing wind, and he told himself he was feeling that storm’s approach. Nothing more, just the usual fizz in the air that preceded such events.

He hurried on, grimacing at the ache in his chest, still feeling the parting kiss of his wife on his lips, the careless hugs of his children round his waist.

He was a man who would never ask for sympathy. He was a man who sought only to do what was right. Such people appear in the world, every world, now and then, like a single refrain of some blessed song, a fragment caught on the spur of an otherwise raging cacophony.

Imagine a world without such souls.

Yes, it should have been harder to do.

After a rather extended time of muted regard fixed dully upon a sealed crypt, four mourners began their return journey to the Phoenix Inn, where Meese would make a grim discovery — although one that, in retrospect, did not in fact shock her as much as it might have.

Before they had gone five hundred paces, however, Rallick Nom drew to a sud shy;den halt. ‘I must leave you now,’ he said to the others.

‘Kruppe understands.’

And the assassin narrowed his gaze upon the short, solemn-faced man.

‘Where,’ Rallick asked, ‘will this go, Kruppe?’

‘The future, my friend, is ever turned away, even when it faces us.’

To this bizarre, unlikely truism, Coll grunted, ‘Gods below, Kruppe-’

But Rallick had already completed his own turning away and was walking to shy;wards the mouth of an alley.

‘I got a sick feeling inside,’ Meese said.

Coll grunted a second time and then said, ‘Let’s go. I need to find me another bottle — this time with something in it that actually does something.’

Kruppe offered him a beatific smile. Disingenuous? Really now.

Seba Krafar, Master of the Assassins’ Guild, surveyed his small army of murderers. Thirty-one in all. Granted, absurd overkill, but even so he found himself not quite as comfortable — or as confident — as such numbers should have made him. ‘This is ridiculous,’ he muttered under his breath. And then he gestured.

The mob shifted into three distinct groups, and then each hurried off in a different direction, to close on the target at the appointed time.

Come the morning, there’d be a newly vacated seat on the Council. Blood-drenched, true, but it would hardly be the first time for that, would it?

Shardan Lim saw before him a perfect future. He would, if all went well, finally step out from Hanut Orr’s shadow. And into his own shadow he’d drag Gorlas Vidikas. They would be sharing a woman, after all, and there would be no meas shy;ured balance in that situation, since Gorlas was next to useless when it came to satisfying Challice. So Gorlas would find that his wife’s happiness was dependent not upon him, but upon the other man sharing her pleasure — Shardan Lim — and when the first child arrived, would there be any doubt as to its progeny? An heir of provable bloodline, the perfect usurpation of House Vidikas.

He had set out alone this night, making his casual way to the Vidikas estate, and he now stood opposite the front gate, studying the modest but well-constructed building. There were hints of Gadrobi in the style, he saw. The square corner tower that was actually higher than it looked, its rooms abandoned to dust and spiders — virtually identical edifices could still be found here and there in the Gadrobi District, and in the hills to the east of the city. Vines covered three of the four walls, reaching up from the garden. If the tower had been a tree it would be dead, centuries dead. Hollowed out by rot, the first hard wind would have sent it thrashing down. This deliberate rejection was no accident. Gadrobi blood among the nobles was an embarrassment. It had always been that way and it always would be.

When Shardan owned this estate, he would see it torn down. His blood was pure Daru. Same as Challice’s own.

He heard horses approach at a dangerously fast canter, up from the lower city, and a few moments later three riders appeared, sharply reining in before the estate’s gate.

Frowning, Shardan Lim stepped out and quickly approached.

Private guards of some sort, looking momentarily confused as they dismounted. Their horses were lathered, heads dipping as they snorted out phlegm.

‘You three,’ Shardan called out, and they turned. ‘I am Councillor Shardan Lim, and I am about to visit the Vidikas estate. If you carry a message for Lady Challice, do permit me to deliver it.’ As he drew closer, he offered the three men a com shy;radely smile. ‘She is a delicate woman — having three sweaty men descend on her wouldn’t do. I’m sure you understand-’

‘Forgive me, Councillor,’ one of the men said, ‘but the news we deliver is bad.’

‘Oh? Come now, no more hesitation.’

‘Gorlas Vidikas is dead, sir. He was killed in a duel earlier today. We were in shy;structed to ride to his widow first, and hence on to Eldra Iron Mongery. It means we got to go right back the way we come, but the foreman insisted. As a courtesy. As the proper thing to do.’

Shardan Lim simply stared at the man, his thoughts racing.

‘Weren’t no duel,’ growled one of the other men.

‘What’s that?’ Shardan demanded. ‘You there, step out. What did you just say?’

The man was suddenly frightened, but he moved into the councillor’s line of sight, managed a quick bow and then said, ‘He was assassinated, sir. The foreman kept saying it was all legitimate, but we saw it, sir, with our own eyes. Two knives-’

‘Two knives? Two knives? Are you certain?’

‘Because of the other duel, you see, sir. It was revenge. It was murder. Coun shy;cillor Vidikas killed another man, then this other one shows up. Then out flash those knives — so fast you couldn’t even see ’em, and Councillor Vidikas topples over, stone dead, sir. Stone dead.’

‘This is all sounding familiar,’ Shardan Lim said. ‘Listen to me, you three. One of you, ride to the Orr estate and inform Councillor Hanut Orr. The other two, go on to Eldra, as you will. I will inform Lady Challice. Then, the three of you, find a decent inn for the night and tell the proprietor to treat you well, and to bill House Lim. Go on, now.’

There was some discussion as to who would go where, and which inn they’d rendezvous at when the tasks were done, and then the three men rode off.

Thunder to the south, getting closer. He could hear the wind but it was yet to arrive. Shardan Lim walked up to the gate, pulled on the braided chime in its elongated niche. While he waited for the doorman to arrive, he thought about how he would deliver this grim news. He would need a grave countenance, some shy;thing more fitting than the dark grin he was even now fighting.

She was a widow now. Vulnerable. There was no heir. Cousins and half-relations might well creep out of the woodwork, mediocre but grasping with sudden ambi shy;tion. Proclaiming ascendancy in the Vidikas bloodline and so asserting their newly conceived rights to claim stewardship over the entire House. Without strong allies at her side, she’d be out before the week was done.

Once Hanut Orr heard the report, and gleaned whatever he could from the particular details, his mind would fill with the desire for vengeance — and more than a little fear along with it, Shardan was sure. And he would not even think of Challice, not at first, and the opportunities now present. The next day or two would be crucial, and Shardan would have to move sure and fast to position himself at her side and leave no room for Hanut Orr once the man’s own ambitions awakened.

An eye-slot scraped to one side, then closed again with a snap. The gate opened. ‘House Vidikas welcomes Councillor Lim,’ said the doorman from his low bow, as if addressing Shardan’s boots. ‘The Lady is being informed of your arrival. If you will kindly follow me.’

And in they went.

She hesitated, facing the wardrobe, studying the array of possible shifts to draw on over her mostly naked body. Most were intended to cover other clothes, as befitted a modest noblewoman engaged in entertaining guests, but the truth was, she couldn’t be bothered. She had been about to go to sleep, or at least what passed for sleep of late, lying flat and motionless on her bed.

Alone whether her husband was there or not. Staring upward in the grainy darkness. Where the only things that could stir her upright included another gob shy;let of wine, one more pipe bowl or a ghostly walk in the silent garden.

Those walks always seemed to involve searching for something, an unknown thing, in fact, and she would follow through on the desire even as she knew that what she sought no garden could hold. Whatever it was did not belong to the night, nor could it be found in the spinning whirls of smoke, or the bite of strong drink on her numbed tongue.

She selected a flowing, diaphanous gown, lavender and wispy as wreaths of in shy;cense smoke, pulling it about her bared shoulder. A broad swath of the same mate shy;rial served to gather it tight about her lower torso, beneath her breasts, firm against her stomach and hips. The thin single layer covering her breasts hid nothing.

Shardan Lim was showing his impatience. His crassness. He was even now in the sitting room, sweaty, his eyes dilated with pathetic needs. He was nothing like what he pretended to be, once the facade of sophisticated lechery was plucked aside. The charm, the sly winks, the suave lie.

This entire damned world, she knew, consisted of nothing but thin veneers. The illusion of beauty survived not even a cursory second look. Cheap and squalid, this was the truth of things. He could paint it up all he liked, the stains on the sheets remained.

Barefooted, she set out to meet him. Imagining the whispers of the staff, the maids and servants, the guards — never within range of her hearing, of course. That would not do. Propriety must be maintained at all costs. They’d wait for her to pass, until she was out of sight. It was their right, after all, their reward for a lifetime of servitude, for all that bowing and scraping, for all the gestures meant to convince her and people like her that she was in fact superior to them. The noble bloods, the rich merchants, the famous families and all the rest.

When the truth was, luck and mischance were the only players in the game of success. Privilege of birth, a sudden harmony of forces, a sudden inexplicable balance later seen as a run of good fortune. Oh, they might strut about — we all might — and proclaim that talent, skill and cunning were the real players. But Challice held the belief that even the poor, the destitute, the plague-scarred and the beleaguered might possess talents and cunning, only to find their runs of fortune nonexistent, proper rewards for ever beyond reach.

Servants bowed, and that they needed to do so was proof of just how flimsy the delusion of superiority was.

She opened the door and walked with dignity into the sitting room. ‘Councillor Lim, have you been left here alone? No one to provide you with refreshments? This is unacceptable-’

‘I sent her away,’ he cut in, and she saw that his expression was strange, con shy;flicted by something but in a most peculiar way.

‘You have not even poured yourself some wine. Allow me-’

‘No, thank you, Lady Challice. Although, perhaps, I should pour you one. Yes.’

And he went over to select a decanter and then a goblet. She watched the amber wine slosh into the crystal, and then flow over before he righted the decanter. He stared down at the goblet for a moment, and then faced her. ‘Lady Challice, I have terrible news.’

Then why do you struggle so not to smile? ‘Ah. Speak on, then, Councillor.’

He stepped forward. ‘Challice-’

All at once, she sensed that something was deeply awry. He was too excited with his news. He was hungry to see its effect on her. He had no interest in using her body this night. And here she had arrived dressed like a fancy whore. ‘Forgive me,’ she said, stepping back and attempting to draw the shift more modestly about her.

He barely registered the gesture. ‘Challice. Gorlas has been murdered. Your husband is dead.’

‘Murdered? But he’s still out at the mining camp. He’s-’ and then she stopped, stunned at how disbelief could so swiftly become certainty.

‘Assassinated, out at the camp,’ Shardan Lim said. ‘Was it a contract? I can’t imagine who would. .’ And then he too fell silent, and the regard he fixed upon her now was suddenly sharp, piercing.

She could not face the question he looked ready to ask, and so she went to col shy;lect the goblet, unmindful of the wine spilling over her hand, and drank deep.

He had moved to one side and still he said nothing as he watched her.

Challice felt light-headed, unbalanced. She was having trouble thinking. Feel shy;ings and convictions, which arrived first? Truths and dreads — she was finding it hard to breathe.

‘Challice,’ Shardan Lim whispered, suddenly standing close. ‘There were other ways. You could have come to me. If this comes out, you will hang — do you un shy;derstand me? It will take your father down — the entire House D’Arle. The whole Council will be rocked to its very foundations. Hood’s breath, Challice — if anyone discovers the truth-’

She turned to him and her voice was flat as she said, ‘What truth? What are you talking about, Councillor? My husband has been murdered. I expect you and the Council to conduct an investigation. The assassin must be found and punished. Thank you for taking upon yourself the difficult task of informing me. Now, please, leave me, sir.’

He was studying her as if he had never truly seen her before, and then he stepped away and shook his head. ‘I’d no idea, Challice. That you were this. .’

‘That I was what, Councillor?’

‘It may be. . ah, that is, you are within your rights to claim the seat on the Council. Or arrange that someone of your own choosing-’

‘Councillor Lim, such matters must wait. You are being insensitive. Please, will you now leave?’

‘Of course, Lady Challice.’

When he was gone, she stood unmoving, the goblet still in one hand, the spilled wine sticky under her fingers.

A formal investigation. And yes, it would be thorough. Staff would be questioned. Improprieties revealed. Shardan Lim himself. . yes, it would be occurring to him about now, as he walked the street, and he might well change his destination — no longer back to his house, but to the Orr estate. To arrange, with growing desperation, the covering of his own tracks.

But none of this affected her. Shardan Lim’s fate was meaningless.

She had succeeded. She had achieved precisely what she wanted, the very thing she had begged him to do. For her. For them. But no, for her.

He had killed her husband. Because she had asked him to. And it was now al shy;most certain that he would hang for it. Shardan would talk, pointing the finger so that all eyes shifted away from him, and his accusation would be all fire, blazing with deadly details. And as for her, why, she’d be painted as a foolish young woman. Playing with lowborn but astoundingly ignorant of just how vicious such creatures could be, when something or someone stood in their way. When obsessive love was involved, especially. Oh, she’d been playing, but that nasty young lowborn thug had seen it differently. And now she would have to live with the fact that her idle game had led to her husband’s murder. Poor child.

Her father would arrive, because he was the sort of father to do just that. He would raise impenetrable walls round her, and personally defend every portico, every bastion. Aim the knife of innuendo towards her and he would step into its path. He would retaliate, ferociously, and the sly sceptics would quickly learn to keep their mouths shut, if they valued their heads.

She would be the eye of the storm, and feel not even a single drop of rain, nor sigh of wind.

Challice set the goblet down. She walked out into the corridor and proceeded without haste back to her bedroom, where she collected the glass globe with its imprisoned moon. And then left once more, this time to the square tower, with its rooms crowded with antique Gadrobi furniture slowly rotting to dust, with its musty draughts sliding up and down the stairs.

I have killed him. I have killed him.

I have killed him

Hanut Orr adjusted his sword belt and checked his rapier yet again. He had come close to beating the hapless mine guard to glean every last detail of the events surrounding the assassination of Gorlas Vidikas, and he now believed he had a fair idea of the grisly story behind it. The echoes tasted sour, personal. Once he learned where the first man’s body had been delivered, he knew where this night would take him.

He assembled his four most capable guards and they set out into the city.

Two knives to the chest. Yes, the past never quite went away, did it? Well, finally, he would be able to deliver his long-delayed vengeance. And when he was done there, he would find the one man who was at the centre of all of this. Councillor Coll would not see the dawn.

He dispatched two of his men to Coll’s estate. Watch. Any strangers show up, they don’t reach the damned gate. We are at war tonight. Be ready to kill, am I understood?

Of course he was. These hard men were no fools.

He knew that damned mob in the Phoenix Inn. He knew every one of Coll’s decrepit, lowborn friends, and he intended to kill them all.

Down from the Estates District and into the Daru District. Not far.

Two streets from the Phoenix Inn he halted his two remaining men. ‘You’ll watch the front entrance, Havet. Kust, I want you to walk in and make a show — it won’t have to be much, they’ll smell you out fast enough. I have the alley, for when somebody bolts. Both of you, keep an eye out for a short, fat man in a red waistcoat. If you get a chance, Havet, cut him down — that shouldn’t be hard. There’s two tough-looking women who run the place — they’re fair targets as well if they head outside. I’m not sure who else will be in that foul nest — we’ll find out soon enough. Now, go.’

They went one way. He went another.

Torvald Nom grunted and gasped as he pulled himself on to the estate roof. Sitting at his desk had been driving him mad. He needed to be out, roving round, keeping an eye on everything. On everything. This was a terrible night and nothing had happened yet. He missed his wife. He wished he was back home, and with the coming storm he’d be drenched by the time he stumbled into that blessed, warm abode. Assuming he ever made it.

He worked his way along the edge so that he could see down into the forecourt. And there they were, Madrun and Lazan Door, throwing knuckles against the wall to the left of the main gate. He heard the door of the house open directly beneath him and saw the carpet of light unfold on the steps and pave-stones, and the silhouette of the man standing in the doorway was instantly recognizable. Studlock, Studious Lock. Not moving at all, just watching, but watching what?

Knuckles pattered, bounced on stone, then settled, and the two compound guards hunched down over them to study the cast.

That’s what he’s watching. He’s watching the throws.

And Torvald Nom saw both men slowly straighten, and turn as one to face the man standing in the doorway.

Who must have stepped back inside, softly closing the door.

Oh, shit.

There was a scuffle somewhere behind him and Torvald Nom spun round. It was too damned dark — where was the moon? Hiding somewhere behind the storm clouds, of course, and he glanced up. And saw a sweep of bright stars. What clouds? There aren’t any clouds. And if that’s thunder, then where’s the lightning? And if that’s the howl of wind, why is everything perfectly still? He wasn’t sure now if he’d actually heard anything — nothing was visible on the roof, and there were no real places to hide either. He was alone up here.

Like a lightning rod.

He tried a few deep breaths to slow the frantic beat of his heart. At least he’d pre shy;pared himself. All his instincts strumming like taut wires, he’d done all he could.

And it’s not enough. Gods below, it’s not enough!

Scorch looked startled, but then he always looked startled.

‘Relax,’ hissed Leff, ‘you’re driving me to distraction.’

‘Hey, you hear something?’

‘No.’

‘Exactly.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean? We ain’t hearing nothing. Good. That means there’s nothing to hear.’

‘They stopped.’

‘Who stopped?’

‘Them, the ones on the other side of the gate, right? They stopped.’

‘Well, thank Hood,’ said Leff. ‘Those knuckles was driving me crazy. Every damned night, on and on and on. Click clack click clack, gods below. I never knew Seguleh were such gamblers — it’s a sickness, you know, an addiction. No wonder they lost their masks — probably in a bet. Picture it. “Ug, got nuffin but this mask, and m’luck’s boot to change, ’sgot to, right? So, I’m in — look, ’sa good mask! Ug.”’

‘That would’ve been a mistake,’ Scorch said, nodding. ‘If you don’t want nobody to know you’re bluffing, what better way than to wear a mask? So, they lost ’em and it’s been downhill ever since. Yeah, that makes sense, but it’s got me thinking, Leff.’

‘’Bout what?’

‘Well, the Seguleh. Hey, maybe they’re all bluffing!’

Leff nodded back. This was better. Distract the fidgety idiot. All right, maybe things didn’t feel quite right. Maybe there was a stink in the air that had nothing to do with smell, and maybe he had sweat trickling down under his armour, and he was keeping his hand close to the sword at his belt and eyeing the crossbow leaning against the gate. Was it cocked? It was cocked.

Click clack click clack. Come on, boys, start ’em up again, before you start making me nervous.

Cutter halted the horse and sat, leaning forward on the saddle, studying the ship moored alongside the dock. No lights showed. Had Spite gone to bed this early? That seemed unlikely. He hesitated. He wasn’t even sure why he had come here. Did he think he’d find Scillara?

That was possible, but if so it was a grotesque desire, revealing an ugly side to his nature that he did not want to examine for very long, if at all. He had pretty much abandoned her. She was a stranger to Darujhistan — he should have done better. He should have been a friend.

How many more lives could he ruin? If justice existed, it was indeed appropriate that he ruin himself as well. The sooner the better, in fact. Grief and self-pity seemed but faint variations on the same heady brew that was self-indulgence — did he really want to drown Scillara in his pathetic tears?

No, Spite would be better — he’d get three words out and she’d start slapping him senseless. Get over it, Cutter. People die. It wasn’t fair, so you put it right. And now you feel like Hood’s tongue after a night of slaughter. Live with it. So wipe your nose and get out there. Do something, be someone and stay with it.

Yes, that was what he needed right now. A cold, cogent regard, a wise absence of patience. In fact, she wouldn’t even have to say anything. Just seeing her would do.

He swung down from the saddle and tied the reins to a bollard, then crossed the gangplank to the deck. Various harbour notices had been tacked to the mainmast. Moorage fees and threats of imminent impoundment. Cutter managed a smile, imagining a scene of confrontation in the near future. Delightful to witness, if somewhat alarming, provided he stayed uninvolved.

He made his way below. ‘Spite? You here?’

No response. Spirits plunging once more, he tried the door to the main cabin, and found it unlocked. Now, that was strange. Drawing a knife, he edged inside, and waited for his eyes to adjust to the gloom. Nothing seemed untoward, no signs of disarray — so there had been no roving thief, which was a relief. As he stepped to shy;wards the lantern hanging from a hook, his foot struck something that skidded a fraction.

Cutter looked down.

His lance — the one that dead Seguleh horseman had given him, in that plague-stricken fort in Seven Cities. He recalled seeing it later, strapped to the back of a floating pack amidst wreckage in the waves. He recalled Spite’s casual retrieval. He had since stashed the weapon beneath his bunk. So, what was it doing here?

And then he noted the beads of what looked like sweat glistening on the iron blade.

Cutter reached down.

The copper sheathing of the shaft was warm, almost hot. Picking the lance up, he realized, with a start, that the weapon was trembling. ‘Beru fend,’ he whis shy;pered, ‘what is going on here?’

Moments later he was back on the deck, staring over at his horse as the beast tugged at the reins, hoofs stamping the thick tarred boards of the dock. Its ears were flat, and it looked moments from tearing the bollard free — although of course that was impossible. Cutter looked down to find he was still carrying the lance. He wondered at that, but not for long, as he heard a sudden, deafening chorus of howls roll through the city. All along the shoreline, nesting birds exploded upward in shrieking panic, winging into the night.

Cutter stood frozen in place. The Hounds.

They’re here.

Grisp Falaunt had once been a man of vast ambitions. Lord of the single greatest landholding anywhere on the continent, a patriarch of orchards, pastures, groves and fields of corn stretching to the very horizon. Why, the Dwelling Plain was un shy;claimed, was it not? And so he could claim it, unopposed, unobstructed by prohi shy;bitions.

Forty-one years later he woke one morning stunned by a revelation. The Dwelling Plain was unclaimed because it was. . useless. Lifeless. Pointless. He had spent most of his life trying to conquer something that was not only uncon shy;querable, but capable of using its very indifference to annihilate every challenger.

He’d lost his first wife. His children had listened to his promises of glorious in shy;heritance and then had simply wandered off, each one terminally unimpressed. He’d lost his second wife. He’d lost three partners and seven investors. He’d lost his capital, his collateral and the shirt on his back — this last indignity courtesy of a crow that had been hanging round the clothes line in a most suspicious manner.

There comes a time when a man must truncate his ambitions, cut them right down, not to what was possible, but to what was manageable. And, as one grew older and more worn down, manageable became a notion blurring with minimal, as in how could a man exist with the minimum of effort? How little was good enough?

He now lived in a shack on the very edge of the Dwelling Plain, offering a suit shy;able view to the south wastes where all his dreams spun in lazy dust-devils through hill and dale and whatnot. And, in the company of a two-legged dog so useless he needed to hand-feed it the rats it was supposed to kill and eat, he tended three rows of root crops, each row barely twenty paces in length. One row suffered a blight of purple fungus; another was infested with grub-worm; and the one between those two had a bit of both.

On this gruesome night with its incessant thunder and invisible lightning and ghost wind, Grisp Falaunt sat rocking on his creaking chair on his back porch, a jug of cactus spit in his lap, a wad of rustleaf bulging one cheek and a wad of durhang the other. He had his free hand under his tunic, as would any man keeping his own company with only a two-legged dog looking on — but the mutt wasn’t paying him any attention anyway, which, all things considered, was a rare relief these nights when the beast mostly just stared at him with oddly hungry eyes. No, old Scamper had his eyes on something to the south, out there in the dark plain.

Grisp hitched the jug up on the back of a forearm and tilted in a mouthful of the thick, pungent liquor. Old Gadrobi women in the hills still chewed the spiny blades after hardening the insides of their mouths by eating fire, and spat out the pulp in bowls of water sweetened with virgin’s piss. The mixture was then fer shy;mented in sacks of sewn-up sheep intestines buried under dung heaps. And there, in the subtle cascade of flavours that, if he squeezed shut his watering eyes, he could actually taste, one could find the bouquets marking every damned stage in the brewing process. Leading to an explosive, highly volatile cough followed by desperate gasping, and then-

But Scamper there had sharpened up, as much as a two-legged dog could, any shy;way. Ears perking, seeming to dilate — but no, that was the spit talking — and nape hairs snapping upright in fierce bristle, and there was his ratty, knobby tail, des shy;perately snaking down and under the uneven haunches — and gods below, Scamper was whimpering and crawling, piddling as he went, straight for under the porch — look at the damned thing go! With only two legs, too!

Must be some storm out there-

And, looking up, Grisp saw strange baleful fires floating closer. In sets of two, lifting, weaving, lowering, then back up again. How many sets? He couldn’t count. He could have, once, long ago, right up to twenty, but the bad thing about cactus spit was all the parts of the brain it stamped dead underfoot. Seemed that counting and figuring was among them.

Fireballs! Racing straight for him!

Grisp screamed. Or, rather, tried to. Instead, two wads were sucked in quick succession to the back of his throat, and all at once he couldn’t breathe, and could only stare as a horde of giant dogs attacked in a thundering charge, straight across his three weepy rows, leaving a churned, uprooted, trampled mess. Two of the beasts made for him, jaws opening. Grisp had rocked on to the two back legs of the chair with that sudden, shortlived gasp, and now all at once he lost his balance, pitching directly backward, legs in the air, even as two sets of enormous jaws snapped shut in the place where his head had been a heartbeat earlier.

His shack erupted behind him, grey shards of wood and dented kitchenware exploding in all directions.

The thumping impact when he hit the porch sent both wads out from his mouth on a column of expelled air from his stunned lungs. The weight of the jug, two fin shy;gers still hooked through the lone ear, pulled him sideways and out of the toppled chair on to his stomach, and he lifted his head and saw that his shack was simply gone, and there were the beasts, fast dwindling as they charged towards the city.

Groaning, he lowered his head, settling his forehead on to the slatted boards, and could see through the crack to the crawlspace below, only to find Scamper’s two beady eyes staring back up at him in malevolent accusation.

‘Fair ’nough,’ he whispered. ‘Time’s come, Scamper old boy, for us to pack up ’n’ leave. New pastures, hey? A world before us, just waitin’ wi’ open arms, just-’

The nearest gate of the city exploded then, the shock wave rolling back to flatten Grisp once more on the floorboards. He heard the porch groan and sag under him and had one generous thought for poor Scamper — who was scrambling as fast as two legs could take him — before the porch collapsed under him.

Like a dozen bronze bells, hammered so hard they tore loose from their frames and, in falling, dragged the bell towers down around them, the power of the seven Hounds obliterated the gate, the flanking unfinished fortifications, the guard house, the ring-road stable, and two nearby buildings. Crashing blocks of stone, wooden beams, bricks and tiles, crushed furniture and fittings, more than a few pulped bodies in the mix. Clouds of dust, spurts of hissing flame from ruptured gas pipes, the ominous subterranean roar of deadlier eruptions-

Such a sound! Such portentous announcement! The Hounds have arrived, dear friends. Come, yes, come to deliver mayhem, to reap a most senseless toll. Vio shy;lence can arrive blind, without purpose, like the fist of nature. Cruel in disregard, brutal in its random catastrophe. Like a flash flood, like a tornado, a giant dust-devil, an earthquake — so blind, so senseless, so without intent!

These Hounds. . they were nothing like that.

Moments before this eruption, Spite, still facing the estate of her venal bitch of a sister, reached a decision. And so she raised her perfectly manicured hands, up be shy;fore her face, and closed them into fists. Then watched as a deeper blot of darkness formed over the estate, swelling ever larger until blood-red cracks appeared in the vast shapeless manifestation.

In her mind, she was recalling a scene from millennia past, a blasted landscape of enormous craters — the fall of the Crippled God, obliterating what had been a thriving civilization, leaving nothing but ashes and those craters in which magma roiled, spitting noxious gases that swirled high into the air.

The ancient scene was so vivid in her mind that she could scoop out one of those craters, half a mountain’s weight of magma, slap it into something like a giant ball, and then position it over the sleepy estate wherein lounged her sleepy, unsuspecting sister. And, now that it was ready, she could just. . let go.

The mass descended in a blur. The estate vanished — as did those nearest to it — and as a wave of scalding heat swept over Spite, followed by a wall of lava thrashing across the street and straight for her, she realized, with a faint squeal, that she too was standing far too close.

Ancient sorceries were messy, difficult to judge, harder yet to control. She’d let her eponymous tendencies affect her judgement. Again.

Undignified flight was the only option for survival, and as she raced up the alley she saw, standing thirty paces ahead, at the passageway’s mouth, a figure.

Lady Envy had watched the conjuration at first with curiosity, then admiration, and then awe, and finally in raging jealousy. That spitting cow always did things better! Even so, as she watched her twin sister bleating and scrambling mere steps ahead of the gushing lava flow, she allowed herself a most pitiless smile,

Then released a seething wave of magic straight into her sister’s slightly prettier face.

Spite never thought ahead. A perennial problem, a permanent flaw — that she hadn’t killed herself long ago was due only to Envy’s explicit but casual-seeming indifference. But now, if the cow really wanted to take her on, at last, to bring an end to all this, well, that was just dandy.

As her sister’s nasty magic engulfed her, Spite did the only thing she could do under the circumstances. She let loose everything she had in a counterattack. Power roared out from her, clashed and then warred with Envy’s own.

They stood, not twenty paces apart, and the space between them raged like the heart of a volcano. Cobbles blistered bright red and melted away. Stone and brick walls rippled and sagged. Faint voices shrieked. Slate tiles pitched down into the maelstrom as roofs tilted hard over on both sides.

Needless to say, neither woman heard a distant gate disintegrate, nor saw the fireball that followed, billowing high into the night. They did not even feel the thun shy;derous reverberations rippling out beneath the streets, the ones that came from the concussions of subterranean gas chambers igniting one after another.

No, Spite and Envy had other things on their minds.

There could be no disguising a sudden rush to the estate gate by a dozen black-clad assassins. As five figures appeared from an alley mouth directly opposite Scorch and Left, three others, perched on the rooftop of the civic building to the right of the alley, sent quarrels hissing towards the two lone guards. The remaining four, two to a side, sprinted in from the flanks.

The facing attack had made itself known a moment too soon, and both Scorch and Leff had begun moving by the time the quarrels arrived. This lack of coordi shy;nation could be viewed as inevitable given the scant training these assassins pos shy;sessed, since this group was, in fact, little more than a diversion, and thus comprised the least capable individuals among the attackers.

One quarrel glanced off Leff’s helm. Another was deflected by Scorch’s chain hauberk, although the blow, impacting his left shoulder blade, sent him stumbling.

The sky to the west lit up momentarily, and the cobbles shook as Leff reached his crossbow, managed a skidding turn and loosed the quarrel into the crowd of killers fast closing.

A bellow of pain and one figure tumbled, weapons skittering.

Scorch scrabbled for his own crossbow, but it looked to Leff as if he would not ready it in time, and so with a shout he drew his shortsword and leapt into the path of the five attackers.

Scorch surprised him, as a quarrel sped past to thud deep into a man’s chest, punching him back and fouling up the assassin behind him. Leff shifted direction and went in on that side, slashing with his sword at the tangled figure — a thick, heavyset woman — and feeling the edge bite flesh and then bone.

Shapes darted in on his left — but all at once Scorch was there.

Things got a bit hot then.

Torvald Nom was looking for a way down when the tiles beneath his boots trem shy;bled to the sounds of running feet. He spun round to find four figures charging to shy;wards him. Clearly, they had not been expecting to find anyone up here, since none carried crossbows. In the moment before they reached him, he saw in their hands knives, knotted clubs and braided saps.

The nearest one wobbled suddenly — a bolt was buried deep in his right temple — and then fell in a sprawl.

Torvald threw himself to one side and rolled — straight over the roof edge. Not quite what he had planned, and he desperately twisted as he fell, knowing that it wouldn’t help in the least.

He had tucked into his belt two Blue Moranth sharpers.

Torvald could only close his eyes as he pounded hard on to the pavestones. The impact threw him back upward on a rising wave of stunning pain, but the motion seemed strangely slow, and he opened his eyes — amazed that he still lived — only to find that the world had turned into swirling green and blue clouds, thick, wet.

No, not clouds. He was inside a bulging, sloshing sphere of water. Hanging suspended now, as it rolled, taking him with it, out into the courtyard.

From the rooftop, which he was able to look up at as the misshapen globe tum shy;bled him over and over, he saw an assassin pitch over the edge in a black spray of blood — and then he was looking at Madrun and Lazan Door, wielding two curved swords each, cutting through a mob that even now scattered in panic.

At that moment sorcery ignited the courtyard, rolling in a spitting, raging wave that swept up the main building’s front steps and collided with the door, shattering it and the lintel above. Clouds of dust tumbled out, and three vague shapes rushed in, disappearing inside the house. A fourth one skidded to a halt at the base of the cracked steps, spun round and raised gloved hands. More magic, shrieking as it darted straight for the two unmasked Seguleh and those few assassins still standing. The impact sent bodies flying.

Torvald Nom, witnessing all this through murky water and discovering a sudden need to breathe, lost sight of everything as the globe heaved over one last time, even as he heard water draining, splashing down out to the sides, and watched the blurred pavestones beneath him draw closer.

All at once he found himself lying on the courtyard, drenched, gasping for air. He rolled over on to his back, saw a spark-lit, fiery black cloud tumble through the sky directly overhead — and that was curious, wasn’t it?

Detonations from within the estate. A sudden scream, cut bloodily short. He looked over to where Lazan Door and Madrun had been. Bodies crowded up against the inside wall, like a handful of black knuckles, and their bouncing, skid shy;ding journey was at an end, every knuckle settled and motinless,

Someone was approaching. Slow, steady steps, coming to a rest beside him.

Blinking, Torvald Nom looked up. ‘Cousin! Listen! I’m sorry, all right? I never meant it, honest!’

‘What in Hood’s name are you going on about, Tor?’ Rallick Nom was wiping blood from his tjaluk knives. ‘I’d swear you were scared of me or something.’

‘I didn’t mean to steal her, Rallick. That’s no lie!’

‘Tiserra?’

Torvald stared up at his cousin, wide-eyed, his heart bounding like an antelope with a hundred starving wolves on its stumpy tail.

Rallick made a face. ‘Tor, you idiot. We were what, seven years old? Sure, I thought she was cute, but gods below, man, any boy and girl who start holding hands at seven and are still madly in love with each other twenty-five years later — that’s not something to mess with-’

‘But I saw the way you looked at us, year after year — I couldn’t stand it, I couldn’t sleep, I knew you’d come for me sooner or later, I knew. .’

Rallick frowned down at him. ‘Torvald, what you saw in my face was envy. Yes, such a thing can get ugly, but not with me. I watched in wonder, in admira shy;tion. Dammit, I loved you both. Still do.’ He sheathed his weapons and reached down with a red-stained hand. ‘Good to see you, cousin. Finally.’

Torvald took that hand, and suddenly — years of guilt and fear shedding away — the whole world was all right. He was pulled effortlessly to his feet. ‘Hang on,’ he said, ‘what are you doing here?’

‘Helping out, of course.’

‘Taking care of me-’

‘Ah, that was incidental, in truth. I saw you on the rooftop earlier. There’d be a few trying that way. Anyway, you did a nice job of catching their attention.’

‘That quarrel through that one’s head was from you?’

‘At that range, I never miss.’

They turned then as Studious Lock, limping, emerged from the wreckage of the main entrance. And behind him strode the Lady of the house. She was wearing leather gloves that ran up to the elbow on which dagger-sheaths had been riveted. Her usual voluminous silks and linens had been replaced by tight-fitting, fighting clothes. Torvald squinted thoughtfully.

Studious Lock was making his way towards the heap of bodies.

Lady Varada saw Rallick and Torvald and approached.

Rallick bowed. ‘Did the mage give you any trouble, Mistress?’

‘No. Is the rooftop clear?’

‘Of course.’

‘And Seba?’

‘Probably scampering for his warren as fast as his legs can take him.’ Rallick paused. ‘Mistress, you could walk back in-’

‘And who is left in my Guild, Rallick? Of any worth, I mean.’

‘Krute, perhaps. Myself. Even Seba would manage, so long as he was respon shy;sible for a single cell and nothing more.’

Torvald was no fool, and as he followed this conversation, certain things fell into place. ‘Lady Varada,’ he said. ‘Er, Mistress Vorcan, I mean. You knew this was coming, didn’t you? And you probably hired me, and Scorch and Leff, because you believed we were useless, and, er, expendable. You wanted them to get through — you wanted them all in here, so you could wipe them out once and for all.’

She regarded him for a moment, one eyebrow lifting, and then turned away and headed back to her house.

Torvald made to pursue her but Rallick reached out a hand and held him back. ‘Cousin,’ he said in a low voice, ‘she was Mistress of the Assassins’ Guild. Do you think she’s anything like us? Do you really think she gives a damn if we live or die?’

Torvald glanced over at Rallick. ‘Now who’s the fool, cousin? No, you’re right, about me and Scorch and Leff — and those fallen Seguleh over there — she doesn’t care. But you, Rallick, that’s different. Are you blind? Soon as she stepped out, her. eyes went to you, and all the stiffness relaxed, and she came over to make sure you weren’t wounded.’

‘You can’t be serious.’

‘And you can’t be so stupid, can you?’

At that moment the main gates crashed open and two bloody figures staggered in.

‘We was attacked!’ Scorch shouted in outrage.

‘We killed ’em all,’ Leff added, looking round wildly, ‘but there could be more!’

Torvald noted his cousin’s expression and softly laughed, drawing Rallick’s at shy;tention once more. ‘I got some wine in my office,’ Torvald said. ‘We can sit and relax and I can tell you some things about Scorch and Leff-’

‘This is not the night for that, Tor — are you deaf?’

Torvald scowled, then thumped at the side of his head. Both sides. ‘Sorry, got water in my ears. Even you here, you sound to me like you’re under a bucket.’

The thumping worked, at least for one ear, and he could hear now what every shy;one else was listening to.

Screams, all through the city. Buildings crashing down. Echoing howls. Recall shy;ing the fireball he’d seen, he looked skyward. No stars in sight — the sky was filled with smoke, huge bulges underlit by wildfires in the city. ‘Gods below!’

Harllo ran down the road. His knees were cut and deeply scored by his climb up the slope of scree, and blood ran down his shins. Stitches bit into his sides and every muscle was on fire. And Venaz was so close behind him that he could hear his harsh gasps — but Venaz was older, his legs were longer, and it would be soon now, no matter how tired he sounded.

To have come so far, and everything was about to end. . but Harllo would not weep. Would not plead or beg for his life. Venaz was going to beat him to death. It was as simple as that. There was no Bainisk to stand in the way, there were no rules of the camp. Harllo was not a mole any more; he was of no use to anyone.

People like him, big and small, died all the time. Killed by being ignored, killed because nobody cared what happened to them. He’d walked the streets of Darujhistan often enough to see for himself, to see that the only thing between those huddled shapes and himself was a family that didn’t even want him, no matter how hard he worked. They were Snell’s parents, and Snell was what they’d made between them, and nothing in the world could cut through those tethers.

That was why they let Snell play with Harllo, and if he played using fists and feet and something went bad, well, that stuff happened all the time, didn’t it? That’s why they never came to get him. And the one man who did, Gruntle, who always looked down at him with sad eyes, he was dead now, too, and it was this fact that eased Harllo’s mind. He was happy to go where Gruntle had gone. He would take hold of that giant scarred hand and know that, finally, he was safe.

‘I got you! I got you!’

A hand snagged at the back of his shirt, missed.

Harllo threw himself forward — maybe one last spurt — away, fast as he could-

The hand caught a handful of tunic, and Harllo stumbled, and then a thin sweaty arm wrapped tight round his neck, lifting him from his feet.

The forearm pressed against his throat. He could not breathe. And all at once Harllo did not want to die.

He flailed, but Venaz was too big, too strong.

Harllo was forced down to the stony surface of the road, then pushed over on his back as Venaz straddled him and closed both hands round his neck.

The face glaring down at him was flushed with triumph. Sweat ran muddy streaks down it; something had cut one cheek and white threads of cave-worms clustered round the wound — they’d lay eggs and that cut would become a huge welt, until it burst and the grubs crawled out, and the scar left behind would never go away and Venaz would be ugly for the rest of his life.

‘Got you got you got you,’ Venaz whispered, his eyes bright. ‘And now you die. Now you die. Got you and now you die.’

Those hands squeezed with savage strength.

He fought, he scratched, he kicked, but it was hopeless. He felt his face swell, grow hot. The darkness flushed red.

Something cracked hard and Venaz was reeling back, his grip torn loose. Hands closed on Harllo’s upper arms and dragged him a short distance away. Gasping, he stared up at a strange face — another boy — who now stepped past him, advancing on Venaz.

Who had scrambled upright, nose streaming blood. ‘Who the shit are-’

The stranger flung himself at Venaz, and both went down.

Coughing, tears streaming, Harllo forced himself on to his hands and knees. The two boys were about the same size, and they were of that age when a real fight had a deadly edge. They fought as would rabid dogs. Clawing into faces, seeking eye sockets, or inside the mouth to tear aside one entire cheek. They bit, gouged, used their elbows and knees as they rolled about on the roadside.

Something snapped, like a green sapling, and someone howled in terrible pain.

Harllo climbed to his feet, and he found he was holding a large round stone in his hands.

Venaz had broken the stranger’s left arm, and he was now working himself on top, fists raining down into the other boy’s face — who did what he could to protect it with his one working arm, but half of those fists got through, smashing into the face beneath.

Harllo stepped up behind Venaz, who was straddling the stranger. He looked down, seeing him as the stranger must have done when Harllo was the one lying on the ground, being murdered. He raised the rock, and then drove it down on to the top of Venaz’s skull.

The impact made him lose his grip on the stone and he saw it roll off to one side, leaving a shallow dent in Venaz’s head.

Venaz seemed to be in the midst of a coughing fit, a barely human stuttering sound bursting from his throat. He pushed himself off the other boy and rose wob shy;bling to his feet. When he turned to stare at Harllo, he was smiling, the teeth bright shards between gushing streams of blood from his nose. His eyes had filled and were now opaque. He lost his balance and reeled to one side, only to lose his footing on the edge of the road and plunge into the grassy ditch.

Harllo went to stare down at him. Venaz was still smiling, lying on his back, his cut and bruised hands making strange circular motions. He had soiled himself and the stench made Harllo step back, away, to walk over and kneel down beside the other boy.

Who was sitting up, cradling his broken arm, hair hanging over his face.

‘Hello,’ said Harllo, ‘who are you?’

Hanut Orr stood in the shadows behind the Phoenix Inn, waiting for the first of the cowardly bastards to come rushing out from the kitchen door. His man must be inside by now, stirring things up. Not long, then.

He ducked at the sound of ferocious howls echoing through the city, and then a thundering concussion somewhere to the south — but close — and he stepped out to the centre of the alley. Some shambling figure walking past had to shift quickly to one side to avoid colliding with him.

‘Watch it,’ Hanut snapped, and then he looked up into the slash of night visible between the buildings, as it suddenly lit red and orange.

It was pretty much the last thing he ever saw.

As soon as he was past the fool, Gaz whirled round, his right fingerless hand lashing out to crack with a crunch against the base of his victim’s neck. Bone against bone, and it was not knuckles that broke — they were by now too scarred, too cal shy;cined, for that. No, what snapped was Hanut Orr’s neck.

Gaz was swinging with his other hand even as the body crumpled, his left pounding into the man’s forehead, Hinging the head back like a bulbous seed pod on a broken stalk. Slap went the body, head bouncing once and then lolling way too far to one side.

He stared down, and then moaned. This was no drunk who’d been leaning against a wall behind the inn. He should have noted the man’s tone when he’d warned him off.

This was a highborn.

Gaz found he was breathing fast. A rapid pounding in his chest, a sudden heat flooding through him. His knuckles throbbed.

‘Thordy,’ he whispered, ‘I’m in deep trouble. Thordyyyy. .’

He looked up and down the alley, saw no one, and then set off, stiff-legged, leaning far forward, his fingerless hands drawn up under his chin. He was going home. Yes, he had to get home, and be there all night, yes, he’d been there all night-

In trouble in trouble I’m in trouble now. Mages and necromancers, guards everywhere — listen to the alarms — they’ve found him already! Oh oh oh trouble, Thordy, so much trouble. .

Councillor Coll had pushed him back on to the bar, then down on to its battered surface. The severe arch forced by the position had Hanut Orr’s thug groaning in pain.

‘Is he waiting, then?’ Coll asked, leaning close. ‘Your shitface boss — is he wait shy;ing outside?’

The man understood loyalty, and he understood the demands of raw survival, and of course there was no contest between the two. He managed a nod and gasped, ‘Alley. He’s in the alley. There’s another man, other side of the street out front.’

‘And who are you all looking for?’

‘Any — uh — any one of you. No, wait. The assassin, the one with the two knives — the one who just killed Gorlas Vidikas.’

The man saw Coll’s broad, oddly puffy face twist into a frown, and the heavy weight pressing down on his chest — keeping him pinned on the countertop — eased back.

‘Meese, this one moves, kill him.’

The woman with the absurd two-handed mace stepped up, eyes flat and lifeless as they fixed on the thug. ‘Give me a reason,’ she said.

The thug simply shook his head and stayed right where he was, leaning now against the rail.

He watched as Coll shambled over to where stood the short, round man in the red waistcoat. They spoke for a time, in tones so low the man had no chance of overhearing their conversation. And then Coll went behind the bar and emerged a moment later with an antique broadsword that looked like a perfect fit in those huge hands. Trailed by the fat man, he marched out into the kitchen, presumably for the back door.

Well, Hanut Orr was an arrogant tyrant. So he got what he wanted and a whole lot more. Things like that happen.

The man suddenly recalled that he’d spilled nothing about the two men waiting outside Coll’s estate. Well, this could work out just fine, so long as he managed to get out of this damned inn before Coll got ambushed at his gate.

Damned noisy in the city tonight — ah, yes, the last night of Gedderone Fete. Of course it was noisy, and dammit, he wanted to be out there himself, partying, dancing, squeezing soft flesh, maybe picking a fight or two — but ones he could win, of course. Nothing like this crap-

All at once Coll and the fat man were back, both looking confused.

‘Sulty dear,’ sang out the fat man, and one of the serving wenches looked over — they all had themselves a quiet, nervous audience among the half-dozen others in the tavern, and so numerous sets of eyes watched as she headed over. She was just rounding the nearest table when the fat man said, ‘It would appear that Hanut Orr has met an untimely end — before we even arrived, alas for Coll’s sake. Best summon a guard-’

She made a face. ‘What? Out there? In the damned streets? Sounds like ten thousand wolves have been let loose out there, Kruppe!’

‘Sweet Sulty, Kruppe assures you no harm will come to you! Kruppe assures, yes, and will warmly comfort too upon your triumphant return!’

‘Oh now that’s incentive,’ and she turned round and headed for the front door. And the man was close enough to hear her add under her breath, ‘Incentive to throw myself into the jaws of the first wolf I see. .’

But out she went.

The guard with the loving family and the aching chest was at the intersection just on this side of the wall one street away from the Phoenix Inn — and hurrying with genuine alarm towards the sounds of destruction to the south (the other raging fire in the Estate District was not his jurisdiction) — when he heard someone shouting at him and so turned, lifting high his lantern.

A young woman was waving frantically.

He hesitated, and then flinched at a howl so loud and so close he expected to see a demon standing at his shoulder. He jogged towards the woman.

‘For Hood’s sake!’ he shouted. ‘Get yourself inside!’

He saw her spin round and scamper for the entrance to the Phoenix Inn. As he drew closer a flash of motion from a facing alley mouth almost drew him round, but when he shot the bull’s eye in that direction, he saw no one. He hurried on, breathing hard as he climbed the steps and went inside.

A short time and a tumble of words later, he followed Councillor Coll and Kruppe into the alley, where they gathered round the corpse of yet another coun shy;cillor. Hanut Orr, apparently.

Wincing at the tightness that was closing like a vice round his ribcage, the guard slowly squatted to examine the wounds. Only two blows — which didn’t sound like his man — but then, the look of those wounds ‘I think he’s killed another one,’ he muttered. ‘Not long ago either.’ He looked up. ‘And you two saw nothing?’

Coll shook his head.

Kruppe — a man the guard had always regarded askance, with considerable sus shy;picion, in fact — hesitated.

‘What? Speak, you damned thief.’

‘Thief? Aaii, such an insult! Kruppe was but observing with most sharp eye the nature of said wounds upon forehead and back of neck.’

‘That’s how I know it’s the same man as has been killing dozens over the last few months. Some kind of foreign weapon-’

‘Foreign? Not at all, Kruppe suggests. Not at all.’

‘Really? Do go on.’

‘Kruppe suggests, most vigilant and honourable guard, that ’twas hands alone did this damage. Knuckles and no more, no less.’

‘No, that’s wrong. I’ve seen the marks a fist makes-’

‘But Kruppe did not say “fist”. Kruppe was being more precise. Knuckles, yes? As in knuckles unencumbered by fingers. .’

The guard frowned, and then looked once more at that bizarre elongated dent in Hanut Orr’s forehead. He suddenly straightened. ‘Knuckles. . but no fingers. But. . I know that man!’

‘Indeed?’ Kruppe beamed. ‘Best make haste then, friend, and beware on this night of all nights, do beware.’

‘What? Beware what — what are you talking about?’

‘Why, the Toll, friend. Beware the Toll. Now go quickly — we shall take this poor body inside, until the morning when proper arrangements are, er, arranged. Such a multitude of sorrows this night! Go, friend, hunt down your nemesis! This is the very night for such a thing!’

Everything was pulsing in front of the guard’s eyes, and the pain had surged from his chest into his skull. He was finding it hard to even so much as think. But. . yes, he knew that man. Gods, what was his name?

It would come to him, but for now he hurried down the alley, and out into yet another bizarrely empty street. The name would come to him, but he knew where the bastard lived, he knew that much and wasn’t that enough for now? It was.

Throbbing, pounding pulses rocked the brain in his skull. Flashes of orange light, flushes of dry heat against his face — gods, he wasn’t feeling right, not right at all. There was an old cutter down the street from where he lived — after tonight, he should pay her a visit. Lances of agony along his limbs, but he wasn’t going to stop, not even for a rest.

He had the killer. Finally. Nothing was going to get in his way.

And so onward he stumbled, lantern swinging wildly.

Gaz marched up to the door, pushed it open and halted, looking round. The stupid woman hadn’t even lit the hearth — where the fuck was she? He made his way across the single room, three strides in all, to the back door, which he kicked open.

Sure enough, there she was, standing with her back to him, right there in front of that circle of flat stones she’d spent days and nights arranging and rearranging. As if she’d lost her mind, and the look in her eyes of late — well, they were in so much trouble now.

‘Thordy!’

She didn’t even turn round, simply said, ‘Come over here, husband.’

‘Thordy, there’s trouble. I messed up. We messed up — we got to think — we got to get out of here, out of the city — we got to run-’

‘We’re not running,’ she said.

He came up beside her. ‘Listen, you stupid woman-’

She casually raised an arm and slid something cold and biting across his throat. Gaz stared, reached up his battered, maimed hands, and felt hot blood streaming down from his neck. ‘Thordy?’ The word bubbled as it came out.

Gaz fell to his knees, and she stepped up behind him and with a gentle push sent him sprawling face down on to the circle of flat stones.

‘You were a good soldier,’ she said. ‘Collecting up so many lives.’

He was getting cold, icy cold. He tried to work his way back up, but there was no strength left in him, none at all.

‘And me,’ she went on, ‘I’ve been good too. The dreams — he made it all so sim shy;ple, so obvious. I’ve been a good mason, husband, getting it all ready. . for you. For him.’

The ice filling Gaz seemed to suddenly reach in, as deep inside him as it was possible to go, and he felt something — something that was his, and his alone, something that called itself me — convulse and then shriek in terror and anguish as the cold devoured it, ate into it, and piece after piece of his life simply vanished, piece after piece after-

Thordy dropped the knife and stepped back as Hood, the Lord of Death, High King of the House of the Slain, Embracer of the Fallen, began to physically manifest on the stone dais before her. Tall, swathed in rotting robes of muted green, brown, and black. The face was hidden but the eyes were dull slits faintly lit in the midst of blackness, as was the smeared gleam of yellow tusks.

Hood now stood on the blood-splashed stones, in a decrepit garden in the district of Gadrobi, in the city of Darujhistan. Not a ghostly projection, not hidden behind veils of shielding powers, not even a spiritual visitation.

No, this was Hood, the god.

Here, now.

And in the city on all sides, the howling of the Hounds rose in an ear-shattering, soul-flailing crescendo.

The Lord of Death had arrived, to walk the streets, in the City of Blue Fire.

The guard came on to the decrepit street facing the ramshackle house that was home to the serial murderer, but he could barely make it out through the pulsing waves of darkness that seemed to be closing in on all sides, faster and faster, as if he was witness to a savage, nightmarish compression of time, clay hurtling into night into day and on and on. As if he was somehow rushing into his own old age, right up to his final mortal moment. A roaring sound filled his head, excruciating pain radiating out from his chest, burning with fire in his arms, the side of his neck. His jaws were clenched so tight he was crushing his own teeth, and every breath was agony.

He made it halfway to the front door before falling to his knees, doubling up and sinking down on to his side, the lantern clunking as it struck the cobbles. And suddenly he had room for a thousand thoughts, all the time he could have wanted, now that he’d taken his last breath. So many things became clear, simple, acquiring a purity that lifted him clear of his body-

And he saw, as he hovered above his corpse, that a figure had emerged from the killer’s house. His altered vision revealed every detail of that ancient, unhuman visage within the hood, the deep-etched lines, the ravaged map of countless cen shy;turies. Tusks rising from the lower jaw, chipped and worn, the tips ragged and splintered. And the eyes — so cold, so. . haunted — all at once the guard knew this apparition.

Hood. The Lord of Death had come for him.

He watched as the god lifted his gaze, fixing him with those terrible eyes.

And a voice spoke in his head, a heavy voice, like the grinding of massive stones, the sinking of mountains. ‘I have thought nothing of justice. For so long now. It is all one to me. Grief is tasteless, sorrow an empty sigh. Live an eternity in dust and ashes and then speak to me of justice.’

To this the guard had nothing to say. He had been arguing with death night after night. He had been fighting all the way from the Phoenix Inn. Every damned step. He was past that now.

‘So,’ continued Hood, ‘here I stand. And the air surrounding me, the air rushing into my lungs, it lives. I cannot prevent what comes with my every step here in the mortal world. I cannot be other than what I am.’

The guard was confused. Was the Lord of Death apologizing?

‘But this once, I shall have my way. I shall have my way.’ And he stepped for shy;ward, raising one withered hand — a hand, the guard saw, missing two fingers. ‘Your soul shines. It is bright. Blinding. So much honour, so much love. Compas shy;sion. In the cavern of loss you leave behind, your children will be less than all they could have been. They will curl round scars and the wounds will never quite heal, and they will learn to gnaw those scars, to lick, to drink deep. This will not do.’

The guard convulsed, spinning down back into the corpse on the cobbles. He felt his heart lurch, and then pound with sudden ease, sudden, stunning vigour. He drew a deep breath, the air wondrous, cool, sweeping away the last vestige of pain — sweeping everything away.

All that he had come to, in those last moments — that scintillating clarity of vi shy;sion, the breathtaking understanding of everything — now sank beneath a familiar cloud, settling grey and thick, where every shape was but hinted at, where he was lost. As lost as he had been, as lost as any and every mortal soul, no matter how blustery its claims to certainty, to faith. And yet. . and yet it was a warm cloud, shot through with precious things: his love for his wife, his children; his wonder at their lives, the changes that came to them day by day.

He found he was weeping, even as he climbed to his feet. He turned to look at the Lord of Death, in truth not expecting to see the apparition which must surely come only to the dead and dying, and then cried out in shock.

Hood looked solid, appallingly real, walking down the street, eastward, and it was as if the webs binding them then stretched, the fabric snapping, wisping off into the night, and with each stride that took the god farther away the guard felt his life returning, an awareness of breathtaking solidity — in this precise moment, and in every one that would follow.

He turned away — and even that was easy — and settled his gaze upon the door, which hung open, and all that waited within was dark and rotted through with horror and madness.

The guard did not hesitate.

With this modest and humble man, with this courageous, honourable man, Hood saw true. And, for just this once, the Lord of Death had permitted himself to care.

Mark this, a most significant moment, a most poignant gesture.

Thordy heard boots on the warped floorboards of the back porch and she turned to see a city guardsman emerge from her house, out through the back door, holding a lantern in one hand.

‘He is dead,’ she said. ‘The one you have come here for. Gaz, my husband.’ She pointed with a blood-slick knife. ‘Here.’

The guard walked closer, sliding back one of the shutters on the lantern and di shy;recting the shaft of light until it found and held on the motionless body lying on the stones.

‘He confessed,’ she said. ‘So I killed him, with my own hand. I killed this. . monster.’

The guardsman crouched down to study the corpse. He reached out and gently slipped one finger under the cuff of one of Gaz’s sleeves, and raised up the battered, fingerless hand. He sighed then, and slowly nodded.

As he lowered the arm again and began straightening, Thordy said, ‘I understand there is a reward.’

He looked across at her.

She wasn’t sure what she saw in his expression. He might be horrified, or amused, or cynically drained of anything like surprise. But it didn’t matter much. She just wanted the money. She needed the money.

Becoming, for a time, the mason of the Lord of the Slain entailed a fearsome re shy;sponsibility. But she hadn’t seen a single bent copper for her troubles.

The guardsman nodded. ‘There is.’

She held up the kitchen knife.

He might have flinched a bit, maybe, but what mattered now would be Thordy seeing him nod a second time.

And after a moment, he did just that.

A god walked the streets of Darujhistan. In itself, never a good thing. Only fools would happily, eagerly invite such a visitation, and such enthusiasm usually proved short-lived. That this particular god was the harvester of souls meant that, well, not only was his manifestation unwelcome, but his gift amounted to unmitigated slaughter, rippling out to overwhelm thousands of inhabitants in tenement blocks, in the clustered hovels of the Gadrobi District, in the Lakefront District — but no, such things cannot be glanced over with a mere shudder.

Plunge then, courage collected, into this welter of lives. Open the mind to con shy;sider, cold or hot, all manner of judgement. Propriety is dispensed with, decency cast aside. This is the eye that does not blink, but is such steely regard an invitation to cruel indifference? To a hardened, compassionless aspect? Or will a sliver of honest empathy work its way beneath the armour of desensitized excess?

When all is done, dare to weigh thine own harvest of feelings and consider this one challenge: if all was met with but a callous shrug, then, this round man invites, shift round such cruel, cold regard, and cast one last judgement. Upon thyself.

But for now. . witness.

Skilles Naver was about to murder his family. He had been walking home from Gajjet’s Bar, belly filled with ale, only to have a dog the size of a horse step out in front of him. A blood-splashed muzzle, eyes burning with bestial fire, the huge flattened head swinging round in his direction.

He had frozen in place. He had pissed himself, and then shat himself.

A moment later a high wooden fence surrounding a vacant lot further up the street — where a whole family had died of some nasty fever a month earlier — sud shy;denly collapsed and a second enormous dog appeared, this one bone white.

Its arrival snatched the attention of the first beast, and in a surge of muscles the creature lunged straight for it.

They collided like two runaway, laden wagons, the impact a concussion that staggered Skilles. Whimpering, he turned and ran.

And ran.

And now he was home, stinking like a slop pail, and his wife was but half packed — caught in the midst of a treacherous flight, stealing the boys, too. His boys. His little workers, who did everything Skilles told them to (and Beru fend if they didn’t or even talked back, the little shits) and the thought of a life with shy;out them — without his perfect, private, very own slaves — lit Skilles into a white rage.

His wife saw what was coming. She pushed the boys into the corridor and then turned to give up her own life. Besk the neighbour the door next over was collecting the boys for some kind of escape to who knew where. Well, Skilles would just have to hunt him down, wouldn’t he? It wasn’t as if puny rat-faced Surna was going to hold him back for long, was it?

Just grab her, twist that scrawny neck and toss the waste of space to one side-

He didn’t even see the knife, and all he felt of the murderous stab was a prick under his chin, as the thin blade shot up through his mouth, deflected inward by his upper palate, and sank three fingers deep straight into the base of his brain.

Surna and her boys didn’t have to run after all.

Kanz was nine years old and he loved teasing his sister who had a real temper, as Ma always said as she picked up pieces of broken crockery and bits of hated veg shy;etables scattered all over the floor, and the best thing was prodding his sister in the ribs when she wasn’t looking, and she’d spin round, eyes flashing with fury and hate — and off he’d run, with her right on his heels, out into the corridor, pell-mell straight to the stairs and then down and round and down fast as he could go with her screeching behind him.

Down and round and down and-

— and he was flying through the air. He’d tripped, missed his grip on the rail, and the ground floor far below rushed up to meet him.

‘You two will be the death of each other!’ Ma always said. Zasperating! She said that too-

He struck the floor. Game over.

Sister’s quick temper went away and never returned after that night. And Ma never again voiced the word ‘zasperating’. Of course it did not occur to her that its sudden vanishing from her mind was because her little boy had taken it with him, the last word he’d thought. He’d taken it, as would a toddler a doll, or a blanket. For comfort in his dark new world.

Benuck Fill sat watching his mother wasting away. Some kind of cancer was eating her up inside. She’d stopped talking, stopped wanting anything; she was like a sack of sticks when he picked her up to carry her to the washtub to wipe down all the runny stuff she leaked out these days, these nights. Her smile, which had told him so much of her love for him, and her shame at what she had become — that horrible loss of dignity — had changed now into something else: an open mouth, lips withered and folded in, each breath a wheezing gasp. If that was a smile then she was smiling at death itself and that was hard for him to bear. Seeing that. Understanding it, what it meant.

Not long now. And Benuck didn’t know what he would do. She had given him life. She had fed him, held him, kept him warm. She had given him words to live by, rules to help him shape his life, his self. She wasn’t clever, very, or even wise. She was just an average person, who worked hard so that they could live, and worked even harder when Da went to fight in Pale where he probably died though they never found out either way. He just never came back.

Benuck sat wringing his hands, listening to her breathing, wishing he could help her, fill her with his own breath, fill her right up so she could rest, so she’d have a single, final moment when she didn’t suffer, one last moment of painless life, and then she could let go. .

But here, unseen by any, was the real truth. His mother had died eight days ago. He sat facing an empty chair, and whatever had broken in his mind had trapped him now in those last days and nights. Watching, washing, dressing. Things to do for her, moments of desperate care and love, and then back to the watching and there was no light left in her eyes and she made no sign she heard a thing he said, all his words of love, his words of thanks.

Trapped. Lost. Not eating, not doing anything at all.

Hood’s hand brushed his brow then and he slumped forward in his chair, and the soul of his mother, that had been hovering in anguish in this dreadful room all this time, now slipped forward for an eternal embrace.

Sometimes, the notion of true salvation can start the eyes.

Avab Tenitt fantasized about having children with him in his bed. Hadn’t happened yet, but soon he would make it all real. In the meantime he liked tying a rope round his neck, a damned noose, in fact, while he masturbated under the blankets while his unsuspecting wife scrubbed dishes in the kitchen.

Tonight, the knot snagged and wouldn’t loosen. In fact, it just got tighter and tighter the more he struggled with it, and so as he spilled out, so did his life.

When his wife came into the room, exhausted, her hands red and cracked by domestic travails, and on her tongue yet another lashing pending for her wastrel husband, she stopped and stared. At the noose. The bloated, blue and grey face above it, barely recognizable, and it was as if a thousand bars of lead had been lifted from her shoulders.

Let the dogs howl outside all night. Let the fires rage. She was free and her life ahead was all her own and nobody else’s. For ever and ever again.

A week later a neighbour would see her pass on the street and would say to friends that evening how Nissala had suddenly become beautiful, stunning, in fact, filled with vitality, looking years and years younger. Like a dead flower suddenly reborn, a blossom fierce under the brilliant warm sunlight.

And then the two gossipy old women would fall silent, both thinking the same dark thoughts, the delicious what-if and maybe-she notions that made life so much fun, and gave them plenty to talk about, besides.

In the meantime, scores of children would stay innocent for a little longer than they would have otherwise done.

Widow Lebbil was a reasonable woman most of the time. But on occasion this gentle calm twisted into something malign, something so bound up in rage that it overwhelmed its cause. The same thing triggered her incandescent fury, the same thing every time.

Fat Saborgan lived above her, and around this time every night — when decent people should be sleeping though truth be told who could do that on this insane night when the mad revelry in the streets sounded out of control — he’d start running about up there, back and forth, round and round, this way and that.

Who could sleep below that thunder?

And so she worked her way out of bed, groaning at her aching hips, took one of her canes and, standing on a rickety chair, pounded against the ceiling. Her voice was too thin, too frail — he’d never hear if she yelled up at him. Only the cane would do. And she knew he heard her, she knew he did, but did it make any difference?

No! Never!

She couldn’t go on with this. She couldn’t!

Thump thump scrape thump scrape thump thump — and so she pounded and pounded and pounded, her arms on fire, her shoulders cramping. Pounded and pounded.

Saborgan should indeed have heard the widow’s protest, but, alas, he was lost in his own world, and he danced with the White-Haired Empress, who’d come from some other world, surely, to his very room and the music filled his head and was so sweet, so magical, and her hands were soft as doves held as gently as he could manage in his own blunted, clumsy fingers. And soft and frail as her hands were, the Empress led, tugging him back and forth so that he never quite regained his balance.

The White-Haired Empress was very real. She was in fact a minor demon, conjured and chained into servitude in this ancient tenement on the very edge of the Gadrobi District. Her task, from the very first, had been singular, a geas set upon her by the somewhat neurotic witch dead now these three centuries.

The White-Haired Empress was bound to the task of killing cockroaches, in this one room. The manner in which she did so had, over decades and decades, suffered a weakening of strictures, leaving the now entirely loony demon the freedom to improvise.

This mortal had huge feet, his most attractive feature, and when they danced he closed his eyes and silently wept, and she could guide those feet on to every damned cockroach skittering across the filthy floor. Step crunch step crunch — there! A big one — get it! Crunch and smear, crunch and smear!

In this lone room, barring the insects who lived in terror, there was pure, un shy;mitigated joy, delicious satisfaction, and the sweetest love.

It all collapsed at around the same time as the floor. Rotted crossbeams, boards and thick plaster descended on to Widow Lebbil and it was as much the shock as the weight of the wreckage that killed her instantly.

Poor Saborgan, losing his grip on the wailing Empress, suffered the stunning implosion of a cane driven up his anus — oh, even to recount is to wince! — which proved a most fatal intrusion indeed. As for the Empress herself, well, after a mo shy;ment of horrific terror her geas shattered, releasing her at last to return to her home, the realm of the Cockroach Kings (oh, very well, the round man just made up that last bit. Forgive?). Who knows where she went? The only thing for certain is that she danced every step of the way.

The vague boom of a collapsing floor in a squalid tenement building somewhere overhead went unnoticed by Seba Krafar, Master of the Assassins’ Guild, as he staggered down the subterranean corridor, seeking the refuge of his nest.

Would the disasters never end? It had all started with that damned Rallick Nom cult, and then, almost before the dust settled on that, their first big contract ran up against the most belligerent, vicious collection of innkeepers imaginable. And the one that followed?

He suspected he was the only survivor. He’d left his crossbowmen to cover his retreat and not one of them had caught up with him; and now, with gas storage caverns igniting one after another, well, he found himself in an abandoned warren of tunnels, rushing through raining dust, coughing, eyes stinging.

All ruined. Wrecked. He’d annihilated the entire damned Guild.

He would have to start over.

All at once, the notion excited him. Yes, he could shape it himself — nothing to inherit. A new structure. A new philosophy, even.

Such. . possibilities.

He staggered into his office, right up to the desk, which he leaned on with both hands on its pitted surface. And then frowned at the scattering of scrolls, and saw documents strewn everywhere on the floor — what in Hood’s name?

‘Master Krafar, is it?’

The voice spun him round.

A woman stood with her back resting against the wall beside the doorway. A cocked crossbow was propped beside her left boot, quarrel head resting on the packed earthen floor. Her arms were crossed.

Seba Krafar scowled. ‘Who in Hound’s name are you?’

‘You don’t know me? Careless. My name is Blend. I’m one of the owners of K’rul’s.’

‘That contract’s cancelled — we’re done with you. No more-’

‘I don’t care. It’s simple — I want the name. The one who brought you the con shy;tract. Now, you can give it to me without any fuss, and I will walk out of here and that’s the last you’ll see of me, and all your worries will be at an end. The Guild removed from the equation. Consider it a gift, but now it’s time for you to earn it.’

He studied her, gauging his chances. She didn’t look like much. There was no way she’d reach that crossbow in time — two quick strides and he’d be right in her face. With two knives in her gut. And then he’d send a note to Humble Measure and claim one more down — leaving what, two or three left? He’d get paid well for that, and Hood knew he needed the coin if he was going to start over.

And so he attacked.

He wasn’t sure what happened next. He had his knives out, she was right there in front of him, and then her elbow smashed into his face, shattering his nose and blinding him with pain. And somehow both thrusts he sent her way, one seeking the soft spot just beneath her sternum, the other striking lower down, both failed. One blocked, the other missing entirely, dagger point driving into the wall she’d been leaning against.

The blow to his face turned his knees to water, but only for the briefest of mo shy;ments, for Seba Krafar was a bull of a man, a brawler. Damage was something to shake off and then just get on with it, and so, shoulder hunching, he attempted a slanting slash, trying to gut the bitch right then and there.

Something hard hammered his wrist, sending the dagger flying, and bones cracked in his arm. As he stumbled back, tugging the other knife from the wall, he attempted a frantic thrust to keep her off him. She caught his wrist and her thumb was like an iron nail, impaling the base of his palm. The knife dropped from senseless fingers. She then took that arm and twisted it hard round, pushing his shoulder down and so forcing his head to follow.

Where it met a rising knee.

An already broken nose struck again, struck even harder, in fact, is not some shy;thing that can be shaken off. Stunned, not a sliver of will left in his brain, he landed on his back. Some instinct made him roll, up against the legs of his desk, and he heaved himself upright once more.

The quarrel took him low on the right side, just above his hip, glancing off the innominate bone and slicing messily through his liver.

Seba Krafar sagged back down, into a slump with his back against the desk.

With streaming eyes he looked across at the woman.

Malazan, right. She’d been a soldier once. No, she’d been a Bridgeburner. He used to roll his eyes at that. A Bridgeburner? So what? Just some puffed up ooh-ah crap. Seba was an assassin. Blood kin to Talo Krafar and now there was a monster of a man-

Who’d been taken down by a quarrel. Killed like a boar in a thicket.

She walked over to stand before him. ‘That was silly, Seba. And now here you are, face broken and skewered. That’s your liver bleeding out there, I think. Frankly, I’m amazed you’re not already dead, but lucky for you that you aren’t.’ She crouched and held up a small vial. ‘If I pour this into that wound — once I pluck out the bolt, that is, and assuming you survive that — well, there’s a good chance you’ll live. So, should I do that, Seba? Should I save your sorry arse?’

He stared at her. Gods, he hurt everywhere.

‘The name,’ she said. ‘Give me the name and you’ve got a chance to survive this. But best hurry up with your decision. You’re running out of time.’

Was Hood hovering? In that buried place so far beneath the streets? Well, of course he was.

Seba gave her the name. He even warned her off — don’t mess with that one, he’s a damned viper. There’s something there, in his eyes, I swear-

Blend was true to her word.

So Hood went away.

The cascade of sudden deaths, inexplicable and outrageous accidents, miserable ends and terrible murders filled every abode, every corner and every hovel in a spreading tide, a most fatal flood creeping out through the hapless city on all sides. No age was spared, no weight of injustice tipped these scales. Death took them all: well born and destitute, the ill and the healthy, criminal and victim, the unloved and the cherished.

So many last breaths: coughed out, sighed, whimpered, bellowed in defiance, in disbelief, in numbed wonder. And if such breaths could coalesce, could form a thick, dry, pungent fugue of dismay, in the city on this night not a single globe of blue fire could be seen.

There were survivors. Many, many survivors — indeed, more survived than died — but alas, it was a close run thing, this measure, this fell harvest.

The god walked eastward, out from Gadrobi District and into Lakefront, and, from there, up into the Estates.

This night was not done. My, not done at all.

Unseen in the pitch black of this moonless, smoke-wreathed night, a massive shape sailed low over the Gadrobi Hills, westward and out on to the trader’s road. As it drew closer to the murky lights of Worrytown, the silent flier slowly dropped lower until its clawed talons almost brushed the gravel of the road.

Above it, smaller shapes beat heavy wings here and there, wheeling round, plummeting and then thudding themselves back up again. These too uttered no calls in the darkness.

To one side of the track, crouched in high grasses, a coyote that had been about to cross the track suddenly froze.

Heady spices roiled over the animal in a warm, sultry gust, and where a moment earlier there had been black, shapeless clouds sliding through the air, now there was a figure — a man-thing, the kind the coyote warred with in its skull, fear and curiosity, opportunity and deadly betrayal — walking on the road.

But this man-thing, it was. . different.

As it came opposite the coyote, its head turned and regarded the beast.

The coyote trotted out. Every muscle, every instinct, cried out for a submissive surrender, and yet as if from some vast power outside itself, the coyote held its head high, ears sharp forward as it drew up alongside the figure.

Who reached down to brush gloved fingers back along the dome of its head.

And off the beast bounded, running as fast as it legs could carry it, out into the night, the vast plain to the south.

Freed, blessed, beneficiary of such anguished love that it would live the rest of its years in a grassy sea of joy and delight.

Transformed. No special reason, no grim purpose. No, this was a whimsical touch, a mutual celebration of life. Understand it or stumble through. The coyote’s role is done, and off it pelts, heart bright as a blazing star.

Gifts to start the eyes.

Anomander Rake, Son of Darkness, walked between the shanties of Worrytown. The gate was ahead, but no guards were visible. The huge doors were barred.

From beyond, from the city itself, fires roared here and there, thrusting bulging cloaks of spark-lit smoke up into the black night.

Five paces from the gates now, and something snapped and fell away. The doors swung open. And, unaccosted, unnoticed, Anomander Rake walked into Darujhistan.

Howls rose like madness unleashed.

The Son of Darkness reached up and unsheathed Dragnipur.

Steam curled from the black blade, twisting into ephemeral chains that stretched out as he walked up the wide, empty street. Stretched out to drag behind him, and from each length others emerged and from these still more, a forest’s worth of iron roots, snaking out, whispering over the cobbles.

He had never invited such a manifestation before. Reining in that bleed of power had been an act of mercy, to all those who might witness it, who might comprehend its significance.

But on this night, Anomander Rake had other things on his mind.

Chains of smoke, chains and chains and chains, so many writhing in his wake that they filled the breadth of the street, that they snaked over and under and spilled out into side streets, alleys, beneath estate gates, beneath doors and through win shy;dows. They climbed walls.

Wooden barriers disintegrated — doors and sills and gates and window frames. Stones cracked, bricks spat mortar. Walls bowed. Buildings groaned.

He walked on as those chains grew taut.

No need yet to lean forward with each step. No need yet to reveal a single detail to betray the strength and the will demanded of him.

He walked on.

Throughout the besieged city, mages, witches, wizards and sorcerors clutched the sides of their heads, eyes squeezing shut as unbearable pressure closed in. Many fell to their knees. Others staggered. Still others curled up into tight foetal balls on the floor, as the world groaned.

Raging fires flinched, collapsed into themselves, died in silent gasps.

The howl of the Hounds thinned as if forced through tight valves.

In a slag-crusted pit twin sisters paused as one in their efforts to scratch each other’s eyes out. In the midst of voluminous clouds of noxious vapours, knee deep in magma that swirled like a lake of molten sewage, the sisters halted, and slowly lifted their heads.

As if scenting the air.

Dragnipur.

Dragnipur.

Down from the Estates, into that projecting wedge that was Daru, and hence through another gate and on to the main avenue in Lakefront, proceeding parallel to the shoreline. As soon as he reached the straight, level stretch of that avenue, the Son of Darkness paused.

Four streets distant on that same broad track, Hood, Lord of Death, fixed his gaze on the silver-haired figure who seemed to have hesitated, but only for a moment, before resuming its approach.

Hood felt his own unease, yet onward he strode.

The power of that sword was breathtaking, even for a god. Breathtaking.

Terrifying.

They drew closer, in measured steps, and closer still.

The Hounds had fallen silent. In the wake of crushed fires, smoke billowed low, barely lit by fitful blue gaslight. Piercing in and out of the black clouds, Great Ravens circled, advanced, and retreated; and moments before the two figures reached each other, the huge birds began landing on roof edges facing down into the street, in rows and clusters, scores and then hundreds.

They were here.

To witness.

To know. To believe.

And, perchance, to feed.

Only three strides between them now. Hood slowed his steps. ‘Son of Darkness,’ he said, ‘I have reconsidered-’

And the sword lashed out, a clean arc that took the Lord of Death in the neck, slicing clean through.

As Hood’s head pitched round inside its severed cloth sack, the body beneath it staggered back, dislodging what it had lost.

A heavy, solid crunch as the god’s head struck the cobbles, rolling on to one cheek, the eyes staring and lifeless.

Black blood welled up from the stump of neck. One more step back, before the legs buckled and the Lord of Death fell to his knees and then sat back.

Opposite the dead god, Anomander Rake, face stretching in agony, sought to remain standing.

Whatever weight descended upon him at this moment was invisible to the mortal eye, unseen even by the thousand Great Ravens perched and leaning far forward on all sides, but its horrendous toll was undeniable.

The Son of Darkness, Dragnipur in one hand, bowed and bent like an old man. The sword’s point grated and then caught in the join between four cobbles. And Anomander Rake began to lean on it, every muscle straining as his legs slowly gave way — no, he could not stand beneath this weight.

And so he sank down, the sword before him, both hands on the cross-hilt’s wings, head bowed against Dragnipur, and these details alone were all that dis shy;tinguished him from the god opposite.

They sat, on knees and haunches, as if mirrored images. One leaning on a sword, forehead pressed to the gleaming, smoke-wreathed blade. The other decapitated, hands resting palm up on the thighs.

One was dead.

The other, at this moment, profoundly. . vulnerable.

Things noticed.

Things were coming, and coming fast.

And this night, why, it is but half done.