“All the girls love Adlar,” Quintrell muttered, leaning towards me on his camp stool. At first I thought there may be some barb in his comment but his features were soft with shared confidence. “But they’re always disappointed. Not so the boys. Have no worry for your pet, my lord.”

  “She no one’s pet,” I replied, but relief kept my tone mellow. “At least I won’t have to warn him about the dangers of straying hands.” A cheer went up as Adlar plucked yet another knife from his belt and added it to the expanding circle of dancing blades, Ayin clapping in excitement. “For a fellow who took a punch from his own mother on account of his clumsiness,” I observed to Quintrell, “he seems to have acquired a remarkable confidence.”

  “The duchess cautioned me as to your suspicious nature.” Quintrell puffed more pipe smoke and leaned a little closer. “You imagine him an agent of hers, one I contrived to slip into your company by virtue of clever mummery.” He bit his pipe stem to let out a wry chuckle. “Such a novelty to meet a man with a mind even more prone to artifice than my own. Although, I daresay the Lady Lorine beats us both on that score, eh?”

  My attention slipped back to Adlar who was now turning in a slow pirouette, the knives arcing to yet greater heights. “So, if he’s not her spy, what is he?”

  “A lad I’m fond of who needed to escape a bad place, to wit: his family. His mother is a spiteful creature of endless criticism and his father her craven slave. I encountered them many times over the years. We players form a loosely aligned nation of our own in many ways, so frequently do we cross paths at the fairs and castles of this land. I’ve known Adlar all his life, off and on, and every time I saw him he appeared yet more miserable, and clumsy. Constant harping, and beatings, will sap the surety from any hand, even those as skilled as his. He needed to leave. It’s the way of things, all children must eventually venture beyond their family’s embrace, sometimes for fear that it might crush them.”

  “I daresay this loose nation of players must be a fruitful source of gossip. Folk who constantly tour the grand houses of the realm entire will surely have interesting stories to share.”

  Quintrell puffed and said nothing, though a half-grin lingered on his lips.

  “I wonder,” I persisted, narrowing my eyes to ensure he saw the hard, purposeful glint, “if your travels ever took you to the Algathinet court?”

  “Duchess Lorine pays me.” The grin lingered on his lips, though the flintiness of his gaze was a match for mine. “You do not, my lord.”

  “You’re here at your lady’s behest, in service to our shared cause. If you have intelligence that might aid us…”

  What gems of knowledge this minstrel might possess, however, would not be unearthed that night, for it was then that a distant shout echoed from the darkness beyond the picket line. Most of those present paid it no heed, still captured by the juggler’s tricks, but I had ears well attuned to the pitch of loudly voiced alarm. Evidently, so did Quintrell for we rose in unison, searching the blackness untouched by the picket’s torches.

  “Quiet!” I barked as the spectators began to cheer again. Adlar’s glittering arc slowed then collapsed in the thickened silence, soon broken by another shout from the gloom, this one accompanied by the drum of galloping hooves.

  “Beware!” a voice echoed from the shadows. “Rouse… the Lady!”

  I pushed my way through the throng to the picket line, finding a line of pike-bearing guards exchanging puzzled glances. “Are we attacked, my lord?” a wide-eyed youth enquired. “Should we sound the horns?”

  “Shut up!” I snapped, ears straining for more of the unseen herald, whoever they might be.

  “Look to the Lady!” The source of the shout finally came into view, horse and rider resolving out of the dark fifty yards to my left. I ran towards him, barking out orders for the archers among the pickets to lower their weapons. Seeing me, the rider changed course, whipping his plainly exhausted mount to a final burst of speed.

  “The Lady, my lord!” I recognised Tiler’s sharp, pale features as he dragged his horse to a halt a few paces off. “They’re here!”

  “Who?”

  “Vergundians, hired blades.”

  “Which direction?”

  He shook his head, sagging in the saddle to drag fresh air into his lungs before blurting an answer. “No. They’re already here. Thessil sent them ahead of us. The inn. They’re under the inn!”

  I shouted as I ran, rousing every soldier I saw while leaping campfires and skirting tents. My words were barely intelligible, but the flash of the longsword in my hand and the furious intent on my face were unmistakable. By the time the inn came into view, I had at least fifty armed crusaders at my back. My speed increased at the sight of the guards lying still at the door to the inn, then flared to an unreasoning sprint at the tumult of combat from within. The doors slammed open as I barrelled through, immediately stumbling over the bloodied corpse of a Vergundian. I expended a precious second regarding his slack-mouthed features framed by silk-adorned braids, skin flecked crimson from an opened throat, then kicked his body aside and charged on.

  I spared scant time in surveying the scene, it was mostly a chaos of struggling figures clustered at the far end of the room. Splintered floorboards lay everywhere among streaked and pooled blood. Short, curve-bladed knives flashed and screams of challenge and pain abounded. Through the crush I caught the merest glimpse of Evadine backed into a corner, face set in grim resolve, her longsword slicing and cutting with tireless efficiency.

  I recall a feral shout escaping my lips before I plunged headlong into the melee. Only the first one I cut down remains clear in my memory, a stocky hired blade wielding a hatchet, his hair cropped short as is custom for those often given to wearing helms. He turned in time to take the point of my sword full in the face, the thrust delivered with enough force to drive the blade clean through the skull. I maintained my charge, putting my shoulder into his chest and propelling his twitching form into the press of bodies. A red fountain erupted as I dragged the longsword from his head, hacking left and right, only dimly aware of the Covenant soldiers rushing forward on my flanks. The rest is a blur of frenzied violence I consider myself fortunate not to remember. I know I lost my sword in the chaos of it all, for when reason descended, I found myself strangling a Vergundian, spitting a torrent of obscenities as I thrust his already charred, smoking head into the burning coals of the fireplace.

  “Burn, you fuck!” I grunted in a final outburst of ferocity, letting his head loll into the flames as I drew my hands back from his throat. They came away red to the wrist, scraps of flesh dangling from my fingertips. I staggered upright, desperately scanning the ruination for Evadine. She stood in the centre of the room, longsword dripping blood at her side. Bodies littered the cramped mess of the drinking den, blood on every surface. Some of the Covenant soldiers were finishing off the wounded assassins while others just stood, chests heaving, faces blank with the befuddlement that dawns in the aftermath of first battle. The urge to rush to Evadine was strong, pull her close and press my lips to hers. I quelled it with difficulty, but the glance we shared sufficed to reassure me she had suffered no injury. Her black cotton garb was torn in places, revealing a few scratches but no cuts of note.

  A flicker of a smile passed over her lips before she looked away. A frown creased her brow as she smoothed a trembling hand over her hip, then her belly, a gesture to which I should have afforded much more notice. However, the sudden growl behind her banished all other concerns. The Vergundian was huge, a raging, wild-eyed bull of a man who must have concealed himself beneath the floorboards with great difficulty. He surged from a pile of bodies, curved knives in both hands, too close to Evadine, too fast for me or her to cut him down.

  The knife flicked past Evadine’s ear in a silvery arc, missing her by a fraction before burying itself in the Vergundian’s eye. He staggered about for a time, his own knives dangling from limp fingers as he performed a dance that might well have been amusing at another time. It ended when Ayin, face streaked red and hair matted with gore not her own, stepped up behind him and slit his throat from ear to ear.

  I turned towards the front of the inn, finding Adlar Spinner framed in the doorway, still crouched in the aftermath of his throw. The bleached stillness of his features made it plain that this was the first time he had used his skills to end a life.

  “This bastard’s not dead.” The gruff voice of a soldier provided another distraction. He stooped over the body of a Vergundian, hand fisted in the ribboned braids to drag his head from the boards. The plainsman’s features were slack, but his half-opened eyes betrayed a glimmer of animation.

  “Stop,” I said as the soldier put a dagger to the Vergundian’s throat. “Leave him be.”

  The soldier was clearly a veteran of previous crusades and probably a few wars. His swarthy, scarred face, still flushed with the fury of recent combat, bunched in puzzlement as I came closer. “A dead man’s tongue doesn’t wag,” I explained before turning to the juggler still frozen in the doorway. “How about it, Master Spinner? Care to earn your coin for a second time?”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The Vergundian didn’t wake until midday, by which time most of the camp had broken up and the crusade begun its march towards Athiltor. Keeping my prisoner alive in the intervening hours had been a taxing business, the mob of vengeful followers that gathered at the inn assuaged only by a brief sermon from the Anointed Lady herself.

  “Do you imagine me a murderer?” she demanded. “Moreover, do you imagine me a fool? This man has my protection, for he is but another victim of heresy. Through him, we will learn the disposition of our enemy. Through mercy will victory be achieved.”

  Possibly due to the fact that these were the most words they had heard from their Risen Martyr in many days, they sufficed to keep the Vergundian alive until dawn. While the host shambled into its ragged marching order, I and the most trusted of my scouts remained behind, as did Adlar Spinner. The bodies had been dragged from the inn and heaped outside without ceremony, although there had been something ritualistic in the way crusaders came to cast spit or piss upon the pile. I made sure our captive could see the corpse mound through the ruined doors, but the sight of the fly-shrouded horror appeared to concern him hardly at all.

  “Uttrach!” he hissed at me after I banished his confusion with a bucket of ditch water. “Triack lemil, ja vorca kir-ech!”

  “Uttrach means coward, my lord,” Adlar Spinner supplied in response to my questioning glance.

  “And the rest?”

  The juggler shifted in discomfort; his complexion still largely devoid of colour. The stain of killing will linger on some souls longer than others, and I had a fancy that the events of the previous nights had dispelled any idealised notions this youth may have harboured towards the trade of soldiering. His fear and distaste for the task set him were plain in the glances he darted at the inn’s other occupants. Ayin sat in a corner, quill poised over an open ledger. She had washed her face but her hair retained a matted spikiness. The Widow rested herself against the counter nursing a cup of brandy. I couldn’t tell if her lack of expression came from boredom or anticipation. Lilat stood at the furthest remove, huddled against the wall with her hood drawn over her features. I knew she would leave if this encounter degenerated into torment, and found I was grateful for it. Tiler was the most animated, pacing back and forth on the only patch of unsplintered floorboards.

  I had gotten most of his story last night. The outlaw related how he had, over the course of several days, managed to ingratiate himself with a party of hired blades heading for Athiltor. His description of the holy city matched what the Widow had gleaned from those fleeing along the King’s Road: hangings and floggings, thieving mercenaries and a fearful population. It was a full week before a drunken crossbowman from the Divine Captain’s inner circle had let slip his commander’s cunning stratagem of secreting assassins in the Malecite Whore’s most likely resting place on the road to Athiltor. Realising the imminent danger, Tiler garrotted the loose-tongued crossbowman, stole a horse and made all haste for the crossroads. The thought of what might have happened had he been only a moment slower put a tremble to my hand as I toyed with one of the curved knives of which these Vergundians seemed so fond. This example had been found in the captive’s hand, and I saw a distinct glimmer of outrage in his gaze as he watched me fiddle with it.

  “He said,” Adlar paused to swallow, “‘Kill me, if you’ve the balls.’”

  “Oh, we’ve got the balls, you goat-shagger!” Tiler snarled, advancing towards the captive. “But you won’t when we’re done! We’ll give you to her.” He stabbed a finger at Ayin. “She knows how to treat your kind.”

  I met his eye, shaking my head. Tiler bit down on another snarl and resumed his pacing.

  “This is an interesting weapon,” I said, twirling the blade I held. “What’s it called?” The knife was, in truth, a novel design I hadn’t seen before. Blade and handle had been fashioned from the same piece of steel, a seven-inch, double-edged sickle attached to a twisted grip with a ring in place of a pommel. I had seen how the Vergundians would fix the ring over their forefinger when they wielded it, the double edge enabling them to slash as well as stab while the ring prevented it falling from their grasp.

  “They call it a ‘trakiesh’, my lord,” Adlar said.

  “Trakiesh,” I repeated, keeping my focus on the Vergundian, bruised features twitching in anger. “Does this word have meaning beyond just a knife?”

  “My mother had one,” Adlar said. “She called it her ‘soul-blade’. Vergundians are given a trakiesh by their clan chief when they come of age, but only if they are judged to have a soul. They don’t think about such things the way we do, my lord. A soul is something that can be lost, or even stolen from the weak or the cowardly. Those judged as soulless are cast out. They believe their trakiesh can take in the souls of others, which will add to their power in the spirit lands when Mother Death comes to claim them.”

  “Savage superstition,” Tiler muttered.

  “Ah,” I mused, tapping the knife’s tip to my lips and enjoying the sight of the Vergundian’s glare. I assumed a Covenanter would exhibit much the same rage if a plainsman pissed on a Martyr Shrine altar. “So,” I went on, “I assume he would greatly desire the return of this thing.”

  Adlar shot a wary glance at the prisoner. “I suppose so. In truth, my lord, I don’t know.”

  “Then ask him.”

  The juggler nodded and spoke to the Vergundian, the question short and flat but provoking a far longer, spittle-flecked diatribe in response. The plainsman lunged forward in his bonds, teeth bared and eyes blazing, issuing forth a gabble of invective from which I could parse no individual words.

  “That was a no, I take it?” I enquired when the Vergundian fell silent.

  “From what I can gather, trakiesh can only be won in battle and cannot be bargained for. The very notion of buying or selling them is offensive.”

  “But selling yourself is not? Is he not, in any way that matters, a whore? For he sold his body for coin.”

  Adlar remained silent and I turned to see him offering an apologetic wince. “There is no Vergundian word for whore, my lord. They look upon such things in… very pragmatic terms. Even if he understood the question, I doubt he’d find it an insult. If that was your intention.”

  “I see. Then, since his kind are so fond of pragmatism, let us be equally so. Ask him if he truly wants to die, or would he prefer to be given a horse and leave to ride from here without further injury?”

  Tiler’s pacing came to an abrupt halt, but another glance from me kept the unwise exclamation from his lips. I expected another angry eruption from the Vergundian in response to Adlar’s translation, but this time his reaction was one of squinting suspicion. Watching him settle into a sitting position, I realised that under the red-brown grime and grazes, his face was that of a man somewhere north of thirty years. This was a veteran mercenary and not some easily gulled youth. A man such as this might not fear death, but neither would he relish death with the eagerness he pretended. Also, I doubted he would be so ignorant of his paymaster’s tongue.

  “Were you at Walvern Castle?” I asked, looking closely at his face. “We killed many Vergundians there. As I recall, they screeched like stuck pigs, did they not, Trooper Tiler?” I added, casting the question over my shoulder.

  “Like cats fucking, more like,” he supplied. “Begged for mercy when we finished them off, too.”

  The plainsman tried to hide it, but the fractional crease to his brow and resentful hardening of his lips told the tale. “Enough,” I said, holding up a hand when Adlar began to translate. Offering a bland smile, I rose and dragged two chairs from the thicket of disarrayed furniture. Sinking into one, I gestured for the Vergundian to take the other.

  “Just sit,” I snapped when he continued to lie on his side, face set in a suspicious scowl. “And we’ll talk like men with a deal to strike rather than angry children. Or—” I gave his knife a meaningful twirl “—I can end this now.”

  The Vergundian grunted and levered himself to his knees, then his feet, standing in tall and prideful defiance before consenting to take the chair. “A stolen trakiesh brings only bad luck,” he said in thickly accented Albermaine-ish. “You should know that, ahlen-trahck.”

  Since he seemed disinclined to explain this obvious insult, I raised an eyebrow at Adlar. “Ahlen-trahck means ‘slave to a woman’, my lord,” the juggler said. “Among the clans, only men lead. Those who show affection or regard for women are scorned.”

  Slave to a woman, I thought, finding enough truth in it to bring a grin to my lips. Ayin and the Widow, however, were less amused. “Slaves are we?” the Widow asked, stepping away from the counter and hefting her short-staved war hammer. Worrisome as this was, I found myself more concerned by the sight of Ayin setting down her quill, a familiar blankness of purpose stealing over her features.