Ponto and his peers followed behind, watching as the group – nearly a dozen men – gathered at the well, dipping in anything they could find that held water. One used the bucket that was normally attached to the well, a few carried buckets of their own, and one used an old helm flipped upside down.

  They turned a corner, bringing the scene into view. A roaring blaze had overtaken a squat building, making wood crack and whine as it was consumed. Orange flames licked at a crimson-and-gold sign. Inside, several racks had already collapsed, leaving their contents to roll across the floor. A jolt ran through Ponto’s veins – he recognized the building as the bakery he had visited earlier.

  The men tossed their water at the edges of the fire, slowing down its advance. Another group flung sand on the neighboring roofs, passing several buckets back and forth in their rush to contain the damage.

  A pained cry made all the men pause. It sounded again. “Help!” a voice begged, seeming to come from inside the bakery. A dark form appeared, shielding its face with one hand as it struggled forward. A burst of wind sucked flames into the store, immersing the form.

  “By the immortals!” one of the men who’d carried water cursed as the flare passed, leaving the form crawling on the floor.

  Priest Itan started forward, but one of the men held him back. “Nothing you can do for him,” the man said. “You’ll only get yourself killed, lad.”

  “I know that. But I have to try.” Priest Itan’s grim expression severed the connection; the other man let him go, turning around to fetch more water.

  Ponto watched Priest Itan make his way toward the bakery. The form had nearly reached the door, inching forward on legs that seemed barely under his control. He reached out a hand toward Itan, who ran forward to take it. The flames leapt from one man’s arm to the other, climbing up a sleeve of the priest’s robes as he pulled the other man to safety. Itan groaned against the pain, digging in his heels until they were away from the worst of it.

  Ponto rushed forward, forcibly taking a bucket of water out of Heck’s hands. At first the other boy fought, but once he realized what Ponto was doing he let go. Ponto ran forward, dousing the pair with water. It hissed and steamed as the fires disappeared.

  Itan leaned back, his chest rising and falling in great heaves. He pulled what remained of his left sleeve away, revealing a blackened arm. “Is he still alive?” the priest asked, nodding toward the old man.

  Ponto leaned down, flipping the body over with a grunt. The sight threatened to make him sick: the man’s flesh was charred and cracked, his face only recognizable as a face due to the neck leading up to it. He closed his eyes, feeling for the man’s soul. A wan blue light shone in front of him, its pull stronger than any he had felt before.

  “No,” Ponto said with certainty. “I see his soul right here.” He felt Itan’s burnt arm on his, and turned to find the priest’s face a rictus of pain.

  “You must remember this, Ponto. This is why we do what we do. To help them find peace in the afterlife. Death is a horrid thing; the least we can do is ensure what comes after is a little better.”

  Ponto swallowed past a lump in his throat. He nodded slowly.

  Chapter 14

  Micol

  Thunder broke through the night, interrupting the silence of the late hour. Dark clouds overhead threatened a storm, looming in the same place they had been for several days. Micol’s eyes turned upward, toward the stonework wall he and three others faced.

  “You ready?” Vasha asked, his grin revealing the gap between his two front teeth.

  “Ready as I’ll ever be,” Micol responded.

  “Remember, we have to get the daughter. The spies said her parents will do anything for her. If we get all three that would be great, but without the daughter they might hold out for the guards to save them.”

  “I know.” Micol sighed with impatience. We all got the same instructions as you, he wanted to say. He looked away from the other boy; six paces away, another pair was readying their grappling hook and shifting nervously. Vasha was the oldest of the four, having seen nearly twenty winters, which he seemed to have taken as a good enough reason to assume authority.

  A two-note whistle reached their ears, the signal to begin their ascent. The other group – the ones charged with subduing the guard – would wait for a count of eighty before attacking. Micol raised the rope coiled around his arm, stepping away from Vasha as he swung the hook around in wide circles.

  With a grunt, Vasha sent the hook flying toward the estate’s balcony. The rope slid through Micol’s hands as it rose, landing on the other side. He pulled it taut and the other boy began to climb. To the right, the other group had missed their first throw; they went through the exercise again, and this time managed to snag the hook on a corner of the balcony. It looked far from a solid catch, but the first of them began climbing anyway.

  “Micol!” Vasha hissed. With a start, Micol realized he’d reached the top. He climbed after, shuffling up the rope as fast as he could. A pair of hands gripped him as he neared the balcony, lifting him the rest of the way over. They helped the third boy over moments later, and the fourth began climbing.

  “She should be inside,” Vasha said, turning to face the closed crownglass window. “Do you think it’s latched?”

  Micol shrugged. “Only one way to find out.” He threw his weight against the balcony door; it reverberated against the frame, groaning but not giving way. Guess that answers that, he thought. He delivered another strike with turned shoulder, producing a cracking sound.

  “Back off!” Vasha whispered, pulling a small axe from his belt. He pushed Micol back, hacking at the edge of the door where the latch met the frame. Wood chipped and flew from each blow – inside the room, Micol heard a girl’s cry and saw a shadow running toward the hall.

  He interrupted his companion’s next blow, stepping forward to toss his weight against the door one more time. It swung open, sending him spilling onto the cold floor. Micol scrambled to his feet, his eyes following the noble girl as she disappeared down a turn of the hallway.

  Without a thought to his allies, he took off after her. The haft of his axe slapped his thigh as he sprinted, arms and legs pumping. The soft soles of his boots skidded on the floor as he turned the same corner she had, spotting flickering torches at the end of the hall.

  Ten paces ahead, two guards turned at a cry from the girl. The men stepped between them; Micol kept up his momentum, his eyes flicking to either side of the hallway to plan a path through. The left side was bare aside from a couple paintings – he assumed of esteemed family members, perhaps even the ones they sought. On the right side was a hip-high table bearing candles and a gilded bust of a wrinkled, bald man.

  He angled toward the table as a pair of swords rose, preparing to meet him. He leapt onto it, legs coiling underneath, and dove at the nearest guard. His knees caught the other man on the shoulders, taking the pair of them to the ground. With an adroitness Micol hadn’t known he possessed, he fell into a roll, growling past a stinging pain in his thigh as he continued the chase.

  The girl had slowed, her eyes trained on the guards and Micol; no doubt she had expected them to stop him. When she saw they hadn’t, she turned to continue her flight. But she didn’t make it far – her feet slipped on a carpet at the end of the hall, sending her sprawling.

  Micol reached her a moment later. He scooped her up in a two-handed hold, turning to face the guards he’d left behind. The one he’d knocked over was still regaining his feet; he glanced at the other one, who slowly made to lower his sword.

  “It’s okay,” Micol said, struggling to hold on to her as she kicked and twisted to get away from him. “We’re not going to hurt you. I promise.”

  “You hurt Suri!” the girl shouted, pummeling him with fists.

  “Who’s Suri?”

  Her eyes flicked over to the guard Micol had knocked over. Vasha and their other allies had reached the pair of guards, replacing their small axes on belts so they could grab the guards’ swords.

  “There you are,” Micol said, relaxing his hold when the girl’s kicking ceased. “See? We’re not the villains your parents would have you believe. We don’t want any bloodshed – we just want to share some of that food and wine and ale you have stored down below.” He’d hoped to calm her, but his words had the opposite effect; she kicked and clawed at his arms with renewed vigor, her teeth burying deep on his forearm. Micol cried out, tightening his grip.

  “You got her?” Vasha asked, his eyes jumping between the disarmed guards and struggling girl.

  “Yeah, I’ve got her.”

  “Good. It’s down to the courtyard, then.”

  “Mhm.” Micol stepped through the arch at the end of the corridor, taking a moment to recall the crude map Death’s spies had shared. He turned right, making his way toward a spiral staircase. His teeth clenched – the girl’s struggling had slowed down, but every few seconds she’d have another burst of energy and try to slither from between his arms.

  He decided to try a different tactic. He set her down and pinned her arms to her sides. “Calm down! Do you see this rope at my side? I’ll tie you up if I have to, but I’d rather not. So just be good and let me carry you on down to the courtyard, okay?”

  The look of fear in her eyes nearly broke his heart. She couldn’t have been more than nine, her hair falling in wild curls that fell into her eyes and covered half of her face. She stared at the rope for a few seconds, and finally gave a resolute nod that seemed like a promise to behave. Micol lifted her back up, and this time she didn’t fight him as he led the way to the stairs.

  The ringing of swords and axes grew louder as they approached the courtyard. A bolt of lightning crashed so close its boom echoed in Micol’s ears for seconds after it had passed. He continued forward, his eyes trained on the fighting. It didn’t look good for those on his side – at least one of them had fallen that he saw, and two more looked to be nursing deep wounds.

  Vasha stepped in front, steel sword reflecting the flickering torches. “Stay your swords!” he shouted. “We have the girl!”

  It was enough to cause most of the dozen guards to stop. The closest one – a grizzled man who reminded Micol of Lieutenant Abena – turned to face the trio. A trail of red stained his mustard coat, winding from the cuff of one sleeve to his breast. His demeanor marked him as the captain of the house guard.

  The captain spat at the ground. “What manner of curs would steal a little girl from her bed? No, don’t tell me, I can already see what you are: cowards, one and all.”

  One of Micol’s allies in the courtyard replied, “Cowards, maybe. But we’ve been bleeding on the streets while you and your masters were cozied up here. It’s time to spread some of that misery, I say.”

  “No!” Vasha said, gesturing toward the man. “We agreed, no man who laid down his weapon would be harmed.” To the captain, he added, “Is it safe to assume you and your allies will be laying down your weapons?”

  The captain tossed his sword to the ground with so much force it rebounded in an arc. His fellow guards did the same, dropping their weapons as Micol’s allies retrieved ropes from their belts to tie them up.

  “See?” Micol said to the girl he held. “Just as I said. No one has to get hurt.”

  “What are you going to do now?”

  “Now we’re going to check on your parents,” Vasha answered, flashing canines in a wicked grin. He whistled, signaling for the two others who’d been at the balcony to follow him down a side passage.

  “He’s not going to hurt them, is he?”

  “No. No, of course not.” The promise rang hollow in Micol’s own ears, but he knew she needed to hear it. True or not.

  An emaciated boy wearing a ripped tunic approached the grizzled leader of the guard as two others finished tying him up. His ribs all but poked through the skin of his chest, his gaunt cheeks puffing with fury. Micol grimaced at the crunch of his fist connecting with the guard’s jaw.

  He rushed forward, stepping between them before the boy could throw another punch. “That’s enough! He’s our prisoner now.”

  “He killed Saulie!” the boy cried, shaking out his fist. Based on the pain twisting his features, Micol guessed he might have broken something.

  Saulie. Saulie. His eyes sought out the motionless body at the edge of the courtyard, near the front gate. The face was a twin of the boy’s, albeit paler and half-veiled in darkness. He vaguely remembered the pair from the two weeks of training they’d shared; neither had spoken much, but even then it had been easy to see how close they’d come to starvation.

  “He has to pay,” the thin boy said, using his uninjured hand to grab the small axe from his belt.

  “No! This isn’t who we are.” Micol took a step to the right, placing himself more directly between the boy and the guard.

  “I don’t take orders from you, deserter.”

  “He’s right,” a man to Micol’s left – with a short beard and a lazy eye – said. It took a moment for Micol to remember his name: Joji. “If we kill others in cold blood, we become bandits. I didn’t sign up to become a bandit, and neither did you.”

  The thin boy’s eyes narrowed. “You don’t know me. Besides, whatever I wanted before he killed Saulie doesn’t matter. All I want to be now is someone who’s got my vengeance. And you and the deserter won’t be able to stop me.”

  “Look around you, boy,” Joji said. “You’re the only one in this lot who wants to turn killer. If you do this, you’ll be doing it alone. And you won’t be doing it long.”

  Several other members of the group circled the thin boy from behind, ready to move if he seemed like he was going to attack. Seeing that, he deflated. His small axe fell to the ground beside one of the guard’s swords.

  “Thanks,” Micol said, nodding at Joji.

  “Don’t mention it.”

  Vasha returned less than a quarter hour later, leading a harassed-looking man and woman. The woman was draped in a bear’s pelt she clutched to her like a last lifeline; the man wore silk breeches and little else.

  “You couldn’t have let them dress first?” Joji asked.

  Vasha shook his head. “We were going to, but this one –” he nodded at the man “— pulled a sword on us from beside the bureau. After that, I figured they forfeited their right to dignity. No telling what was hidden in the jewelry box.”

  The girl in Micol’s arms began squirming again, reaching out to the pair. “Alright, go to your parents,” he said, setting her down. She ran over to them, hugging her mother tightly.

  Beyond the noble family, the two others who’d gone with Vasha appeared, pushing a guard forward. The man bore several cuts and the start of a purple bruise on his brow that promised to be a bad one. They guided him to the portion of the courtyard where the other guards had been cordoned, tying his hands and legs tightly.

  “That’s it, then,” Vasha said. “Time to move onto the next part of the plan. How many do we have standing?” He counted heads, skipping over a man who was half-bent clutching a wound in his belly. “I count nine.”

  “Nine seems right to me,” Joji said. “I’d say we’ll need six or so to keep the prisoners under watch.”

  “I can spare three. The more we have to unload to the cellars, the faster it’ll go.”

  Joji’s jaw clenched. “You put too much trust in these ropes, boy. All it takes is one poorly managed knot and the lot of them’ll be free. Most of those guards have seen more fighting than all of our number put together. They’ll quickly overwhelm three.”

  Vasha frowned, considering the problem. “Alright, then. We’ll leave that one as well.” He pointed to Saulie’s brother.

  “No, you should bring that one with you. I’ll take the deserter and those two.” He pointed to the two largest members of the group. Micol recognized one of them from his time on the docks – Sakaye. He’d been a member of another crew, but had apparently fallen on hard times. The other, a stocky woman with hair black as night, clung to the shadows, her eyes flicking between Vasha and Joji.

  “We’ll need strong backs for unloading the cellar. I’m not leaving you with them.”

  “We’re all supposed to be equal here. Why not let them choose?” Joji glanced at Sakaye.

  “I’m with Joji,” he said.

  The woman dipped her head in agreement.

  “Micol?” Vasha asked. “You’ll help us, won’t you?”

  Micol shook his head. “The game’s up if the prisoners get free. I’ll stay with those here.”

  “Fine, then. Everyone else with me.” He entered the main hall through a pair of wooden doors, leading the four others who could stand. They took a left soon after and disappeared.

  “Not enough,” Joji muttered. “Guarding this lot is a six-man job.”

  “We’ve got five, at least,” Micol said.

  “Four. That one is on his way out.” He jerked his head toward the man nursing a stomach wound. “He just hasn’t realized it yet.”

  “Perhaps Death will keep him here. Surely there’s some benefit to working with him, right?”

  Joji fixed him with a cold stare. “The aspect is too busy to help us. As are all the aspects when you need them. No, mark my words: that man will die without seeing another dawn.”

  Micol sighed. “Alright, then. Four of us. How do you want to handle the prisoners?”

  “First, we need to secure their patrons.” He raised his voice to address all of those left in the courtyard. “Who still has rope?”

  “I do,” Micol said, retrieving a length of rope from his belt. The woman who’d been lingering in shadow stepped forward as well. They approached the noble family – wife and child cowered behind the bare-chested man, who raised his fists as if harboring some illusion of brawling with them.

  The terror written in their eyes made Micol miss a stride. He wanted to assure them everything would be okay, but he doubted they would believe a word he said. Instead, he tapped the axe at his hip. “Sir, if I wanted to hurt you and your family I wouldn’t use my fists.”