? ? ?

The Volarians, like the Faithful, gave their dead to the fire. The caravan folk wrapped the grey-haired man in canvas, doused it in lamp oil and set it aflame with a torch. No words were said and there was no display of grief from the onlookers as none seemed to know the man who had died in his sleep, only his name taken from his citizen’s tablet: Verkal, common and nondescript. His belongings were being auctioned off as Frentis and the woman continued on their way.

“He was sent to spy on us,” the woman said eventually. “In case you were wondering. One of Arklev’s, I expect. Seems the Council-man’s enthusiasm for our grand project has waned somewhat.” This wasn’t for his benefit, he knew. Sometimes she liked to voice her thoughts, converse with herself. Something else she had in common with Master Rensial.

Five days’ travel brought them in sight of the Jarven Sea, the largest body of inland water in the empire according to the woman. They made for a small ferry port situated in a shallow bay, the terminus of the caravan route, busy with travellers and animals. The sea was broad and dark beneath the cloudless sky, tall mountains visible in the haze beyond the western shore. The ferry passage cost five squares each plus five circles for the horses. “You are a robber,” the woman informed the ferryman as she handed over the coin.

“You’re welcome to swim, citizen,” he replied with a mocking bow.

She laughed shortly. “I should have my man here kill you, but we’re in a hurry.” She laughed again and they led the horses aboard.

“When I first took this tub it was one square per man and one circle per horse,” she said later, as the slaves worked the oars under the whip of an overseer and the ferry ploughed its way across the sea. “That was over two centuries ago, mind you.”

This made him frown. Centuries? She can’t have more than thirty years.

She grinned at his confusion but said no more.

The crossing took most of the day, the city of Mirtesk coming into view in early evening. Frentis had thought Untesh the largest city he was ever likely to see but Mirtesk made it a village in comparison. It sprawled in a great bowl-like coomb ascending from the shore, countless houses of grey granite stretching away on either side, tall towers rising from the mass, the steady hum of thousands of voices growing to a roar as they reached the dock. A slave was waiting on the quay as they guided the animals ashore. “Mistress,” he greeted the woman with a deep bow.

“This is Horvek,” she told Frentis. “Ugly, isn’t he?”

Horvek’s nose looked as if it had been broken and reset several times, most of his left ear was missing and scars covered the muscular flesh of his arms. But it was his bearing that Frentis noticed, the set of his shoulders and the width of his stance. He had seen it many times in the pit. This man was Kuritai, a killer, like him.

“The Messenger is here?” she asked Horvek.

“He arrived two days ago.”

“Has he been behaving himself?”

“There have been no reported incidents in the city, Mistress.”

“That won’t last if he lingers.”

Horvek took the packhorses and forced a passage through the dockside throng as they followed, turning down myriad unknowable cobbled streets until they came to a square, rows of three-storey houses forming the four sides. In the centre of the square a large statue of a man on a horse stood in a patch of neatly trimmed grass. The woman dismounted and went to the statue, gazing up at the face of the rider. The figure was dressed in armour Frentis judged as somewhat archaic, the bronze from which he was fashioned liberally streaked with green. He couldn’t read Volarian but from the extensive list adorning the plaque on the base of the statue, this had been a man of no small achievement.

“There’s gull shit on his head again,” the woman observed.

“I’ll have the slaves whipped, Mistress,” Horvek assured her.

She turned away, walking towards a three-storey house situated directly opposite the statue. The door opened as she mounted the steps, a female slave of middle years bowing deeply. The interior was a picture of elegant marble and gleaming ornamentation, tall canvases on most walls, each depicting a battle of some kind, some showing a figure whose features resembled those of the bronze man outside.

“Do you like my home?” the woman asked Frentis.

Again the binding was loose enough to permit speech, but again he refused to do so. He heard the slave stifle a gasp but the woman just laughed. “Draw a bath,” she told the slave, turning to ascend the ornate staircase rising from the marble floor. Her will tugged Frentis along as she climbed the stairs and entered a large room where a man sat at a long table, a grey-clad somewhere past his fiftieth year. He was eating a plate of cured meat, a crystal wineglass at his side, and seemed to recognise Frentis instantly.

“You’ve put on some muscle, I see,” he said in Realm Tongue before taking a long drink from the wineglass.

Frentis searched his face, finding nothing familiar, but there was something in the man’s voice. Not the tone, the cadence. Plus he spoke Realm Tongue with no trace of a Volarian accent.

“Our young friend spent five years in the pits,” the woman said, keeping to Volarian. She perched herself on the tabletop, pulling off the calf-length boots she had worn in the desert to massage her feet. “Even the Kuritai only have to survive for one.”

“They don’t have the benefit of a life in the Sixth Order, eh, Frentis?” The man winked at him, provoking another surge of familiarity.

The woman gave the grey-clad a look of close scrutiny. “Older than your last. What’s this one’s name?”

“Karel Teklar, a wine seller of middling station, with a fat wife and five perfectly horrible children. I’ve done little else but beat the little beasts for two days.”

“The gift?”

The man shrugged. “Some small scrying ability he didn’t know he had. Always wondered why he did so well at cards though.”

“No great loss then.”

“No,” the man agreed, getting to his feet and coming closer to Frentis. The angle of his head as he studied him once again maddeningly familiar. “What exactly happened at Untesh, brother? I always wondered.”

Frentis remained silent until a flare of the woman’s will forced the words out. “Council-man Arklev Entril arrived to treat with Prince Malcius after the Alpirans laid siege, bringing greetings and offers of trade with the Volarian Empire. He shook my hand after I’d searched him for weapons. When the last Alpiran assault hit the walls his will bound me, forced me to abandon the prince. I ran to the docks and came aboard his ship.”

“That must’ve stung a bit,” the man said. “Losing the chance for glorious self-sacrifice. Another tale for Master Grealin to tell the novices.”

Frentis’s confusion deepened. How can he know so much?

“Don’t fret though.” The man moved away, casting his gaze about the room, taking in the racks of weapons lining the walls. “Malcius survived and returned to rule the Realm, though by all accounts, not remotely so well as his illustrious father.”

“Did Malcius see you run?” the woman asked.

Frentis shook his head. “I was commanding the southern section, he was in the centre.” I fled and left two hundred good men to die, he thought. They saw me run.

“So for all he knows,” the man said, “brave Brother Frentis, onetime thief raised to great renown by service in the Sixth Order, died heroically in the final attack on the city.” He exchanged a glance with the woman. “It’ll still work.”

She nodded. “The list?”

The man reached into his shirt and tossed a folded piece of parchment to her. “Longer than I expected,” she said, reading it.

“Well within your abilities, I’m sure.” He picked up the wineglass and took another large gulp, wincing a little as if he found it sour. “Especially with the help of our deadly urchin here.”

Urchin. Nortah used to call him that, Barkus too. But Nortah was dead and Barkus, he hoped, safely back in the Realm.

“Anything else?” the woman asked.

“You need to be at South Tower within a hundred days. Once there someone will find you. You’ll be tempted to kill him. It’s important you don’t. Tell him the Fief Lord alone won’t suffice. The whore must die as well. He should also have some word of our perennial foe, some stratagem to kill him, or at least make him vulnerable, the details are a little vague. Other than that.” He drained the wineglass and Frentis noticed a sheen of sweat on his forehead. “Only the usual, eternal pain if you fail, and so on. You’ve heard it before.”

“He never was very original in phrasing his threats.” She got down from the table and walked to a rack of thin-bladed swords over the fireplace. “Any preference?”

The man flicked a fingernail against his wineglass, bringing forth a sharp ping. He smiled at the woman. “Sorry to disappoint you.” He dropped the glass to the floor where it shattered, slumping into the chair at the head of the table, face now bathed in sweat. His gaze grew unfocused, but brightened momentarily when he saw Frentis. “Give them all my regards, won’t you brother? Especially Vaelin.”