“In here, my lord!” Lord Orven’s voice called from an adjoining chamber.
He found Orven crouched beside the bloodied, wheezing form of General Gian. Another three attendants lay close by, all dead. The general clutched his sword tight in his fist, Vaelin noting the red stain on the blade.
“You wounded him?” he asked in Chu-Shin, crouched at the man’s side.
“Leg . . .” Gian gasped, a cloud of blood accompanying the word. He convulsed, letting out a shout that was both enraged and despairing. “Known him since . . . he was a boy . . . practically raised the little bastard . . .”
“Send for Brother Kehlan,” Vaelin told Orven. “The assassin’s wounded in the leg. Have the guards look for a blood trail, and get the hounds out of the kennels.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“Wait . . .” Gian groaned, dropping his sword to reach for Vaelin’s cloak as he made to follow Orven from the chamber. “The weapons . . .”
“A concern for another time, sir,” Vaelin said. He tried to pry Gian’s hand loose but the man held on, staring up at him, a fierce plea for understanding in his gaze.
“We need them . . .” Gian convulsed again, a thick torrent rushing from his mouth to bathe the flagstones. He dragged air into his lungs and spoke on, fighting through the pain. “They’re coming, thousands upon thousands of the fuckers . . .”
“Who?” Vaelin leaned close as Gian’s voice descended into a ragged whisper. “Who is coming?”
The word emerged in a wet sibilant rasp, Vaelin seeing a familiar dimness creep into Gian’s eyes. “S-Stahlhast . . .” He groaned, a brief flare of life returning to the gaze he fixed on Vaelin. “Coming for us . . . then you . . . then everything . . .”
“General?”
Gian’s eyes continued to stare into his, but the glimmer of life had gone and his hand slipped from Vaelin’s cloak. “General of the Seventh Cohort of the Venerable Host,” Vaelin murmured, reaching out to close the man’s eyes. “I suspect you deserved a better end.”
“Blood here,” Alum called from the corridor outside. Vaelin cast a final look at the general’s corpse and left the chamber, finding the Moreska crouching to inspect a small red spatter on the flagstones.
“He’s bound the wound,” he said, fingers tracing through the still-wet blood. “This was moments ago.” His brows bunched in concentration as he rose, reaching out to pluck a torch from an iron bracket on the wall. “Strange,” he murmured, casting the light over the floor and the walls.
“What is it?” Vaelin asked.
“The blood, the mark it leaves, like a shooting star.” Alum paused to point at a single elongated drop on the wall. “Like the trail left by a wounded cheetah. But surely no man can move so fast.”
“This is not truly a man,” Vaelin said. He followed Alum to the end of the corridor where it met the tower’s western stairs. The hunter’s torch revealed more blood on the steps leading to the tower’s lower reaches but none leading up.
“Wait,” he said as Vaelin started down. “No more shooting stars, see?” His torchlight played on a series of small rounded drops.
“It’s a false trail to be sure, my lord.”
Vaelin glanced up to find Sehmon standing alongside Ellese. “Really?”
The youth blanched a little but straightened, finding the resolve to meet Vaelin’s gaze. “It’s an old trick,” he said. “One I learned young. People always expect you to go down,” he inclined his head at the stairs to the left, “when it’s usually better to go up. Rooftops are an outlaw’s friend.”
Vaelin gestured for two North Guard to follow the descending trail, then started up, eyes scanning the stonework for more blood but finding nothing. He paused at a doorway to an open walkway overlooking the North Guard barracks, but saw nothing of interest. He was about to move on when Alum stopped him with a touch to the arm, moving out onto the walkway to run his hand along the stones of the low battlement.
“Here,” he said, raising a hand to display a small drop of blood on his finger. “Still fresh.”
“Then where . . . ?” Vaelin’s gaze roamed the walkway. The door it led to guarded the tower’s secondary armoury and was consequently secured with no less than five locks. The wall above offered no handholds, nor did the wall below.
“Uncle,” Ellese said softly. Vaelin turned to see her