guards he’d left behind now without employment, Killian still couldn’t stand down. Couldn’t relax. Couldn’t shake the feeling that danger crept in the Princess’s direction.
Bercola shook her head when he didn’t answer. “No one man can do this job alone, Killian. Not even you. Hire new men. Pull from the city guard.”
“None of them are suitable. They aren’t…” He struggled to find an explanation for why, but that was the trouble with being ruled by instinct, by a mark bestowed on him by a god. Some things he just knew.
A grimace stretched across Bercola’s large face, her colorless eyes casting upward. “You’re intolerable when you’re tired. Worse when you’re being a defeatist. Go and get some sleep. I’ll watch over Her Highness until morning.”
Tension flowed out of Killian’s shoulders, and he gave his friend a wink. “She likes you better than me anyway.”
“Only because I don’t cheat at cards.” She shoved him between the shoulder blades hard enough that he staggered. “Go. Sleep.”
He had rooms at the palace, but rather than retreating to them, Killian made his way into the city. The skies of Mudaire were dark with cloud cover, and he pulled his hood up so that his face was mostly concealed. Partially to protect himself from the heavy wet snow falling from the sky and partially to avoid recognition among the throngs of civilians filling the streets of Mudamora’s capital.
Men, women, and children of every race, from nearly every nation. Mudaire was a port city eclipsed in status only by Serlania on the southern shores of the kingdom and Revat, the mighty capital of Gamdesh on the Southern Continent. Killian wove his way through them, heading in the direction of his family’s manor house in the gated quarter of the city. His brother’s manor, given that Hacken was now High Lord Calorian. Hacken had fled for Serlania by ship, and other than Garrem and a handful of caretakers, the residence was likely to be empty. Peaceful. Quiet.
Killian avoided the god circle at the center of the city, the distinct towers dedicated to each of the seven rising several stories higher than any other structure in Mudaire. The towers seemed to shift and move, the carved reliefs of the gods’ faces watching him no matter how he kept to the shadows. It was always the way, even with the rough shrines found in smaller villages. Bercola told him it was his imagination, but when one had stood face-to-face with a god—as Killian had—one never forgot what it felt like to be subjected to their scrutiny.
Killian started down the central boulevard leading to the south gate, which was lined with taverns, inns, and brothels, when a loud crash split the air. The man he’d just fired toppled out the door of a tavern, rolling backward down the steps to land with a splash in a puddle. The spectacle, Killian decided, was made far more entertaining by the fact that the idiot’s trousers were around his knees. The man struggled to his feet, trying to hitch the sodden fabric back over his bare ass. “She wasn’t worth it anyway!” he shouted, shaking his free hand at the door.
A blond blur shot down the steps, tackling the man back into the mud. “If you ever hurt one of my friends again,” she shouted, “I’ll break your bloody neck.”
Killian’s skin prickled, a familiar awareness that what he was seeing was important drawing his attention to the girl’s face.
She continued to shout threats, emphasizing every other word with a punch, and Killian watched with interest as she broke the man’s nose. Split his lip. Cracked his cheekbone. But it wasn’t until she flipped the man facedown in the puddle with the apparent intent of drowning him that Killian intervened. Reaching down, he caught the girl by the belt and heaved her off, dodging as she swung her fists in his direction.
“Admirable bit of work,” he said, sidestepping another swing of her fists. “But you’ll be of no use to me if you’re in prison for murder.”
“I’m of no use to you at all.” The girl cast a dark glare at the man she’d been pummeling as he scuttled bare-assed down the street. “If you’re wanting to spend your last bit of coin before you’re conscripted by the King, head inside. You cause trouble, I’ll be the one to toss you out.”
“I’ve no doubt.” Killian pushed back the hood of his cloak, the sleet melting as it touched his forehead, running in cold dribbles down