David Dalglish - A Dance of Shadows

“There’s no hope for you,” the assassin said, his voice a whisper.

The crossbow bolt thudding into his neck seemed to say otherwise. The assassin slumped to the bed and bled out on the sheets as Victor scrambled to his feet. A third man stood at the door, miniature crossbow at his side. He was an older man, and wore the plain browns of a commoner. Plenty of scars lined his face, and calluses his hands.

“Friend,” the man said when Victor reached for his sword.

“That so?” Victor asked, putting a foot on the dead man’s head so he could yank his blade free. “Then who are you, friend?”

“No lie, milord. I’m here to help. My name’s Gart. Antonil put me here to protect you.”

The light was dim, but Victor saw Gart pull down his shirt, revealing a city guard’s tunic underneath as proof.

“Antonil’s keeping his eye on me, is that it?” Victor asked.

“You expressed concern about the families staying here. He thought it best to help keep an eye on them.” Gart nodded at the two bodies. “Caught them sneaking toward the stairs when they thought everyone asleep. Killed the guards at the stairs by your door. Real pros.”

Victor used his heel to roll over the one at his feet, then looked him over.

“Any idea the guild?” Victor asked.

“Not really. Not like they’d have been foolish enough to send people with colors or tattoos identifying them.”

It made sense, but was still frustrating. Standing, he looked to Gart and frowned at the crossbow. “How’d you sneak that past my guards?”

Gart stood up straight. “I told them it was with the authority of the king, and that they were to tell no one, not even you. If it makes you feel better, your men were most displeased, and I feared they might inform you despite my warnings.”

Victor felt his anger growing. Not only had two men come into his place of safety and nearly killed him, but Antonil was spying on him as well, and hiding things from him?

“It’s no longer safe here,” Victor said, grabbing his armor. “I told Antonil bringing in civilians would put me at risk. I told him! They will not stay here, not any longer. And much as I owe you, Gart, I still resent that your presence was kept hidden from me.”

“Just following my orders, milord.”

“I know. It’s those orders I plan on questioning.”

Armor on, sword buckled to his waist, Victor stepped into the hall. His guards lay slumped against the wall, throats opened and tunics stained with blood. Victor closed their eyes with his fingers, offered a silent word of thanks to the men who had given their lives to protect him. And then he was moving on, Gart in tow.

“Summon your guard, and have them clean up this mess,” Victor told him. “After that, start gathering the people here and bring them to the castle. If Antonil wants them kept safe, and wants to position men in secret to guard them, then let him take responsibility for them in full. I need no more assassins in my bedchambers.”

“Milord, I’m not sure if I should do that until…”

Victor spun on him while still halfway down the stairs.

“I will speak with Antonil myself, and I assure you, I will not have my request denied. Take them to the castle. Do you understand me?”

The older man nodded. “As you wish, milord.”

They continued down the stairs to where the commoners slept all across the floor. Victor navigated around, and then he and Gart stepped out into the night. Four men stood guard at the door, and they saluted when they realized it was he.

“City guard will soon arrive,” Victor told them. “Help them in any way you can.”

He started toward the castle unescorted. One of his men called out after him. “Milord…”

Victor glared, silencing his comment. Gart followed him a little ways, then stopped. “Nearest guard station is this way,” he said, gesturing east.

“I will be at the castle,” Victor said, not slowing. “Safe travels.”

Gart didn’t look happy, but he left anyway. Victor knew he was being proud, but he didn’t care. He was a skilled fighter, and he wore his shining armor. Piss on anyone who thought him vulnerable. The scum of the city needed to catch him sleeping in his bedclothes to even have a chance. Marching down the quiet night streets, he made his way toward the center of the city, then hooked north toward the castle. Only a few times did he see signs of life, those of taverns burning their midnight oil to fill the poor and destitute with enough alcohol to forget their dreary lives. Victor both pitied them and despised them. They’d be either fodder for thieves or new recruits. Once their lives continued to fall apart. Once they lost enough to believe they could never replace it without taking by force.

Several times he thought he saw someone following him out of the corner of his eye, a gray blur of a strange cloak along the rooftops. When he glanced back, it was always gone. He shook his head.

“Are you there, Watcher?” he whispered. “Do you follow me?”

He heard no answer, and he sighed. It might have been good to talk with the man, to see if he’d made any progress in his own private search for the Widow, or in combating the ruthless guilds. But, snubbed, he continued on north, toward the castle, to ensure Guard Captain Antonil would never again think it his right to spy on a lord of the realm.

Haern couldn’t begin to guess what stupidity was leading Victor to walk the streets of Veldaren at night without any escort. Pride? Arrogance? Delusion? Whatever it was, it kept Haern skulking along the rooftops, a careful eye on both him and the ground below. Did it matter that Victor carried a sword? All it’d take was a single man with a crossbow to bring him down.

The wood beneath his boots should have creaked due to his weight, but magic placed within the soles by Tarlak kept his landings soft as he leaped across the alleys. Victor was picking up the pace, and Haern couldn’t decide whether that was good or bad. Good because it got him to safety faster. Bad because it meant Haern had to hurry, and couldn’t scout ahead as carefully as he wished. That, and the running wasn’t exactly kind on his body. While not fully recovered from the wounds given to him by both Grayson and Nicholas Bloodcraft, he still felt well enough to be out in the night. Tarlak and Delysia, however, had strongly disagreed. His compromise had been to keep an eye on Victor’s home while the rest of the Eschaton scoured the city in hopes of catching the Widow in another murder.

Victor, of course, was supposed to have remained in bed like a sane man, not rush through the main streets, sticking out like a damn bonfire in the middle of a snowstorm.

“Where are you headed?” he whispered aloud as he paused, just slightly ahead of the man on the street. “To the castle? Or to…”

An innate sense of wrongness flooded him, and in response he leaped off the side of the building, spun in air, and caught its side with both hands. Immediately he flung himself back up, drawing his blades and kicking forward. He caught his mysterious attacker square in the chest with his boots, blasting him backward.

Except that the hood of her red coat fell backward, and he saw that it wasn’t a he , but a she . The girl had short blond hair, fierce blue eyes, and a glare to her that was chilling despite her obvious youth. In each hand she wielded a thin dagger so sharp its edge seemed to shine. She crouched on one knee, breathing heavily from the blow to her chest.

“Bloodcraft?” Haern asked, seeing the coat.

The girl smiled at him. “Joanna,” she said.

She stood erect, daggers twirling in her hands. Haern refused to focus on her fingers, instead waiting for the tensing of the muscles in her legs, the shifting of her feet, to reveal the timing of her lunge. The moment she moved, he was ready, curling aside so she could not trap him against the ledge of the rooftop. Her daggers snaked in, but he had reach on her. His sabers sliced in a circle, the maneuver designed to sweep aside both her daggers and leave her right side vulnerable.