Steven Erikson - Blood follows

The maid in waiting had done her job well. Guld’s man had reported her return at dawn; and now she and the princess were on their way, and they’d lead Guld and his men to the quarry.

He exited the tower’s gaping gateway and moved quickly down the streets. Sharn was making a terrible mistake. The last thing Guld wanted to do was to arrive too late-although it’d serve to deliver a message to the king: Impede my investigation at your peril, Sire. You should’ve let me question her. But the satisfaction of that wasn’t worth a young woman’s life-likely the lives of two young women, since the maid-in-waiting would probably share Sharn’s fate.

He’d worked out their route from the succession of lights revealed by his men, and arrived with, he guessed, moments to spare, at the mouth of an alley opening onto Fishmonger’s Round. A battered, partly slumped barrow marked the alleymouth. Guld crouched on the broken slate and recovered his breath.

The Round was empty, the post black and unadorned, save for the fiercely flapping notice, which had yet to be removed by Bauchelain. Atop the post sat a crow, asleep, rocking with the gusting salt-breeze. A dog loped across the cobblestones to lap at Beru’s Fount. Guld remained in the shadows. He slowly unsheathed his longsword, and fervently hoped that his squad had managed to stay on the trail, which they should have picked up outside the palace.

A lone knot of uncertainty remained for the sergeant. The eunuch had managed to leave Sorrowman’s unseen. There were sorceries that could achieve that, of course. A possibility that troubled Guld.

He stiffened as he saw a cloaked woman arrive from the street to his right. The handmaiden. Damn, a brave lass. He watched as she cautiously approached the wood post in the Round’s centre. There to await him? That makes no sense-I can’t imagine the girl actually spoke to the eunuch-it would’ve been enough to simply ascertain his daily hiding place. No, this makes no sense at all. He thought to voice a shout, to run out there, but instead remained motionless behind the slight mound, as a second robed figure-the princess-appeared, following the maid with languorous, appallingly confident strides.

The maid had stopped in front of the post, and seemed to be regarding its height as if about to supplicate herself before it. Sharn was about ten paces away and closing.

Atop the post, the crow bestirred itself.

Guld’s eyes widened with sudden understanding. He opened his mouth to bellow out a warning, then something hard and heavy hammered the base of his skull. Groaning, he sagged, fighting waves of blackness. Close, yet seeming from a great distance, he heard a deep voice whisper at his side.

“Apologies, Sergeant. This is but one, and I want them both. We need to wait. We need the blood, for only then will Korbal Broach be vulnerable-enough to call for help. And then my long hunt ends…”

Guld was unable to resist as the man beside him, massive and dark and armoured- the foreigner with the scimitar — pried the sword from the sergeant’s numbed fingers. The man had a heavy iron crossbow resting on his left forearm, a rune-crowded quarrel in place and nocked. “Don’t worry,” the man whispered in his appalling and barbaric accent, “you’ll get what’s left of ’em both, enough to appease the mob. But now leave me to my business. You have no idea what you face-be glad for that.”

Guld managed to lift his head. The scene spinning before his eyes, he could only half-discern what was happening at the post. The crow had spread its wings, then it drifted down toward the handmaid. There was a blur and a cold ripple and the crow became a man, a huge, chain-armoured, bald-headed man, who looked down on the maid. She said something and he giggled in reply. He raised a hand, gestured delicately and the girl buckled, gurgling, then flew limp and sprawling to one side with blood spraying onto the cobbles.

Princess Sharn groaned as if in ecstasy.

The eunuch slowly approached her.

Beside Guld, the hunter raised his weapon weapon and took careful aim.

“Shoot,” Guld managed to hiss. “Shoot, damn you!”

He heard creaking sounds come from the hunter, and turned to see the man’s face darken, as if with great strain. “What in Hood’s name is the matter with you?” Guld tried to push himself upright, but the pain lancing through his head was too much. He could only stare in dawning realisation as the hunter strained with all his might, yet could not move a muscle.

A cool, calm voice spoke behind them. “Steck Marynd, you are a stubborn one, aren’t you? You are welcome to struggle all you like, but I assure you that, although you cannot see it, the demon holding you fast exercises but a modest effort in restraining you. Gods,” Bauchelain continued as he stepped around both men, “what a wasted life, this maniacal pursuit. How many years since that unfortunate crossing of our paths? Far too many indeed. I suggest you retire, thankful that I’ve spared your life, once again-but, I add, for the last time. ’Tis not mercy that stays my hands, sir. But indifference, alas. You are, after all, naught but a minor irritation. Well,” he paused, then raised his voice to the eunuch even as the monstrosity began a sorcerous gesture of death in front of the princess. “Korbal Broach! Leave off the damsel, old friend. Her poor maid will suffice this night, surely?”

Korbal Broach hesitated, then cocked his head in Bauchelain’s direction. “Twice touched, this one, Bauchelain,” he said in a reedy thing voice. “She belonged to last night, yet deprived was I, humble servant to life.”

“The Lady pulled, then,” Bauchelain said easily, walking up to his companion. “Give her that.”

The eunuch pouted. “You would deprive me of begetting, again, Bauchelain?”

“I think you have enough for now,” the man replied. “Besides, detecting a hastening of events, I have dispatched our manservant to the docks-after imposing a long slumber on the corporal outside Sorrowman’s, of course. In any case, vast coin is even now being spent on our behalf, and so our departure is imminent.”

“But Bauchelain,” Korbal Broach said softly, “all who neared my trail are assembled. We could silence them each one, and the city would remain ours for many more weeks. Even the sergeant’s squad has been taken care of-who now could endanger our efforts? Kill the sergeant, kill Steck Marynd, kill the princess, and lo, we are at ease once again.”

“In a city plunged into violent chaos.” Bauchelain shook his head. “Steck’s death is not to be by our hand this night, Korbal. He will live many years yet, unfortunately. As for the sergeant, I admit to sufficient respect to warrant him a grave threat-should the princess die tonight-”

“Then kill him. ’Tis easily solved.”

“Not so,” Bauchelain answered smoothly. “Less than an hour past, the Mortal Sword, Tulgord Vise, swore a blood-vow, consecrated by the High Priestess of the Sisters. It seems our entourage of pursuers has grown by one, and like Steck Marynd, the goddess-charged fool will not relent in his hunt. So, let us not add Sergeant Guld to the train. The Mortal Sword, blooded by the Sisters, even now defies my wards, and approaches.”

“Kill him.”

Bauchelain shook his head. “Best to wait a year or two, when the power of the ritual has faded somewhat. I’ve no wish to stain my clothes-” He turned as the clash of horse hoofs sounded from down a side street. “Oh dear, it seems we’ve tarried too long as it is…”

Tulgord Vise had broken through the wards. The thundering charge of his warhorse fast approached from beyond the humped barrow that rose like a tiny hummock where the street opened onto the Round.

Bauchelain sighed. “The Mortal Sword’s sudden gift of power is… formidable.” He raised a hand. “Alas, he forgot to bless his horse.” A gesture. On the other side of the barrow there was a bestial scream, then a terrible crashing sound followed by a solid crunch. The stones of the barrow seemed to bulge momentarily in the low torchlight, then settled once more in a haze of dust. “It will,” Bauchelain spoke, “be some time before the Mortal Sword regains his senses, sufficient, that is, to extricate his head and shoulders from the barrow.” He swung back to Korbal Broach. “My friend, we’ve outstayed our welcome. Our manservant lays out the coin-our baggage is being carted to our transport. It is time, Korbal, we must move on.”