feral dog, but Brynd wasn’t having any of it. Randur spotted at least three occasions where Brynd could have finished the job, but instead he would throw a punch to his stomach or jaw, sending the man sprawling.
He forced Malum towards the edge of the roof, up against the battlements, where there was no more room to run. With a combination of quick moves, Brynd had put a deep cut in Malum’s arm and forced him to drop his sword.
The gang leader fell to his knees in pain. He growled, clutching his arms, ‘You wouldn’t hit an unarmed man, a man of your dignity? Go on, do it. I dare you.’
Brynd walked around to one side, utterly expressionless. Eir came along to stand next to Randur, and they both watched, waiting to see what would happen.
‘I could show you mercy,’ Brynd called out, then turned to address those on the roof, those few still standing, those gang members now lying face down with their hands over the back of their heads, his own Night Guard soldiers. ‘I could show him mercy, couldn’t I?’ he bellowed.
Only the sounds of the wind and the sea in the distance could be heard.
Malum spat at the commander’s boots. ‘Get on with it. I never was a patient man.’
Brynd stood over him. He drew one arm back and sideways, holding up his blade, and in a frighteningly quick swipe he cut off Malum’s head. One of the bound gang members gasped. Another called out something inaudible. There was a genuine look of emotion in their eyes.
Brynd watched the body slump down as the blood pooled thickly by his boots. He moved over to one side to retrieve the head and grabbed it up by the hair. He held it aloft to a bass cheer from his own soldiers.
Brynd then walked calmly over to Randur and Eir, still clutching Malum’s head. Randur could barely take his eyes off it.
‘I wore him down for you,’ Randur grinned. ‘Erm, welcome back, commander. Sorry the place is a bit of a mess. Personally, I blame Eir.’ He nudged her in the ribs.
‘Randur!’ Eir gasped. ‘My apologies, commander. We did our best against overwhelming numbers.’
‘You did just fine,’ Brynd replied. Only now could Randur see just how tired the man was. ‘How long was this going on for?’
‘A couple of nights and days, I’d say? I’ve lost track if I’m honest. It all sprawled into one sleepless night.’ Randur turned to Eir for confirmation and she nodded.
‘Good work,’ Brynd replied. ‘I mean that.’
Randur found himself incredibly uneasy when speaking to a man carrying a severed head. Blood still dripped from it onto the roof and Randur casually moved out of the way of the trail of blood. ‘What are those things?’ Randur pointed to the enormous insects now at the far end of the rooftop.
‘They’re called Mourning Wasps. New form of transport. Very useful in a tricky situation.’
‘Was that you who came earlier?’ Randur asked. ‘We saw some similar things a while ago.’
‘No.’ Brynd’s confusion gave way to a private realization that Randur must mean Jeza and her friends.
Randur looked over to the wasps, which seemed inert, hardly moving at all. He quite fancied having a go on one.
‘The battle — it went well, did it?’ Eir asked. ‘As well as these things can go.’
‘You know the cost of war as well as I do, having seen the remnants in the hospital. Artemisia’s people lost more than we did, since our lines were far behind her own, protecting our towns and our people. But the loss of life was many times what we saw in Villiren. Half the Night Guard has gone.’
Eir opened her mouth to say something, but then thought better of it.
‘What’re you going to do with that head?’ Randur asked, pointing to it.
‘There are still a few dozen gang types in the Citadel. I’m going to round them all up, show them this head, then place it on a spike by the entrance for everyone to see.’
‘Good advertisement, that,’ Randur admitted.
‘Senior members of the gangs will be executed also. Another warning, another lesson to be given to the people. If we’re to move our culture on, and live side by side with one another, we damn well need to have some respect for the operations of this Citadel or we’ll have riots every day.’
Eir cringed, but nodded. ‘I understand.’
‘Besides, the man whose head I hold made his trade before the war by putting fear into the lives of the citizens of this city. Good, honest people will want to see his head on a spike. They’ll sleep easily knowing the gangs have been dealt such a blow.’
‘Where’s Artemisia?’ Eir asked.
‘She’s still with her people,’ Brynd replied. ‘They have much grieving to do. We’ll grieve with them also, when the time is right. They gave so many lives in order to save their future — and ours — here, on this Archipelago.’
‘What next?’ Randur asked. ‘Clean up the Citadel, start getting things back in shape in Villiren, help Artemisia’s culture with cleaning up the dead?’
‘All of those things,’ Brynd replied. As he turned away, still clutching Malum’s severed head, he called over his shoulder, ‘And then, we plan for peace.’
THIRTY — FOUR
There was a knock on the door and Brynd looked up from his desk. Warm morning sunlight fell across legal papers.
‘Come in,’ Brynd called out.
Randur poked his head around the door and sauntered to the chair next to Brynd. He slouched into it and put his feet up on the table. ‘Guess what?’
‘What?’
‘One of the servants downstairs suggested that they’d seen some woman hunched over a corpse near the edge of Saltwater and the Wastelands.’
‘And?’ Brynd asked, raising an eyebrow.
‘You think it’s Rika?’ Randur asked.
‘I don’t know. No one’s spotted her since you unleashed her.’
‘It was a sensible option,’ Randur replied coolly. ‘The gangs would have killed her if they found her — at least she took some of them down on her way out.’
‘Anyway, it’s too early to tell if it’s Rika. There are a lot of strange things in this city. I’ll send out a patrol around the southern rim of Saltwater, just in case.’
Randur nodded his approval. ‘Up to much then?’
‘I’m checking the laws that have been passed recently; copies have been made and I’m seeing there are no errors. Just one rogue scribe and we’ll get all sorts of problems.’
‘Nice clothes by the way.’
Brynd was wearing an ornate uniform, similar to the Night Guard clothing of old, but a paler shade of grey, with greater details and a new emblem on the chest: two overlapping stars. It had taken a few weeks for him to decide on this, but the Night Guard wasn’t the same now it was so depleted. He needed change, for himself as well as the others.
‘Shouldn’t you be getting ready yourself?’ Brynd asked.
‘Probably.’
‘Cold feet?’ Brynd pressed, largely to amuse himself.
‘Nah. Well, yes. I’m not the marrying type — or at least I never thought I would be. And it doesn’t seem right, does it? To be having some posh party after all that’s gone on?’
‘We’re not doing it for the party,’ Brynd said.
‘You don’t strike me as the partying kind of guy.’
‘I know how to enjoy myself.’
‘Sure you do. Anyway, so why are we doing this?’
