within and for the words associated with eating. The goblin had been right: His wife did make good food. The bundles contained chewy sausages pickled with bitter herbs, big steamed dumplings of starchy noon mash, eggs boiled in broth, and-to Ekhaas’s surprise and Ashi’s delight-tiny but sweet shaat’aar. They ate them all, sharing the third bundle between them, then sat and watched as a fifth moon, pale yellow Nymm, rose low in the southeast and began to climb up against the bright haze of the Ring of Siberys.
“The thing that you can’t tell me about,” Ashi said into the silence. “It’s happening tonight, isn’t it? That’s why we’ve stopped here.”
“It’s supposed to happen tonight. We hope it happens tonight.”
“And you still can’t tell me anything more?”
Ekhaas shook her head. “No, not yet. But soon, I promise.”
Out by the wall that surrounded the lightning rail yard, something moved. It was too far away for even Ekhaas to see clearly, but there was, for an instant, a brief eclipsing of the lights from the city over the top of the wall. Just a flicker. It might have been nothing at all. Ekhaas’s breath caught in her throat, though, and she paused, watching.
“Ekhaas?” asked Ashi softly. She was alert and tense, staring after Ekhaas into the darkness. Her hand was on her sword. “Is something wrong?”
The flicker came again-and kept coming. One after another, dark bodies swarmed over the wall, caught briefly by the dim light before dropping again into shadow. Ashi whispered a curse and started to rise. Ekhaas grabbed her arm and held her down.
“Don’t move,” she said.
Ashi froze and sank back down into a crouch. Ekhaas crept to the edge of the cart and peered into the yard. Everything was as motionless and quiet as before, the silence broken by murmurs from the soldiers as they played some game and by crews laboring around the station. Beyond about twenty paces, she could see nothing more than Ashi, but the colorless nightvision of her people cut through the closer shadows. She watched and waited for the first hint of movement. The moment stretched out…
Then they were there, not just at the edge of her vision, but slipping out from behind another stationary lightning rail cart parked in the yard, so close that even Ashi could see them. Ekhaas heard her draw a sharp breath. She came close to gasping as well, and she had been expecting this.
A dozen black-clad goblins flowed through the moonlight like rats or ferrets.
“Who are they?” Ashi whispered.
“Shaarat’khesh and taarka’khesh,” said Ekhaas. “Goblins of the Silent Clans.”
“The assassins?”
“When they need to be.”
Sentries posted outside the delegation’s carts looked studiously away. The goblins went to the third cart, the one that carried the tigers and that, as Ashi had observed, seemed so empty. One of them tapped a soft rhythm on the cargo door. A moment later, the door slid open and the goblins of the Silent Clans vanished into the cart. The door closed and they might never have been there at all, except for one goblin who remained outside-and looked up at Ekhaas and Ashi with glittering eyes in a dark stained face. They’d been seen. The goblin pointed at Ashi, his eyebrows and ears lifting in an unspoken question. Ekhaas nodded. The goblin turned back to the cart from behind which he and the others had emerged. He beckoned.
Another figure stepped into the moonlight, a shifter with a pack over one shoulder and the heavy shape of a hobgoblin sword at his side. Ashi started. “Geth?” she said, then “Geth!”
Before Ekhaas could say anything or even move, Ashi was on her feet and clambering down to the ground. Below, Geth stared, then ran to meet her. Ekhaas closed her eyes for a moment and let out a sigh of relief before climbing down the ladder as well. Inside the cart, the rest of the delegation was stirring in curiosity at the commotion outside. Ekhaas heard Tariic telling them to be calm and to remain in the cart.
He emerged just as she reached the ground. “So he’s here,” he said. “They found him.”
“Did you doubt it?” Ekhaas asked.
“I sometimes doubted that they’d bring him in alive.”
Ekhaas couldn’t say anything to that. The same fear had nagged at her. She turned away and went to her friends, grateful that death hadn’t been a necessity.
Ashi was talking more than Geth was, spilling her reasons for being in Sigilstar with a delegation of Darguuls and asking after him seemingly in the same breath. “What are you doing here? Where have you been? Where are Singe and Dandra?”
“Bear and Boar!” said Geth. “One question at a time! I wasn’t expecting to find you here either.” He pulled himself away from Ashi and gestured to the black-clad goblin who still stood by the lightning rail cart. “This is Chetiin. He’s an elder of the taarka’khesh. Him and his people found me in Lathleer in Aundair. We almost fought until Chetiin explained why they’d come looking for me.”
Chetiin bent his head to Ashi. He didn’t say anything, but his eyes lingered on the lines of the dragonmark that patterned her face. She bent her head in return, but Ekhaas saw her self-consciously tug her scarf into place as she looked back to Geth. “What were you doing in Aundair? How did they find you?”
Ekhaas raised her voice. “I told them where to look,” she said. Both shifter and human turned to her. She held her ears proudly stiff and reminded herself she’d done nothing wrong. “It’s good to see you again, Geth.”
Ashi and Geth both spoke at the same time, Geth greeting her with the same respect, Ashi staring and spitting out, “You? You knew he was coming? Khyberit gentis, why didn’t you tell me?”
“I couldn’t tell you,” said Ekhaas. “I-”
“She had orders not to say anything about it,” said Tariic as he joined them. “Not to you, not to anyone. What is happening is larger than your friendship. Chetiin, ta muut.”
“Cho, chib,” said Chetiin. His voice was thick and strained like a scar. He spoke in the human language, following Ekhaas and Tariic’s example. “It was a small task. Ekhaas duur’kala’s magic guided us to the right area, and the taarka’khesh among my band were able to locate him easily enough. He travels quietly for someone not of the Silent Clans.”
“High praise from you,” Tariic said. He looked to the shifter. “Geth, I’m Tariic of Rhukaan Taash, nephew and emissary of Lhesh Haruuc Shaarat’kor.”
“I know,” said Geth. “Chetiin told me who you are.”
“What else has Chetiin told you?”
Geth scratched the thick stubble on his chin. “Enough to persuade me to follow him and meet you. That Haruuc needed me”-his hand dropped to the ancient sword at his side-“and Wrath. That Ekhaas was involved, too, which is really why I came. He didn’t say anything about Ashi.”
“He didn’t know about her,” Ekhaas told him. “None of us did. Ashi wasn’t part of our plans initially.”
He gave her a long look. “I think it’s time I heard more about these plans. Chetiin got me this far on your name, Ekhaas, but I didn’t agree to go any farther until I know more. I’m not sure I like people making plans around me without asking first.”
“I want to know what’s going on, too,” agreed Ashi.
“So,” said Vounn, “would I.”
The lady seneschal stood behind them, wrapped in a shawl against the night air. Her face, as ever, was expressionless, but her voice was firm.
Tariic scowled. “Didn’t I tell you to wait in the cart?”
“You told your people to wait in the cart. Your authority doesn’t extend to me.” Her eyes narrowed. “Nor does it extend to my charge, yet it seems she’s become part of something. Please, enlighten me.”
“Who is this?” growled Geth.
“Geth, may I introduce Lady Seneschal Vounn d’Deneith, envoy of House Deneith to Lhesh Haruuc,” said Tariic tightly. “Lady Vounn, Geth.”
“She’s my mentor,” added Ashi.
Geth looked Vounn up and down and grunted.
Vounn’s lips pressed together. “Another figure from Ashi’s past,” she said.
Color rushed into Ashi’s face. “He’s my friend!”
“And mine,” said Ekhaas.
“He may be the one person,” said Tariic, his ears twitching, “who can prevent the collapse of Darguun when
