“kill him!” The griffon crouched and glared as if he’d like nothing better than to pounce over the blazing barrier and down into the marchers. Aoth then strode to the edge of the sundial and looked down at the man who’d hailed him.
“I’m Daelric Apathos,” said the sunlord, “steward of the Keeper’s house. Thank you for holding back the rabble.”
To Aoth, the fellow sounded more stiff than grateful, but it seemed best to take the statement at face value. “That’s why I’m here, Sunlord. To keep the peace.”
“Hold them back for a few more moments, and my clergy and I will complete the malediction.”
“That won’t be necessary.”
Daelric blinked. “I assure you, I only intend a mild rebuke. It won’t be that much worse than the average sunburn.”
“And I assure you, if you start praying again, I’ll snuff the fire, climb back on my griffon, and leave you and the Church of Tchazzar to sort things out for yourselves.”
The high priest sneered. “I should have known better than to expect piety from one of your kind. The war hero will hear how you denied me in my hour of need.”
“I bet she will.” Aoth paced to the front of the sundial. Peering out across the wall of hissing flame, still burning hot and bright with no fuel but magic to sustain it, he located the prophetess. “As long as I’m collecting names, I may as well get yours.”
She drew herself up even straighter, as though to assert that she wasn’t afraid. “Halonya.”
“Well, Halonya, you and your friends go march somewhere else.”
“It’s our city as much as it is that priest’s. We have the right to walk the street. Any street, including this one.”
“I’m an officer of the watch, which means you have the right to walk where I say. Now go, or the next fires will drop right on your heads.”
Halonya held his gaze for another moment, then nodded curtly. She pivoted and started to lead her fellow cultists away. They followed, but not without some glaring, spitting, and obscene gestures to demonstrate their dislike of Aoth.
The sunlords were more restrained about it. But their stony faces conveyed the same sentiment.
“This is nice,” said Jet. “At least they agree on something.”
Gaedynn spotted three lights shining close together in the dark street below. He sent Eider, his griffon, named for a love of swimming unusual among her kind, swooping lower.
The lanterns belonged to a patrol, but not one of the Brotherhood’s. The men were locals. Their lights revealed an eviscerated corpse. A circle of spectators, some in their nightclothes, had assembled to gawk at it. A couple cried out when Eider touched down. The griffon gave them a disgusted look.
As Gaedynn dismounted, he caught the smells of spilled blood and waste. Judging from the fallen wooden bucket and the communal well just a stride or two away, the dead man had ventured out for water. The killer had left a green handprint on the brickwork surrounding the hole.
Gaedynn looked for the sergeant in charge. That appeared to be a blunt-featured man who was evidently putting on weight, since even with the bottom buckles left unfastened, his leather cuirass was too tight for his flabby body. His face pale in the lantern light, swallowing repeatedly, he stood and stared at the dead body.
“When did this happen?” Gaedynn asked.
The pudgy man shook his head. “Who knows?”
Gaedynn stooped to examine the remains. He’d spent most of his youth as a hostage among the elves of the Yuirwood. It had been an alarming experience at times, particularly when his father’s continued misbehavior made his captors think they really ought to kill him in retaliation, or what was the point of having a hostage in the first place? But it had taught him woodcraft, and to him it looked like claws rather than a blade had ripped the victim. Which didn’t necessarily mean that a human wasn’t responsible for the crime.
Gaedynn rose and waved a hand at the gawkers. “Have you questioned them?”
“If any of them had seen the murderer, they’d be dead too.”
“Not if the killer didn’t see them,” Gaedynn said. “Now, have you questioned them?”
“No.”
“Well, someone should start, or at least make sure no one wanders off. The rest of us need to try to pick up the killer’s trail. I’ll look from the air…” He belatedly noticed the watchman’s scowl. “What’s wrong?”
“Maybe your flying beasts and fancy gear impress Nicos Corynian. But you’re no better than us, and we don’t take orders from you.”
“My friend, I realize I’m not your commanding officer, and I would never presume to tell you how to proceed, except that you don’t appear to be proceeding. And how will that look when you report to those who do command you?”
The sergeant somehow managed to look nettled and sheepish at the same time. “It’s just… we’re used to dead bodies, but not like this.”
“I understand.” Gaedynn glanced around, taking in the several streets and alleys snaking and forking away from the central point, then turned his gaze on the rest of the watchmen. “We’ll need to split up to have any hope of catching the murderer.”
“We don’t all have lights,” a watchman said.
“Then commandeer them,” Gaedynn said. “Quickly! For all we know, the killer is only a few moments ahead of us.”
And that, he realized, was what they were afraid of. No one actually wanted to catch up with the fiend. Not by himself and in the dark.
“The whoreson probably headed back to the wizards’ quarter,” said another man. “We’ll have the best chance of spotting him if we all head in that direction.”
“We have no idea where he’s headed.” Gaedynn turned back to the sergeant. “But search as you think best. Just look somewhere, and we’ll rendezvous back here.”
He hurried back to Eider and swung himself into the saddle. The griffon trotted, lashed her wings, and sprang skyward.
Gaedynn laid an arrow on his bow and, guiding Eider with his knees, flew a spiral course away from the well. He looked for motion atop the roofs and in the air.
For a while he was optimistic about spotting it. As he understood matters, the sole witness claimed the killer had fled the scene of his first atrocity by traveling over the housetops, even if said witness wasn’t clear whether he’d jumped like a squirrel or flown like a bird.
But all Gaedynn found were bats, owls, scurrying roof-dwelling rats, and an elderly astrologer leaning on a gnarled cane as he studied the moon and her trailing cloud of glittering tears. And when Eider had wheeled her way over a good quarter of the city, it was time to admit their quarry had eluded them.
He hoped the watchmen had had better luck. But he doubted it, and when he returned to the well, he found them loitering around empty-handed.
“Useless,” sneered an onlooker to his companion, just loud enough for Gaedynn to overhear.
“We need to run them off,” Randal said.
“Yes,” and “Right,” said some of the other boys.
But Theriseus asked, “Why?” Towheaded and gangly, not much good at games, he was just like that, always asking questions. Sometimes it made him seem clever, and sometimes stupid.
Either way, Randal had an answer for him, because he’d listened to his father talk-well, yell, really-about that very subject.
“They strut and push people around like they conquered the city or something. But they’re just sellswords, which means they’re just animals who kill for coin.”