had to. Because giants and lizard things were charging down the slope like a wave rushing at the shore.
For the next several heartbeats, Khouryn wondered if reaching the horses was actually going to be enough. It was possible that the giants with their long legs could run just as fast, or the lizard creatures for that matter. Or one of the rocks whizzing through the air could kill or lame a horse.
But he and his comrades gradually pulled ahead, and one by one the giants gave up the chase and shouted after them. Khouryn didn’t speak their language, but the mockery in their tone was unmistakable.
And maybe they deserved to feel superior. Because when Khouryn and his companions caught up with the dragonborn who’d ridden away before them-the warriors whose lives they’d bought with their seemingly suicidal rearguard action-they saw there were only three of them. That meant Clan Daardendrien had lost twenty-five of its finest.
Balasar looked around at what little was left of their war band, then made a spitting sound. “And we never even got to the scout on the bat!”
Hasos glared at Aoth. “A man is dead!” the noble said.
“I regret that,” Aoth replied. “But war really is coming. Threskel is moving more and more of its strength to the border. You’d better get used to the idea that before this is over, a lot of men will be dead.”
“The other farmers are afraid to work the fields.”
“All the more reason to help me stop the raiders in their own territory before they slip into yours and hurt people.”
Hasos’s mouth twisted. “We’ve been though this, Captain. I won’t provoke the Threskelans into attacking any more aggressively than they are already. I won’t risk men I may need later.”
Aoth studied Hasos. Please, he thought, show me a sign that this whoreson sent the killers after me. Do it and I’ll arrest him, take sole command of all the soldiers hereabouts, and worry about justifying my actions to the war hero later.
But the scene before him didn’t change. He could depend on his fire-kissed eyes to see through darkness or mirages, but providing some intimation of a man’s secret thoughts was a more difficult trick.
Of course, it was entirely possible he was staring at the wrong man anyway. He wanted Hasos to be guilty. It would make life simpler, and he didn’t like the aristocrat any better than Hasos liked him. But that didn’t mean the Chessentan really was sheltering dragonborn assassins.
“All right,” said Aoth, “you keep your men patrolling your own lands, I’ll keep sending mine into Threskel, and maybe together we can keep any more peasants from catching arrows. Now, if we’ve talked about everything you wanted to discuss, I have something too.”
Hasos scowled like he wasn’t done witlessly trying to blame the plowman’s death on the sellswords’ incursions into enemy territory. But then he evidently decided to let it go. “What’s that?”
“I need to walk this keep from top to bottom.”
“Why?”
“Obviously, my lord, if the Threskelans lay siege to Soolabax and succeed in getting inside the walls, your residence will become crucial to our defense. So I need to be familiar with it. I should have looked it over before this, but I had even more urgent things to do.”
“I suppose I can have someone show you around. Or do it myself, if you think that would be better.”
And then, if there was something Aoth wasn’t meant to see, his guide would steer him away from it. “No need. I can find my way around a fortress. I just wanted your permission.”
“Very well. You have it.”
Aoth left Hasos’s study and proceeded to explore the smallish castle from battlements to cellars. He took inventory of its strengths and weaknesses, just as he’d said he would. But he also looked for signs of secret passages and hidden chambers.
Which evidently didn’t exist.
He finished in the wine cellar. Exasperated by his failure, he found a dusty old bottle and picked at the cork with his dagger. He got some of it out and pushed the rest down the neck into the red liquid inside. Hoping he was pilfering something expensive, he took a swig.
Not bad, in a sour sort of way.
When he’d drunk his fill, he left the bottle on the floor, departed the keep, and walked to the temple of Amaunator. He had to wait while Cera completed a ceremony, but then she received him in a study considerably brighter and cheerier than the one where Hasos conducted business. The costly glass windows and skylights let in the warm afternoon sunlight.
Cera lifted off a round golden mask and set it on a table. “You look awful.” She sounded slightly hoarse from her praying and chanting.
Aoth snorted. “Thanks so much. Lack of sleep will do that to a person. The war is starting. I have to spend most of my time in the field. Then when I do make it back to town, instead of resting I walk the streets or fly over them, looking for some sign of the dragonborn.”
“From your manner, I take it you still haven’t found one.”
“No.”
She removed the topaz-studded cloth-of-gold stole hanging around her neck. “I guess ‘true sight’ doesn’t live up to its reputation.”
“It doesn’t make me omniscient, if that’s what you mean. You jeer at me. Have you had any better luck?”
She poured water from a pitcher into a goblet and took a sip. “Not yet. There’s a ritual that enables me to tell if another person’s speaking the truth. When I have the chance, I perform it before I talk to someone we decided was a likely suspect.” She smirked. “By the way, you’re reimbursing the temple for the incense I have to burn.”
“Even though you’re telling me I won’t be getting much for my coin.”
“I’m afraid not. Even if a person is guilty, the trick is steering the conversation in such a way that he needs to lie. I can’t just say, by the way, are you hiding dragonborn in your house? Or, how’s the plan to murder that ugly little sellsword commander going? What’s that all about, anyway?”
“And who’s to say you’re even talking to the right people? Or that anyone is sheltering the reptiles? Maybe they’ve taken refuge in an empty building.”
“Now that I doubt. To say the least, Soolabax is no metropolis, but it’s grown since Hasos’s ancestors built the walls. It’s crowded now, especially since we locals had to find space for you sellswords. There just aren’t that many vacant houses.”
“I suppose not.” He felt a yawn coming on and smothered it. He considered using a tattoo to stave off fatigue and decided not to bother. “It sounds like I just have to keep looking over my shoulder.”
“Not necessarily.”
“Oh?”
“I assume that even a devil-worshiping Thayan is aware that among his other attributes, Amaunator is a god of time.”
“You mean Bane. It’s Bane my countrymen all worship since Szass Tam drove the other zulkirs out. But yes, I know that.”
“Then it may not astonish you that under certain circumstances, the Keeper gives his clerics a measure of power over time. Not enough to visit the past in the flesh-there are excellent reasons why no one can ever be allowed to do that-but to travel there in spirit and watch what unfolds.”
He frowned. “You’re saying our souls could lurk outside your garden and see where the dragonborn came from. Get a direction, anyway.”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know. It sounds like a form of divination, and I told you what happened when the wizards tried that in Luthcheq.”
“It’s not divination in a technical sense. It is a unique way of directing divine power, one that most people outside my order have never even heard of. That gives us reason to hope that we could do it without triggering the assassins’ mystical defenses.”
