lingering outside. Palm, fingers upright, followed swiftly by a single finger pointing downward, then two pointing directly at him.
Stay here, watch for anyone who gets past us.
He nodded and stepped back, keeping his weapon trained on the doorway.
Rear guard established, vision adjusting to the gloom, Ellowaine took a moment to orient herself. A large entry chamber, coated in paint so faded that she couldn't guess at its original color, offered only a single exit other than the front door and an empty coatroom. What remained of a desk, its legs long since scavenged for firewood, slumped atop rat-eaten carpet. The air was pungent with old dust and older mildew, spiced just a bit by fresh urine.
Ischina sidled up to the far door and peered cautiously around the corner for just an instant before jerking her head back. Spotting no danger, she dropped into a half crouch and darted through for a closer look. Ellowaine moved toward the door, while the others gathered on either side.
'Hallway,' Ischina whispered as she reemerged into the chamber. 'Lots of doors, staircase at the far end. I'm guessing a cheap hostel, maybe a flophouse.'
Ellowaine nodded. She'd seen the like before, and in her experience, it probably hadn't been much nicer before being abandoned.
'Whistles,' she said simply. Instantly, the others produced, from within pouches or on thongs around their necks, plain tin tubes that produced a surprisingly sharp tone. She drew her own from a pocket on her belt and wrapped the thong around her wrist.
'Two by two. Quinran and I are upstairs. You do not, under any circumstances, let your partner out of your sight.'
Three quick nods were all the acknowledgment she received, or required.
Slightly more gently-but only slightly-she continued. 'Judging by the smell, more than a few vagabonds have been using this place. Try not to kill anyone unless you're certain they're a threat-but don't risk your skins for it.'
More nods, and then she was off toward the stairs, Quinran falling into step behind. Even as they reached the steps, she heard the first door being kicked open back down the hall.
The stairs creaked and screeched like a cat under a rocking chair, and the entire structure quivered beneath their weight. Ellowaine, a hatchet now in each hand, winced with every step, but no amount of care could silence the rickety wooden banshees, so she'd little choice but to bear it. Gaps in the dust suggesting that someone else had come this way might have been days or even weeks old, but the broken spiderwebs hanging between the banister and the inner wall had to be more recent. Keeping silent, despite the stairs heralding their approach to all and sundry, she gestured at the webs with a blade. Quinran nodded his understanding and shifted his grip on his broadsword.
Below, Arkur and Ischina kicked in a second door.
The light faded as the captain and the corporal climbed higher. Presumably, most of the second floor's windows were shuttered or boarded. They slowed, hoping to give their eyes time to adjust, and scowled darkly at each other. They were a daytime patrol; none of them carried lamp or torch.
'If this was just some vagrant carrying a stick that you saw,' she breathed at him in a voice below even a whisper, 'you'll be digging latrine ditches for a week.'
'If this is the other option,' he whispered back, flinching away as another step screamed in the near darkness, 'I might just volunteer.'
A third door clattered open on the floor beneath them.
And something moved in the shadows above.
It was nothing Ellowaine had seen, or could put a name to. Just a sensation, a touch of breeze without benefit of an open window, a flicker of movement in the dangling cobweb. She froze, listening, halting her companion as he tensed to take another step.
Nothing. Nothing at all…
Except, just maybe, the faintest creak. It could have been the building itself, sighing and settling its aching joints. But so, too, could it have been the muffled protest of a floorboard buried beneath old carpet.
Weapons at the ready, Ellowaine and Quinran increased their pace, hoping now not for the stealth that the stairs had rendered impossible, but to reach the top before anyone could intercept them partway.
Nobody tried. They found themselves in a hall very much like the one below. Doors occupied the walls to either side. A few hung open, the wood dangling loosely from the hinges like hanged convicts, but most were firmly shut.
Again they looked at each other, then at the nearest door. Quinran shrugged, and Ellowaine made a flicking motion toward it. Hatchets in hand, she stood back, ready to strike as the corporal kicked.
Rotted wood gave way so easily he stumbled. A cloud of foul splinters wafted into the air, and the stench of mildew grew nigh overpowering, but the room was empty save for a splotched mattress and soiled sheets.
The same across the hall, and again in the room neighboring that. They were just turning toward the fourth door when Ellowaine drew abruptly to a halt.
'What is it, Captain?'
'Listen!'
A moment. 'I hear nothing.'
'That's just it!' She tilted her head, indicating the stairway, and Quinran understood.
Where were the sounds of Ischina and Arkur opening doors downstairs?
The corporal opened his mouth, but no answer crawled its way onto his tongue. They couldn't be taking a break, not so early in the process. Could they have run into trouble? What could have silenced them both before either could sound a whistle?
Ellowaine stood, undecided, but only for a span of heartbeats. Absently spinning her hatchets in small circles beside her, she stepped once more toward the stairs. 'Watch my back.'
She'd moved only a couple of paces before she realized that no sounds of footsteps followed her. Behind her, the door to a room they'd already searched slammed shut, hiding whatever lay beyond.
Of Quinran, or any life at all, the hallway offered no sign.
Ellowaine hit the door at a full tilt and dropped into a roll as it fragmented. Across the moldy carpet she tumbled, then back to her feet, blades at the ready.
Quinran crouched on the floor, holding one hand to the back of his head. A thin trickle of blood-not enough, Ellowaine noted with no small relief, to suggest a dangerous wound-welled up between his fingers.
For just an instant, she couldn't understand how the room could be empty. Someone had grabbed the corporal, struck him across the head to keep him silent, but where-?
To her right, nigh invisible in the artificial twilight, a low hole in the wall provided egress to the next chamber. She listened, but neither the thump of a footfall nor the creak of a board suggested any movement.
'Can you stand?' she asked softly.
'I can bloody do more than that.' Quinran rose, lifting his sword from the floor beside him. 'Where are the bastards?'
'Later. First, we're checking on the others.'
The corporal frowned, but when Ellowaine headed for the stairs, he followed.
They bounded downward, at speeds one notch shy of reckless, and the steps unleashed a chorus of wails. It was easy enough to see where their companions' efforts had ceased: Just look for the last open door. Once they were off the shrieking stairs they slowed, progressing with weapons at the ready.
Only as they neared could they see the crimson smears leading into the nearest open room. They gagged as the swirling dust of neglect pasted the acrid and metallic tang of recent slaughter to their tongues, their teeth, their throats.
Ellowaine darted past the door, crouched low, and rose with her back to the wall. Quinran mirrored her posture on the opposite side.
One… two…
She spun through the doorway, hatchets whirling, the corporal at her back.
And all but slipped in the puddled gore. 'Good gods…'
The mercenary was certainly no stranger to violent death. It was the swiftness of it all, the fact that they'd
