Toll the Hounds

name.’

‘Well, your wife calls you Useless, so if you’d prefer that…’

Gorlas flung the weapon at the man’s feet, where it skidded in a puff of golden dust. ‘On guard,’ he ordered in a rasp. ‘To the death.’

The man made no move to pick up the weapon. He Stood as he had before, head tipped a fraction to one side.

‘You are a coward in truth,’ Gorlas said, drawing his rapier. ‘Cowards do not deserve to be treated with honour, so let us dispense with convention-’

‘I was waiting for you to say that.’

The foreman, standing off to one side, still struggling with the ache in his chest from a labouring heart, was in the process of licking his gritty lips. Before he had finished that instinctive flicker, the scene before him irrevocably changed.

And Gorlas Vidikas was falling forward, landing hard. His rapier rolled from his hand to catch up in the grass lining the track. Dust puffed up, then slowly set-tled.

The stranger-had he even moved? the foreman was unsure-now turned to him and said, ‘You heard him dispense with the rules of the duel, correct?’

The foreman nodded.

‘And, think back now, good sir/did you even once hear me voice a formal chal-lenge?’

‘Well, I was part of the way down the trail for a moment-’

‘But not beyond range of hearing, I’m sure.’

‘Ah, no, unless you did whisper something-’

‘Think back. Gorlas was babbling on and on-could I have said anything even if I’d wanted to?’

‘True enough, thinking on it.’

‘Then are we satisfied here?’

‘Ain’t for me to say that either way,’ the foreman replied. ‘It’s the man this one was working for.’

‘Who, being absent, will have to rely solely upon your report.’

‘Er, I suppose so.’

The man shrugged. ‘Do as you see fit, then.’ He glanced down into the pit. ‘You get the feeling they’re about to start cheering,’ he said.

‘They ain’t decided.’

‘No?’

‘They ain’t decided if whoever replaces Vidikas is gonna be any better, you see?’

‘Because, in their experience, they’re all the same.’

The foreman nodded. ‘Didn’t think you was nobleborn.’

‘No, I’m not.’

‘No, you’re pretty much like them below. Like me, even.’

‘I suppose so.’ The man walked to the body of Gorlas Vidikas, bent down to roll it on to its back, and the foreman saw the two knife handles, blades buried to the hilts, jutting from Gorlas’s chest.

He decided to lick his lips again, and somehow the dust suddenly tasted sweeter. ‘Know anything ‘bout property law, any chance?’

‘Sorry, what?’

‘Like, if I was paying on a loan to this man-’

‘No, no idea. Though I imagine if you just sit tight, maybe wait to see if any-body ever shows up to collect, well, that would hardly be considered illegal. Would it now?’

‘No, seems proper enough to me,’ the foreman agreed.

The man worked the knives back out, wiped the blood off on the stained, rum-pled cloak. ‘Did he tell true about Harllo?’

‘What? Oh. He did. The lad tried to escape, and was killed.’

The man sighed, and then straightened. ‘Ah, shit, Murillio,’ he muttered. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘Wait-this Harllo-was he that important? I mean-’ and the foreman gestured, to encompass not only the corpse lying on the road, but the one that had been there the d«y before as well, ‘all this killing. Who was Harllo?’

The man walked to his horse and swung himself into the saddle. He collected the reins. ‘I’m not sure,’ he said after a moment’s consideration. ‘The way it started, well, it seemed…’ he hesitated, and then said, ‘he was a boy nobody loved.’

Bitter and scarred as he was, even the foreman winced at that. ‘Most of ’em are, as end up here. Most of ’em are’

The man studied him from the saddle.

The foreman wondered-he didn’t see much in the way of triumph or satisfac-tion in that face looking down at him. He wasn’t sure what he was seeing, in fact. Whatever it was, it didn’t fit.

Collecting the reins, the stranger drew the horse round and set off up the road. Heading back to the city.

The foreman coughed up a throatful of rank phlegm, then stepped forward and spat down, quite precisely, on to the upturned face of Gorlas Vidikas. Then he turned round. ‘I want three guards and the fastest horses we got!’

He watched the runner scramble.

From the pit below rose the occasional snatch of harsh laughter. The foreman understood that well enough, and so he nodded. ‘Damn and below, I’ll give ’em all an extra flagon of ale anyway.’

Cutter rode for a time as dusk surrendered to darkness. The horse was the first to sense a loss of will, as the rider on its back ceased all efforts at guiding its pace. The beast dropped from a canter to a trot, then a walk, and then it came to rest and stood at the edge of the road, head lowering to snag a tuft of grass.

Cutter stared down at his hands, watched as the reins slithered free. And then he began to weep. For Murillio, for a boy he had never met. But most of all, he wept for himself.

Come to me, my love. Come to me now.

A short time later, three messengers thundered past-paying him no heed at all. The drum of horse hoofs was slow to fade, and the clouds of dust left in their wake hung suspended, lit only by starlight.

Venaz the hero, Venaz who followed orders, and if those meant something vicious, even murderous, then that was how it would be. No questions, no qualms. He had returned up top in grim triumph. Another escape thwarted, the message sweetly delivered. Even so, he liked being thorough. In fact, he’d wanted to make sure.

And so, in keeping with his new privileges as head of the moles, when he col-lected a knotted climbing rope and set off back into the tunnels, he was not ac-costed. He could do as he liked now, couldn’t he? And when he returned, carrying whatever proof he could find of the deaths of Bainisk and Harllo, then Gorlas

Vidikas would see just how valuable he was, and Venaz would find a new life for himself,

Good work led to good rewards. A simple enough truth.

Whatever flood had filled part of the passage deep in the Settle had mostly drained away, easing his trek to the crevasse. When he reached it he crouched at the edge, listening carefully-to make certain that no one was still alive, maybe scuffling about in the pitch blackness down below. Satisfied, he worked Bainisk’s rope off the knob of stone and replaced it with his own, then sent the rest of the coil tumbling over the edge.

Venaz set his lantern to its lowest setting and tied half a body-length of twine to the handle, and the other end to one ankle. He let the lantern down, and then followed with his legs. He brought both feet together, the rope in between, and edged further over until they rested on a knot. Now, so long as the twine didn’t get fouled with the rope, he’d be fine.

Moving with great caution, he began his descent.

Broken, bleeding bodies somewhere below, killed by rocks-not by Venaz, since he’d not even cut the rope. Bainisk had done that, the fool. Still, Venaz could still take the credit-nothing wrong with that.

Even with the knots, the slow going was making his arms and shoulders ache. He didn’t really have to do this. But maybe it would be the one deed that made all the difference in the eyes of Gorlas Vidikas. Nobles looked for certain things, mysterious things. They were born with skills and talents. He needed to show the man as much as he could of his own talents and all that.

The lantern clunked below him and he looked down to see the faint blush of dull light playing across dry, jagged