Warlock's shadow

cleaver having at a thick joint of meat. And the blood …

He was late to practice that morning, but once there, he immersed himself in it. He let his muscles do what they did every day, stopped thinking, turned his mind blank and in his head, he walked away from everything. By the end of the day, he’d had more curses and taps from Sterm’s cane than he could count, and Tasahre was giving him the strangest of looks. He thought he might have fought unusually well when they’d sparred.

Why? Why had Master Sy taken the man’s head? A ghoulish trophy? Kasmin was more than just a friend for Master Sy, but still — that wasn’t the thief-taker he knew; no, there had to be a reason for it.

The dreams left him alone that night. The next morning, Tasahre was shaking him awake.

‘A girl monk in with the boy novices?’ he mumbled at her. ‘Whatever will the elder dragon say?’

Tasahre glared at him. ‘Come,’ she hissed. ‘Quickly.’

Outside it was still dark. On the eastern horizon, out across the estuary, the sky was tinged with pink. Today was Abyss-day, the day the old gods pierced a hole through the heart of the world. What did she want with him on Abyss-day? There wasn’t supposed to be any training.

Outside, there were soldiers in the temple. Not just the usual ones in yellow with their sunburst shields but soldiers in the colours of the city Overlord, lots of them, passing yawns between them as though it was some sort of game. The other dragon-monks were there too, still as statues, watching, tense and prickling with hostility. At the open gates, he caught a glimpse of a man dressed in grey robes leaning quietly against the walls, his face hidden beneath a cowl. Grey was the colour of death. He thought he saw the man meet his eye and wag a finger, but then some soldiers passed between them and when they were gone, so was the man in grey; instead Berren saw someone else, almost the last person he’d expected to see, striding across the temple yard with a cadre of soldiers trailing behind him. Justicar Kol. Whatever this was, it wasn’t about a naughty novice who played truant in the night.

‘What’s happening?’ he asked.

Tasahre put a hand on his shoulder. It was a soft touch and yet it made him jump as though someone had set off a firecracker. ‘I don’t know. A man has been murdered. There is talk of conspiracy and treason and assassination, but it is all whispers. The elder dragon says we have a snake in our nest.’ She sounded unsettled. ‘They are looking for your master, too,’ she added softly. She nodded towards the justicar. ‘That one is here to speak with you.’

‘What? Why? Why are they looking for Master Sy?’

‘I don’t know. Has he done something wrong?’

Berren shook his head. But shaking his head wasn’t enough — the pictures and the sounds ran in circles inside him and he wanted to be rid of them. It would have been easy to tell her how he’d slipped out, how he’d lain in wait, and then how Master Sy had come with the Headsman and the terrible things that had followed. About the fight in the House of Records and the bodies they’d taken out to the Wrecking Point. It all wanted to come out. Right back to the archer up on the warehouse roof.

The hand on his shoulder tightened. ‘If he has done something wrong, Berren, the crime is his, not yours. You are his apprentice, that is all. You have nothing to fear.’

Really? Nothing? Because it didn’t feel like nothing.

At the gates, the figure in grey was there again.

‘Let this city man ask his questions. I will be with you. Is he a friend? He says you know him.’

‘Who’s that?’ He pointed towards the gates, to the man in grey. His finger was shaking. He wasn’t even sure why, just that everything was wrong, everyone was wrong, nowhere was safe and he needed to run away from all of them. The urge was building up inside him, irresistible.

‘Who?’ Tasahre frowned.

‘There!’ But the man in grey was gone again.

‘Berren! Stop! You’re shaking!’ She reached out to him again. Her hand on his shoulder was firm and warm, and in her face, all he could see was concern for him. He felt the panic ebb away. ‘What is it that makes you afraid, Berren?’

He wasn’t sure. Losing everything all at once, maybe. He shrugged and shook his head. He couldn’t give an answer that made any sense, and even if he could, he was quite sure he wouldn’t want to share it.

‘Whatever it is, you must find it and face it. Fear is the killer of thought.’ She frowned and let go of him. ‘There. It is fading. Come. You must talk to this city man who claims to be a friend and then he can go.’ She kept looking at all the soldiers scattered around the temple, the Overlord’s men. The other dragon-monks were prowling the temple yard like hungry tigers. He’d never seen them like this, never seen them so on edge. It was infectious.

‘What’s happening?’ he asked again.

‘I don’t know, Berren. I don’t know.’

Kol had seen them and was coming towards them. Maybe he would know. Berren tried not to think about what he’d seen at the Two Cranes. A part of him wanted to let it all come out — Kol was a friend, right? But he couldn’t.

‘Berren.’ Kol stopped in front of him. He looked as nervous as the monks. He glanced at Tasahre. ‘Is there somewhere we can talk? Quietly? Preferably alone.’

‘I …’ Berren looked back at Tasahre.

‘No,’ she said. ‘Berren is my student and I am responsible for him. I will hear your questions too.’

‘You?’ Kol snorted. ‘What has any of this to do with you, monk?’

‘This is my temple and we are outside your law,’ she said, quiet but firm. ‘Come.’

There were soldiers everywhere, and men Berren didn’t know but who wore fine clothes and swords as though they were lords. Tasahre marched past them all, past a cluster of priests swathed in whispers who all stopped and stared as they passed. She took them to where the monks lived and slept, to their meditation room.

‘Here,’ she said. ‘Speak your piece, city man, then go.’

Kol glared at her. ‘I wish to speak to Berren alone.’

‘I will not leave him with you. I don’t trust you.’

‘You do know who he is, girl?’

‘Of course.’

The justicar was seething. At other times, Berren knew, he would never have taken this. He would have shouted at her, driven her away somehow, or else walked away himself, too proud to be defied; but those were other days. Today he was … Kol was almost scared!

‘Boy, send her away,’ he hissed. ‘Do it!’

Berren cringed but Tasahre stepped between them. She met the justicar’s stare. ‘He may do as you ask, city man, but I will not go. Ask your questions of the monks of the fire-dragon. Berren is within our circle for now. We are as one.’

‘You can take that mystical crap and shove it up your arse,’ growled Kol. He kicked over a stool. ‘Fine. Boy, this isn’t about you, this is about your master. Where in the name of the broken god is he?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Bollocks!’

Berren winced. If he had known, what would he have said? ‘The last time I saw him, he was home.’ There, at least that was true. Sort of true.

‘You think I didn’t look there? You know what I found at the Two Cranes yesterday? Blood, boy. A whole load of it and someone missing a head. Ironic given who it was, and so I think you can guess who I’m talking about. You know the last place I went to where I saw that much blood? That would be the House of Records a bit over a week back. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you? Think carefully, boy, because I know you were there.’

‘You don’t have to answer anything,’ murmured Tasahre. Berren whipped round and glared at her.

‘No? So when you ask all the same things as soon as he’s gone, I don’t have to answer you either, right?’ He turned back to the justicar. ‘Master Kol, I don’t know where Master Sy is.’ How much could Kol know? The thief- taker had been careful at the House of Records, careful about who saw what, at least. ‘Yes. We went there in the night. About a week ago. Master Sy … I don’t know what he’s been doing since I started my training here. He wouldn’t say.’ He’d tell the truth, as much of it as he could. He could almost hear the thief-taker whispering in his