Oath of Swords

Yet that guard was a problem. His sword didn’t worry Bahzell-not taken by surprise out of the dark-but if he had time for a single shout, the hradani might as well not have come. Still, this was a problem he’d dealt with before, and against guards far more alert than this fellow seemed.

The hradani cocked an eye at the moon. A nice, thick patch of cloud was coming up fast, and he drew his dagger. He’d left his arbalest with Brandark, for it was only in tales that men obliged by dying silently with arrows in their guts. If you wanted to be quiet, you needed a knife at close quarters, and he’d coated the blade in lampblack against any betraying gleam.

He held the weapon at his side, but his attention never wavered from the guard. A tiny corner of his mind supposed he should feel sympathy for the stranger he was about to kill, but he didn’t. If that fellow’s friends had done their jobs, they wouldn’t have a Horse Stealer in the shrubbery thirty feet from the wall. Besides, if the i

The cloud swept towards the moon, and Bahzell waited with the motionless patience he’d learned the hard way. Then the moonlight dimmed, and the hradani was on the move. He didn’t wait for the light to go completely; he moved while it was still dimming and the guard’s eyes would be adjusting to the change, and for all his size and bulk, he made no more sound than the wind.

The hapless guardsman had no warning at all. One instant all was still, as cold and boring as it had been all night; in the next, a hand of iron clamped over his mouth and wrenched his head back as if he were a child. He had one instant to see the glitter of brown eyes, the loom of half-flattened, foxlike ears, and then a dagger drove up under his chin and into his brain.

Bahzell lowered the corpse to the ground and crouched above it, ears cocked for any sound, then straightened and peered through the lattice. It had two leaves, meeting in the middle, and he detected no sign of life in the ill-lit courtyard beyond. So far, so good, but the iron gate bars were leprous with rust, and his hand was cautious as he reached for the latch handle.

He turned it gently, and hissed a curse at pinch-pe

Hinges creaked less shrilly than the latch as he eased the gate open, and he pulled the dead guard to his feet. He leaned the body back in the angle of the wall and propped it there. It didn’t look much like an alert sentry to him-then again, the fellow hadn’t been an alert sentry, so perhaps no one would notice a change if they glanced his way.

The Horse Stealer shrugged and slipped through the opening. He drew the gate gently closed behind him, gritting his teeth once more as hinges squeaked, but he didn’t latch it. The latch mechanism was too damned noisy for that; besides, he might be in a hurry when he came back this way.

Few windows were lit, and most of those that were glowed only dimly. Either the baron’s servants were expected to get along with poor illumination, or else most of them had gone to bed, leaving only night lights behind them. Bahzell reminded himself to assume it was the former-which, given the state of the grounds, seemed likely, anyway-and turned to the one wing whose many-paned windows gleamed brightly. He worked his way silently along the wall towards it, hugging the shadows, and his keen ears were cocked for any noise while his eyes swept back and forth.

He reached the well-lit wing and allowed himself a sigh of relief, but the truly hard part was just begi

The ground-floor windows were little more than slits, precisely to make life difficult for intruders, but the second-floor windows were wider. Of course, they were also closed, and half of them were shuttered as well, but Bahzell picked a glass-paned door that was neither lit nor shuttered. It gave onto a small balcony, and he wondered fleetingly how comforting a prayer might have been just now for a man with any use for gods as he sheathed his dagger and jumped up to catch a balustrade that would have been beyond the reach of any human.

He worked his hands up the carved stone uprights and grunted as he got a knee over the balcony’s lip and rolled over the railing. It was awkward in mail, especially with his sword on his back, and he made far more noise than he liked, but no one raised a shout of alarm.

He flattened against the wall beside the door, waiting a moment to be sure no one had seen him, then tried the latch. It was locked, of course, and the crack between it and its frame was too narrow to get his dagger through. He muttered a quiet malediction, tugged off his gloves, and dug his dagger point into the soft lead that sealed the pane beside the latch in place.

It was nerve-wracking work, yet he made himself work slowly. His hands were cold, but his fingers needed their ungloved nimbleness, and he bared his teeth as the first diamond-shaped pane fell into his palm. He laid it aside and went back to work, and an adjoining pane came away quickly. With both of them out and the supporting lattice between them cut, he could reach through to grip the next pane from both sides, and within five minutes he had a gap large enough to get his entire forearm through.

He examined the latch by touch and found the deadbolt. The door popped obediently open, and he slipped inside and drew it shut once more.

The smell of leather and ink told him he was in a library. Light gleamed under a door across from him, and he picked his careful way towards it, skirting the half-seen tables and chairs which furnished the room.

The door was unlocked. He eased it open a tiny crack and peered out on a hallway as richly furnished as the outer keep was poorly maintained. No one was visible in the only direction he could see, but there was a mirror on the facing wall, and he froze instantly, holding the door exactly where it was.

The guardsman in the hall was unarmored, but he wore a broadsword at his side as he stood with his back to a closed door at the end of the passage, and he looked far more alert than the gate guard had been.

The Horse Stealer mouthed another silent curse, then paused. A guard implied something-or someone-to guard. It was remotely possible Zarantha was behind that door; if she wasn’t, then the sentry was likely there to protect the baron’s own privacy, and-

His thoughts chopped off, and his lips drew back in a snarl as a high, shrill scream echoed through the thick door. His muscles twitched, but he made himself stand a moment longer. If that was the baron, and if the baron was a wizard, there was but one way to face him. The thought sickened Bahzell, yet it was the only way-he’d known that before ever setting out tonight.

He drew a deep breath, stepped back from the door, closed his eyes, and reached deliberately deep within himself.

He felt the bright, instant flare, the shock of a barrier going down, a door opening . . . a monster rousing. Jaw muscles lumped and sweat dotted his forehead, but he fought the monster. He’d never attempted anything quite like this, for he’d been afraid to. The Rage was too potent. He dared not free it often, lest it grow too terrible to control, and that had always precluded experiments. Yet tonight he needed it, and he let it wake but slowly, rationing out the chain of his will link by single link, strangling the need to roar his challenge as the fierce exultation swept through him.