Paludan had a reputation for squeezing a ducat till the Patriarch thereon squealed like a eunuch undergoing his signature procedure.

Father Obilade confessed, "I can't go with that. I wasn't given the power. Your fee is ... I suppose excessive isn't the right word. You pay the most when you buy the best. Meet me here same time, night after tomorrow night. I'll want Caniglia that you're coming."

"We'll be here," s.h.a.got promised cheerfully. "I'm looking forward to taking your money." And he was. He had found a Deve who would invest it at an excellent rate of return. He had no idea what he would do with his wealth, but that did not concern him. He was enjoying life as much as he ever had.

He did not sit around. He sent Svavar out to dog Rodrigo.

Father Obilade wanted the attack to take place in the Madhur Plaza, as near Basbanes's Fountain as could be managed. In response to questions about why, the priest shrugged and said the location had personal meaning for Paludan.

s.h.a.got examined the plaza personally, and had Svavar do so repeatedly, by day and by night. The site seemed ideal for what the priest wanted done. There were numerous excellent lurking places where heroic rescuers could wait to charge cut and, to their eternal sorrow, be just moments too late to save Rodrigo Cologni.

Rodrigo Cologni was an a.s.sa.s.sination begging to happen. He was predictable in the extreme. He left the Cologni compound at the same time every time. And he followed the same route to the same wh.o.r.ehouses.

FATHER OBILADE YIELDED TO s.h.a.gOT'S FINANCIAL DEMANDS. He turned over four hundred of the six hundred ducats two days before Rodrigo's scheduled early elevation to Heaven. s.h.a.got told the priest, "We'll follow your script if we can, but we'll change s.h.i.t around if anything comes up." The old priest scowled. "Just get it done."

SVAVAR AND s.h.a.gOT MOVED INTO THE MADHUR PLAZA hours ahead of time. They brought all their trophies and fetishes. Even Svavar felt optimistic. "Going to be some real surprised a.s.sholes, Grim. Going to be some real surprised a.s.sholes."

s.h.a.got chuckled. "Yeah. Going to be some good laughs on Father Obilade and Paludan f.u.c.king Bruglioni and his b.u.t.t boy, Gervase. So. Let's fade into the f.u.c.king background and let the drama begin."

They did not stand out. Brothe drew countless pilgrims from everywhere. Basbanes's Fountain was a sight the foreigners all wanted to see. It had a history almost as long as that of the Old Empire itself.

Rodrigo Cologni pa.s.sed through the plaza, outward bound, escorted only by his bodyguards. s.h.a.got and Svavar felt even more confident.

A city watchman reminded them, "No sleeping in the plaza, gents."

"Not to worry," s.h.a.got replied in credible Firaldian. "We've got a place to stay. We work for Paludan Bruglioni." He grinned and chuckled. The sergeant would remember that later.

Svavar laughed softly, too. He was having a good time. For the first time since they had come out of the Great Sky Fortress, he was happy to be alive, partly because he thought they were putting one over on the G.o.ds themselves.

"Hey," s.h.a.got said, "we need to get out of sight. The Bruglioni gang should rum up pretty soon."

They slipped into the deep shadows between two buildings. Svavar asked, "You think the Bruglioni guys will do the job if we just sit on our hands?"

Treachery was in the works. s.h.a.got's dreams had confirmed that. But he had dreamed much more. Some of which he had not yet unraveled. What Svavar suggested fit.

"Excellent thinking, little brother. I don't know what they'd do. How about we give them the opportunity? We can always tag Rodrigo somewhere else, later."

The wait seemed both long and short. One of those things relative to the moment. Svavar had trouble controlling the giggles. That was when time fled its swiftest. Time dragged when he grew somber and thought about everything that could go wrong.

"Quiet," Svavar whispered. "Here's the boss's boys."

Six Firaldians stole past, visible briefly in the light of a rising sliver of moon. They went into hiding scarcely a dozen yards from where s.h.a.got and Svavar had holed up.

"Did you recognize any of them?" s.h.a.got asked in a whisper that could not be heard five feet away.

"This isn't going to be a happy night for the Bruglioni. I saw Gildeo and Acato Bruglioni for sure. One of the others looked like Saldi Serena." That put both sons and a nephew of Paludan Bruglioni among the condemned.

In the middle of the plaza the complex menagerie of Basbanes's Fountain kept spitting and peeing and pouring. The falling waters generated a soporific noise that s.h.a.got found hard to fight.

The moon moved on to where its light would no longer betray someone who snaked out of the thin gap where s.h.a.got and Svavar waited. s.h.a.got murmured, "Hang on. I'm going to see if I can hear anything." Carrying the head from the Haunted Hills. s.h.a.got stole toward where his would-be a.s.sa.s.sins waited. Soon he lay on his stomach inches from the mouth of the gap where the Bruglioni boys had gone to ground.

A heated argument was underway. Somebody wanted to know why the idiot foreigners had not shown. Someone told that one to shut the f.u.c.k up. It was not time, yet. Fifteen minutes from now, then they could start worrying.

One of the lesser Bruglioni insisted, "I could go a long way, for a long time, on four hundred ducats."

"Your wh.o.r.es would pick your bones within a week."

s.h.a.got could be as patient as stone when he knew there was a point. He remained frozen, listening, as minutes, then tens of minutes slipped by. He listened as the Bruglioni gang grew ever more uneasy.

Their cat's-paws were supposed to have arrived by now. They had not shown. Had Paludan flung four hundred ducats into a great big black sack of nothing?

Soon it was way past time for s.h.a.got and Svavar to be out there hanging around the fountain, a pair of drunken foreigners who looked threatening to no one but themselves. Most of the foreigners infesting the city were too stupid to tie their own bootlaces.

s.h.a.got crept backward. It would not be long before Rodrigo appeared. Already, it seemed, the Cologni was at the nether edge of the range of his behavior. He was late.

Drunken singing approached.

Rodrigo. And his bodyguards. And some drunks that the Cologni had acc.u.mulated during the evening.

This was something that Svavar had not seen before. It was out of character. "I definitely don't think we should do it now, Grim. I don't like the look of this."

Rodrigo's drinking buddies did not seem interested in getting on out of the Madhur Plaza. They stopped at Basbanes's Fountain and stalled around until Rodrigo's bodyguards insisted that Rodrigo get moving.

s.h.a.got muttered, "I think I'll just go pound on that old priest till his b.a.l.l.s fall off."

Svavar touched his arm. "There's some excitement starting."

The Bruglioni crew surrendered to the romance of their own stupidity. They rushed the party in the plaza.

As s.h.a.got intuited, the drunken new friends were not drunk at all. But their level of alertness had dropped because no attack had come when expected at the fountain. On the other hand, Rodrigo's guards were sharply alert because of the pretend drunks' obvious stalls.

When the Bruglioni thugs rushed out, the Cologni bodyguards shoved knives into the backs of the pretend drunks.

The rush arrived. Blades flashed. Several men went down, one a Cologni bodyguard.

Then came a surprise second rush consisting of another half-dozen men who swooped in from the far side of the square. A great clangor ensued.

Both Gildeo and Acato Bruglioni thought well of themselves as duelists. They had reputations to support their confidence.

Their confidence was misplaced.

"These guys are f.u.c.king professionals," s.h.a.got said. The new bunch were very good, though not good enough to avoid injuries of their own.

The speed and fury of the mess left the Bruglioni thugs and Rodrigo's bodyguards no chance to flee.

s.h.a.got nodded to himself as the winners collected their prize-Rodrigo Cologni-and then their wounded. Those included the backstabbed companion drunks, who were still alive but unlikely to remain that way if they did not get some skilled care soon. "Four of them are hurt bad. Two more have lesser wounds. As soon as they're out of sight, start tracking them. We need to find out who they are and where they're headed."

Svavar nodded unhappily. He was not feeling particularly bloodthirsty now. Which was, probably, why Grim was giving him this job while he stayed here.

Svavar knew Grim would have no trouble finding him later. Grim always knew where he was.

THE BRUGLIONI WERE TRYING TO PULL THEMSELVES Together, to limp back to the family fortress, when s.h.a.got strolled up. At this point, no one had yet been killed. But none of the Bruglioni or Cologni were in shape to fight on, either. s.h.a.got cut a couple of throats, just to get everybody focused. One of those belonged to Acato Bruglioni, who had not been badly hurt before. His skill as a duelist did him no good whatsoever.

s.h.a.got told the rest, "I want to know what this was all about." He asked pointed questions, with a sword's tip encouraging quick responses. He killed Saldi Serena when that young man tried to run.

s.h.a.got learned that the setup had been what he guessed. He and Svavar were supposed to take the frame for murdering a man expected to support the Patriarch in the Collegium.

"And who stopped you?"

"That's what doesn't make no sense," Gildeo Bruglioni confessed. "Those were the Patriarch's wolves. The Brotherhood of War. They wouldn't have no reason to kidnap Rodrigo Cologni. He's on their side. But those were the orders they had."

"Really?" s.h.a.got set his undermind to work on that, and the fact that the Brotherhood attackers had been entirely familiar with what was supposed to be happening. "This is what you're going to do. a.s.suming you want to survive. Finish off those Cologni. Then start hiking. Fast as you can."

Reluctantly, Gildeo Bruglioni turned on Rodrigo's wounded bodyguards, none of whom were able to resist.

Gildeo finished, turned, discovered that s.h.a.got had slain the rest of the Bruglioni crew. His mouth opened but nothing came out.

s.h.a.got killed Gildeo with a single stroke that took the man's head right off. Then s.h.a.got jogged off after his brother. How long would it be before people moved in to loot the dead? s.h.a.got wondered if he ought not to have done so himself.

How big a stink would come from tonight's evils? A huge one, surely, once the evidence was examined.

s.h.a.got grinned. This was fun.

Rodrigo Cologni's captors were headed toward the Teragi River and the Castella dollas Pontellas, which made sense if they were Brotherhood of War.

s.h.a.got stopped trying to overtake his brother. He ranged out in front of his quarry instead.

Those men moved slowly, avoiding notice.

s.h.a.got knew little about the Brotherhood of War. They were some kind of fighting priests, which sounded like a bad joke, considering the Chaldarean priests of his experience.

He ambushed the party from the side, after letting their point man pa.s.s the unnaturally impenetrable shadow in which he crouched. A shadow he did not recognize as unusual, only as handy.

Much happened around s.h.a.got that he failed to notice.

He attacked with an ancient bronze sword in one hand and the demon's head in the other. He thought he was jumping in amongst priests like Sylvie Obilade. It seemed he could see in the dark tonight, a talent of considerable utility.

He had no trouble dropping the first four surprised and previously injured kidnappers he encountered. Then the point man returned and s.h.a.got learned the truth about the fighting priests of the Brotherhood of War.

s.h.a.got's opponent was like none he had faced since those far days when he and Erief practiced against one another. Only the fact that the darkness was no handicap gave s.h.a.got any edge.

He kept dancing away, seizing fleeting chances to strike at the others. He had a chop at Rodrigo Cologni's hamstring when he noticed the old man trying to slip away.

Then s.h.a.got found himself with his back to a wall. The best of three attackers was directly in front of him. Another unwounded man came at him from his right while an injured but capable fighter occupied him on his left, trying to get past the scowling demon's head. All three were wary, cautious, professionals. s.h.a.got would have been calling for the Choosers of the Slain had he not seen his brother behind his attackers.

It was not easy, even so. s.h.a.got suffered several wounds, including one that would have been permanently crippling had he not been touched by the G.o.ds.

Svavar fared worse. The Old Ones had placed less of a blessing on him. He suffered slash wounds to both arms and stab wounds to his stomach and chest. They were serious but needed not be fatal if handled quickly.

s.h.a.got performed some hasty first aid, collected the dead- making sure everyone but his brother belonged to that select category-in a heap out of sight of pa.s.sersby, then settled next to Svavar, shoulder to shoulder, so that his own Great Sky Fortress blessing would rub off.

s.h.a.got the b.a.s.t.a.r.d might be a festering mold on human thing but he did love his little brother.

s.h.a.got soon felt sleep trying to take control. He could not let that happen. He had hours of must-do ahead of him, still.

"Little brother. Can you get up and stumble home now?"

Svavar grunted. He could do that. For s.h.a.got's sake. Thanks to s.h.a.got. But he could not do much more, if s.h.a.got wanted something else.

"Good. So do that, then."

Svavar murmured, "We moved our stuff to the backup place."

"That's right! I'm having trouble keeping my eyes open and my brain working. Go there and lay low. I'll wrap this s.h.i.t up."

"Grim..."

"Go on. Can you carry something? Can you take this totem stuff for me?"

"What're you going to do?"

"I'm going to go have a friendly chat with that a.s.shole priest. And make sure we get paid. Take this stuff and get moving." s.h.a.got hugged his brother before the younger man trudged away, carrying a thirty-pound load and a hundredweight of pain, picking his way through an unfamiliar city in the dark, his destination a flat he had visited only once before.

THE BRONZE SWORD WAS THE ONLY ITEM OF POWER THAT s.h.a.gOT RETAINED. It still cut dead flesh like slicing softened b.u.t.ter. He completed his first task in three minutes. Then he set about systematically relieving the dead of any coins they had been carrying when misfortune overtook them.

The Brothers were not rich men but amongst them they did carry as broad a variety of coin as could be imagined. s.h.a.got failed to recognize the origins of most.

No matter. Merchants would know them. And would weigh them, too. They trusted no one. And trusted those with big names and big reputations least of all.

Plundering done, s.h.a.got slung his sack of heads over one shoulder, then retraced his route to the Madhur Plaza.

The sack was actually a shirt taken off the largest of the dead Brothers.

s.h.a.got's wounds ached terribly. He worried about Asgrimmur, hoped the G.o.ds had sense enough to protect his brother. His mission was doomed without Asgrimmur's help.

He returned to the Mahdur Plaza. the ma.s.sacre in the square had been discovered. the bodies had been plundered. Now the righteous folk, with torches and lanterns, were out tut-tutting and recalling the good old days when there was order in Brothe and things like this just did not happen where the right sort of people had to look at it.

Such was human nature.

s.h.a.got headed for the Bruglioni citadel. He might be able to get there before the bad news arrived.

THE APPOINTED TRADESMEN'S GATE WAS AJAR AND UNGUARDED. s.h.a.gOT moved through the Bruglioni back court to Father Obilade's quarters. the priest's door opened instantly. Sylvie Obilade and another waited behind it. An unfamiliar voice demanded, "What the h.e.l.l took you so ...?" the speaker realized that s.h.a.got was alone. And that s.h.a.got was s.h.a.got. He gawked. Father Obilade gawked. the first man dropped a hand to the hilt of a dueling sword but did not draw. s.h.a.got offered him a warning shake of the head.

"You owe me some money, old man." s.h.a.got produced the head of Rodrigo Cologni.

"Sweet Aaron! Blessed Kelam!" Father Obilade made signs meant to ward off the evil eye and the Instrumentalities of the Night. "Did you have to ...?"

"You wouldn't just take my word, would you? You're Brothen. Easy there, fellow." the other man, pale as death now, had begun to ease away. "Stand still. I'm not happy tonight."