A hooded stranger intercepted Lian’s charge, knocking him to the ground.

Aralt cursed the fog and the mist from the falls that had masked the second intruder’s presence until the last moment. The newcomer narrowly avoided an arrow as he seized the heartwood staff from the boy’s hands, inexplicably putting himself between the boy and the advancing j’thirrin. Lian scuttled backward on wet flagstone flecked with broken glass, averting his gaze when the contents of a flask that stank of everlight sprayed into the assassin’s face. The Soulless reeled, clawing at his face as the foul-smelling liquid ran into his eyes. Aralt yanked Lian to his feet, shielding him when the shadow assassin burst into flame. Lian clamped his hands over his ears. Aralt turned his face away. The stench of burning flesh made them all cringe.

“I…still…see…you!”

Flailing, the assassin ran screaming into the open space of the plaza. Telta put two arrows through his neck before he toppled into the plunge pool to be swept away. Ignoring the searing pain in his arm, Aralt pushed Lian in Scanlin’s direction and lunged for the newcomer, fully intending to send him reeling over the edge as well.

“Sweet Creator, no!” Lian grabbed his sword arm, face pale with fear, black eyes lit with more than the early morning light. “Don’t hurt him. He’s a friend.”

A friend? Aralt spun the intruder around as the first ribbon of sunrise shot through the mist; grey hooded eyes widened at the touch of the sword at his throat. Aralt flicked back the Shirahnyn’s cowl.

“You,” he breathed. “I should have known.”

Two of his soldiers closed in to disarm the man, starting with the bloodwood staff. Though he followed every motion with his eyes, the Shirahnyn let the vial of liquid fire fall from his fist and made no move to retrieve his basket-hilted sword. Starbeads glinted along a turquoise leather scabbard, and ragged multicolored plumes festooned the sword’s intricately fashioned avian hilt. No common sword. No common swordsman.

“I should have let you die in Sylvan.”

Scanlin was beside him. “Your arm…”

“It’s fine.” It wasn’t. It hurt like the fires of the nether place, but he wasn’t about to disclose that information in front of everyone—particularly not in front of the Shirahnyn. “Take Lian back inside while I deal with this.”

“Aralt, please. It isn’t what you think.”

He shook the boy away. “What I think is that we were just attacked by a shadow assassin.”

“We were. Can I look at your—”

Aralt cocked an eyebrow in mute response.

“What? You thought Tycho was one of them? Don’t be ridiculous; he isn’t j’thirrin. Let me see your eyes,” Lian insisted, pulling hard on Aralt’s shirt front to make him look down. A long breath escaped the boy’s lips, his eyes fluttering closed. “Neither are you.”

“And you can tell just by looking in my eyes?”

“Well, I…well…”

“I’m not sure I want to take the chance with this one,” he said, leveling his sword again. The Shirahnyn remained calm in the grips of his captors. And silent.

Lian took possession of his staff and banged it on the stone. “No! Scanlin? Scanlin, tell him.”

“Tell me what?”

Scanlin drew a slow breath as he sheathed his sword. “’Tisn’t in his blood. Or wasn’t in Sylvan.”

“You tested his blood?” he asked, eyes forward, meeting the Shirahnyn’s placid gaze.

“When all the talk o’ shadow assassins began, aye. Perryn sent for the tools needed. I couldnae keep one o’ the Soulless in Sylvan. Especially after Lian arrived.”

“You knew he was there?” Aralt accused them both with his words.

“N-no,” Lian stammered. “Grey didn’t know anything, and I didn’t know until the Feast of Light. I’m not lying. Stop looking at me like I’m lying. If I’d known it was Tycho, I wouldn’t have let you keep him in a cage!”

A cage? He clenched his jaw. He had done no such thing and resented the insinuation. Out of common decency, they hadn’t even kept the Shirahnyn in a cell below street level. If they had, they might have gleaned more information.

Lian offloaded his staff to Telta as he clasped the stranger’s hands before pulling him into a fierce embrace. “I kept watch until the Feast of Light, like we agreed, but I was afraid I’d lost you again.”

“As did I, arjha. Be thankful for the second harvest.”

Enough! Aralt dragged Lian back by the shirt collar, his brother’s blade still trained on the interloper. He hadn’t had an excuse to kill the Shirahnyn before; now his need for information outweighed the need for messy revenge bubbling up inside him. He pinned the stranger with his gaze. Watched him flinch. Good. “How many of you are there?”

Tycho lifted his chin. Aralt judged him younger than himself, younger than Kynlan would have been, had he lived. But the Shirahnyn's pale eyes were those of a man who had seen too much. “I am alone, syr Tremayne. I swear it.” He looked at Lian. "By the God of the Kynseis, I swear it.”

He considered telling this unwelcome interloper that the last man who had sworn an oath like that had perished in an airship crash. “How many of them then? How many j’thirrin?”

“I saw but the one.”

“I have uncounted missing and dead and you’re telling me that was the work of a single man?”

“No,” Tycho said slowly, even softer than before. So near the falls, Aralt had to strain to hear the answer. “It is the work of something unholy. And I am sorry, but they are all dead. The poison stops the heart. Or worse.”

The implication was that he might be next.

“Grey, take Lian inside. See to our wounded, then check on the other half of the company.”

“You will not find them alive.”

“You already know this?” When no further explanation was forthcoming, he motioned two of his remaining squad forward, pausing to measure Tycho’s unflinching expression. “Escort our guest. He’ll feel more like talking inside.”

All semblance of self-control disappeared as Tycho struggled to free himself.

Aralt lowered his sword and closed the distance between them, smiling grimly down at the younger man. “Is something wrong? I thought you might like the chance to pray, seeing as you’re swearing oaths by Him.”

“You can’t do that to him!” Lian stomped on Scanlin’s feet in an attempt to free himself. “You can’t drag him underground—or under the mountain. It goes against everything they believe. It would be like asking Scanlin to kiss a blood-stained idol of Akahan.”

Aralt didn’t see that it was but having Lian and the Shirahnyn both writhing like wild colts was not improving his mood.

“Tycho didn’t kill any of your people. He wouldn’t. I know he wouldn’t. And he wasn’t trying to hurt me. He was trying to keep me from doing something stupid.” Lian glanced up at Scanlin. “Because I wasn’t listening to wisdom.” Neither are you.

This is not the time!

This is precisely the time. Please.

He quelled his rapidly beating heart and, without looking at Scanlin, gave a curt nod. “Put him behind the falls. Telta? Tie him up Take all his weapons. Check everywhere.”

When they reached the fallen soldier the j’thirrin’s throwing star had struck earlier, Lian sank to his knees, his rapid breath betraying the onset of tears.

“Fergus…no. I didn’t realize… I went to his house before we left Sylvan. His wife trains the hunting cats. They have children.”

“Four,” Aralt said. Two boys, two girls. A fifth would never know their father.

Lian looked up at him. “How many more died?” The gravity of the situation had suddenly come fully into focus. Tycho appeared equally shaken.

“That bothers you?” he asked. “You burned your own alive.”

Tycho’s face pinched in anger. “You know nothing.”

“Oh, I think I do.” Aralt stepped aside that two of the others could lift their fallen comrade and carry him into the antechamber of the kirke. Lian shuffled after them, head bowed, shoulders slumped. Scanlin slid an arm across the boy’s shoulders. Whatever passed between them was lost to whispers. He turned back to the Shirahnyn. “You don’t like seeing Lian upset, is that it? He knew every one of my people by name and they were willing to die for him. He’ll carry that with him the rest of his life. Tell me what I need to know and then maybe you can share that burden.”

“I saw but one, but it is those that pass unseen that are of the greatest danger,” Tycho replied in a calm tenor voice, but it was apparent that the Shirahnyn was clearly paying more attention to Lian than the question. The lad’s emotional breakdown seemed to weigh heavily on him. “When one of the Soulless falls, another will arise in time. Examine your dead—and your injured. If any are missing, I do not know their fates.”

He nodded stiffly as he walked out onto the terrace toward the esri byre to undertake the unenviable task of counting the dead.