Yan Tovis turned to one of her sergeants. ‘Are there fresh horses in the stables?’

A nod. ‘Four, Atri-Preda.’

The first old woman pushed at the other at that and said, ‘Tolya! Be well I did!’

Yan Tovis tilted her head back in an effort to loosen the muscles of her neck. She closed her eyes for a moment, then sighed. ‘Saddle them up, Sergeant. Pick me three of the least exhausted riders. I am off to find our missing Master at Arms.’

‘Sir.’ The man saluted and departed.

Turning back to the old women, the Atri-Preda asked, ‘Where is the nearest detachment of Tiste Edur?’

A half-dozen heartbeats of non-verbal communication between the two hags, then the first one nodded and said, ‘Rennis, ma’am. An’ they be well not once visited neither.’

‘Be glad they haven’t,’ Twilight said. ‘They would have separated Boaral’s head from his shoulders.’

The second woman snorted. ‘Not so’s he’d notice-’

‘Shush!’ scolded the first one. Then, to Twilight, ‘Ma’am, Dresh Boaral, he lost mostly alia his kin when the Edur come down. Lost his wife, too, in Noose Bog, what, now be well three years-’

The other hag spat onto the floor they had just cleaned. ‘Lost? Be well strangled and dumped, Pully, by his master himself! So now he drowns on his own drinkin’! But oh she was fire wasn’t she-no time for mewlin’ husbands only he likes his mewlin’ and be well likes it enough to murder his own wife!’

Twilight said to the sergeant who had remained, ‘We will stay for a few days. I want the Dresh here under house arrest. Send a rider to Rennis to request adjudication by the Tiste Edur. The investigation will involve some sorcery, specifically speaking with the dead.’

The sergeant saluted and left.

‘Best be well not speak wi’ the mistress, ma’am.’

Twilight frowned at the woman. ‘Why not?’

‘Liable she is t’start talkin’ and ne’er stop. Master drunk an’ she’s fire, all fire-she’s a might claw his eyes out, be well an’ that.’

‘Are you two witches?’

More silent communication between the two hags, then the first one edged one knobby, hairy foot forward and care-fully wiped at the gobbet of spit on the pavestones. The toes, Twilight saw, were taloned.

‘You are Shake? Shoulderwomen of the Old Ways?’

Wrinkled brows rose, then the one named Pully curtsied again. ‘Local born you be well as we’d known, aye. It’s there, ma’am, you’re a child of the shore an’ ain’t you gone far, but not so far as to f’get. Mistress ne’er liked us much.’

‘So who strangled her and dumped her corpse in Noose Bog, Pully?’

The other seemed to choke, then she said, ‘Dresh give ‘is orders plain as web on a trail, didn’t he, Pully? Give ‘is orders an’ wi’ us we be well here since the Keep’s first Mack stone was laid. Loyal, aye. Boaral blood was Letherii blood, the first t’these lands, the first masters a’all. Dresh the First give us ‘is blood in full knowing, t’blacken the Black Stone.’

‘The first Dresh here found you and forced your blessing?’

A cackle from the second woman. ‘What he be well think were blessing!’

Twilight looked away, then stepped to one side and leaned a shoulder against the grimy wall. She was too tired for this. Boaral line cursed by Shake witches-who remained, alive and watchful, through generation after generation. She closed her eyes. ‘Pully, how many wives have you two murdered?’

‘None wi’out Dresh’s command, ma’am.’

‘But your curse drives them mad, every one of them. Don’t make me ask the question again.’

‘Ma’am, be well twenty and one. Once their bearin’ days are done. Mostly.’

‘And you have been working hard at keeping the Tiste Edur away.’

‘No business a theirs, ma’am.’

Nor mine. Yet… not entirely true, is it? ‘End the curse, Pully. You’ve done enough.’

‘Boaral killed more Shake than any other Dresh, ma’am. You know that.’

‘End it,’ Twilight said, opening her eyes and facing the two women, ‘or your heads will be in sacks and buried deep in Noose Bog before this night is out.’

Pully and her companion grinned at each other.

‘I am of the shore,’ Yan Tovis said in a hard voice. ‘My Shake name is Twilight.’

The hags suddenly backed away, then sank down onto their knees, heads bowed.

‘End the curse,’ Twilight said again. ‘Will you defy princess of the Last Blood?’

‘Princess no longer,’ Pully said to the floor.

Yan Tovis felt the blood drain from her face-if not for the wall she leaned against she would have staggered.

‘Your mother died be well a year past,’ Pully said in a soft, sad voice.

The other witch added, ‘Crossin’ from the Isle, the boat overturning. They say it was some demon o’ the deep, pushed too close by dark magic out at sea-the same magic, my Queen, as could be well squirted Master at Arms west as they say. A demon, up unner the boat, an’ all drowned. Whisperin’ from the waters, my Queen, dark and well nigh black.’

Yan Tovis drew a deep breath. To be Shake was to know grief. Her mother was dead, now a face emptied of life. Well, she had not seen the woman in over a decade, had she? So, why this pain? Because there is something else. ‘What is the name of the Master at Arms, Pully?’

‘Yedan Derryg, Highness. The Watch.’

The half-brother I have never met. The one who ran-from his blood, from everything. Ran nearly as far as I did. And yet, was that old tale even true? The Watch was here, after all, a mere bell’s ride from the shore. She understood now why he had ridden out on this night. Something else, and this is it.

Yan Tovis drew her cloak about herself, began pulling on her gauntlets. ‘Feed well my soldiers. I will return with Derryg by dawn.’ As she turned to the door she paused. The madness afflicting the Dresh, Pully.’

Behind her the witch replied, ‘Be well too late for him, Highness. But we will scour the Black Stone this night. Before the Edur arrive.’

Oh, yes, I sent for them, didn’t I? ‘I imagine,’ she said, her gaze fixed on the door, ‘the summary execution of Dresh Boaral will be something of a mercy for the poor man.’

You mean to do it before the Edur come here as they say, Highness?’

Yes, Pully. He will die, I suppose, trying to flee arrest.’ After a moment, she asked, ‘Pully, how many shoulder-women are left?’

‘More than two hundred, Highness.’

‘I see.’

‘My Queen,’ ventured the other, ‘word will be sent out, cob to web as they say, before the sun’s rise. You have been j chosen a betrothed.’

‘I have, have I? Who?’

‘Shake Brullyg, of the Isle.’

‘And does my betrothed remain on Second Maiden Fort?’

‘We think so, Highness,’ Pully replied.

At that she turned round. ‘You don’t know?’

‘The web’s been snapped, Highness. Almost a month now. Ice an’ dark and whisperings, we cannot reach across the waves. The shore is blind to the sea, Highness.’

The shore is blind to the sea. ‘Has such a thing ever occurred before?’

Both witches shook their heads.

Twilight swung about and hastened outside. Her riders awaited her, already mounted, silent with fatigue. She strode to the horse bearing her saddle-a chestnut gelding, the fittest of the lot, she could see in the torchlight-and pulled herself onto its broad back.

‘Atri-Preda?’

‘To the coast,’ she said, gathering the reins. ‘At the canter.’

‘What’s wrong with them?’

The Hound Master’s face was ravaged with distress, tears streaming down his wind-burned cheeks and glistening like sweat in his beard. ‘They’ve been poisoned, Atri-Preda! Poisoned meat, left on the ground-I’m going to lose them all!’

Bivatt cursed under her breath, then said, ‘Then we shall have to do without.’

‘But the Edur mages-’

‘If our own cannot treat them, Bellict, then neither can the warlocks-the Edur tribes do not breed dogs for war, do they? I am sorry. Leave me now.’