The instant he released something changed on the grounds. A man now stood where Lurin couldn't recall ever having seen anyone walk. The man's hand snapped up then held something to his pale face. While they gaped, dumbfounded, he walked up to the wall near them.

Amagin was already sobbing. Shurll stared, immobile. Lurin flinched, tensed to run but unable. The man's clothes hung open in sliced folds. Dark wetness gleamed beneath down his torso and arms. Scars gleamed also at his neck like lines of pearl. He held up Lurin's stone between thumb and forefinger, leaned over the wall.

‘Run.’

Blubbering, Amagin ran. Lurin threw himself at Shurll. She had not moved, perhaps not even blinked. He wrapped his arms around her, buried his face in her chest, too terrified to look. They were dead. It was a spirit come to drag them away to the Abyss. He waited for that bony touch that was Hood's beckon.

But after a time, heart in a frenzy, nothing happened. Shurll made quiet soothing sounds while her hands brushed his shoulders.

‘Welcome, Topper!’ Lurin heard the spirit call, his voice distant.

He dared a glance: the spirit, or man, had moved away and now faced the low front wall.

‘Don't be a fool, Cowl,’ another voice answered.

Lurin turned completely, pressed his back to Shurll, glanced up to her; she watched, avid, her eyes huge.

Cowl, the one within the grounds of the Deadhouse, gestured an invitation to the other with his blades. ‘Come in – let us finish our debate here. Who will have the last word, do you think?’

The other, Topper, stepped into view: long tangled white hair, dark-faced, clothes hanging rags. But his eyes! Angular and bright like lamps. He shrugged. ‘By my hand or the House's… is of no matter to me.’

Cowl spread his arms wide. ‘I choose my own fate, Topper. I remain undefeated. You lack the will to challenge me? So be it – the defeat is yours.’

‘Dancer took you.’

Cowl's eyes rolled as he made a show of considering. He pointed a blade to his neck. ‘I call this a draw.’

‘You are mistaking desperation for defiance. You only fool yourself.’

‘And you are a coward.’

Topper motioned to the grounds. ‘Time is short. Flee while you can.’

Lurin glanced across the yard and jerked, terrified. The tree branches were moving. Never had he seen those black limbs shiver or bend, even in the strongest of storms. Steam as of freshly turned earth climbed from the heaps that littered the grounds. The heavy mist gathered to carpet the yard.

Cold like a winter morning bit at Lurin. He shivered uncontrollably.

‘Fool!’ Topper called. ‘It will have you! Flee, now!’

Cowl stumbled as if something had yanked upon him. But his smile was fixed, his teeth bright and sharp. ‘I choose defiance!’ he yelled, wild fever in his voice.

‘You choose despair.’

Falling, the one called Cowl went on one knee. He laughed, low at first, but climbing in pitch and volume until it rang so loud it drowned out a comment from Topper. And then Lurin's skin crawled in horror as the one named Cowl appeared to sink – yes, sink straight down into the steaming earth as if pulled. ‘Come join me!’ he shouted, laughing mockingly.

Topper lunged forward to grip the top of the stone wall. ‘Fool! You are Avowed! You will never die!’ The man sounded genuinely horrified.

Cowl's answer to that was to burst forth with even greater fevered, ardent laughter – exulting, darkly triumphant – the mirth of a man gone truly mad. Lurin buried his face once more in Shurll's chest. Eventually, the peals choked off, fell to silence. When Lurin looked back the grounds were empty.

His gaze caught the one called Topper staring directly at them. Lurin's breath caught and he froze. The eyes burned in the night as he'd heard some jewels do. Then the man bowed, an arm across his stomach, the other held out. Stepping back he disappeared into darkness.

Eventually, Lurin found he could breathe again. He peered up at Shurll, whispered: ‘What happened?’

And she, looking off into the night, her gaze so distant, stroking his head, murmured repeatedly, ‘Nothing. It's all right. Nothing happened. It was nothing.’

In the morning Talia demanded he recite it all again – from the mad ride through the Abyss, to the battle, and Laseen's funeral cortege to Cawn – even the dull journey by coastal merchantman to Unta.

‘And the Imperial Funeral?’ she asked.

Rillish laughed, sitting up. ‘Gods no. We aren't invited to that.’

‘But you're a member of the official Wickan delegation to the Throne!’

Rillish leaned back, tucked a rolled blanket behind his back. ‘Believe me – I am no more welcome in Unta than the Wickans themselves. We are there on sufferance only.’

‘And this Mallick creature is to really succeed Laseen?’

‘By unanimous acclaim of the Assembly and all regional governors, Fists and all.’

She shook her head, her brows crimping. ‘And I've never even heard of the man.’

‘You should get out more, sergeant.’

She made a face. He pushed the sheets off her belly, eased his head on to her stomach. ‘Huh. Funny… You don't look pregnant.’

‘Not yet, you fool! Gods, you men.’

‘Humph… If you say so.’ He gently pressed a hand there on her belly. Son or daughter – you might grow up in a world where all this is hut an ugly memory. And perhaps those decades from now if I am still around I will be able to show you all that might be yours by right of your name. And perhaps I will be able to give you more than my love. Though I know that even that is precious enough. And more than some.

Proprietor, merchant, innkeeper and ex-Imperial sailor, Aron Hul knew a dangerous man when he saw one and this newcomer sent all his nerves jangling the moment he dismounted from his well-fed and well-shod horse that bore new, well-oiled tack. Aron noted the man's soft leather boots, the studded leather wrappings at his legs, his fitted armour of boiled cuirass, vambraces, the twin ivory-handled sabres worn high under his arms, and his rich travelling cloak. But what fixed his attention was the extraordinary scar running across the man's face from left temple, notching the bridge of his flattened nose, to mar his right cheek. The man stood for a time in front of his trading establishment, stared south to the Idryn flowing so brown and wide on its way to the Bay of Cawn, and the Nap Sea. Then he turned and entered the trading post.

Aron quickly set out his most expensive wine and spirits. The man sat at one of his two tables. ‘Yes, sir?’ Aron asked from behind his counter.

‘A drink.’

‘I have Talian winter wine, spirits of juniper berry from Bloor.’

‘The Talian.’

‘Excellent, sir.’ He brought out a glass and the bottle. The man pressed a gold Imperial to the gouged slats of the table. Aron almost tipped the bottle. An Imperial Sun – didn't see too many of those these days. ‘You don't have anything smaller, do you, sir? We're just a small river station, you know.’

The man leaned back, smiled in a way that Aron knew was meant to reassure him. ‘I know. It's yours for the bottle and a little information.’

Aron allowed his brows to rise as if in dubious surprise. ‘Really, sir? Information, you say? Out here? What could we possibly know out here?’

He gestured vaguely to the river. ‘Oh, travel. Shipments and cargo. People coming and going. That sort of thing.’

Aron's nerves now reached a screaming pitch; he kept his good-natured smile. ‘Really, sir? Such as?’

‘I'm looking for someone who may have come through here about a month ago. During the troubles. A young woman. She would have been travelling alone. You'd remember her if you saw her, if you know what I mean,’ and he winked.